Elon University

Archives: Expert Predictions

How Anarchy Works: On Location with the Masters of the Metaverse, the Internet Engineering Task Force

IETFers know the Net is caught in the middle of a fatal embrace between the Godzilla of Microsoft and the smog monster of the Regional Bell Operating Companies – with the Terminator of local and national government intervention hovering nearby. Commercial enterprises, government forces, and telecommunications providers are concerning themselves with the Net as they never have before … Some of the best thinkers in the IETF believe the greatest hope for the relative freedom and independence of the Net lies in a kind of self-canceling effect that may result from the interplay of these new outside threats. Could be.

How Anarchy Works: On Location with the Masters of the Metaverse, the Internet Engineering Task Force

Some say the problems with IP can be fixed only when they are free of the homogenizing effects of the IETF; because of its size, the argument goes, only the lowest common denominator of network thinking takes place at the IETF. These dissenters may end up ignoring the mainstream IETF work on the next generation of IP – and strategize a better IP in skunkworks alternative working groups. But in the elastic, anarchic structure of the IETF, there’s room for such alternatives, dissent, and working-around.

How Anarchy Works: On Location with the Masters of the Metaverse, the Internet Engineering Task Force

“We reject: kings, presidents, and voting. We believe in: rough consensus and running code.” Which might translate to, “In the IETF, we don’t allow caucusing, lobbying, and charismatic leaders to chart our path, but when something out on the Net really seems to work and makes sense to most of us, that’s the path we’ll adopt.” … The IETF’s political culture is hardy enough so that the Net mechanisms and structures it has fostered may very well enable the Net to survive in good enough shape through the next millennium.

The Playground of Big Science: Sandia Labs Used to be the ‘Conscience’ of the Cold War. Now That it’s Over, the $4 Billion Question is Whether These Specialists in Everything from Astrophysics to Virtual Reality Can Create a New Mission – and Find a New Market – Before Congress Pulls the Plug

Welcome to the infinitesimal world of micromachines – MEMS, as they are known – where physical laws are turned upside down and an entire mechanism can fit easily on the head of a pin … Not only are these “microlabs” smaller than anything that was imaginable a few years ago, but they can be fabricated 1,000 to the silicon wafer … Some of the fantasies include free-ranging microrobots cruising through the bloodstream, reporting on conditions, and making repairs on a cellular level as well as microfactories creating entire tool chests of micromachines.

The Playground of Big Science: Sandia Labs Used to be the ‘Conscience’ of the Cold War. Now That it’s Over, the $4 Billion Question is Whether These Specialists in Everything from Astrophysics to Virtual Reality Can Create a New Mission – and Find a New Market – Before Congress Pulls the Plug

For 100,000 years, nature gave you a great kinesthetic sense; you didn’t think about a problem, you lived through it … If we’re successful, … the computer will vanish, the screen will disappear, and you will live in a rich information world.’

‘Anarcho-Emergentist-Republicans’: Is There a New Politics Emerging in the Net/Cyberspace/Digital Culture?

Here in the heart of the information economy the dream that seizes the imagination of our rising cyber class of entrepreneurs and code-warriors is one of empowerment and autonomy through greater information and technology … It hinges on a certain mode of behavior becoming universalized – in this case computer literacy, gadget acquisition, and a voracious appetite for ersatz reality. If the Net truly does become the cultural glue holding the emerging global village together, the pressure toward such behavior will become relentless. Perhaps it will be fitting justice if the catalysts of the new digital politics are ultimately forced by the logic of their political ideals to become online Dr. Frankensteins battling their own creation run amuck.

‘Anarcho-Emergentist-Republicans’: Is There a New Politics Emerging in the Net/Cyberspace/Digital Culture?

Even if we presume the mass acquisition of PCs or set-top boxes enabling easy access to the wording of legislation or actual voting, it seems unlikely that citizen engagement will increase and that the venerable dream of a living democracy will simply be revivified by more bandwidth. If info and access were the magical formulas for a greater democracy, then C-Span would have already wrought major changes in the political landscape. In actuality, it seems, most people are not hankering for greater involvement in political debates and decisions; they’d just like the whole mess to go away while they scramble to make the rent or the mortgage.

‘Anarcho-Emergentist-Republicans’: Is There a New Politics Emerging in the Net/Cyberspace/Digital Culture?

If the price to be paid for efficient and secure Web commerce and e-mail is an online ID registry and the abolition of anonymous messages – or if opponents of digitized porn, inflammatory postings, or other messy side effects of the First Amendment manage to “clean up cyberspace” – we may find the Net’s much-vaunted freedom jettisoned in the rush to stake claims on virtual gold mines.