Top 33 Quotes & Sayings by Jon Postel

Explore popular quotes and sayings by an American scientist Jon Postel.

Last updated on September 18, 2024.

Jonathan Bruce Postel was an American computer scientist who made many significant contributions to the development of the Internet, particularly with respect to standards. He is known principally for being the Editor of the Request for Comment (RFC) document series, for Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP), and for administering the Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA) until his death. In his lifetime he was referred to as the "god of the Internet" for his comprehensive influence; Postel himself noted that this "compliment" came with a barb, the suggestion that he should be replaced by a "professional," and responded with typical self-effacing matter-of-factness: "Of course, there isn’t any 'God of the Internet.' The Internet works because a lot of people cooperate to do things together."

American - Scientist | August 6, 1943 - October 16, 1998

Source: Wikipedia

In a chemistry class there was a guy sitting in front of me doing what looked like a jigsaw puzzle or some really weird kind of thing. He told me he was writing a computer program.

Jon Postel

Corporate documents, like football game plans, are not easily drafted in a stadium, with thousands of very interested fans participating, each with their own red pencil, trying to reach a consensus on every word.

Jon Postel

A name indicates what we seek. An address indicates where it is. A route indicates how we get there.

Jon Postel

Another aspect of our work is multimedia teleconferencing.

Jon Postel

The routers get involved in this and they know that on the path between this router and that router a certain percentage of the bandwidth is reserved to these things and a certain percentage of it is allowed on a first come first served basis.

Jon Postel

Being in the limelight has its minuses.

Jon Postel

The world wide web has really been quite spectacular and not something I would have predicted.

Jon Postel

That was clearly surprising, interesting - a very interesting milestone was when you can pick up a magazine and read an article about some sort of computer related thing and they mention the word internet without explaining it.

Jon Postel

One of the things that is not so good is that a decision was made long ago about the size of an IP address - 32 bits. At the time it was a number much larger than anyone could imagine ever having that many computers but it turned out to be to small.

Jon Postel

I think that audio and video over the internet in the sense of teleconferencing and telephone calls. Maybe we'll actually have picture phone through your work station.

Jon Postel

One way to get high speed to the home is over cable systems.

Jon Postel

The overriding rule, if you want to run a domain, is to be fair.

Jon Postel

But I do have a computer at home and a pretty good ISDN connection.

Jon Postel

All this stuff was done via FTP but the web has put a really nice user interface on it.

Jon Postel

Years ago when you'd go to a working group most of the people in the working group would be from universities. Now most of the people are from companies who are building internet products and care what the standards turn out to be.

Jon Postel

I think they called me the closest thing to a God of the Internet.

Jon Postel

If you're in charge of managing domain name space you should treat everybody who asks for a registration the same. Whatever that is - whether it's nice or ugly or whatever - just be fair, treat them all the same.

Jon Postel

Group discussion is very valuable; group drafting is less productive.

Jon Postel

There was one issue on which there seemed to be almost unanimity: the Internet should not be managed by any government, national or multinational.

Jon Postel

Everyone should have ten megabits and then the web will be a wonderful thing.

Jon Postel

But as soon as we got that higher speed access to the home there's going to be a tremendous crunch on the backbones for a much higher speed bandwidth. People really ought to be planning for that.

Jon Postel

I also administer the Internet Assigned Names Authority, which is the central coordinator for the Internet address space, domain names and Internet protocol conventions essential to the use and operation of the Internet.

Jon Postel

The Internet works because a lot of people cooperate to do things together.

Jon Postel

Be conservative in what you do, be liberal in what you accept from others.

Jon Postel

I got involved when I was a graduate student at UCLA when UCLA was the first site on the net.

Jon Postel

TCP works very hard to get the data delivered in order without errors and does retransmissions and recoveries and all that kind of stuff which is exactly what you want in a file transfer because so you don't want any errors in your file.

Jon Postel

Then I started graduate school at UCLA. I got a part time research assistant job as a programmer on a project involving the use of one computer to measure the performance of another computer.

Jon Postel

But as soon as we got that higher speed access to the home there?s going to be a tremendous crunch on the backbones for a much higher speed bandwidth. People really ought to be planning for that.

Jon Postel

I think they called me the closest thing to a God of the Internet. But at the end, that article wasn't very complimentary, because the author suggested that I wasn't doing a very good job, and that I ought to be replaced by a "professional." Of course, there isn't any "God of the Internet." The Internet works because a lot of people cooperate to do things together.

Jon Postel

TCP implementations will follow a general principle of robustness: be conservative in what you do, be liberal in what you accept from others.

Jon Postel

In general, an implementation must be conservative in its sending behavior, and liberal in its receiving behavior.

Jon Postel

Be conservative in its sending behavior, and liberal in its receiving behavior.

Jon Postel

Years ago when you?d go to a working group most of the people in the working group would be from universities. Now most of the people are from companies who are building internet products and care what the standards turn out to be.

Jon Postel

Top 33 Quotes & Sayings by Jon Postel

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