The internet is becoming increasingly crowded with vast amounts of information, influencing us more profoundly. Concerns have emerged about the future development of the internet This was first published in 2005 (originally at hardware.no, now tek.no), from a paper I wrote at college (NITH) This post is translated by ChatGPT. YMMV. While the internet is often described as a global phenomenon, it's crucial not to overlook personal information systems, family, and group information systems as integral parts of it. This article is based on a piece by Berners-Lee, addressing two scenarios. The first concerns the internet becoming too monocultural, and the second deals with the opposite—becoming too multicultural. The article doesn't provide a definitive conclusion but focuses on the process leading to both scenarios. Human beings have always had the need to communicate. Native Americans used smoke signals, settlers sent letters via the Pony Express, and Alexander Graham Bell invented the telephone (Lauckner, Litner, 2003). Until today, various communication methods have been invented, such as mobile phones, pagers, satellites, and the internet, among others, with many still in use. Like all communication mediums, the internet has its own impact on the culture of its users (Eriksen, 2005). It is perhaps the communication medium that is still most under development. New websites emerge, better connectivity options are offered to private and public consumers, and various entities introduce new concepts for internet use (Valmot, 2004). Information technology has proven unpredictable in recent years. Initially hyped as a "tsunami that would sweep over us," the internet today is better described as a small stream growing into a large river (Eriksen, 2005). A qualitative method was employed to gather data on internet development. Literature searches were conducted using major search engines such as Google/Kvasir, as well as news websites' search engines and the ACM database. The theoretical compendium (2005) provided by NITH Oslo for PJ400 students was also utilized. This document contains some terms used in the article: The internet has not led to enormous economic growth or turned the world into a "global village" as previously predicted. Technology does not behave uniformly everywhere, but it has elicited diverse reactions globally. Many schools in Scandinavia assume that students have internet access at home, even though internet usage is still in its infancy (Eriksen, 2005). Sir Timothy John Berners-Lee (2002) addresses what the internet is, how it is structured, and how it came into being in his article. Towards the end, he presents two possible development scenarios for the internet, the two major concerns he describes: Berners-Lee (2002), Director of W3C, says: The internet will become like a huge McDonald's, and internationally, just like a monoculture. When the transatlantic internet cable was to be laid, the French feared that the Louvre culture would be trampled by Disney culture. By this, Berners-Lee means that there will be a portal superior to all others. This portal becomes the only medium through which everyone perceives the world. This scenario leads to homogenization of society. Berners-Lee further states that it would be terrible if the language were to become so simple that everyone could understand it. The problem with monoculture would then be the content, as it would become too uniform. He also addresses another scenario for the future development of the internet; it will become too multicultural. There will be several small communities with their own norms, cohesiveness, and understanding of communication. The author believes this can lead to significant problems when individuals from one community communicate with outsiders. Violence can often become the only method of communication (Berners-Lee, 2002). Communication becomes the challenge in the multicultural alternative, not only in everyday interactions as mentioned earlier but also between people on the internet. Language problems will arise when others have their understanding of their language, especially when character sets do not work well together. The first HTML documents could only represent Western European languages (not Asian languages), but in HTML 5.0 released in 2000, also known as XHTML, Unicode was supported. Only then could the character sets of the entire world be used in a standard manner (wikipedia.org, 2005). In an article written by Thomas Hylland Eriksen, a professor at the Department of Social Anthropology at Blindern, a concern closely related to what Berners-Lee describes is raised. "Pessimists of various kinds have argued that the internet would destroy thinking because information becomes so fragmented, that it would degenerate into a marketplace, that it would be a tool for total North American cultural dominance in the world, that it would weaken local communities and create anonymity and alienation." (Eriksen, 2005, "Unintended Consequences" (page numbers not provided)) "But this is not a concern supported by existing research on the internet today," says Eriksen. About half of the content on the internet is in languages other than English. Eriksen further suggests that it is not a bad idea for the world to be bilingual. As mentioned above, local communities can be either strengthened or weakened by being mediated via the internet. Some such communities, geographically fragmented, would hardly exist without a technology like the internet. A study from Trinidad shows that Trinidadians use the internet to strengthen their cultural identity, and it positively impacts traditional family values to maintain daily contact across oceans (Eriksen, 2005, "Unintended Consequences" (page numbers not provided)). The internet has a significant impact on work, leisure, knowledge, and worldview. Take Wikipedia as an example; Wikipedia is an online encyclopedia written and updated by volunteers around the clock worldwide (wikipedia.org, 2005). What makes Wikipedia special is that anyone, at any time, can edit any article. Here, information is asserted by ordinary people, not just professors, experts, and researchers. This is a medium where everyone can be informed about what they want, but users face a choice. The choice lies in trusting information that is not confirmed by higher academic institutions. Wikipedia is an information channel that influences our knowledge, whether the information is false or accurate. It was recently pointed out that one of the creators of Wikipedia, Jimmy Wales, believes that much of the information there is nonsense: "Wales, in response to a statement by a former colleague, admitted that much of the information on Wikipedia is not adequately safeguarded against errors. In some cases, the content has been nonsense." Today, there are many different user groups on the internet: users who want to run applications and interact over the internet, commercial internet service providers selling internet services for profit, private-sector internet providers operating part of the internet, governments upholding laws, protecting consumers, and so on. Owners of internet patents and providers of public services also fall under these user groups (Clark, Wroclawski, Sollins, Braden, 2002). Within these mentioned categories, there are also various types of users: people who send spam to make money, music lovers who want to share their recordings, copyright holders who want to stop them, people who want to talk to each other privately, while authorities want to eavesdrop on conversations. With so many user groups within this field growing larger every day, the development of the internet will increase in line with technological advancements. This is considering new services being launched and new connectivity options (lyse.no, 2001). The flow of information reaches new heights every day (internettrafficreport.com, 2005); cable networks must be expanded, and at certain times, the internet becomes overloaded (Doctorow, 2005). In 1997, French Telecom had to build a new cable network that increased capacity fivefold to keep up with internet development (itavisen.no, 1997). In 2004, over 60% of Norwegian households were connected to the internet (ssb.no, 2003), and today, 695,000 private households in Norway have high-speed internet connectivity (itavisen.no, 2005). Two years ago, there were over 605 million computers connected to the internet (infoplease.com, 2002); in 1999, the number was 162 million (Oliver, 1999). This shows an exceptionally rapid growth of computers with access to the internet. With this growth of connected machines, all IPv4 addresses will soon be exhausted (tunnelbroker.as8758.net, 2005). That is to say, there will soon be "no room" for more machines on the internet. IPv4 offers less than one address per person living on this planet, hence the need for a new version with a larger address space. The solution is IPv6. In addition to providing a larger address space, IPv6 offers a new and better-designed protocol stack that includes everything IPv4 has. IPv6 is backward compatible and is currently being implemented on the internet slowly but surely. With the increasing flow of information, the composition of users, intra-group information exchange, global terrorist activities, and job redundancy, several authoritarian bodies have become aware that the internet is an information source that must be monitored (cnn.com, 2005). There is not much time between articles in some of Norway's largest newspapers discussing that employers read their employees' private emails (aftenposten.no, 2005). Internet surveillance is a widely discussed topic, especially as it can affect individual rights. Paul Bresson, spokesman for the U.S. Department of Justice, says: "As long as communication technology evolves, we must ensure that such progress does not come at the expense of our nation's safety and security." The internet is the largest medium today, and it is continuously growing. In the early 1990s, the internet was opened for public use, and today, web surfing and email are part of our daily lives. While the internet is often described as a global phenomenon, it's crucial not to overlook personal information systems, family, and group information systems as integral parts of this. We know that global harmony is necessary for world peace, but it can only happen when social groups of all sizes are respected (Berners-Lee, 2002). This also applies via the internet. Berners-Lee believes that there should be no limits preventing a blog author from linking to public documents. This would clearly create a limitation in terms of freedom of expression and the rights of the individual. A balance must exist going forward, between small and large cultures. Berners-Lee chooses to describe the connection with the difference in cultures as a coastline. The closer one gets to a coastline, the more interesting the structure appears. When one gets closer, more details become noticeable, such as small stones, seaweed growing on rocks, and so on. The coastline has structure at all levels. "I have a deep feeling that society must be like this. Society cannot have a simple structure that exists on one level. We need a complicated structure. [...] It means that our society and the technology we use [...] must work at each of these levels." Can the scenarios described by Berners-Lee become a reality? This is where my opinion on how the internet will develop lies. Personally, I believe that we also need a complicated structure; we need a balance. At the same time, one must be able to consider the individual. Berners-Lee raises two central concerns that I think everyone in the IT environment should keep in mind regarding development. It cannot be the case that there is either a monoculture or a multiculturalism. There must be a balance here. The direction itself should lie between the two scenarios described by Berners-Lee. Regarding the flow of information, I am very unsure whether one can be prepared enough for the increasing information exchange on the internet. It's like waiting for a tsunami. By tsunami, I don't mean what the internet was hyped up to be, but how the flow of information can affect us if we are not prepared for it. If there are no systems and protocols with enough capacity to handle information, the internet will develop into an unstable network of fragmented data. Surveillance is a separate chapter where legal authorities and governments discuss the topic extensively. I believe that one should be able to say what one wants without risking reprisals from either authorities or employers. The limit is when information that can be dangerous, both for nations and ethnic groups, ends up in the wrong hands.Introduction
Materials and Methods
Terms
Abbreviations
How Will the Internet Develop in the Future?
Discussion
Can the Increasing Flow of Information Be Managed?
Conclusion
Information exchange in high gear
Written by AlexanderNote
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