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The Internet Communications Intel

Intel Predicts Death Of WWW 300

LostCluster writes "Forbes is running a report saying that Intel's CTO claims that the WWW is 'running up on some architectural limitations' that will eventually cause its downfall. He's pushing a project called PlanetLab that has Princeton, Cambridge, Hewlett-Packard and AT&T on board, but Cisco is notably absent from that team."
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Intel Predicts Death Of WWW

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  • by otisg ( 92803 ) on Monday September 13, 2004 @06:21AM (#10233889) Homepage Journal
    Is he also, by any chance, suggesting a solution: buy more, newever, faster Intel chips!?
    • I never did figure out how to insert a CD-ROM or an internet connection directly into a pentium chip like on the adverts...
    • Can't Al Gore do anything right? No wonder he is so pissed off now.
    • Is he also, by any chance, suggesting a solution

      Here's the part of the article that states the problem:

      At Intel's technical conference, CTO Patrick Gelsinger said the Internet will begin to collapse as millions of new computer users from developing nations begin to sign on."We're running up on some architectural limitations," Gelsinger was quoted as saying.

      And the solution:

      Gelsinger's solution is to build a new network over the current Internet, that would monitor and direct traffic and better fight se
  • by RedShoeRider ( 658314 ) on Monday September 13, 2004 @06:22AM (#10233892)
    .....WWW is going to die, DVD's are a thing of the past....blah blah blah.

    Yeah, and Beta's been "dead" for 20 years. But I still can go buy tapes for it.

    • by binaryDigit ( 557647 ) on Monday September 13, 2004 @07:18AM (#10234156)
      .....WWW is going to die, DVD's are a thing of the past....blah blah blah. Yeah, and Beta's been "dead" for 20 years. But I still can go buy tapes for it.

      Actually the fact that you can still get your hands on Beta tapes is not relevant, heck, I can still get my hands on new 8" floppies. And actually, once hi-def dvd's start showing up, today's dvd's will be a thing of the past.

      Better analogies would be doomsayers talk about "we need to develop optical technologies because magnetic media will hit a stone wall at 1GB", or "cpu's will max out about 500mhz, better use optical computing" or "ipv6 needs to be adopted to deal with the shrinking ip address pool".
      • And actually, once hi-def dvd's start showing up, today's dvd's will be a thing of the past.

        I don't think so. The DVD is certainly "good enough" for movies. It's a major step compared to VHS (much better quality, but more important: no more rewinding, better scene selection, multiple language tracks, extras and better archievability) but a hi-def dvd is just "like DVD, only better" which is not really going to fly.

        There are just too many DVD-players out there, it will take at least 10 years, probably mo

    • I work in the broadcast television industry now. It's a bit different then systems administration at an ISP.

      Getting beta decks is getting tougher and tougher. It's still highly used in the distribution industry as well.

      There is a analogue/digital hybrid deck that is new and I believe around 5000. There are a surprising number of shops that specialize in rebuilding, parts and supplying rebuilt decks. 3/4 has mostly been phased out and I've seen piles of 3/4 decks piled up anytime I go to a broadcast shop.
  • Well... (Score:5, Informative)

    by spieters ( 312206 ) <spieters&gmail,com> on Monday September 13, 2004 @06:23AM (#10233897)
    Don't bother to RTFA this time, the article's about as low on info as the summary.
    • WWW != Internet (Score:5, Insightful)

      by lazybeam ( 162300 ) on Monday September 13, 2004 @06:35AM (#10233954) Homepage
      I thought that the HTTP protocol was going to die? But no, they are talking about the Internet switches and routers being overloaded. And it will only get worse as more people use broadband - that means ISPs will have to upgrade their equipment! (shock! horror!) The WWW is going to break with all the "&#34;" codes in the article, too.

      Gelsinger's solution is to build a new network over the current Internet,

      The WWW is a network over the current Internet... Oh well
    • Re:Well... (Score:5, Insightful)

      by KilobyteKnight ( 91023 ) <bjm@NOSPAm.midsouth.rr.com> on Monday September 13, 2004 @06:50AM (#10234007) Homepage
      Don't bother to RTFA this time, the article's about as low on info as the summary.

      Complete lack of technical savvy is what I've come to expect from Forbes. They just don't get the SCO thing either. And in this article, they interchangably use the terms "World Wide Web" and "internet". Forbes is obviously the magazine for pointy haired bosses, I can't imagine anyone else taking it seriously.
      • Re:Well... (Score:5, Informative)

        by Ranx ( 28829 ) on Monday September 13, 2004 @08:19AM (#10234627) Homepage
        Intel's press release about the same speech has a little bit more information, although nothing technical.

        http://www.intel.com/pressroom/archive/releases/20 040909corp.htm [intel.com]

        Also interesting: a link to the open platform website:

        http://www.planet-lab.org/ [planet-lab.org]

        Interesting quotes:

        "Applications run on PlanetLab are decentralized, with pieces running on many machines spread across the global Internet. They can also self-organize to form their own networks, and include some form of application processing inside the network (instead of at the edges), adding new intelligence and capabilities to the Internet."

        "It would provide a platform on which Web services can run and a way to connect grid computing sites and utility data centers. It sits above the new physical infrastructure supplied by Internet 2 and above the networking layer where IPv6 functions, adding a new stratum of higher-level functionality to the Internet."

        Why it has to replace the current TCP/IP-infrastructure is still unclear (apart from selling more hardware).
        • Thanks for those links. At least now there is something to discuss (aside from wondering of how a sketchy article like that gets posted...)

          I'm not sure this is about replacing infrastructure as much as it is about monitoring traffic and maybe routing specific protocols and services across different paths and shutting down specific types of traffic if it looks like a DoS attack or worm activity. Maybe its something expanded on the QoS concept. I think its possible that all this still runs over IP and exi
    • Re:Well... (Score:5, Interesting)

      by Alsee ( 515537 ) on Monday September 13, 2004 @06:52AM (#10234024) Homepage
      Last time Slashdot ran this story I did a little digging. I'm not sure of everything Intel has in mind, but part of their plan is to impose a Trusted Computing layer on top of the internet. "Security" "viruses" "authentication" blah blah blah. What it really amounts to is that if you do not "voluntarily" submit to Trusted Computing and turn over control of your computer you will be locked out.

      Slashdot ran a story quite some time ago about Cisco Working to Block Viruses at the Router. [slashdot.org] The way they really work is they first scan that you are Trusted Computing Compliant, then they can scan exactly what software you are running, for example to ensure you are running the mandated firewall or anti-virus software or whatnot.

      If you do not submit to Trusted Computing, or if you are not running the mandated software, then the router "quarantines" you until you come into compliance. In other words it denies you a network connection. Compliance is "voluntary", but you are blocked from the network until you comply.

      -
      • I've heard this technology described as "dirty vlans" - quarantining of suspect machines by the use of (Cisco) programmable switches and routers - but it was aimed at the business market, this would be the first time I've heard it suggested for use in the wider internet.
        • Re:Well... (Score:3, Informative)

          by Alsee ( 515537 )
          this would be the first time I've heard it suggested for use in the wider internet.

          PDF link [bsa.org] From the last two paragraphs on page 11 through page 14 is a transcript of Bush's Cyber Security advisor addressing a Gobal Technology Summit in Washington DC in 2001 and directly calling on ISP's to start making plans to make such a system mandatory as part of ISP terms of service. To fight viruses, to secure our National Information Infrastructure, to fight terrorists, to defend our way of life, to fight Osama b
      • Re:Well... (Score:2, Interesting)

        by Kaenneth ( 82978 )
        Couldn't a Virus/Trojan Spoof the authentication?
        • How about a regular program? ie, I don't want to feed Big Brother, so I run some program that spoofs compliance by listing completely arbitrary programs running - like BeOS and nothing else.
        • Couldn't a Virus/Trojan Spoof the authentication?

          In general, no.
          Authentication is based on a random key locked inside each chip which you are forbidden to see. Every chip has a different key. That random key is signed by the manufacturer, and it is effectively impossible for you to forge that signature.

          The only way to pass authentication is either to be a genuine and secure chip, or to physically dig that key value out of a tamper-resistant and self-destructing microchip. Not impossible, but you'd need a

          • In general, no.
            Authentication is based on a random key locked inside each chip which you are forbidden to see. Every chip has a different key. That random key is signed by the manufacturer, and it is effectively impossible for you to forge that signature.


            So I do a "man in the middle" attack on my own computer.

            -- less is better.

      • Re:Well... (Score:3, Insightful)

        by johnhennessy ( 94737 )
        I agree completely.

        What has been hogging IT resources for the last 2 years - viruses. So every single director of IT will definetly buy something that will instantly fix all their resourcing woes.

        Intel, Symantec, etc, etc are all picking up on this and trying to sell products based on this. Do we trust the moral fibre of all of these companies with our freedom ? I think not.

        Education is what people need, not products. I don't think people willfully leave their computers as Zombies.

        On the other hand - if
      • If you do not submit to Trusted Computing, or if you are not running the mandated software, then the router "quarantines" you until you come into compliance.

        As much a grip as MS has on computers, I see many situations where this concept would NOT apply or be useful. What about your PS2, Xbox, your Fluke Linkrunner, various forms of Linux, various switches, Jetdirect cards, home routers, music station, airport, X10, Palm pilot, RF bar code scanners etc.. Or basically ANYTHING that get an IP address. How
      • by D4C5CE ( 578304 ) on Monday September 13, 2004 @11:29AM (#10236610)
        What it really amounts to is that if you do not "voluntarily" submit to Trusted Computing and turn over control of your computer you will be locked out.
        Intel Outlines Strategy For Making The Internet Smarter, Safer, More Reliable And Useful [intel.com]
        (...)
        This would transform the Internet from a data transmission pipe into a vast platform for hosting a wide array of services available [add: for ________ $ / __ (+ your immortal soul where applicable)?, ed.] to the world's six billion inhabitants. Gelsinger referred to this approach as the ability to provide planetary-scale services.
        (...)
        we are confident that we now can begin deploying and testing revolutionary, planetary-scale commercial services that will change the way business is done on the Internet.
        (...)
        "A planetary-scale overlay of computational services would open the Internet up to a new era of innovation while complementing other Internet initiatives," Gelsinger added. "It would provide a platform on which Web services can run and a way to connect grid computing sites and utility data centers. It sits above the new physical infrastructure supplied by Internet 2 and above the networking layer where IPv6 functions, adding a new stratum of higher-level functionality to the Internet."
        Oh, glad it's only about World Domination! ;-)
        Nothing scary there, just what almost every computer company strives for.
        How reassuring...
        SCNR
    • Re:Well... (Score:5, Informative)

      by Skjellifetti ( 561341 ) on Monday September 13, 2004 @08:56AM (#10234978) Journal
      Forbes once wrote an article about 64 bit computing where they defined a 64 bit machine as one that could address 64! bytes of memory. There writers and editors really don't have much of a clue about technology.
  • In other news (Score:5, Insightful)

    by A1kmm ( 218902 ) on Monday September 13, 2004 @06:23AM (#10233900)
    Intel predicts that it will be able to convince the world to abandon the unscalable approach of following standards, including upcoming standards like XForms and IPv6, and open P2P systems, and instead invent its own propietary system.
    • I looked at the article and it had..

      &#34;Beware of the End of the World (Wide Web), &#34; Says Intel

      Clearly the &#34; the start of the internet corruption. :-O

      On a more serious note, the news story doesn't actually tell you anything except use Intel stuff.
  • by Anonymous Coward
    ... it has already happened!?

    "The Internet will end when 1 million slashdotters click this link"
  • Swamped in dupes (Score:5, Informative)

    by BenjyD ( 316700 ) on Monday September 13, 2004 @06:23AM (#10233906)
    Dupes [slashdot.org]
  • by walmass ( 67905 ) on Monday September 13, 2004 @06:24AM (#10233908)
    WWW may be dying, but repeating old stories [slashdot.org] is forever

  • by Biotech9 ( 704202 ) on Monday September 13, 2004 @06:24AM (#10233909) Homepage
    I'd love to see how much of the nets resources are taken up by spam mail, viruses, worms, and the like. I would imagine (although I am totally uneducated in the arena of 'tech') that if these problems were wrapped up for good, a whole lot of stress would be removed from the Internets shoulders.

    I'm also cynical enough to predict that intel are saying;
    "The net is dying... AND WE HAVE THE SOLUTION! SIGN UP NOW FOR ONLY $5.99 TO GET A STARTER PACK"
  • Dupe (Score:4, Funny)

    by Detritus ( 11846 ) on Monday September 13, 2004 @06:25AM (#10233914) Homepage
    Dupe, Dupe, Dupe, Dupe of URL
    Dupe of URL.
    Dupe of URL.
  • by gustgr ( 695173 ) <gustgr.gmail@com> on Monday September 13, 2004 @06:26AM (#10233916)
    WWW may reach the same level Gopher is today, it is not so popular (mainstream) but it's contents can be very interesting if you perform some data mining (geekly speaking of course).
    • The primary reason that Gopher's contents are so interesting is because it never caught on as a commercialisable medium - i.e. there are no ads, pop-ups etc. Unfortunately there is no Mother Gopher any more, nor is there a reliable VERONICA either, which means that you need to know where in gopherspace something is before you can look at it. [For instance: a NeXTSTEP gopherspace at sdf-eu [sdf-eu.org].]
  • by BinBoy ( 164798 ) on Monday September 13, 2004 @06:26AM (#10233917) Homepage
    The end of Usenet/NNTP has been predicted many times as well. It's a stage that every successful protocol eventually reaches. Our baby is growing up!
  • by gowen ( 141411 ) <gwowen@gmail.com> on Monday September 13, 2004 @06:26AM (#10233921) Homepage Journal
    Perhaps the internet will be killed by the fact that, with constant breeding of duplicated news stories, one will eventually reach critical mass and overwhelm all other information.
  • Publicity (Score:2, Insightful)

    by crull ( 221987 )
    They're doing what they can to get some publicity to the PlanetLab [planet-lab.org] project.
  • by News for nerds ( 448130 ) on Monday September 13, 2004 @06:26AM (#10233924) Homepage
    In Soviet Russia, WWW predicts Death Of Intel!
    "Forbes is running a report saying that AMD's CTO claims that Intel's P4 is 'running up on some architectural limitations' that will eventually cause its downfall."
  • by Anonymous Coward on Monday September 13, 2004 @06:27AM (#10233926)
    It is official; Netcraft confirms: the Internet is dying

    One more crippling bombshell hit the already beleaguered the Internet community when IDC confirmed that the Internet market share has dropped yet again, now down to less than a fraction of 1 percent of all servers. Coming on the heels of a recent Netcraft survey which plainly states that the Internet has lost more market share, this news serves to reinforce what we've known all along. the Internet is collapsing in complete disarray, as fittingly exemplified by failing dead last [samag.com] [samag.com] in the recent Sys Admin comprehensive networking test.

    You don't need to be a Kreskin [amdest.com] [amdest.com] to predict the Internet's future. The hand writing is on the wall: the Internet faces a bleak future. In fact there won't be any future at all for the Internet because the Internet is dying. Things are looking very bad for the Internet. As many of us are already aware, the Internet continues to lose market share. Red ink flows like a river of blood.

    All major surveys show that the Internet has steadily declined in market share. the Internet is very sick and its long term survival prospects are very dim. If the Internet is to survive at all it will be among OS dilettante dabblers. the Internet continues to decay. Nothing short of a miracle could save it at this point in time. For all practical purposes, the Internet is dead.

    Fact: the Internet is dying

  • waste of time (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Docrates ( 148350 ) on Monday September 13, 2004 @06:27AM (#10233927) Homepage
    You know TFA is a load of crap when the excerpt is about the same size as the actual article...and half of the article's page is devoted to promoting some financial news service.

    This is, by far, one of the worst news posts EVER on slashdot.

    In fact, do go to the article and witness the historic event.
  • Very Vague (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Manip ( 656104 ) on Monday September 13, 2004 @06:29AM (#10233930)
    It strikes me that this 'new internet over the existing one' is an extremely vague idea.

    At least to me, they have not said what the problems are to begin with and further more have not said how they are going to address each one.

    All this tells us is 'X Corp is working on an unknown problem with an unknown solution'.

    Adding a network on the existing one doesn't sound like a great solution either because it uses the apparently flied infrastructure to construct a method to make that structure more stable..? Sounds like building on sand to me..
    • Re:Very Vague (Score:5, Interesting)

      by leifbk ( 745927 ) on Monday September 13, 2004 @07:06AM (#10234097) Homepage
      At least to me, they have not said what the problems are to begin with and further more have not said how they are going to address each one.

      The problem, from a financial point of view, is of course that it isn't that easy to make money off the Internet as a lot of investors may have thought. TFA suggests as much when it's said that "the Internet will begin to collapse as millions of new computer users from developing nations begin to sign on." My guess is that most of those new users from developing nations hardly have the potential to generate profit remotely in proportion to their consumed bandwidth. So the Internet as a means to stockpile return on investment may well soon be a thing of the past.

      And that probably sums up Forbes' interest in the case.

      However, as long as the infrastructure of the 'net mainly consist of rather cheap hardware and essentially free software, I can't foresee the imminent death of what we really love about it: The free exchange of information around the globe. It's not the death of the Internet, then, it's rather a full turn of the circle back to Tim's vision. And good riddance to the money hoarders.
      --
      defenestrare necesse est

      • My guess is that most of those new users from developing nations hardly have the potential to generate profit remotely in proportion to their consumed bandwidth.

        I think this is bad economic thinking. First, the deployment of bandwidth in developing countries for equivalent technologies will be cheaper because of the lower costs of living.

        Secondly, there are a wide range of last-mile options available now that were not widely available as the web ramped-up in the US (such as wireless). Technology has al
      • "... it isn't that easy to make money off the Internet as a lot of investors may have thought."

        True, but it's because they keep thinking of the Internet as a product in itself instead of as an enhancement or adjunct to more traditional businesses. It makes as much sense of Forbes to say the phone system is dying because companies, other than telcos, haven't found a way to make money from it.

    • Invent a "problem", then offer a solution.

      The history is filled with these types of marketing schemes. In the 1930s there was a product called Listerine, made to treat throat infections. A guy called Gerald Lambert made a marketing scheme, "inventing" a problem ("bad breath") and offered the solution (his product), the birth of mouthwash products.
      Ref: http://chnm.gmu.edu/features/sidelights/whoinvente dbo.html [gmu.edu]
  • Internet 2 (Score:2, Interesting)

    by Icarus1919 ( 802533 )
    It's unfortunate that while a newer, faster version of the internet is in the works, it's supposedly going to be limited to use by scientists and other researchers. Perhaps the system with increased complexity that was previously reported on slashdot is the answer to our difficulties?
  • by Anonymous Coward on Monday September 13, 2004 @06:31AM (#10233940)
    Any article that confuses the Internet with the world wide web can't be taken seriously.
    • If the internet really was to die (say, for example due to something or other happening to the way IP works), it would be completely legitimate for publications such as the NYT to make this "death of WWW". Because that's the effect that 90% of their readers would be interested in.

      On the other hand I think it's even worse when they say on TV that some scientist "has invented a computer" that does X - when they really mean someone wrote a software that does X.
      • Reporters, especially TV reporters, are the worst. I once heard a TV reporter refer to "emailing over the web". Obviously popular webmail services confuse the issue a lot. But if the reporters can't get technology right, it makes me wonder about what else they're fudging or getting flat-out wrong. Politics? Economics? Foreign affairs? Scary stuff when you consider that the general population depends on the media to inform them about important and interesting matters.

      • They don't care about e-mail or chat? Doesn't matter, I work with dozens of news people. This is very unlikely to be a conscious effort to package information into easily digestible form, the reporter almost certainly doesn't know the difference.
    • Yep. I was stunned by the lack of research that went into this article. Strike two for Forbes.com recently. I think I'm going to start ignoring them.
  • The experts (Score:5, Funny)

    by shoemakc ( 448730 ) on Monday September 13, 2004 @06:32AM (#10233943) Homepage

    Well god bless them. I remember the day vividly when my shiney new Pentium 3 arrived, and i was finally able to browse the internet.

    And why hardware limitation exactly are they refering to; heat from your cpu exhaust instantly melting through your patch cable?

    -Chris

  • "InterWeb" (Score:5, Informative)

    by Scoria ( 264473 ) <slashmail AT initialized DOT org> on Monday September 13, 2004 @06:35AM (#10233960) Homepage
    Article summary: FUD.

    However, it is somewhat humorous that the writer often substitutes "World Wide Web" for "Internet." Considering that the number of estimated Internet users increased from 38,000,000 at the end of 1994 to 604,000,000 in 2004, I am somewhat incredulous to the belief that our current architecture is incapable of accommodating expansion. It may not be inexpensive, but it is possible.

    Aside from that, the article contains no other information. A substantial percentage of the article body is actually dedicated to FinancialWire and StreetSignals.
    • Not to mention mangled quotes. I'm starting to wonder why Forbes even exists in this day and age with such quality technology reporting.

      Though perhaps that's where all those failed companies in the late nineties went when the Internet killed them.
    • Upgrade the core internet backbone. Internet not fast enough? Upgrade the routers and fiber(or lay more) running between the internet hubs, ISPs, service providers and core technology hosting companies. The rest is trickle-down effect...

      That, and maybe put more caching servers in place.
  • by nysus ( 162232 ) on Monday September 13, 2004 @06:40AM (#10233976)
    "Gentleman, the bad news is that there isn't much more money to be made selling Internet hardware. Profit levels in Internet-related hardware are down 300% from 5 years ago.

    The good news? We've just landed a top notch PR firm to help sell our message that we must upgrade and overhaul the whole infrastructure. We'll be monitoring the impact of this message over the next several months. If successful, we expect to see profit levels soar again within 3 years."
  • Re-architecture (Score:5, Interesting)

    by el americano ( 799629 ) on Monday September 13, 2004 @06:45AM (#10233996) Homepage
    A worthless article to be sure, with no discussion of the web's architectural problems. (bad Slashdot) There is obviously more to the architectural problem than will be solved by IPv6, but allowing for IPv6 and higher capacity routers alone, I'm sure the web could go a long time with no other upgrade. I can only wonder how much money Intel will spend on convincing people that the web will die "sooner than you think." If it's anything like the $300 million they spent on telling people they have the best/only Wi-Fi solution, we'll be hearing this for a long time.
  • ...the death of Intel, the rise of AMD, film at whatever

    h.
  • by davejenkins ( 99111 ) <slashdot&davejenkins,com> on Monday September 13, 2004 @06:49AM (#10234006) Homepage
    Has he linked his project to the War on Terror(TM)? If not, he won't stand a chance of getting any funding or attention. The virus protection scam comes close, but he needs to throw in a little more doom and gloom...
  • What?? (Score:2, Funny)

    by ceeam ( 39911 )
    No more slashdot then?! --shock--
  • The web sucks (Score:5, Interesting)

    by autopr0n ( 534291 ) on Monday September 13, 2004 @06:56AM (#10234045) Homepage Journal
    I really think the future lays in some sort of system that distributes server load to clients. sort of like an interactive bittorent.

    A lot of things that are done these days over the web are extremely simple and could be done on the client side, but can overwhelm a server when it needs to be done for thousands or millions of people. And bandwidth still isn't free.
    • What you are talking about is a peer-to-peer world wide web. Where a client request a page, www.slashdot.org, and the file(frontend, output of the database-stuff) that is sent to it may or may not come from the actual server hosting /., rather it would come from either the server, or one of the clients that are also browsing the site(or have recently) at that given time..

      Smart caching(of the 'end result website). Purgin the cach ever-so-often and doing so efficiently and reliably(not the bogged-down Tempor
  • by adoarns ( 718596 ) on Monday September 13, 2004 @06:59AM (#10234056) Homepage Journal

    The Web was not created by companies like Intel. It wasn't created by companies at all, only in some cases co-opted by them.

    When companies like Intel pitch these wide-ranging changes, it comes over like some seedy traveling salesman pitching a monorail.

    If we want to make changes to the web, we will.

  • by Jugalator ( 259273 ) on Monday September 13, 2004 @07:02AM (#10234072) Journal
    The WWW will eventually die [space.com], along with other common Internet technologies!

    PlanetLab? Not RTFA, I suppose that's to make a new planet for us?

    Thanks, Intel!
  • by tommasz ( 36259 ) on Monday September 13, 2004 @07:03AM (#10234077)
    Pentel, the world's leading provider of 0.5mm mechanical pencils has predicted the World Wide Web cannot continue to function at its present level for much longer. Pentel is offering an alternative, called WSD, or Writing Stuff Down, that is virtually immune to scaling problems currently plaguing the Web. Industry experts have been slow to respond to this proposal but their responses are expected any day now, via another new technology called the Post Office.
  • Remember Intel are the guys who were trying to downplay AMD's 64bit processor when it first came out?

    They basically say something like "640k is enough for everyone" except that a few months down the road when market forces start acting, who are the ones playing the catch up game now?

    I'd say we'd all be happily surfing the WWW in our subterran bunkers in 2038 when Intel is no more..
  • A little piece of the WWW dies every day. But after it has spent it's 12 hours on the front page of /. it will be back. Don't worry, the death is only temporary...
  • These are the people who have published a series of pro-scox/msft and anti-linux articles. Not to mention numerous other idiotic articles. There investment advice is just as worthless - Forbes used to praise a medical company called Dynacq (DYII) now that company is in the pink sheets (DYII.PK).

    Forbes is absolutely worthless. I'm amazed anybody considers forbes worth anything.
  • ... are bringing it to its knees ...

  • I got some spam the other day about 'architectural limitations'. I think that is what they mean, they should give it a go, no gadgets and gizmos, no creams, no pumps required!

    Lets reinvent the web and have someone own it, and we all pay them! yes please! here is my credit-card number.

    1337H4X0R696969696
  • It seems the author of the article has decided to give it a sensationalist spin. PlanetLab is a platform intended for researchers to experiment with new protocols. It's a world wide network of computers dedicated to research, and a number of interesting research projects are using it.

    http://www.intel.com/research/exploratory/planet la b.htm ...
  • ...by buying AMD next time I build a computer. Shame on them.
  • by D4C5CE ( 578304 ) on Monday September 13, 2004 @07:47AM (#10234359)
    Whoever wrote this may not have been stood up in front of a firing squad yet, but hopefully he's been sacked by now:
    &amp;#34;Beware of the End of the World (Wide Web),&amp;#34; Says Intel
    Yet bad HTML and childish language are the least of this blurb's problems - even the dot.com bubble in its heyday has probably never produced an article so full of vapor and devoid of the slightest piece of information at all:
    the Internet will begin to collapse as millions of new computer users from developing nations begin to sign on. "We're running up on some architectural limitations," Gelsinger was quoted as saying. Gelsinger's solution is to build a new network over the current Internet, that would monitor and direct traffic and better fight security threats or traffic surges.
    So how does one sum up this little "gem"?
    As "Erm, vaguely, something, some day"?!
    An while they are at it, how about defining the out-of-context "collapse" and "some architectural limitations" for this article to have any meaning whatsoever?
    However, Cisco
    controls most of the routers and switchers comprising the current web, and it may have other ideas.
    OMG. Aren't we all just stunned by the writer's clarity, precision and thorough understanding of all things technical...

    If there's an "anti-Pulitzer", a prize for the worst misachievements in journalism, Forbes&FinancialWire may just have given us a very promising "Candidate of the Year".

  • by El Camino SS ( 264212 ) on Monday September 13, 2004 @07:56AM (#10234434)
    Here is how the "trusted internet" will fail:

    1. Claim that the internet, with the advent of widespread broadband, is going to crash. Cause the herd to panic. Bypass your IT manager. Put it right in Forbes and Fortune 500. Make them demand it from the top down.
    2. Speak of adding a new functionality (like a new and improved clippy) and then slide in DRM to prevent "hackers" from getting into your machine. This of course, will never prevent hackers. All it will do is make the hackers get into the BIOS level of your computer when you allow a shell at that level.
    3. Roll out "trusted computing." Pretty soon, your computer won't trust you to let you do what you want on it. You will feel a sudden twinge as millions of Joe Users will cry out in agony, and then suddenly, silence.
    4. Geeks will find and work with corporations that are not on trusted computing. They will be fine. They will know where to get the useful mobos and processors. Their side of the internet will not change at all, ever.
    5. One generation of "Joe User" will find that all of the interesting things that made owning a computer are now blocked and will become frustrated. They will blame the computer instead of the architecture. "My Dell won't let me do what I want!" Gateway, Dell, and other Windows syncophants will start going belly up in the slimmest of markets after they drove all of the profit out of the business. IBM will be fine with Linux for the business market. Comcast will hemmorage profits when people can't get to what they really want, and then suddenly turn on all of the other companies. AT&T will suck it up, those losing more traction in the real world as usual.
    6. The industry will dump DRM and trusted computing while it is still hot, because basically, there won't be any purchases, and people have to sell computers to pay the bills. Word will get out to the common person, quickly, and they will sit on the shelves and rot.

    Why do I think it will happen just like this?

    The whole "trusted drinking" thing worked so well during prohibition. A group of Holy rollers thought that banning things or preventing them would stop bad activity. All prohibition did was make "bad" activity more expensive... and much more aggressive and organized. These "trusted computing" twits are insane. If they think that it is going to work, they're nuts. Go ahead and delay Longhorn or whatever. Simply put, it ain't going to work. Look, if geeks need to get their chips from Burma, or Morrocco, or wherever, rest assured that they will find a way.
  • will make it better?

    Stupid idiot...

  • ...to take away Intel employees' external web access so they'll work harder.
  • A bunch of companies have different solutions which disrupt the original shared code cooperative model and Unix dies.

    A bunch of companies have different solutions which disrupt the opriginal standards based model and the Internet dies.

    I might accept the idea but it does not belong to Intel, Princeton, AT&T, nor Cambridge. It belongs in the bucket with all the other ideas that eventually get implemented. Otherwise the Net will be just like television.
  • Let's see: (Score:2, Funny)

    by Mr.Surly ( 253217 )
    1) Flying cars only 10 years away (for the last 60 years).

    2) Y2K will end life as we know it.

    3) WWW now officially dead. Close your browser.

    I guess that sums it up. Forgive me if I don't hold my breath.
  • &#34;No support for quote marks&#34;, says Forbes

    &#34;The WWW has never shown that it can consistantly produce the quotation marks we need
    when we need, and for this reason it needs to go back to the drawing board&#34;, said an unnamed source with the Forbes web design team.
  • Planetlab connection (Score:5, Informative)

    by FU_Fish ( 140910 ) on Monday September 13, 2004 @09:12AM (#10235176) Homepage
    As a user of both the WWW and Planetlab I can say that they are totally unrelated. The WWW is a source for finding/exchanging existing data. Planetlab is a testbed for new networking/computing technologies. Planetlab produces data, the WWW distributes data.
  • What the hell? (Score:2, Informative)

    by BuBu_ ( 72690 )
    In the slashdot posting we get this: He's pushing a project called PlanetLab that has Princeton, Cambridge, Hewlett-Packard and AT&T on board, but Cisco is notably absent from that team."

    Yet, when we look at the article: It's a vision apparently shared by Cisco (NASDAQ: CSCO), Hewlett-Packard (NYSE: HPQ) and AT&T Corp. (NYSE: T), all of whom are working feverishly, either together or apart to save the World Wide Web, which Intel and others see as becoming so overloaded it will eventually break.
  • due to technological limitations (heat disapation, power consumption) that will cause its demise.

    *rolls eyes*
  • death of TCP/IP (Score:4, Insightful)

    by peter303 ( 12292 ) on Monday September 13, 2004 @09:37AM (#10235464)
    The ethernet (and mostly internet) protocol was predicted to die 30 years ago. People offered alternatives like ATM and MicroSofts early 90s protocol (failed attempted hijacking of the Net), but none really caught. A mediocre standard used by billions of computers perseveres.
  • It will never happen (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Cokelee ( 585232 ) on Monday September 13, 2004 @10:42AM (#10236153)

    The entire idea is asinine. To paraphrase who many simply call the inventor:

    The Internet will never be controlled by a single company or a group of companies; Any company that tries to control it will fail.
    -- Sir Tim Berners-Lee
  • Better ideas? (Score:2, Insightful)

    by HotGarbage ( 806745 )
    I was wondering.. Now, I understand that Intel is trying to drum up some business. Ok, fine..but I also understand that there is a natural progression to evrything, and without getting into religion, there is an evolution to things as well. That being said, was not a major part of the history of the Internet the direct result of a collaboration of Digital, Intel and Xerox (DIX)? If so, (and I could be confusing my facts here), but does it not make sense that such a collaboration be necessary to evolve the I
  • I was there (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Groo Wanderer ( 180806 ) <charlie@nOSpam.semiaccurate.com> on Monday September 13, 2004 @11:10AM (#10236416) Homepage
    I was at the IDF Keynote, and I bounced some questions off Gelsinger afterwards. There are two problems with this that make it a non-starter in my opinion.

    First, they are talking about layering another level of obfuscation on top of the net as a fix for the underlying problems. Rather than dealing with the problems, they ignore them, and make a shiny thing. Wow, that's architecture for you!

    Next, with the innovation fom HP lately, and the fact that they are going commercial with it rather than open and standards based, it is doomed to be a niche idea at best. As one questioner afterwards pointed out, the internet was built on open ideas. This is looking to go the opposite way. NEXT!

    Vint Cerf was cool though. They said there would be a special guest, but to my horror, they only meant Vint. No telletubbies in bondage gear this year. I can only hope for spring 2005 IDF....

    I plan to rant about this on the Inq as soon as I recover from last week.

    -Charlie
  • by Animats ( 122034 ) on Monday September 13, 2004 @11:50AM (#10236852) Homepage
    PlanetLab is another "mobile code" scheme for running your stuff on other people's machines.

    As an operational model, this fails. Either the system gets take over by hostile code, or there's some central adminstration that controls who runs what. (This last is the 3G cell phone services model. It's not working.)

    This is one of those ideas, like "push technology" and "micropayments", which fail because the people who benefit are separate from those who absorb the costs. Only in a monopoly situation can that work.

  • by InfiniteWisdom ( 530090 ) on Monday September 13, 2004 @02:49PM (#10238967) Homepage
    If Intel's CTO really said that its time for him to be fired. Except that he didn't. What he really said is this [intel.com]

    Planetlab isn't an alternative to anything. Its not even a network really. Its a research testbed, for people who want to evaluate their protocols on more realistic network conditions than the LAN in their labs. Its a good tool to help design the next generation Internet, but Plantlab in itself isn't going to do anything.

    I know this because I happen to be one of the people who does network research on Planetlab, and one of those 429 happens to sit on a table across the room from me right now.

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