Elon University

Archives: Expert Predictions

Friends and Partners: Building Global Community on the Internet

The ability to transcend geographical, cultural and political boundaries, as well as barriers of race, gender, age and handicap, unleashes a potential for understanding and cooperation that perhaps has never been possible on this scale before … The ability to promote and nurture community and partnership which transcends all sorts of boundaries can yield enormous benefits.

IP Next Generation Overview

Another market which could use the next-generation IP is device control. This consists of the control of everyday devices such as lighting equipment, heating and cooling equipment, motors, and other types of equipment which are currently controlled via analog switches and in aggregate consume considerable amounts of electrical power. The size of this market is enormous and requires solutions which are simple, robust, easy to use, and very low cost.

IP Next Generation Overview

The possibility is that every television set will become an Internet host. As the world of digital high-definition television approaches, the differences between a computer and a television will diminish.

IP Next Generation Overview

Nomadic personal computing devices seem certain to become ubiquitous as their prices drop and their capabilities increase … They will need a common protocol which can work over a variety of physical networks. These types of devices will become consumer devices and will replace the current generation of cellular phones, pagers, and personal digital assistants … The nature of nomadic computing requires an Internet protocol to have built-in authentication and confidentiality. It also goes without saying that these devices will need to communicate with the current generation of computers.

IP Next Generation

The next phase of growth will probably not be driven by the computer market … What is likely to happen is that other kinds of markets will develop. These markets will fall into several areas. They all have the characteristic that they are extremely large. They also bring with them a new set of requirements which were not as evident in the early stages of IPv4 deployment. The new markets are also likely to happen in parallel with one another. It may turn out that we will look back on the last 10 years of Internet growth as the time when the Internet was small and only doubling every year. The challenge for an IPng is to provide a solution which solves today’s problems and is attractive in these emerging markets.

Laws of Electronic Communities & Their Roads: High Noon?

People from all walks of life still have the opportunity to help shape the eventual form of laws in cyberspace. In fact, the democratic nature of electronic communities coupled with the ever increasing numbers of people joining the Internet require continual change in the application of these legal principles. Because users of electronic communities can determine the rights and duties of their fellow participants via an acceptable-use policy, commonality may be achieved as disparate groups in different networks realize independently similar conclusions regarding how to apply fairness and justice in their electronic community.

Grassroots Democracy and the Internet: The Telecommunications Policy Roundtable – Northeast USA

Neighborhood associations will probably flourish as people discover the ability to address common concerns like crime, public services, and property transactions (and gossip!). Ultimately, local governments may be the most impacted by an increase in grassroots associations. Finally, the most pressing task in promoting grassroots democracy is to diffuse Internet technology. The major barriers lie less in public policy or economics than in simply teaching people how to use the technology.