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US Has More IPv6 Eyeballs Than Asia, Because of Apple

Posted by timothy on from the yummy-apple dept.

An anonymous reader writes "Google has been checking to see who's using IPv6. According to the company's tracking, half of all IPv6-capable systems seen by Google are Macs, helping the US land in fifth place in percentage of IPv6 users world wide, ahead of China and Japan."

5 of 162 comments (clear)

  1. sounds damn scary by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    IPv6 Eyeballs! Run!!!!

  2. False negatives abound by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    OK, so I have 7 computers in my house. They all run either Linux or Vista. (Some both as two are dual boot). They are all IPv6 capable. However, my Linksys NATing router is not. So unless my machines find an ISATAP server somewhere, there is going to be no information that Google gets showing that all my machines could do it if I just sprung for a new router. I would imagine there are a lot of people in the same situation. I guess if they are trying to find out how many homes are capable - then maybe this is the right way. But if they are trying to just see how many COMPUTERS - then it isn't going to be correct.

  3. Re:Linux much by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    you can't completely ignore that Linux has been pushing IPv6 for some time.

    Yes, yes we can.

  4. This result seems to be because of Apple routers by JSBiff · · Score: 5, Informative

    From the article, I picked up the reason for this result (but not until after posting a similar question, I must confess). Most home computer users, regardless of their platform, tend to connect to the internet through some sort of router device. Most of these routers use IPv4 only, and use NAT to share the Internet connection.

    Many Mac users, instead of using some 'generic' WiFi access point, instead use Apple's Airport Extreme router. Per the article, Airport Extreme's have support for IPv6 built right into the router, and the router will *automatically* route IPv6 traffic using the 6to4 standard (which basically tunnels the traffic over the IPv4 connection from the ISP).

    I suspect that if you connected your Ubuntu computer (or Vista, or XP if you installed IPv6 manually) to the Internet using an Airport Extreme, then IPv6 would work fine under Ubuntu too. That is, I think the 'magic' here that makes IPv6 "just work" is in the router, not in the OS.

  5. Re:Do Macs automatically setup a 6over4 Tunnel? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny
    Well, you went through
    • Denial (No way! Apple would have to be tunneling)
    • Anger (Damn it, I shoulda read the article... Apple IS tunneling. Why hasn't anyone told me!!), and
    • Bargaining(So is anyone ELSE doing tunneling? I'd like to get one, but Apple's so expensive)

    After you Google for it, it will be Depression (*SIGH* No, nobody else is doing it any cheaper.) and finally Acceptance (Apple is so Awesome! I really shoulda switched sooner)... so, spare yourself the depression and just buy one. k? :)