"Top down" has an exact meaning.
If the government had decided to create a Department of the Internet, the results would have been somewhat different than what they did do, which was support a few key sections of a process already under way.
We'd probably be waiting for the product like we're waiting for fusion reactors. "Apollo" type projects are overrated. It's why things like tax credits for solar power are a better idea than creating a solar "Synfuels Project."
I think we can reliably credit most of the advances in the past twenty years or so in computer tech to the private sector.