For most of the life of the Internet the United States has played the biggest role in the development and managing of it. At one point all the data that flowed on the Internet went through the US and US companies. I don’t there are very many companies involved with the Internet infrastructure ever imagined a day would come where this wasn’t the case. That day however may very soon be upon us; if it already hasn’t started happening.
In the past week we have heard that Comcast is going to be introducing download caps which follows on the heels of Time Warner announcing trial runs of the same idea. Not that long ago universities in Canada were seriously considering moving the US based servers they were using for research for more localized options.
Their concerns revolved around the US Patriot Act and the immense powers for surveillance of activity within the US Internet infrastructure. It was also suggested that if this became more of a trend than just a couple of Canadian universities could the Patriot Act end up hurting business like Google.
Then today we have John Markoff from the New York Times writing a post about how Internet traffic is starting to bypass the US. It is his point that companies are more interested in their profit margins instead of creating technological advances regarding the Internet.
While companies like Comcast or Time Warner are trying to boost their bottom lines by any means possible without improving or advancing Internet connectivity the US is; quite rapidly in some cases, being surpassed by foreign countries. As John points out in his post:
Internet technologists say that the global data network that was once a competitive advantage for the United States is now increasingly outside the control of American companies. They decided not to invest in lower-cost optical fiber lines, which have rapidly become a commodity business.
He also ties in the fact that other countries are beginning to realize that the Internet is an integral part of their economic development. This means that they are wanting to start gaining control of how the Internet enters and leaves their countries.
Along with that there are growing concerns outside of the US about how it’s intelligence agencies believe that they need to have access to all the data that flows through the Internet. This doesn’t sit well with a lot of countries and as a result we are beginning to see a lot of the Internet traffic being routed around the US
Ms. Claffy said that the shift away from the United States was not limited to developing countries. The Japanese “are on a rampage to build out across India and China so they have alternative routes and so they don’t have to route through the U.S.”
Andrew M. Odlyzko, a professor at the University of Minnesota who tracks the growth of the global Internet, added, “We discovered the Internet, but we couldn’t keep it a secret.” While the United States carried 70 percent of the world’s Internet traffic a decade ago, he estimates that portion has fallen to about 25 percent.
This has to lead one to wonder what is going to happen to the US in the large global Internet scheme of things. When you consider that it is being run by companies who don’t appear to be interested in advancing the technology anymore and you have countries going around them for various reasons it doesn’t bode well for the country. More importantly where does this leave the US people as the Internet is obviously starting to leave them behind.
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CTL, the same cats who brought us the 
A quick Web search will bring an event dubbed “
As has been made very clear by the media, the presidential candidates chosen to represent the two major parties of the United States for the election this November will be spending precious primetime airspace sparring over issues which pollsters of America deem most important to the nation’s people. Those who dislike watching the matches will of course stray to different stations. But millions of others will remain transfixed. And given the social componentry now available to Web users, a large swath of the population - democrats, republicans and independents alike - will undoubtedly continue to toss one-liners and Google-searched investigative research every which way in any and all Internet channels available.
