UC Irvine gets to ‘Cerf’ the Web with Internet pioneer

UCI CAMPUS — The first time Vint Cerf got to use a computer, it was a bit bigger than the portable one he uses now. In fact, he could sit inside of it.

The Internet pioneer, who spoke at UC Irvine on Wednesday morning, got an early taste of technology in 1958 when his father brought him to the Systems Development Corporation in Santa Monica. There, Cerf got to see a massive computer that the United States used to scan for Russian planes during the Cold War. The system was so large that it literally came with a seat inside — but that didn’t discourage Cerf, who saw a golden future in those lumbering contraptions.

“The idea that you could create a world of your own, with software that would do what you told it to do, was just mesmerizing,” Cerf told the audience of faculty, students and professionals that assembled at 7:30 a.m. in the California Institute for Telecommunications and Information Technology.

The speech was the first in a planned series at the campus institute, which is usually referred to as Calit2 and houses technological research projects. Assistant director Shellie Nazarenus said she hoped to bring in both technicians and policymakers to talk about the latest breakthroughs in the digital world. Cerf, who lives in Virginia, is a member of the institute’s advisory board.

“The idea is exposing the Orange County business community and our campus community to the next generation,” Nazarenus said.

Cerf, who won the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2005, is considered one of the founding fathers of the Internet. In the late 1960s, while a student at UCLA, he worked on ARPANET, a computer network that laid the groundwork for the modern-day system. He later helped to develop commercial e-mail while working for MCI Digital Information Services in the 1980s.

Since 2005, Cerf has been the vice president and “Chief Internet Evangelist” for Google. The company, he said, gave him the humorous title because he had trumpeted technology over the years with the fervor of a preacher.

During his 90-minute presentation, Cerf touched on the ways the Internet has changed — and, in particular, grown — over the last few decades. Ten years ago, he said, there were 22.5 million computers worldwide serving as hosts; at last count, that number had increased more than 20 times. He noted, however, that only 16.6% of the world’s citizens had Internet access, and that computer technology was an essential part of developing countries.

Joerg Meyer, an assistant professor of engineering, said he jumped at the chance to hear Cerf speak — especially since the Internet was such an integral part of his job.

“We use it in the classroom,” he said. “If a situation comes up and we need a definition, we just Google it.”