Internet Efficiency Prizes, Internet Best Practices

Morning Brew: Why the Internet Is Running Out of Electricity at http://youtube.com/watch?v=xHuoWV3Jwik

The Internet as a whole is grossly inefficient, sending megabytes where a few Kilobytes would do. Gigabytes where MegaBytes would do. Rarely do you get offered an index and selection from data “sharing”, it is “click here to download petabytes, see we’re sharing”. The data centers like it because they can say “I need more people, I need more machines, I need more buildings, I need more power” (pun intended). Efficiency gains are definitely possible. But “big and expensive” beats “small and efficient” whenever plans are made. For the last 26 years of the Internet Foundation, it got worse every year. Greed and “grow without limits” is what wins every time, not sustainable global systems. Encourage groups to at least try. It is possible, but not likely as long as boasting and “big” and bragging usually beat benign and beautiful. The incentives are all wrong, the Internet is badly designed and operated. Read any plans, and see if they offer “we’re going to be bigger – unlimited growth to benefit a few” or “sustainable and sufficient, distributed and collaborative and accessible to all”.

Filed as (Internet Efficiency Prizes, Internet Best Practices)

Richard Collins, The Internet Foundation