Hardware
News Commentary – We are running out of Internet Addresses… Again!
0So, it seems to me that about every year at this time, we have a frenzy concerning how we are running out of Internet addresses. As background, every device that
connects to the Internet must have a unique identification code, called an IP address. The current addressing scheme is nearly 15 years old and called, IP version 4, or IPv4 for short. The funny thing is that I have been reading this same story for each of those past 15 years and even did a term paper on it when I got my masters!
On Mondays I offer comments on some of the most interesting information technology stories that I have found on the web that week. Please feel free to join in the discussion or suggest other stories.
Today’s comments were generated after I read a CNN story. It is about the same message that they issue once per year. I recommend it to you. Give it a read below.
CNN.com – Are you ready for the big internet crunch?
“(CNN) — The internet as we know it is reaching its limits.
Within 18 months it is estimated that the number of new devices able to connect to the world wide web will plummet as we run out of "IP addresses" — the unique codes that provide access to the internet for everything from PCs to smart phones.
"The internet as we know it will no longer be able to grow," Daniel Karrenberg, chief scientist at RIPE NCC, the organization that issues IP addresses in Europe, told CNN.”
The basic problem is that when the Internet went mainstream in the mid-nineties, no one envisioned that every person on the planet would have multiple computers, let alone a smart phone, toaster, and Wii that needed an address. The problem got very acute around the millennial, but was warded off by a new addressing scheme for downstream computers, called NAT, that allowed every computer on a local network to share a single point-of-presence connection to the Internet. This is why, you are said to be sharing an internet connection on your local street, at the coffee shop, and at work.
The solution is to upgrade the address scheme to a newer version, called IP version 6 or IPv6. You can read all about it at Wikipedia. Don’t worry about version 5… it is caput. IPv6 brings a host of new features in addition to its dramatically increased address space including quality of service, security, and expandability. The good news is that every piece of networking hardware built in the past five years came out-of-the-box compatible. The bad news is that people have continued to write online software code that only works on IPv4 even though they new it’s life expectancy was short. And thus lies the problem, the actual impact of shifting will be a crap shoot until we pull the trigger. That, and no one wants to be the first penguin off the iceberg, and risk mission kill.
The best news is that this story has not changed on lick in the past eight years! We will all gnash our teeth, complain a bit, and decide to put off the inevitable for another year. Stay tuned in June 2011 for another CNN news story on this ery same issue….
What do you think about this topic? Do you agree or disagree with me? Do you have a recommended news story for next week? Please share your ideas below.
That is my Information Technology Thought of the Day (ITTOD) for May 31, 2010 by Scott Coughlin.
Image Credit: VEED.in – Tech News
Video: The End of the “I’m a Mac” Ad Campaign
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Anyone involved in Information Technology during the past five years is aware of the famous Apple “I’m a Mac…I’m a PC” TV Ad campaign. Besides being simply hysterical, it also is credited with creating the greatest wave of Apple’s market share growth in history. Unfortunately, Apple has decided to end this run of 30 second comedy spots. They have even pulled all of them off of their website. Lucky for us that fans of the series have archived them all on YouTube!
I usually feature comedy on Saturdays. In the past, I have featured jokes, comics, cartoons, and news on the weekends. Sometimes I include comics, stories, games, and photos. By far, though, videos with Information Technology (IT) themes have been the most popular. So I have gone back to this endless well!
For this week, I have picked this video to share with you as follow-up. It is called “Buy a Mac”… It is by Apple Computers and compiled by nahu090yt. It is a seven minute compilation of the first 15 classic commercials from this campaign. I am sure that with a little YouTube searching, you could easily find the entire series of commercials.
I hope that I gave you a good chuckle to make your weekend a little more meaningful. I will be back Monday with more serious IT topics!
I will miss this ad campaign.
What did you think of the video? Did you like it? Do you know of any other similar movies or clips? Please share.
That is my Information Technology Thought of the Day (ITTOD) for May 29, 2010.
video credits: nahu090yt and Apple Computer
image credit: The Revolver and Apple Computer
Book Recommendation – Cyber War: The Next Threat to National Security and What to Do about It by Richard A. Clarke
0I have a book recommendation for all Information Professionals, military buffs, and historians. It is ‘Cyber War: The Next Threat to National Security and What to Do about It’ by Richard A Clarke and Robert K. Knake. The book is about exactly what
the title says. It is written at exactly the right technical and intellectual level to be relevant, accurate, and thought provoking. I highly recommend it to Information Technology Professionals everywhere.
It is available in print and kindle editions from major book sources, including Amazon.com. I appreciated it so much that I also added it to The Information Technology Thought of the Day Webstore, permanently.
I will try to get a full review up in the next couple of weeks, as I finish it. I can already tell though that it will be a modern day classic for the niche that it is targeted at as well as statisticians and current event geeks.
The opening chapter alone is worth the price of admission and really demonstrates well how much the world of warfare has changed in the past 20 years due to the Internet and Information Technology. I especially appreciated how the author makes the case that Cyber War is real whether you think that it is or not. I also valued the parallels that were drawn between the dawn of cyber war and the coming of naval aviation and nuclear weapons. Considering that the author is a leading expert on Nuclear War policy, I figure that he probably knows what he is talking about.
Image Credit: Tesco Books