The first go at co-operation, the Chiang Mai Initiative of 2000, was to expand and formalise a network of bilateral swap agreements between central banks, under which they promised to provide each other with liquidity.

ECONOMIST: Banyan

In the mid nineteen-nineties, Xerox built a system called Eureka that was a kind of social network where technical representatives could swap ideas on how to install and fix machines around the world.

FORBES: Workplace of Warcraft

Research work by Mr Metcalfe and his co-worker established that they could swap far more data far faster than over the Hawaiian network.

BBC: Original Ethernet diagram, 3Com

The system is also made future proof by a patent-pending capability to swap out the wireless card should hardware technology change or if the user chooses a different network infrastructure in the future.

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