MIT's Chaosnet Chose Reliability Over Speed, a Different Path From TCP/IP

MIT's AI Lab built Chaosnet in the 1970s as a network protocol for Lisp machines—specialized computers for artificial intelligence work. Unlike TCP/IP, which later prioritized speed across long distances, Chaosnet was engineered for guaranteed error-free delivery within a single facility. That choice reflected a simple reality: in AI research, a single undetected bit error could corrupt results silently and invisibly.