The Internet is outdated, inventor claims – The INQUIRER — I think it’s too late to stop now as the net has actually become a patchwork quilt of protocols.
THE BLOKE bloke behind the Pentagon’s Advanced Research Projects Agency, ARPAnet says that the Internet is completely out of date.
Larry Roberts ran ARPAnet, which was the precurser to the Internet. In an interview with the Wall Street Journal, Roberts said that the technology behind the web is now 40 years old and needs a rethink.
He said that when he was working at ARPAnet he was unsure how long the technology could work, especially since the system didn’t ensure that information packets would arrive at their destination.
Now he is convinced that there will be all sorts of hell to pay now that companies are using the Internet to make phone calls and consumers begin to dabble in online video.
Roberts said that the Internet wasn’t designed for people to watch television and he should know he designed it.
Now
Bull.
Software intelligence always gets around the problems of a lousy hardware interface.
It’s a simple matter of waiting six hours for a one hour show. Problem solved.
This guy was a guest on Coast to Coast AM a couple of weeks ago, I think. Very interesting 3 hour interview.
Hey I invented the internet! This guy is an impostor.
This story comes from the Inquirer. Nuff said.
“He now runs a start-up, Anagran which makes a flow router that analyses Web traffic to discern whether it is an email, a movie or a phone call and then carves out the bandwidth needed for transmission.”
I think he’s just regretting he didn’t license the TCP/IP protocol.
#5,
I read the WSJ article after you pointed it out, I never read the Inquirer article. My conclusion of this story… Roberts says the ISP’s need new hardware, the ISP’s say, yeah lots of growth, but we will be fine without Roberts equipment.
My criticism of the Inquirer not only remains, but is strengthened. The Inquirer deliberately cherry picked bits from the origianl article to make a sensational story, otherwise without merit. Because they are click whores.
But but but Web 2.0 is our salvation!
Sheesh, the internet is just a fad. Put it next you your pet rock and hula hoop.
#9 – You aren’t 100% wrong… What I once, foolishly in my youth, saw as a potentially empowering technology that would usher in a new era of progressive politics, citizen access to government, and the free dissemination of true information… has turned out to be a strip mall of easy credit rip-off shops, dollar stores, and radio shacks, with a parking lot full of white vans peddling grey and black market goods.
The most important benefit of the Internet is how easy it now is to find high quality photographs of female nudity for free.
#10, you were not foolish in your youth, just failed to see the complete picture and the human nature. Whenever the free dissemination of true information is possible, false information and all other “ills” you mention are free to spread as well. Human nature is to take advantage of it. We are blessed by the big brains to sift through it though,…
Ye for the Internet and Ye for the brains…
On the story: I find the inventors new product absolutely abhorrent and contrary to what the internet is. Advantage of the complex system he originally invented is the basic simplicity in its roots. Start tinkering and filtering needlessly and you are on the road to ruins… Only adjustment needed is greater capacity and many places in the world have shown that it is possible and relatively cheap. (Would you care to discern e-mail from the video on 4GBps line as that old lady in Sweden?)
Roberts said that the Internet wasn’t designed for people to watch television.
[cranky] And while we’re on the subject, people weren’t designed to watch television to begin with. [ /cranky]
Someone tell pops where to order Depends online and he’ll calm down.
#15. “Someone tell pops where to order Depends online and he’ll calm down.” Clear, objective summarisation, in a single sentence.
I agree with the analysis. For example, if everybody was using IPv6 and SSL authenticated e-mail, a large part of our problems would be solved. But we cannot auto switch the entire internet to new protocols.
#17 – Angel’s a horny bastard. I’m a completely different horny bastard. 🙂
OK,
there are ALOT of concerns in this..
1. the Main backbone, interconnects and everything else is Dependant(in the long run) on the Phone lines and the Phone company. Even if you have Cable/DSL/Fiber… It all leads back to 40-50 year old Copper wire someplace along the line.
Even the OLD fiber that was laid 30 years ago(hardly used now) is obsolete.
2. Phone company.. Many cities at the time of the Boom, were NOT setup for the amount of traffic, and the USE that their systems would go thru. Most were setup for about 6-10% use..After the boom it went to 80%.
3. Even AFTER the improvements at the BOOM, it took over 10 years to get Towns and smaller locations to UPGRADE. The phone company Dont want to pay more or INSTALL more then is BASIC..
4. we are dependent on the BACKBONE of the phone service. We need MORE then 1, and WE need an alternative to the Phone company.
5. Rating the speed of the Data being used, and the Wants/needs of all the data that are being USED. We have gone from sending Email and wondering to having/forcing the Net(IN THE USA) to overload with more data then it was originally intended. And STILL there are many locations that CANT get access to highspeed. We’ve gone from a couple MEGS per day to Gigs in less then 15 years. And the phone coprs are using ALL their bandwidth.
6. Ranking in speed the USA is NOT in the top 10 anymore. but this counts areas that ARENT nations. Hong Kong is laying a 100Mb per user Line(
ECA – You explained how the infrastructure is outdated not the internet. While I’ll cede that the internet is dependent on the infrastructure, I have yet to see a better widely accepted replacement for the internet we know today. Anything can be improved but I believe access to the internet has made large leaps since the age of the browser.
It’l be alright, if something breaks they can fix it, if the tubes get clogged, we’l just start shutting down everybodies computer that does over 6 gigs of dl’s a day. Even better we could just shut down the internet for a day or two see if getting some rest helps.
Hey, You kids! Get off my internet. Little punks…
Oh the irony. I checked the mail today. Seems I live in the comcast test area. Sometime in the next year they are gonna offer me 150 megabit service. Holy crap I’m gonna have to upgrade my lan to gigabit now.
Oh well. So much for that theory of the tubes not being large enough.
18 For example, if everybody was using IPv6 and SSL authenticated e-mail, a large part of our problems would be solved.
Reminds me of all the hype about “Internet2” – remember how those universities would inter-connect on their own private internet and use it to try-out new equipment and protocols… which would someday trickle-down to the rest of us?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet2
Yeah, baby!
They hit 9-Gbits/sec 10-months ago…
Are you feeling the “trickle-down”, yet? 🙂
21,
Ok
we need to FIX email programs..
We need to make a SECURE format that is FULLY traceable BACK to the sender and cant be Hacked/hidden/faked…ANd wont accept ANYTHING thats IS…
Back to DISPLAY info ONLY…
NO loading of CRAP on my system.
NO SALES…Advert sites only, but you would need to call them to ORDER.
NO random ADVERTS on sites.
Teach people HOW to optimize their SITES, you dont need a 300dpi Pic…Anything above 96DPI is a waste and takes up bandwidth.
Kill Encoding CRAP into pics and movies…
Back up to HTML, ONLY…it works…Leave the rest ALONE…I hate sites that say,,,”SORRY you cant view Anything because you arnt running ActiveX/Flash or anything ELSE.
MOVIES and anything ELSE, needs to be recompressed to run BETTER…I dont need a SUPPER HIGH RES, as it cant be displayed…