[SIGCIS-Members] Email inventor: Help me set the record straight for the WP

dave.walden.family at gmail.com dave.walden.family at gmail.com
Tue Feb 28 14:51:48 PST 2012


Ray Tomlinson says, I believe, that the SDS 940 system had email before he did his demo with Tenex systems.  We had a 940 at BBN while Ray et al.were developing TENEX.  So that's another pre-networked email system, like CTSS but slightly later.  

it seems plausible that electronic email came to be called email in parallel with other things coming to be called e-something, e.g., e-business, I.e., first we talked about electronic mail and then people e'ed it.  I doubt some guy we never heard of was the source of this idiom.

Sent from my iPad

On Feb 28, 2012, at 2:32 PM, "McDonald, Christopher" <cmcdonald at ecfs.org> wrote:

> I agree with Marie that a simpler account would be better. Maybe
> 
> 1) CTSS / time-sharing systems
> 
> 2) ARPANET mail (the @ sign makes a nice anecdote)
> 
> 3) Commercial e-mail systems
> 
> 4) MIME or webmail 
> 
> I did a quick Google Books search for "email" or "e-mail" in the range 1960-80, and the first few pages of hits were positives - mis-dated or some kind of transcription error.  
> Inconclusive, but it suggests that neither term was in wide use before 1980.  
> 
> On the other hand, there are many hits on "electronic mail".
> 
> Chris
> 
> ________________________________________
> From: members-bounces at sigcis.org [members-bounces at sigcis.org] On Behalf Of Marie Hicks [mhicks1 at iit.edu]
> Sent: Tuesday, February 28, 2012 5:06 PM
> To: sigcis
> Subject: Re: [SIGCIS-Members] Email inventor: Help me set the record straight for the WP
> 
> Hi everyone,
> 
> Tom, that's great news. For what it's worth (and perhaps others here
> can chime in with their thoughts), I'd say that keeping the milestones
> to 4 would probably serve our side of the story better. Short and
> sweet points of historical information that support an easily
> graspable overall thesis will grab the casual reader.
> 
> I'd also like to resist the urge to go on a credential hunt--I think
> that quibbling with Ayyadurai's formal title at MIT will only detract
> from the points we'd like to see the public absorb.
> 
> If you'd like a second pair of eyes on the piece, I'd be happy to
> help. Indeed, maybe we, as a group, could offer a vetting of the piece
> if you're comfortable with making it into a collaborative SIGCIS
> endeavor over the list. Not only might it give the resulting piece
> more weight (to be signed by the main collective of historians on
> computing history) but it would also be a great way to further enhance
> the SIGCIS's public exposure.
> 
> Best,
> 
> Marie
> _______________
> Marie Hicks, Ph.D.
> Assistant Professor of History of Technology
> Lewis Department of the Humanities
> Illinois Institute of Technology
> Chicago, IL
> mhicks1 at iit.edu
> twitter: @histoftech
> www.mariehicks.net
> 
> 
> 
> On Tue, Feb 28, 2012 at 2:57 PM, Thomas Haigh <thaigh at computer.org> wrote:
>> Hello everyone,
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> Exciting news! If you read the response from the Washington Post ombudsman,
>> you may remember that it mentioned that the post “has invited Ayyadurai and
>> MIT to write a response to all the readers who wrote in to denounce the
>> story. That also is an excellent way to address the dispute, and enhance the
>> discussion. That will be appearing in coming days.”
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> I’ve just been asked by Emi Kolawole to prepare a piece disputing
>> Ayyadurai’s claim and laying out the actual historical consensus on the
>> invention of email. This will presumably run alongside his defense of his
>> position. Not sure about length or format yet.
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> So, who wants to help me get it right? To avoid spamming the list too much,
>> maybe reply to me directly unless you are confident your post will be of
>> general interest to the list.
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> Here are a few areas where I’d like to pin things down more and would
>> welcome assistance.
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> 1)      Does anyone have a usage of “email” or “e-mail” prior to 1980? I
>> haven’t looked seriously at this.
>> 
>> 2)      If I had space to mention 6 or 8 milestones in the development of
>> “modern email” what would they be? Say a sentence, a date, and maybe a
>> person or two for each. I’m thinking something like
>> 
>> a.       CTSS and other timesharing university systems,
>> 
>> b.      ARPANET network mail,
>> 
>> c.       Proprietary commercial email systems
>> 
>> d.      SMTP over TCP/IP,
>> 
>> e.      desktop clients,
>> 
>> f.        Notes
>> 
>> g.       MIME,
>> 
>> h.      webmail.
>> 
>> 3)      Does anyone know MIT job titles? Ayyadurai claims to be a “Faculty
>> Lecturer in Biological Engineering” at MIT and this has been widely reported
>> and even survived recent upheavals on his Wikipedia page. This seemed rather
>> tautological to me, as lecturer is not  usually a faculty position in the
>> USA. Googling “Faculty Lecturer” MIT gives no other individuals holding this
>> title.  One of his personal pages at MIT includes the title,
>> http://web.mit.edu/be/people/ayyadurai.shtml although he does not appear on
>> a list of faculty in Biological Engineering
>> http://web.mit.edu/be/people/alphabetical.shtml. He is listed on another
>> page http://web.mit.edu/be/people/index.shtml  as “Research/Teaching Staff”.
>> Doing a “people” search from the MIT web page, which pulls official
>> institutional data, gives him only as a Visiting Lecturer (a job title I do
>> understand) in Comparative Media Studies. So does the position of “Faculty
>> Lecturer” even exist at MIT?
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> Tom
>> 
>> 
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