Internet DRAFT - draft-isoc-internet-for-everyone
draft-isoc-internet-for-everyone
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Informational Comment Vint Cerf
Internet Draft Internet Society
Document: draft-isoc-internet-for-everyone-00.txt April 1999
Category: Informational
The Internet is for Everyone
Status of this Memo
This document is an Internet-Draft and is in full conformance with
all provisions of Section 10 of RFC2026 [1]. Internet-Drafts are
working documents of the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF), its
areas, and its working groups. Note that other groups may also
distribute working documents as Internet-Drafts. Internet-Drafts are
draft documents valid for a maximum of six months and may be
updated, replaced, or obsoleted by other documents at any time. It
is inappropriate to use Internet-Drafts as reference material or to
cite them other than as "work in progress."
The list of current Internet-Drafts can be accessed at
http://www.ietf.org/ietf/1id-abstracts.txt
The list of Internet-Draft Shadow Directories can be accessed at
http://www.ietf.org/shadow.html.
1. Abstract
The Internet really is for everyone. However, it will only be such
if we make it so.
2. The Internet is for everyone
The Internet is for everyone!
How easy to say - how hard to achieve!
Where are we in achieving this noble objective?
The Internet is in its 11th year of annual doubling since 1988.
There are over 44 million hosts on the Internet and an estimated 150
million users, worldwide. By 2006, the Internet is likely to exceed
the size of the global telephone network, if it has not by that time
become the telephone network by virtue of IP telephony. Moreover,
tens of millions of Internet-enabled appliances will have joined
traditional servers, desktops and laptops as part of the Internet
family.
Pagers, cell telephones and personal digital assistants may well
have merged to become the new telecommunications tool of the next
decade. However, even at the scale of the telephone system is it
sobering to realize that only half the population of Earth has ever
made a telephone call.
It is estimated that commerce on the network will reach somewhere
between $1.8T and $3.2T by 2003. That is only four years from now
(but a long career in Internet years).
The number of users of Internet will likely reach over 300 million
by the end of the year 2000, but that is only about 5% of the
world's population. By 2047 the world's population may reach about
11 billion. If only 25% of the then-world's population is on the
Internet, that is nearly 3 billion users or ten times the population
estimated at the end of the next year.
As high bandwidth access becomes the norm, through digital
subscriber loops, cable modems and digital terrestrial and satellite
radio links, the convergence of media available on the Internet will
become obvious. Television, radio, telephony and the traditional
print media will find counterparts on the Internet - and will be
changed in profound ways by the presence of software that transforms
the one-way media into interactive resources, shareable by many.
The Internet is proving to be one of the most powerful amplifiers of
speech every invented. It offers a global megaphone for voices that
might otherwise be heard only feebly, if at all. It invites and
facilitates multiple points of view and dialog in ways
unimplementable by the traditional, one-way, mass media.
The Internet can facilitate democratic practices in unexpected ways.
Did you know that proxy voting for stock shareholders is now
commonly supported on the Internet? Perhaps we can find additional
ways in which to simplify and expand the voting franchise in other
domains, including the political, as access to Internet increases.
The Internet is becoming the repository of all we have accomplished
as a society. It is becoming a kind of disorganized Boswell of the
human spirit. Be thoughtful in what you commit to email, news
groups, and other media - it may well turn up in a web search some
day. Shared databases on the Internet are acting to accelerate the
pace of research progress, thanks to online access to commonly
accessible repositories.
The Internet is moving off the planet! Already, interplanetary
Internet is part of the NASA Mars mission program now underway at
the Jet Propulsion Laboratory. By 2008 we should have a well-
functioning Earth-Mars network that serves as a nascent backbone of
an interplanetary system of Internets - InterPlaNet is a network of
Internets! Ultimately, we will have interplanetary Internet relays
in polar solar orbit so that they can see most of the planets and
their interplanetary gateways for most if not all of the time.
The Internet is for everyone - but it won't be if it isn't
affordable by all that wish to partake of its services, so we must
dedicate ourselves to making Internet as affordable as other
infrastructure so critical to our well being. While we follow
Moore's Law to reduce the cost of Internet-enabling equipment, let
us also seek to stimulate regulatory policies that take advantage of
the power of competition to reduce costs.
The Internet is for everyone, - but it won't be if Governments
restrict access to it, so we must dedicate ourselves to keeping the
network unrestricted, unfettered and unregulated. We must have the
freedom to speak and the freedom to hear.
The Internet is for everyone - but it won't be if it cannot keep up
with the explosive demand for its services, so we must dedicate
ourselves to continuing its technological evolution and development
of the technical standards the lie at the heart of the Internet
revolution. Let us dedicate ourselves to the support of the Internet
Architecture Board, the Internet Engineering Steering Group, the
Internet Research Task Force and the Internet Engineering Task Force
as they drive us forward into an unbounded future.
The Internet is for everyone - but it won't be until in every home,
in every business, in every school, in every town and every country
on the Globe, Internet can be accessed without limitation, at any
time and in every language.
The Internet is for everyone - but it won't be if it is too complex
to be used easily by everyone. Let us dedicate ourselves to the task
of simplifying Internet's interfaces and to educating all that are
interested in its use.
The Internet is for everyone - but it won't be if legislation around
the world creates a thicket of incompatible laws that hinder the
growth of electronic commerce, stymie the protection of intellectual
property, and stifle freedom of expression and the development of
market economies. Let us dedicate ourselves to the creation of a
global legal framework in which laws work across national boundaries
to reinforce the upward spiral of value that Internet is capable of
creating.
The Internet is for everyone - but it won't be if its users cannot
protect their privacy and the confidentiality of transactions
conducted on the network. Let us dedicate ourselves to the
proposition that cryptographic technology sufficient to protect
privacy from unauthorized disclosure should be freely available,
applicable and exportable.
Moreover, as authenticity lies at the heart of trust in networked
environments, let us dedicate ourselves to work towards the
development of authentication methods and systems capable of
supporting electronic commerce through the Internet.
The Internet is for everyone - but it won't be if parents and
teachers cannot voluntarily create protected spaces for our young
people for whom the full range of Internet content may be
inappropriate. Let us dedicate ourselves to the development of
technologies and practices that offer this protective flexibility to
those who accept responsibility to provide it.
The Internet is for everyone - but it won't be if we are not
responsible in its use and mindful of the rights of others who share
its wealth. Let us dedicate ourselves to the responsible use of this
new medium and to the proposition that with the freedoms Internet
enables comes a commensurate responsibility to use these powerful
enablers with care and consideration. For those who choose to abuse
these privileges, let us dedicate ourselves to developing the
necessary tools to combat the abuse and punish the abuser.
I hope Internauts everywhere will join with the Internet Society and
like-minded organizations to achieve this easily stated but hard to
achieve goal. As we near the milestone of the third millennium, what
better theme could we possibly ask for than making the Internet the
medium of the new millennium?
Internet IS for everyone - but it won't be unless WE make it so.
3. Author's Addresses
Vint Cerf
Chairman, Internet Society
April 1999
Email: vcerf@MCI.NET
