Did anyone else see this article on ZDNet (http://news.zdnet.com/2100-1035_22-6237715.html) about the Internet hitting its limit?

AT&T has claimed that, without investment, the Internet's current network architecture will reach the limits of its capacity by 2010.

Jim Cicconi, vice president of legislative affairs for AT&T, warned that the current systems that constitute the Internet will not be able to cope with the increasing amounts of video and user-generated content being uploaded.

"The surge in online content is at the center of the most dramatic changes affecting the Internet today," he said. "In three years' time, 20 typical households will generate more traffic than the entire Internet today."

What do you guys think? Is there truth in this guy's argument? Should we be worried?

There's been an uber-high bandwidth (as in ~8GB/sec) successor to the current internet in the works for quite some time now (since the 90's I think). It is already being utilized by the military and several universities here in the U.S. AFAIK.

I don't believe that the internet is in any danger of expiring. It's far too profitable an enterprise.

.... It's far too profitable an enterprise....

exactly!

when there's monies to be had, it'll never end !! Why do you think Prostitution has lasted so long !!

mtfbwya

Interesting. While I don't think the Internet will "die" by 2010 it does seem to me that the ever-increasing utilization of the Internet for video will place additional strain on the Internet. IMHO 100 Mbps is what we need for "last mile" connections but here in the U.S.A. I don't think our ISP's backbones are ready to support that much additional bandwidth demand, hence AT&T's statement about the additional investment that needs to be made in Internet infrastructure.

As long as I can transact business online though I'll be OK. Everything else is a nice-to-have.

No, it will not die, but rather, providers will die off by refusing to add new technology to their services to increase bandwidth. Companies like Verizon, however, are all set to take on the increasing needs with a variety of internet choices, and their fiber-optics service is the future of accessing the internet...don't worry, the internet is gonna be just fine...

Not to mention that it might be rationed a bit until resources can catch the infrastructure up with the demand too. I'm sure that they'll take precautions to prevent total failure of the internet in the meantime though.

^Already have...illegally that is. The cable internet providers are getting a little sneaky by cutting off access for a certain amount of time for people who download extreme amounts of crap...it's been reported several times, it isn't legal (I'm pretty sure it's not at least), but there's not much to stop them...

Wasn't CERN developing a next-generation system of the Internets? I think they called it the Grid and were using it to facilitate communication and resources for their particle accelerator. They said they'll eventually get it out to the unwashed masses, I believe.

Yes, but who is going to pay for all the upgrades necessary to bring it to the "unwashed masses?" In all likelihood the ISP's (in the U.S.A. at least) and so they have to be convinced that the masses will pay for the additional performance.

I'm paying about USD$50 per month for my broadband Internet access (10 Mbps down/1 Mbps up) but I'm not really interested in paying more than that for Internet access. Of course since cable is my only option for broadband Internet service I guess I'll be stuck with paying higher prices if my ISP wants to charge them. I definitely don't want to go back to dial-up. :p

I think it was the trick of all internet service providers. The ultimate goal of all internet providers is to transform the internet into the cable television pricing model. Through it they got a lot of money.