CompuServe

CompuServe (or CompuServe Information Services , or CIS ), was the first principal online service with the the United States, while dominating during the years 1980 and while remaining an important actor in the middle of the years 1990 when it was put on the key by FAI based on the graphic environments like AOL. Today the company acts as FAI, pertaining at AOL. The company is mainly known to have developed the format Digital image GIF in 1987 like to have offered the first service of Email and assistance on Personal computer to the general public in 1979.

History

CompuServe was founded in 1969 with Columbus in the Ohio under the name Compu-Serv Network, Inc. like a subsidiary company of the company Golden delicious United Investment. The first nobody to have chaired the company was Dr. John R. Goltz, although generally it is Jeffrey Wilkins, the son-in-law of Harry Gard which is the founder of United Golden delicious, which comes to mind in this function. The initial objective of the subsidiary company is double: to ensure the service of computer support of United Golden delicious, and to try to generate an income by renting the access to its waiters PDP-10 in the course of the day according to a model Time-sharing. Finally, it became independent into 1975 before being acquired by H&R Block in 1980.

In 1979, CompuServe became the first company to propose the email and the customer support for the users of PC. The company beat new records in 1980 while becoming the first online service to propose the Chat in real-time thanks to its software CB Simulator .

The original technology of Dial-up of 1969 was relatively simple: the local phone number with Cleveland for example was simply a foreign line of exchange for a modem with Columbus connected to a system of lodging of particular time-sharing. Later, the modems were connected to minicomputers DEC PDP-15 which acted as of the switches so that a phone number is not related to a destination of particular lodging. Finally, CompuServe developed its own packages of commutation network, implemented on minicomputers on DEC PDP-11 acting as of the nodes which were installed through the United States (and later, in other countries) and were inter-connected.

In 1982, the network had become sufficiently wide so that it is possible to form a Section of Services Network to provide possibilities of network in a zone extended to the customers. This made it possible to the customers to provide accesses dial-up in all the country to their own shelterers, who were typically connected to the CompuServe network via a connection X.25.

Then, the company forged alliances with the private networks Tymnet and Telenet, among others, which gave to CompuServe the broadest selection of telephone connection of dial-up. Other networks made it possible CompuServe to reach even more areas, including international areas, usually with overloads of substantial times of connection. It was not unusual with beginning of the year 1980 to have to spend 30$ per hour to connect itself to CompuServe, which at the time cost 5 to 6$ per hour. Consequently, the company was called CompuSpend (spend means to spend) or Compu$erve.

The apogee

In the middle of the years 1980, CompuServe was the largest online service which existed. Accounts could be bought in the majority of the American data-processing stores (a box with a guide of instruction and an account of test); the notoriety of this service was very important. The service continued to improve in terms of user interface and offers, and in 1989 CompuServe bought and dismantled its principal competitor: The Source.

CompuServe started to extend outside the the United States, thus opening with the international scene with the Japan in 1986 with Fujitsu and Nisso Iwai, developing a version of Japanese CompuServe named NIFTYSERVE in 1989. Fujitsu and CompuServe also Co-developed WorldsAway, a prototype of interactive community with a virtual world called now VZones with newHorizones and the worlds finished Dreamscape with misadventures representing the participants. At the end of the years 1980, it was possible to be connected to the network of CompuServe by using the communication protocol standardized by packet switching X.25, but gradually the company introduced its own direct access into several countries, a more economic solution. With the extension of its network to international, CompuServe increased its commercial capacities by opening branches with Munich and London.

CompuServe launches its services to France in November 1993.

With the beginning of the year 1990, CompuServe counts hundreds of thousands of users who visit its thousands of moderated forums, ancestors of Usenet, then discussion forums of today. Among these forums, some dedicated to the support customer of companies of material or computer software. The audience of the first users grows, and extends to crowd from “Geek”, in spite of a desertion partial towards the Bix online service of the magazine Byte. CompuServe time, it is mainly the opening of communication networks to a general public broader than the simple researchers, geeks, or academics.

In 1992, CompuServe lodges the first device of email WYSIWYG known and the posts of forums. Police forces of writings, colors and emoticons were coded on text 7 bits based on the messages via the software of navigation of CompuServe NavCIS, usable with the systems DOS and the first Windows 3.1.

End in France

CompuServe stops its services in France in November 2007

The repurchase by Worldcom

Technologies and the law

External bonds

Official site of CompuServe

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