I am a master. A master of webs.
January 12, 2012 12:04 PM Subscribe
Who coined the term "webmaster"?
Response by poster: Does it take its etymology from "dungeonmaster"?
posted by to sir with millipedes at 12:08 PM on January 12, 2012
posted by to sir with millipedes at 12:08 PM on January 12, 2012
I'd assume it's derived from 'postmaster', the standard term and generic contact address for someone maintaining an email server, which in turn derives from the term for someone in charge of a physical post office.
posted by holgate at 12:12 PM on January 12, 2012 [2 favorites]
posted by holgate at 12:12 PM on January 12, 2012 [2 favorites]
The term hostmaster for someone who manages a host naming scheme (such as the domain name system) was also in use before the advent of the web.
posted by grouse at 12:17 PM on January 12, 2012
posted by grouse at 12:17 PM on January 12, 2012
There was a close connection between early web culture and graphic arts and printing. The 'webmaster' was a brand of mechanical drive for a newspaper-style printing press ('web' in printing parlance). I suspect some of the very earliest usages may have been riffing on this meaning.
posted by dhartung at 3:30 PM on January 12, 2012
posted by dhartung at 3:30 PM on January 12, 2012
That feels like a bit of a reach, dhartung.
FWIW, the Wikipedia talk page has someone who backs up the *master convention (which itself goes back to RFC 822, designating postmaster@foo.tld as a reserved address). This thread from comp.infosystems.www, including posts from Tim Berners-Lee and Marc Andreessen, seems to imply the same; it also includes a post from Paul Lindner, describing himself in his .sig (quite accurately) as "gophermaster", which I suspect is not derived from the printing world.
posted by holgate at 5:15 PM on January 12, 2012
FWIW, the Wikipedia talk page has someone who backs up the *master convention (which itself goes back to RFC 822, designating postmaster@foo.tld as a reserved address). This thread from comp.infosystems.www, including posts from Tim Berners-Lee and Marc Andreessen, seems to imply the same; it also includes a post from Paul Lindner, describing himself in his .sig (quite accurately) as "gophermaster", which I suspect is not derived from the printing world.
posted by holgate at 5:15 PM on January 12, 2012
I agree with holgate. When I first went online, virtually no one had heard of the web outside CERN and 'webmaster' hadn't been coined. However, 'postmaster' was widely known; pretty much anyone with an email address was aware that their domain had a postmaster. More technical types were familiar with 'hostmaster' as well.
Early webpages often had a 'webmaster' contact address at the bottom and it seemed clear that it was an extension of the 'postmaster' and 'hostmaster' usage.
posted by Busy Old Fool at 3:53 AM on January 13, 2012
Early webpages often had a 'webmaster' contact address at the bottom and it seemed clear that it was an extension of the 'postmaster' and 'hostmaster' usage.
posted by Busy Old Fool at 3:53 AM on January 13, 2012
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Pronunciation: Brit. /ˈwɛbˌmɑːstə/ , /ˈwɛbˌmastə/ , U.S. /ˈwɛbˌmæstər/
Forms: also with capital initial.
Etymology: < web n. + master n.1
Computing.
Categories »
The administrator of a web site (who may also be its designer).
1993 FAQs to HTML in comp.infosystems.www (Usenet newsgroup) 29 June, [Contact email address] webmaster@athena.mit.edu.
1995 Multimedia Today Apr.–June 16/2 The IBM home page is like the table of contents to a magazine, and provides links to other pages that the company's webmasters feel would be valuable or interesting to you.
1999 InternetWeek (Electronic ed.) 2 Aug., Many Webmasters are no longer developers but rather are administrators that have the development work done by others.
posted by brainmouse at 12:07 PM on January 12, 2012 [1 favorite]