Prestel
In 1983, the Prestel messaging service known as “Prestel Mailbox” was launched, initially hosted on the computer known as "Enterprise", and later available from all IRC computers by means of a centralised messaging computer known as "Pandora". This facility extended the original day one concept of “Response Frames” whereby an end user could send a message back to the IP who owned the page via special pages, for example to order goods or services. The user’s name, address, telephone number, and date could be added automatically to the message when the IP set up the response frame by means of codes which triggered extraction of key data from the users account held on the IRC computer. Initially response frames were ingathered by an IP from each IRC individually, but later the facility to collect messages from all IRCs at the UDC from where they could be ingathered centrally was implemented, and with the introduction of Mailbox, they could be retrieved from any IRC.
American Registry for Internet Numbers
The organization was formed in December 1997 to "provide IP registration services as an independent, nonprofit corporation." Until this time, IP address registration (outside of RIPE and APNIC regions) was done in accordance with policies set by the IETF by Network Solutions corporation as part of the InterNIC project. The National Science Foundation approved the plan for the creation of the not-for-profit organization to ""give the users of IP numbers (mostly Internet service providers, corporations and other large institutions) a voice in the policies by which they are managed and allocated within the North American region."". As part of the transition, Network Solutions corporation transitioned these tasks as well as initial staff and computer infrastructure to ARIN.