💻 Codepublished 2w ago
The high-stakes midnight cutover that birthed the modern internet
On January 1, 1983, computer networking faced its ultimate deadline: DARPA permanently turned off the ARPANET's original NCP protocol and mandated TCP/IP across every connected machine. Computers that had not migrated their networking software by midnight were abruptly severed from the network. This synchronized switch, known as "Flag Day," laid the technical foundation for the modern internet. Relieved engineers celebrated surviving the high-stakes cutover with custom pinback badges reading: "I survived the TCP/IP transition."
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