Voices of Old Technology - A Museum in the Making Perspectives on Our History Through Technology     CUNY and BITNET

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CUNY and Yale started BITNET ("Because It's Time" Network) in 1981. BITNET was a major precursor to the internet, and its founding pioneers were Ira H. Fuchs (CUNY) and Greydon Freeman (Yale University). According to the pages below, BITNET connected a large international group of institutions throughout the world to make possible "the electronic non-commercial exchange of information in support of research and education."

The following ad appeared in the November 11, 1984 New York Times, seeking Systems Programmers to fill openings at CUNY to support BITNET, an "international computer network of over 70 institutions of higher education and research linking over 300 computers."

Information about this exciting and creative part of CUNY's tech history can be found in the following links on the  Corporation for Research and Educational Networking (CREN) website:

• A summary of the early days of BITNET and its relationship with CREN:  http://www.cren.net/cren/cren-hist-fut.html
• More about BITNET: http://www.cren.net/cren/history.html

© copyright 2004 by Syd Lefkoe