Where's the Money?
January 2005
It is often the case that it takes a significant amount of effort to produce seemingly simple outcomes. While we now take the net for granted and see nothing terribly spectacular behind the click of a mouse to bring up a web page, the mechanics behind this action are no less extraordinary than they ever were, no matter how much we now see this as the Internet simply doing what it was designed to do.
While the technical engineering aspects of the Internet are impressive, the business side of the network is no less impressive. In this article we will look at the manner in which Internet Service Providers (ISPs) from the perspective of their financial dealings, and take a look at some of the business pressures that are defining the structure of today's Internet industry. more
IP Adressing Schemes
December 2004
Any identity scheme for a communications network must achieve three quite fundamental functional objectives: identity , location and reachability . In more informal terms the network's identity scheme must be able to identify who is attached to the network, where they are located and how to pass a communication element from one location to another. There are a number of ways to do this.
One approach is to use distinct identity sets for each of these three functional requirements. This is similar to what we use ourselves, where my name identifies myself, but not my location, and a description my location does not reveal my identity. In such a multi-part system there is a requirement for a set of mapping functions to allow an identity to be mapped to a location (such as a telephone directory), and a pair of locations to be mapped to a path specification (such as a map). more
ICANN, the ITU and WSIS and Internet Governance (Part 2)
November 2004
In the previous article I looked at ICANN, its brief history, and its achievements. In this article I'd like to cast the net a bit wider and look at the concept of "Internet Governance" in the context of the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) and the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS).
One of ICANN's major achievements has been the restructuring of the generic top level domain name business, where it has been able replace a single monopoly operator with a system of registry operators and registrars. The registry operators are constrained not by regulatory fiat by under the terms of formal contracts with ICANN, so that regulatory constraint is replaced by contractual obligation.Registrars operate under a lighter set of strictures, and the major constraining factor is the competitive market for registrar services. In general, the outcomes of these restructuring measures have been positive, in that the price to consumers had fallen, the market has, to some extent stabilised, and the privileged monopoly position enjoyed by a single operator has been, to some extent, diluted. more
