The Internet in some sense starts with, at the very latest, the Treaty of Bern in 1874. Because the Internet is just the current physical incarnation of the Network.

(The Treaty of Bern says how to make physical letter post work internationally the way we're used to today, before that it was a colossal pain in the arse)

The Network is like the Word, it's fundamental to what we are, the precise implementation may change, but the idea is forever.

Automobiles, T-shirts, babies brought up almost exclusively by their immediate biological parents, cow milk as a normal human beverage, portraits, funerals, the novel - these are all "just" culture and might become unfashionable and go away over the longer term or in other contexts - they're not fundamental to what we are. But the Word and the Network are right at the centre of what we are, as people.

Blockchain is just a weird cultural blip. It's not even T-shirts, it's Pork Pie Hats. People keep trying to make it a thing, but it's not a thing.