50 Years Ago, Launch of a New World

50 YEARS AGO, LAUNCH OF A NEW WORLD
[SOURCE: Washington Post, AUTHOR: Joel Achenbach]
Sputnik and its aftermath are a familiar tale at this point -- the story of a fat and happy superpower suddenly finding itself in a full-blown existential crisis but shaking free of its torpor, revamping science and math education, and winning the race to the moon. Fifty years later, however, the standard narrative of disaster, recovery and triumph is being overhauled by historians. They're more likely to speak of Sputnik's impact as a shock to the system that incited political maneuverings and media misinformation. Much that seemed certain in October 1957 turned out to be misunderstood or purely illusory. Humans have not set up space colonies or left boot prints on Mars, as widely predicted, but we have launched a stunning number of new Sputniks -- thousands of satellites for communications, navigation and surveillance that have changed everything from how we fight wars to how our rental cars guide us to our hotels. One result of Sputnik had nothing to do with space. It was the creation of the Pentagon's Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, a technology think tank that went on to develop a computer network called Arpanet. Arpanet evolved into the Internet. More broadly, the Space Age, so famously inaugurated by Sputnik, has taken on new shadings in recent years. The "conquest of space" has never played out according to script: Sputnik signaled the moment when humankind escaped the gravity well of the planet, but rather than propelling us to the stars, space technology keeps turning back toward terrestrial needs and desires.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/01/AR200710...
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* How NASA helped invent Silicon Valley
http://www.news.com/How-NASA-helped-invent-Silicon-Valley/2009-11397_3-6...

* The age of the satellite
The satellite industry has grown by leaps and bounds in the 50 years since the Russian government launched Sputnik, generating more than $100 billion annually.
http://www.news.com/The-age-of-the-satellite/2009-1033_3-6210986.html