Slashdot Mirror
Hannu H. Kari Gives The Internet 2 More Years
erick99 writes "Dr. Hannu Kari says the Internet will will collapse in 2006 as reported in an article on ARS Technica. Yes, this is the same Dr. Kari who has predicted doom before, but it is still an entertaining read and there is more than a grain of truth in his reasoning." Reader Titney writes adds a couple of excerpts from an article on NewsRoom Finland: "The entire system will crumble to bits as the sheer bulk of rubbish circling around in the net exceeds the public pain threshold. ... When the internet is no longer operational for business purposes, one has to time warp back 10 to 20 years and make do without information networks"
Until Netcraft confirms it I wont believe it. I'll back check in two years at http://www.netcraft.com to verify his findings.
-- a 2006 web odyssey
...I have a bridge for sale.
"Accept that some days you are the pigeon, and some days you are the statue." - David Brent, Wernham Hogg
The entire system will crumble to bits as the sheer bulk of rubbish circling around in the net exceeds the public pain threshold. ...
Yeah, but when that happens we'll more likely timewarp back fifty or one hundred years. Spammers, virus copiers and script kiddies will simply be hunted down for sport and tortured on live TV. The penalty for being an idiot on the internet will be public beheading.
I'm begining to look forward to 2006 now.
I've always wondered whether a story that mentions Slashdot in the subject would bring on a recurisve slashdotting that would result in the ultimate destruction of the internet.
Well, it's worth a try anyway
Please read my Canon EOS tech blog at http://www.everyothershot.com
... Imminent death of the net predicted. Film at Eleven.
I predict that within one year, someone smart enough to know better will predict the demise of the Net within 2 years. Can I have my "Professional Futurologist" badge now?
Athletic Scholarships to universities make as much sense as academic scholarships to sports teams.
For those who didn't RTFA (like the editor), he was indeed predicting the end of the internet back in 2001. However, he was predicting that there were five years left. So he's been consistent on 2006.
Not that he's, yanno, sane or anything, but at least he's consistent.
[insert witty sig here]
...we all get fiber in heaven with no caps.
----
WWJD...For a Klondike Bar?
-- Thou hast strayed far from the path of the Avatar.
For example, I used to enjoy debates on newsgroups, but last I checked (several years ago), they were just full of trash. The topics I was interested in had been largely abandoned by those that were actually knowledgable in the fields due in great part to this.
Another example is Yahoo message boards. Here we see what the lack of pretty much any moderation entails. Spam infested, crapflood infested, it's pretty difficult to get any meaningful discussion there.
I think what will happen is that there will be heavier moderation and more stringent entrance requirements for various online forums. The Internet will still function, it just won't be as open as it once was.
does this guy seriously think people will just sit by and let this happen, even assumning it's possible? I think it's safe to say at the first sign of problems around 6 gillion nerds world wide would start working on fixes and sending them to anyone who might possibly give a damn. Given the number of users, even IF this is a problem, it could be solved quickly.
No, one has to create VPNs and block all access that doesn't come from the inside.
Or you could use dedicated lines that have no connection to the Internet.
You have two hands and one brain, so always code twice as much as you think!
Is this like the predication that we'd run out of IP addresses in the late 1990's. We all know that happened. Wait, no it didn't. Humans fixed the problem with private networks and NATing. In the process, they improved security and sanctity of their networks.
It's a funny thing, networks. You see, since humans control them, they make changes and adjustments in response to the needs of the network. Thus the network grows, adapts, and becomes a more powerful entity.
That being said, there are two things I wish I could exorcise from the net: Spam and viruses. These two creatures are responsible for more useless traffic than just about anything else. It would also be nice if protocols like GNUTella died or were fixed. The number of useless packets generated by such protocols is amazing.
Javascript + Nintendo DSi = DSiCade
Today the good professor warned that the fun bus could all come to a crashing halt in less than two years because of steady increases in everything that makes the Internet such a pain in the rear. Viruses, trojans, spam, and security flaws
I suffer from none of those things. Never have. And I use both Linux and WinXP. A good portion of my friends, family and coworkers don't suffer either.
Basically, this guy is saying that the Internet in its current form won't be around in five years.
I have a saying: "It doesn't matter until it affects the common man - then it will get fixed." It does not matter what "it" is - as long as "it" only affects a small number of folks "it" won't get fixed.
Look back at the old DOS days - when the 640K memory limit only affected high-end users, it didn't matter. When Joe Average started to bump his head, the problem was fixed (largely by the introduction of Windows enhanced mode). Look at spam - now that it affects just about everyone, moves are being made to fix it.
Yes, in five years we the Internet as we know it today won't exist - open SMTP proxies won't be allowed to exist, users will have up-to-date virus protection and firewalls, etc.
Guess what - the Internet as it existed five years ago doesn't exist, either!
www.eFax.com are spammers
I predict another five years for the Internet in its present form
I agree absolutely. If I saw a glimpse today of the net in five years I probably wouldn't recognize it. It is a cosstantly evolving organism. In 1999 I wouldn't recognize the net today.
Will it die? No, of course not. Games, porn, mail, chat, music, p2p, that's not going anywhere.
Business? Will businesses need to re-address the way they do business? More security, VPNs maybe, perhaps even leaving the net for other Information Systems solutions? Perhaps. If I knew the answer I would be rich in 5 years.
What the next big thing? Who knows. I never thought in 1999 that music downloads for money could be successful.
"You cannot find out which view is the right one by science in the ordinary sense." - C.S. Lewis on Intelligent Design
I know that a lot of our clients and feiends are using e-mail less and less. They are finding that they are buried under a growing deluge of spam and virus laden messages, and are moving back to telephone calls, faxes, and even paper letters.
We are lucky in having an ISP with superb and effective spam filtering, so only see a few dozen messages a day that fit that description.
Likwise we're very vigilant about virus protection and use a firewall, so have thus far avoided any virus infection.
Still, most casual users aren't at this level, and they are finding that the Internet is less useful than it used to be.
I don't hink that the Internet will collapse, but I can see a time when we start seeing casual users abandon it as more trouble than it's worth.
And just to throw in a very frigtening idea, what happens when one or more spammers successfully sue ISPs for blocking their mail? Even if it can't be done domestically, various international trade agreements may support such and action.
Three Squirrels
Well, the public telephone network suffered from the problem of unsolicited bulk marketers calling people during dinner.
It still survives. But it did have a few adjustments made to it.
- CallerIDs to screen calls.
- Answering machines to screen calls. Turning off the ringers to remove the sense of urgency that used to be ascribed to incoming phone calls.
- Legislation for donotcall.gov.
- Paying the telephone company more for unlisted landlines.
- Not giving out phone numbers to any entry point to the direct marketing industry databases.
- Moving to cell phones that are automatically unlisted.
I guess I see the internet just evolving around the problems in multiple ways.I hate to say goodbye to anonymity in email that is abused by spammers because it has a special place for whistleblowers. But perhaps blog postings can still serve that purpose.
"Provided by the management for your protection."
"Can anyone tell me what the Internet was and how it almost destroyed humankind in the year 2007?" - school teacher Debbie
If you had super powers, would you use them for good, or for awesome?
When people and programs automatically accept incoming messages only from signed correspondants who match their contact database, all the rest of the messages will be treated as spam. The Net will lose its youthful trust, and much of its optimism and openness to change, which will inhibit innovation and social growth. But it won't die. It will grow old, bitter and rich.
--
make install -not war
*cough*Mathus*cough*
Just as a broken clock is right twice a day, eventually some doomsayer is going to be right, but I'm going to go out on a limb and say it won't be Dr. Kari, and it will not be in 2006.
Information wants to be anthropomorphized.
This is what happens when you use a Mac (Apple has been dying for years) with a BSD-dying-for-years-based OS and live in a country where it goes dark for months on end. It infects your thinking. You start watching film noir, dressing in black and predicting the death of everything from the Internet to your neighbor's dog.
Lighten up already. If the Internet takes as long to die as either Apple or BSD, we're safe well into the next generation or two.
-Charles
Learning HOW to think is more important than learning WHAT to think.
And it didn't happen then, either.
-- Jim Crigler In 1937, I began, like Lazarus, the impossible return. -- Whittaker Chambers
Some of us were remembering the the M7 Loma Prieta quake exactly 15 years ago Monday. 10% of Stanford buildings were condemned, several freeways collapsed, but the InterNet went humming along. People used it send email when the phones were dead and exchange earthquake data. At that time the net was more concentrated in the US with root servers in D.C. and Silicon Valley.
... When the internet is no longer operational for business purposes, one has to time warp back 10 to 20 years and make do without information networks
Perhaps the author remembers when the telephone and the postal mail services, both got so flooded with junk that all business quit using them, entirely, several years ago.
I also remember them becoming flooded with junk, but I don't remember when business quit using them.
And if the author does remember business quitting to use these services, what does he think we will return to ??? "giddyup, trigger" ???
From Sealab 2021 Debbie: Now who can tell me what the internet was and how it almost destroyed the world in 2006?
Only the people who believed the internet was some kind of nirvana, where all the sins of mankind were going to be washed away by technology, are disappointed with the way things are going. The rest of us deal with the quirks and it still proves most useful. And businesses are the most locked in. Are we going to go back to modems and BBSs? Not if we want to stay in business. We will deal. The internet will deal. And mankind will remain unchanged in the face of technology.
I won't read the article because I don't want to be liable for more rubbish pouring through the pipes of the Internet. I don't want to help him fulfill his prophesy.
/. have a good reason to not RTFA.
For once, we all at
Obviously, the internet is made up of not only the hardware and the software and the data - it is also the people, and people are ultimately flexible and capable of adaptation to the situations that may arise. Just as the internet allows routing around failed nodes, so will people route around the noise.
If you talk about pain, consider the withdrawal pain all of us will have to go through if the internet just wasn't available for all of our daily things anymore.
An example of adaptability of things relating to human-ness influence - languages have generally changed over the ages, and has withstood the assault of abuse and misuse more or less intact. People are always worried that new coinage and usage of the language will corrupt the language to the point where it is no longer useful - this is far from the truth, and so it will be for the internet.
The Internet will collapse, because there's too much crap floating around? I think there's a lot of crap floating around, but I don't get to notice much of it due to my software and usage patterns. I think this technique will continue to work for years to come.
Ok, so maybe email is suffering from a spam overdose. This can be countered by fixing the protocols. It won't be RFC 821, but it will still be there in some form.
As for www, as long as I don't go to crap sites, I don't see crap. Simple as such. Just because there are lots of crap sites doesn't mean there won't be any good ones. And frankly, I don't think the percentage of crap sites is that high (unless you're talking code quality).
Argh, I'm not going to think up any more examples. It's a ridiculous claim, why am I even responding.
Please correct me if I got my facts wrong.
The Internet is a playground with no dried up old teachers to tell us not to hang upside down on the monkey bars. But groups and structures based on groups mature just like individuals, only slower. As the Internet evolves it will become self-policing. As we can see already with moderated forums, the relevant information can be made to bubble to the top with some small effort of users of said information. It is in the self interest of all Internet users to make it a viable place to find and exchange information. We are all selfish, and I think we'll get what we want. The other advantage the Internet has is that there are a lot of smart people using it and smart people are even better at figuring out how to get what they want than the average Joe. Perhaps the Internet would have already "collapsed" in a useful sense were it not for Google and others. Where there's a will there's a way.
Well if Spam and Spyware continue to increase then the net experience will be affected for some.
Thing is spyware can be avoided by ditching Windows and Spam is starting to being tackled with email system changes such as the one proposed by Yahoo.
"Television programming will become so bogged down with advertisements and pandering to the lowest common denominator that it will collapse under its own weight in bloat, and we will go back to the telegrammophone."
In the future, I would want to not be isolated from my friends in the Space Station.
Basically what I'm getting at is that it doesn't matter until someone in a position that has the power to force change is affected directly or indirectly.
As with your example with DOS, more than high-end users were being affected. The competition work out alternatives to use extra memory (EMS memory anyone ?), and it wasn't until MS realized that they were going to loose to the competition that they came out with XMS and High Memory, etc. scheme from DOS 5 onwards.
Windows Enhanced mode did not take effect for a long time. Lots of applications were still written and being written for DOS, even when Windows 3.1 was around. It wasn't until the release of Windows 95 that things began to change and people started to look towards Windows as a "real" application platform.
The entire system will crumble to bits as the sheer bulk of rubbish circling around in the net exceeds the public pain threshold.
The doctor is wrong for several reasons.
First off, his premise is based off of nothing changing. The Internet behaves like an evolutionary biological system. Spammers send out spam, people build spam filters to lock out spam, and then the spammers improve spam to beat the filters. It mirrors a biological eveloutionary race. Unless one group eliminates the other entirely by an new improvement in strategy, this will go back and forth for a long time.
Furhtermore, there is also a predator-prey model at work. As the predators(spam,viruses,spyware) become more prevalent, the 'weak' users will be weeded out. Actually, they will get fed up and abandon the meidum. The 'stronger' prey are more impervious to such nusances, and will just ignore them. As the easy prey decreeses, so does the profitiability of spammers, spyware, and vectors for virri. This will cause their numbers to drop, and allow a new batch of weak prey to enter the model.
The netw will never 'crash' due to issues such as this, but it may experience rises and falls in popularity among the masses. The sky is not falling.
HA! I just wasted some of your bandwidth with a frivolous sig!
that means that soon the only place to find any info will be slashdot...
AccountKiller
Ah, but will it die before or after implementing IPv6?
If it's after, I think we can relax a bit longer. Hell, I'm sure Duke Nukem Forever is currently aimed at IPv6 networked play...
Here's a nice hypothetical question: What would you do if somehow you knew 24 hours in advance that the world as we know it, i.e. the internet, would collapse? Would you download the latest version of your favorite Linux programs, turn of the computer in quiet resignation, or would you nostalgically make your last few Slashdot posts? Think about it.