Dearest Internet: Happy 40th Birthday! Wow. It feels like just yesterday that Al Gore gave birth to you. (Ha! What? OK, I know. It's getting old.)
But really, Internet, you've come a long way from the days of ARPANET and message boards. Now we have message boards with photos... and Poking! Amazing!
I remember the first time I got to know you: In the early 90s when, in grade-school computer class, I was granted my first email address on Prodigy. Oh the possibilities, I thought. My powers were limitless. I could talk to anyone I wanted. And lo and behold, one fine day I received an email from none other than Mary Tyler Moore! Does life get any better? Not hardly.
The thing is, we remained pen pals for quite some time before I found out it wasn't Mary at all. It was just my computer teacher using the MTM alias to fool me.
Why do you let things like that happen, Internet? Why do you let your users take on pseudonyms and alter-egos and destroy the lives of little girls?
In fact, not to bring you down on the big Four-Oh or anything, but I have to say that you're starting to grate on our nerves for a LOT of reasons, beyond the absurdity of anonymity. You are, in fact, being blamed for the erosion of numerous industries: journalism, music, movies, book publishing. Was this intentional? Are you waging some personal vendetta against profitable business?
Then again, much like Charles Manson, you aren't exactly the culprit here: It's your followers who are causing all of the destruction. The pirates, the community on Wikipedia, Silicon Valley, Chris Anderson...
But you need to start controlling your people, Internet. They've gone completely insane! No one wants to pay for anything anymore. Everyone's a "content creator," or worse, a "curator." They think that hierarchy is flattened and they can talk to the president! It's just madness!
Not to mention their focus is completely out of whack. As your followers are Tweeting away and uploading funny cat photos, the developing world is trying to rub two cellphones together just to get access to you. Oppressive regimes are turning your lights out or using your Tubes to disseminate false information. Hello!
We believe you have a future. That's why we started this site about "the Future of the Internet" (popular little fellow you are). But there's a lot of work to do and we're worried -- particularly when it comes to the ever-shrill level of hype surrounding your most insignificant, profitless features. You do recall a period during the late 90s when you kind of, like, died because of that, right? We're concerned that you're letting that happen again.
So, yeah, fine. Have a happy birthday, Internet. But maybe you can put the party to rest after today and get to work.
40 years from today- I see all kinds of smart devices connected to a common network (Internet?). Smart Cars, Smart Televisions, Smart Appliances, Smart Furniture, gosh the list is enless.... With all those devices online, one may look back and say..what PC?
My first exposure to the internet came in the late 70's at a company I was working at (and the company where I first moved into the computer world i.e. Data Processing as an Operator). I was at the Corporate location which also had several divisions there and one of these divisions had access. All text based. Man has it come a long way :-)
Thank you for the warm words.I am glad , that you and many different folks from many different countries talk about me so much( though sometimes it looks like gossips) Anyway, I am glad that I help you in many ways and make your life better.Just one tiny request.Please, can you make something and silence those people who blame me in every single problem on Earth. Some depressed teenager or crazy manager comiites suicide- because of me...Some terrorists blow up something- my fault.Can you please stop it?
NF:="Fascinating to hear these guys say "whoops" on security, isn't it?"
The IBM PC was was marketed in 1981
It was not until Aug.6 2004 when XP/SP2 was released that there was a serious effort to address the security problem. Not for a lack of warnning: virus codes such as "Stoned", "Falling Letters", "Pakistani Brain" plagued Sneaker net users -- until we got rid of floppy drives. at which time such virus codes have migrated into USB devices
and of course Nov. 1988 : The Robert Morris Internet Worm
now with VISTA and Win7 we have UAC -- which essentially asks the user to distinguish between good updates and bad ones. the fakes are pretty good -- and getting better.
talk about being a "Day late and a dollar short" -- it is easy to understand that the original designers didn't anticipate the need for security -- they "knew everyone who was on the net" -- back in the beginning.
but look at the industry response to the issue
Public Key Encryption was published in 1991 -- that's 18 YEARS ago
Public key encryption provides the keys we need. If you study it you will realize that it is MUCH MORE than just encryption. It provides AUTHENTICATION: i.e. it allows you to VERIFY the IDENTITY of WHO YOU ARE TALKING TO
it provides INTEGRITY: it allows you to verify that your copy of a message has not been altered or substituted in transit.
these things are based on TRUST MODELS
you have a Trust Model in your computer-- it came with your browser. Do you know what's in it? why would you trust it?
we should have a general presentation and discussion of Trust Models here on IEv
think about this for a minute: if i have a proper authentication process and message integrity I don't care if you do steal my account number. although you can create a transaction: you can't authenticate it
that your data is going to be stolen on the net goes without saying. we should all operate on the basis that that has already happened.
A most back-handed kind of birthday card written from a glass-half-empty perspective but an amusing piece nevertheless.
From a glass-half-full pov, I would like to salute the incredible connections that the Internet now facilitates. That plus the much greater visibility that it brings to all human activities is a great present for us all.
You ask, Nicole, where we will all be in 40 years, but I don't think you need to look as far ahead as that. In 10 years, I think the Internet will have gone largely mobile and desktop PCs and even laptops will be anachronisms. We all will be using our cellphones or if we're power users, our smart phones, to cloud compute to our heart's content. It's only a matter of time.
Nicole, I'd like information to be shared on a much bigger scale. We're already seeing it with data.gov, but there are so many government entities and universities entrenched in old systems and that are resistant to change. I think in the science and medical fields especially we could accomplish so much more if we combined forces and could share info more easily.
Hi Paul. I'm glad you liked it and found it amusing. No worries. I'm not calling on Congress for anything. It's not up to Congress to decide whether we start paying for content online, that's for sure!
Thanks for pointing that out, Mike Acker. Vint Cerf actually said the same thing at a recent conference, and on live chat on Internet Evolution. When he was asked what he would've done differently in the beginning, he said he would've put in a much stronger focus on authentication into the Internet's architecture: "I think it would be very useful to have in hand ways to strongly authenticate persons and equipment and even software in the Internet. It would aid in avoiding malware or being phished or pharmed, for instance," he said.
Fascinating to hear these guys say "whoops" on security, isn't it?
Thanks guys, I'm glad you enjoyed it! Fun for me to write as well. But yeah you both make great points, and I'm curious as well to see where we'll be in another 40 years. The thing is, I think it's going to look completely different than it does now, but there's so much hype around what we have today (Twitter, Facebook) as if these things are the Mecca of the Internet. I think and hope we're going to move far beyond social media. The next 40 years should be interesting. What do you hope to see accomplished?
The ThinkerNet does not reflect the views of TechWeb. The ThinkerNet is an informal means of communication to members and visitors of the Internet Evolution site. Individual authors are chosen by Internet Evolution to blog. Neither Internet Evolution nor TechWeb assume responsibility for comments, claims, or opinions made by authors and ThinkerNet bloggers. They are no substitute for your own research and should not be relied upon for trading or any other purpose.
Ahh, the holiday season is upon us: People have begun bargain hunting, department stores are donning premature decorations, turkeys are being shot to death, and email inboxes everywhere are being graced with season-appropriate promotional materials so absurd, one might think they were actually written by the clinically insane.
Considering President Obama went and took the Nobel Peace Prize this year (attention hog, much?), Internet Evolution had to settle for a nomination for the second best prize in the world: a MIN Editorial & Design award. And we're happy to say that we won. Big time.
NEW YORK -- Web 2.0 Expo -- Here at the Javits Center in New York City, several industry innovators have come out to take the stage at the Web 2.0 Expo. But some are having a hard time keeping the audience's attention. The culprit? What else? Twitter.
The debate over whether Google is fairly aggregating newspaper content online has been going on for a while, with Rupert Murdoch and News Corp. leading the discourse. Typically it's followed a consistent pattern: Murdoch complains about Google stealing its content to no real benefit to his company, someone suggests hiding the content from Google, and things get quiet on the News Corp. side of the room.
While Google introduces its new Chrome OS (which I'm hearing will be widely available in one year? Did I mishear that?), IBM announced 10 new products today to help companies using IBM System z mainframe technology.
Smarter Collaboration: How to Thrive in a Challenging Business Environment Market conditions are changing faster than ever, and organizations need to improve their agility and adaptability in order to provide better service and improve processes. The ability to work with customers, business partners, and employees as effectively as possible - while at the same time holding down costs - is a key to success. READ THIS eBOOK
your weekly update of news, analysis, and
opinion from Internet Evolution - FREE! REGISTER HERE
Wanted! Site Moderators Internet Evolution is looking for a handful of readers to help moderate the message boards on our site – as well as engaging in high-IQ conversation with the industry mavens on our thinkerNet blogosphere. The job comes with various perks, bags of kudos, and GIANT bragging rights. Interested?
To save this item to your list of favorite Internet Evolution content so you can find it later in your Profile page, click the "Save It" button next to the item.
More companies are trolling social networks to find and vet potential job candidates. Beware the pitfalls of blurring the line between personal and professional lives.
When Reiter gets incensed over incompetent Verizon FiOS order-taking and support, he broadcasts it via Twitter. Did it do any good? How should your company offer Twitter support? Watch this for all the answers.
A digital content market is emerging. Only two things are known about it: the first is that at some point the Internet will primarily become a paid network. The second known factor is that there are innumerable variables in the digital content market that have yet to be worked out. It’s not known, for example, exactly how users will pay for content (micropayments, subscriptions, bartering of farm animals, other).
The Google backlash continues. After seeing their Project 10^100 submissions disappear into the bowels of a Google server farm, a group of irate developers has started their own site to re-collect and vote on the ideas.
Bad news! By eliminating the world’s digital divide we’re likely to create a new divide: the information divide, where we end up creating a two-tier Internet where access to 'quality' content is controlled and charged for by mega-corporations, and the gulf between information haves and have-nots is entirely dependent on how much money they have. This is, of course, an almost exact inversion of the current situation on the Internet – where access is expensive and content is free.
As enterprises leap into the Web 2.0 world of blogging, commenting, and social networking, just 'being there' won't deliver ROI. You may want a 'Web Evangelist' to systematically harvest the feedback in order to polish your product or service.
Good news! The cost of Internet infrastructure, services, and access devices has been plummeting at an accelerating rate over the last 10 years and will approach a point in the next 20 years where these technologies become so fantastically cheap that ubiquitous, low-cost, high-speed networks, storage, and access devices will effectively eliminate the digital divide for most of the world's population.
The city of San Francisco is on the leading edge of using the Internet to provide government transparency. It is providing WiFi for its have-nots, and its DataSF.org initiative is putting the city's valuable data back in the hands of its citizens, with innovative results.
What can users today do to protect their online privacy? The simplest and most obvious option is to not use the Internet – at all. However, once all digital information is consolidated over the Internet, trying to protect digital identity by simply unplugging from the Internet becomes impossible – a fact that has manifest implications for civil liberties, Saunders says.
Industry initiatives and government stimulus funds are giving enterprise software vendors a great opportunity to help build out and manage smart grid technologies.
The problem with telepresence is that it's not universally accepted, because video calling isn't. While we can all do video calling, we also apparently worry too much about how we look. If we want HD telepresence in our future, we have to dress down, mess up our hair, and dive into our online life.
The US loses about $20 billion a year on pirated software, movies, and music. But public policy can help stem the tide of digital theft. For example, France has recently passed a 'three strikes and you’re out' law, whereby if after two warning letters an individual continues to download pirated software then his Internet access will be cut off. US policy makers should consider adopting similar policies.
Financial management planning does not need to include Voodoo economics, but it does help to tap into the knowledge base of your team through some sort of real-time system. We explore your options.
When Reiter gets incensed over incompetent Verizon FiOS order-taking and support, he broadcasts it via Twitter. Did it do any good? How should your company offer Twitter support? Watch this for all the answers.
The successor to the BlackBerry Bold 9000 – the Bold 9700 – will be available soon in the US. Is it worth upgrading? Reiter's got one, and offers advice.
Digg
Del.icio.us
Reddit
Email This
TWEET THIS
