First, the facts. The intertubes are getting clogged. You Tube, my space, video and music transfers, on top of ever more users spending more time on the net contribute to this mass of digital hair, soap residue, crap and toilet paper. A simple reaming won't fix it. The basic fact is the tubes are too narrow. Perhaps Alaska's senatwhore was right after all.
Consumer and corporate use of the Internet could overload the current capacity and lead to brown-outs in two years unless backbone providers invest billions of dollars in new infrastructure, according to a study released last week.
A flood of new video and other Web content could overwhelm the Internet by 2010 unless backbone providers invest up to $137 billion in new capacity, more than double what service providers plan to invest, according to the study, by Nemertes Research Group, an independent analysis firm. In North America alone, backbone investments of $42 billion to $55 billion will be needed in the next three to five years to keep up with demand, Nemertes said.
Turns out that my original read was in error. There is no intertube crisis, just another attempt at exerting control.
Probably many of us were not familiar with the term "Exabyte". For myself, I would have guessed it had to do with a VIagra spiked snack.
Internet users will create 161 exabytes of new data this year, and this exaflood is a positive development for Internet users and businesses, IIA says. An exabyte is 1 quintillion bytes or about 1.1 billion gigabytes. One exabyte is the equivalent of about 50,000 years of DVD quality video.
Internet to max out in 2 yrs.
Obviously the parties bringing the power to the people via the tubes, have a lot of thinking and spending to do. Will they do their jobs? Perhaps that is the wrong question. Perhaps it should by, "Do they have a choice?"
Even if there is not clogging going on, those who claim that there is, and many in government have a hidden agenda. I apologize for being taken in on the initial read, and thank those readers who have educated me further.
These issues remain a problem for us to deal with in the future.
TAXATION
GOVERNMENT CONTROL
CENSORSHIP
TWO TIERED INTERTUBES
TAXATION
It seems as this issue comes up each time a state or local government has a budget crisis - translation: They raise this every year. With something as powerful, as useful and as incredible as the Tubes, it is a surprise that some city or state (or federal government) hasn't already taken some steps in to profit from the Tubes. Ten years ago, the Tubes were still too new, too untested, and too unknown to be taxed. That is no longer the case. it has become an integral part of all businesses, governments, and normal citizens' lives. That bodes badly for us on the tax issue.
The actualy pro and anti arguments have not changed much at all. Back in 1998, (edited in 2001) this article hit it on the head. Almost ten years later, it is still worth a glance. Internet Taxation: which side are you on?
This argument will eventually come to an end. Unfortunately, it will not be a good end. The needs for the money outweigh the needs of the tubes. At some point in time, we will be paying an access fee in some form. Once a tax or access fee is charged, everyone will have to pay it. And never will it return to a free form of access again. The question is when and how much? Given the billions necessary to increase pipeline capacity, the most surefire way is to "force" us to pay for it. Watch for big business to lobby for the highest capacity, at the lowest price, while the average individual user gets to pay for more than his or her fair share of any tax.
GOVERNMENT CONTROL
Alas, this is a battle we have already lost. Team Bush is not even the biggest, baddest, and most intrusive culprit.
China has already successfully forced all internet service providers, news agencies and others in the industry to bend to its will. Getting Reuters or BBC on a critical Chinese story is almost impossible. Given how the Bush administration has made so many topics secret, and given its love for spying on its citizens, how long before our content is controlled by Bush and his henchmen?
It won't be all it once. It won't be sudden. It will be incremental, with some excuses, fake threats and other spin leading the way. Government control will happen, unless we stand up to each and every step they try to take.
Along with access fees or taxes, eventually, in the name of national security, our anonymity will also be a thing of the past. Logging in will become a necessity, with Big Brother watching every key stroke.
CENSORSHIP
Although this is related to Government Control, it is also somewhat different. Censorship means that certain views will not be permitted. Blogs like Kos, Firedoglake, Buzzflash, TMP, and other important places would not only be banned, but the popular views held by individual users would also subject them to trouble. It has happened before in our country. During the late 1950s Red Scare, our government attacked the freedom of speech. Blacklisting Hollywood types simply because they held certain political beliefs was the rule, not the exception. Even today, many adults shiver at the term "socialism" and "communism", without truly understanding those concepts. The US government successfully married those words with the image of a Nuclear USSR, anxious to attack us.
We also arrested japanese descendants on the west coast, and exercised other political control over newspapers and other forms of communication in the past. The Sedition Act of 1917 outlawed dissent against WWI. And we were all present for the earliest four acts we know as the 1798 Alien and Sedition Acts, intended to stop all criticism of government. It has happened before. It WILL happen again.
How hard would it be for this government to install similar control, based on fear, loathing and lack of knowledge, especially if our country were attacked again? Not to sound too paranoid, is it out of the realm of possibility that Bush/Cheney would actually fake an attack simply to maintain control and prevent impeachment, investigations, and trials of their henchmen? To control the message they want to give us? To sell their take over of our country?
From one perspective, Libby's pardon was but the first step in an emotional response that every individual has - self-preservation. With the litany of crimes Bush/CHeney have committed, their urge for self-preservation must be that much stronger. You can't blame them for it, but we sure as hell need to protect against it.
TWO TIERED INTERTUBES
People have warned about two tiers for some time. The bottom feeders (us) would be stuck on a slower, lower capacity, ancient system, while businesses, government and those willing to pay a premium for superfast service would have access to the top tier.
That would certainly solve the problem of intertube clogs, but it would also erase the great gift to mankind that the net has become. On the current tubes, everyone is almost created equal, sometime even more so.
With more than 100,000 readers of Kos pages, messages that are ignored by MSM, ideas ignored by politicians, and theories ignored out of ignorance are discussed daily. Having a two tiered system would prevent our mini-soapboxes from working. Do not think that such a result is considered bad, especially by the corporate world which does not like open communications, which often point out their wrong doing and worse. Not only do we get to compare notes, combine resources, and exchange data, the corporate citizen is now being forced to respond to issues they formerly could have covered up.
Does anyone think that Wallmart's problems with lead paint on kiddie toys would have had the impact that it has without the Tubes? OR Haliburton's suspicious move to the MIddle East in advance of subpoenas, congressional investigations and teams of intertubers going through each document and posting the results on line?
Corporations hate the fact that you and I can talk openly about them and even compare notes. One reason why we will probably see a two tiered system is to relegate us into an alley, trying to make us irrelevant.