Transcript The Future of the Internet - Welcome to IOL E-mail

The Future of the Internet
Niall Richard Murphy
Ireland Online System Operations
Networks & Telecomm Research Group, TCD
Overview
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“The problem with educated guesses”
Some basic theory (definitions)
Identify obvious trends (mostly technical)
Examine the past, and project the future
trends in other areas...
What kind of areas?
 Technical
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(mercifully brief)
Where is the growth coming from?
What kind of areas?
 Humanities
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Economics
• Who can and can’t afford the Internet
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Politics
Social Intercourse
Miscellaneous
Speculation Spectacles
 “Far-out” Stuff
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What will the Net be
How will we communicate with it?
What will we be
Futurology 101
 The Dangers of Prophecy
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extending existing categories and not inventing new
ones
(Parent office, Physics and Victoriana)
not seeing correctly the secondary implications of a
new factor (e.g.: horseless carraige)
(R.A. Heinlein “Pandora’s Box”)
“Against stupidity, the gods themselves contend in
vain”
(Greek saying)
Futurology 101
 The rate of change of the rate of change
“The information technology boom is just beginning. In
the next 10 years we’ll see more change than we’ve seen in
the last 25.”
(Bill Gates, Indiana Lecture Series #4)
 Conclusion: Art, not science
A word of explanation
 What is this Internet thing, anyway…
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Simplest definition:
A network of networks
(which doesn’t really tell you anything useful)
The noun for all of the TCP/IP capable “hosts”
in the world
(currently mostly computers, modems,
routers..)
Really not much more than a common standard
followed (varyingly) by everyone connected
Another word of explanation
 Key points to remember
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Every internet host has an “IP address”
• Unique throughout the world
• Are of the form “dotted quad”
(for example 137.43.4.16)
• Can usefully be thought of as being in two parts
– Network part (137.43 meaning UCD)
– Host part (4.16 meaning the host “orca”)
Son of word of explanation
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Most, but not all hosts have “names”
• Distinct technical meaning - but really just so that
humans can remember hosts more easily
• The “name” for 137.43.4.16 is “orca.ucd.ie”
• The hostname of orca.ucd.ie is “orca”
• The domain name of orca.ucd.ie is “ucd.ie”
• The second level domain name of orca.ucd.ie is
“ucd”
• The top level domain name of orca.ucd.ie is “ie”
(which is the top level domain for all hostsin
Ireland)
Bride of word of explanation
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These names are maintained in “name server”
databases (called the DNS)
• Run by essentially every medium to large size
organisation that is internet connected
• ccTLDs (country code top level domains such as ie
and fr) run the master name database for a country
• gTLDs (generic top level domains such as .com and
.org) run by an organisation in the states
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Every significant organisation runs a
nameserver and has many hostnames stored
there
DNS structure
The root
"."
.ie
(country TLD)
.COM
(generic TLD)
.ORG
(generic TLD)
ucd.ie
(second level)
foobar.org
(second level)
orca.ucd.ie
(host)
www.foobar.org
(web server)
Second cousin twice removed of
word of explanation
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Not only do these organisations have name
servers, they might have
• web servers (eg: www.ucd.ie)
• IP address servers (eg: dhcp.irlgov.ie)
• news servers (eg: news.iol.ie)
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Most significant applications (things you might
want to do) that exist have an entry in DNS
 Hence the DNS nicely supports Internet
surveys
Obvious Trends
 “The Internet is getting bigger and it’s
happening fast.”
 “Show me the numbers”
Obvious Trend #1.1: Hosts
Obvious Trend #1.2: Hosts
Obvious Trend #1.3: Domains
(Ireland)
Obvious Trend #1.4: Domains
(worldwide)
Obvious Trend #1.5: People
online
?
Summary after obvious trends
 Linear or flattening out of growth predicted
by most experts
 My prediction: exponential growth will
continue for a while yet due to “unforseen
events”
 Real limits to growth are still unapproached
Technical - IP addresses
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Addressing - we are running out of addresses!
• The current version of TCP/IP only hasroom for
“another few years”
• Thankfully there is another version in development
(IPv4 is the current version, IPv6 is the new one)
• Most people will never even need to know, since the
DNS will take care of whether it’s an IPv4 or IPv6
address
• If v4 = 137.43.4.16, v6 = FF80:0:0:0:0:0:1:4:89:2b..
• Prediction: this won’t be a (real) problem
Technical - Domain names
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Naming
• ccTLDs, gTLDs enjoyed relative harmony up until
relatively recently
• ccTLDs comparitively stable
• gTLDs currently “enjoying” controversy
– New domain names have been proposed since .COM is
running out of “usable” names
– By “usable” we mean domains people are likely to want to
use (or even unlikely)
– There are interests who want this not to happen
• Prediction: new ones will eventually materialise
Technical - User Interfaces
 Current user experience
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Using a computer and modem
(User-opaque as opposed to user-transparent)
Prone to errors, configuration problems...
 Predictions of future user experience
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Need to up the ease-of-use
Metropolitan area wireless radio networks
“Mobile ubiquitous computing” - watches,
pacemakers, car engines, ambulances..
Where is the growth coming
from?
 Application-driven growth
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Mostly web service (accounts for ~ 79% of all
major ISP traffic)
Also email, java apps, not so much discussion
groups (signal to noise ratio decreasing)
 Commerce-driven growth
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Commercial interests do the serious investment
Corporate users make the money for ISPs
(not home users)
Questions to guide us
 Internet: The Great Leveller
(or is it?)
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Qui bono?
“Show me the money”
 What is the effect upon people and their
interactions with other people?
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“Future Shock”
(Alvin Toffler)
Who can afford the Internet?
 Historical picture of Internaut
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White, male, middle-class, American…
(your worst nightmare)
 Has changed dramatically
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Surveys
 Will change dramatically
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Prediction: pretty much every 1st/2nd world demographic will be
thoroughly represented..
Who can afford the net?
 Minimum equipment for net access
(~ = approximately)
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Computer (~100 IRP for old one)
Modem (~20 IRP for old one)
Phone line (~100 IRP for installation ?)
Electricity (~ 50 IRP / 2 months)
 … instantly puts it beyond reach of 2/3rds
of the worlds population
Who can afford the net?
 It’s much worse than that
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The cost of getting from ISP to ISP is
astronomical in comparison
(many hundreds of thousands of IRP per month
in order to be considered a “contender”)
The cost of cross-pond links or leased lines are
punitive
Only the very wealthy or the well managed
business can afford this business
Who can afford the net?
 Two thirds of the worlds people have never
even made a telephone call.
(Bill Gates)
 Of course Bill could pay for
all of us on the planet to
make about 100 calls each…
(Bill Gates wealth clock)
Political
 Digital Voting
 The E-commerce pact
 The various Communication Decency Acts
(CDAs)
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“The Internet is free speech at a level not imagined by the founding
fathers. It gives everyone an unstifled voice.”
Political
 War crimes on the MBONE
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Prediction: Justice via the net
“No-one ever got poor underestimating the taste
of the American public”
Political
 Activism
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Protests
• Italians against their telco
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Censorship
• Saudi Arabia vetting ISPs
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Racism
• Gay web site attacks
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Revisionism
• “The holocaust did not exist”
Political
 MGA (Mysterious Government Agencies)
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NSA, CIA, FBI… but especially the NSA
Project ECHELON
 Cryptography
 Privacy
Social Intercourse
 Online Addiction
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Depression
Dropouts
Social Intercourse
 Advertising … (combination of ec. & soc.)
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Mega Brands
Intel
Social Intercourse
 Sex, Gambling
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Cybersex
Pornographic industry
Gambling online
Social Intercourse
 Behaviour changes
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Displacement activities
Relationships (marriages) over the net?
Miscellaneous
 Language
 Homes
 Year 2000 class problems (2038)
Real Crystal Gazing
 “The sum total of human knowledge at our
fingertips”
 Interfaces
 The nature of humanity changing?
Summary of Trend Analysis
 When in Rome…
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In general people seem to do pretty much the same
things online as they do offline
Perhaps cybersex and other online dodginess is a
healthy indication
The effect of having a lot of useful data continually
accessible to (theoretically) every individual is
unknown but probably as great
 Prediction: we accept it now; soon we’ll rely on it
Two momentums
 Two “C”’s
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Convenience
• Soon there will be no reason not to conduct many
activities over the Internet
• It will be quicker, cheaper, more secure
(security maybe not soon, but definitely needed)
• William has to get Windows to stop crashing first
Two momentums
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Commerce
• Companies want to be able to take your money
faster
• Fortunately they seem to deliver something in return
for that
• Even though online shopping is legally a gray area,
consumers have more picketing power
Paul Simon
 Brief Bio
 “And I believe these are the days of lasers
in the jungle, lasers in the jungle somewhere,
stacatto signals of constant information,
a loose affililiation of millionaires and billionaires
and baby”
(The Boy in the Bubble, Graceland, 1986)
William H. Gates III (of Borg)
Sources
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http://www.nua.ie
http://www.ucd.ie/hostmaster/
http://www.nanog.org
http://www.ripe.net
http://www.nw.com
The Worlds of Robert Heinlein (NEL 1972) - Robert Heinlein
http://www.jerrypournelle.com
http://www.microsoft.com/BillGates/
http://www.macontel.com/data/govt/cda329.htm
http://www.isoc.org/postel/
http://www.usi.edu/LIBARTS/SOCIO/finalpro/
http://www.cusd.chico.k12.ca.us/~tgray/3Dhorses.html
http://www.cato.org/events/speakers/volokh.html
http://www.mids.orgs/topics/
The Soul of the Internet - Neil Randall
Count Zero - William Gibson
Talk available from..
 http://www.iol.ie/~niallrm/