First space shuttle flight (NASA/KSC archives)
BITNET ("Because It's Time NETwork") set up to link the mainframes at Yale and the City University of New York using an NJE (Network Job Entry) fixed link developed by IBM. NJE transmitted virtual 80-character punch-card packets, i.e. remote batch jobs, and 132-character-wide output from one machine to another. These virtual punch-card packets could be used by the appropriate programs to transmit batch job files and also to send electronic mail, as well as for simple interactive communication.
BITNET and its European counterpart, EARN, set up in 1982, formed the first network available to the broad academic user community and students. The ARPANET set up previously was only used by the few, rare laboratories that collaborated with the US Department of Defense. BITNET/EARN gave rise to a widespread e-mailing and discussion culture, and to support this software such as LISTSERV and the original prototype for IRC, RELAY, were developed.
The KERMIT file-transfer protocol was devised at Columbia University in New York. Local Area Networks and fixed Internet links were a speciality of laboratories, and the only shared means of data communication between computers was a slow serial connection and a modem. KERMIT made it possible to transfer files reliably and to establish data-terminal connections with almost any mainframe or microcomputer via a slow serial cable. KERMIT software is still available for most operating systems, and its way of transmitting data is also supported by many other modem-communications programs.
Hayes brings its Smartmodem 300 modem onto the market. This is intended for consumers to use with their microcomputers at a speed of 300 bit/s. It could be directly controlled from the computer using AT commands, which are still the industry standard for all dial-up modems, even today. Before this, the only modems available were expensive 'dumb' modems mainly rented to companies and installed at high prices from telecom companies. This required the acquisition of a special data-telephone connection, and dialling had to be done by hand or using a separate dialing device.
Example transmission of the first verses of the Kalevala by e-mail with a 300bit/s terminal connection using the KERMIT protocol.