PSINet

PSINet, based in Northern Virginia, was one of the first commercial Internet service providers (ISPs) and was involved in the commercialization of the Internet until the company's bankruptcy in 2001 during the dot-com bubble and acquisition by Cogent Communications in 2002.

It was founded on December 5, 1989 and officially began offering services, including limited for-profit access to the Internet, on January 1, 1990, becoming one of the first companies to sell Internet connectivity.

PSINet was founded in 1989 by Martin L. Schoffstall and by William L. Schrader, who initially funded the company through personal loans, including using credit cards and by selling the family car. It was initially known as Performance Systems International. In very late 1989, the company acquired NYSERNet assets and established an ongoing outsourcing contract with NYSERNet. NYSERNet, a non-profit research and education network serving New York State, had created one of the first regional Internet networks under Schrader's and Richard Mandelbaum's leadership and technical leadership from Schoffstall, Mark Fedor, and others. This acquisition gave PSINet commercial access to what would come to be known as the Internet.

Before 1990, the Internet had been largely funded by government agencies including DARPA (the original and still existing at that time, ARPANET), the National Science Foundation (NSF) for NSFNET, various U.S. federal agency networks such as the Department of Energy and NASA, and with grants to various regional networks including NSYERNet. Many of the stake-holders of the Internet of the 1980s were military, industrial, or academic researchers who were largely satisfied with the then current model of usage and governance. However, appropriate commercial usage policies were debated on such mailing lists as com-priv (commercialization and privatization of the Internet), within semi-public forums such as the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF), and included an investigation by the NSF's Inspector General staff. This included an intense debate on the "settlement model" of the Internet which was worldwide and both public and private in scope.

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