> Well, you could make things quicker but you'd still be limited by the hardware of the time.
But a lot of it is down to knowing what is possible. E.g. we know internet access via late 70's level home machine is possible with a few KB for a trimmed down IP stack and SLIP (because it's been done by now).
We know the basic concept behind the www. Creating a trimmed down web that'd be feasible to make available by 1980 would not be all that hard - it's not really a hardware/speed problem, but about maturing ideas (e.g the basic ideas had been around since at least Vannevar Bush's Memex idea, published in 1945; and in more fleshed out forms adapted for computers since the 60's).
You'd be limited by networking. Or rather, primarily by uncommon it was. But by the early 1980's, non-internet systems like GameLine, Quantum Link etc. that were to become America Online, started appearing. Arriving with the knowledge that the internet would become dominant, and even a rough idea of how internet protocols works, and the knowledge to go seek out people that could help you with the appropriate standards etc., you could get into that market years before, and be in a much better situation by e.g. being prepared for TCP/IP and the web becoming dominant.
But a lot of it is down to knowing what is possible. E.g. we know internet access via late 70's level home machine is possible with a few KB for a trimmed down IP stack and SLIP (because it's been done by now).
We know the basic concept behind the www. Creating a trimmed down web that'd be feasible to make available by 1980 would not be all that hard - it's not really a hardware/speed problem, but about maturing ideas (e.g the basic ideas had been around since at least Vannevar Bush's Memex idea, published in 1945; and in more fleshed out forms adapted for computers since the 60's).
You'd be limited by networking. Or rather, primarily by uncommon it was. But by the early 1980's, non-internet systems like GameLine, Quantum Link etc. that were to become America Online, started appearing. Arriving with the knowledge that the internet would become dominant, and even a rough idea of how internet protocols works, and the knowledge to go seek out people that could help you with the appropriate standards etc., you could get into that market years before, and be in a much better situation by e.g. being prepared for TCP/IP and the web becoming dominant.