I was reading a book, The Victorian Internet, which talked about how connected the Victorian era was, with wires stretching everywhere above the roads. It’s probably exaggerated, but it got me thinking. There are many ways to engage in en masse interconnectivity. Computers, of course, are one of them, but we also have had, for example, messenger pigeons, drones we can send to different places, search dogs with an interconnected sniff system (I forgot what that was called), etc.
Suppose you had a civilization. Maybe it’s on a planet whose environment interferes with the capabilities of a classic internet, or maybe it’s a normal fantasy setting where the classic internet is cursed. However, the civilization still needs some kind of apparatus of interconnectivity. What’s the best/closest thing you can think of as a replacement for the internet without it being the internet as we know it?
Technically, the internet has multiple layers and only the lowest ones are dependent on the physical network implementation—you could totally send network packets via messenger pigeon and still have it be a valid part of the internet. But I think the scenario you most likely have in mind is one where we don’t have wired or wireless networks, and/or we don’t have computers to function as endpoints. And the goal is to have some kind of long-distance user-to-user exchange of non-sensory data (i.e., not just telephones or broadcast media.)
One solution might be to shine lasers on a distant object, like the moon: everyone has a designated signaling target on the object, and you could send them data by shining a pattern of light on their target.
The moon is 1.26 light seconds away. That’s a 2520 ms ping.
OSI Model gang represent!
Also, I’m sure you already know this, but RFC 1149 (IP over Avian Carriers) was actually tested by Bergen Linux User Group. They successfully sent packets several kilometers.