The Times of India is reporting that by 2010, the Internet will be hopelessly “deadlocked” with both users and web sites and could potentially suffer a “meltdown.” Their report is based on a recently released study that claims that the sheer volume of data transmitted will exceed the ability of the network to keep up with demand within three to five years.
The study, which was carried out by Nemertes Research Group, is based on analysis of current Internet infrastructure and projected traffic over the coming years. The study’s authors conclude that as soon as 2010, major Internet players such as Google and YouTube will be unable to keep up with demand, and that e-commerce is likely to be hit hard by a lack of available bandwidth.
Of course this is not the first time someone has cried “the sky is falling” about an impending Internet disaster. As far back as 1996, some so-called Internet “experts” were predicting that the influx of new households online would reach a tipping point, and the infrastructure of the world wide web would be saturated and on the verge of collapse by 1999.
Of course the projected “Internet crash of ‘99″ never took place, and in the years that followed the Internet has continued to grow and expand with well over a billion users, and probably nearly as many web sites.
And who could forget those year 2000 crash predictions? Even moderate and respected analysts were predicting that the so-called “millennium bug” would have a devastating effect on the Internet. Flash forward seven years and it easy to poke fun at some of these gloom and doom predictions with the benefit of hindsight.
But could there be some veracity to the new studies, and more importantly, isn’t it just possible that we will eventually reach a point where bandwidth constraints fall to such levels that new Internet innovation will be all but locked out?
The authors of the recent study suggest that great online innovations like Amazon.com or Google may not be able to get their foot in the door in the near future because of increasing bandwidth demand and outdated infrastructure. Obviously, innovation is the lifeblood of the Internet, and without the opportunity for new startups to make their mark on line, the net will fall into a stagnant economic hole — and certainly no one wants that.
Luckily, the report does not suggest that Internet operations will fail completely — as in a full crash — but only that bandwidth constraints may seriously impair e-commerce and prevent the kind of risk-taking online that could produce the next YouTube, MySpace, or even the next Google. Scary thought.
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wow…. that would suck…
Comment by Emily Hannah — December 7, 2007 @ 12:01 pm