As you may have noticed from my writings, the main topic of this blog is Digital Infrastructures for (networked) computer applications. These infrastructures are the platforms on which computer applications are delivered to users, so that they can interact with each other. What are the major research questions around these digital infrastructures? How is the […]
(This post was updated in http://www.petersgriddle.net/2010/05/digital-divide-on-ip-addresses.html) Every computer connecting to the Internet has to have an Internet address. No problem, you would say, unless you realize that there are more people living on the earth than there are Internet addresses. Internet addresses are defined by the Internet Protocol (IP for short), which is currently in its […]
At the end of 2001 I wrote a presentation about the future of networking, in which I made predictions for the digital infrastructure situation in 2005. Last week I revisited these, and checked them against the reality of 2005. For the home I predicted megabit, always-on Internet, VPN to the office, video, dozens of Internet […]
Yesterday, the annual Dutch Deloitte Technology Fast 50 awards were presented. As part of the program there are also Rising Star awards for companies less than 5 years old. Among the finalists were Watchmouse and Moniforce, two companies that I have helped with their product and marketing development. Watchmouse made 2nd place! As you can […]
This week, Yahoo announced that it will be beefing up its mail service to “[mimic] the look and feel of a computer desktop application like Microsoft’s Outlook”. This means that Yahoo is taking Microsoft head-on for dominance of the desktop. We are talking about the desktop in a generic sense, as the place that is […]
Last week, long time Internet pioneer Vint Cerf signed up to be Google’s chief internet evangelist”. His previous job was with the telecoms firm MCI. In the BBC report, the story concludes with the observation that The move of such an influential figure is significantin that it marks the way that power in the net […]
Suppose a hundred people get told by an enthusiastic friend to try podcasting. Of these, ten don’t have any hardware on which they can play the podcasts. So the rest goes online, and tries to find interesting content, but only 50 people can find a directory in which they can even start to look for […]
Home computing is still too complicated to install and maintain. Last week my neighbours asked for my advice on getting ADSL to their home, as their teen daughter is driving up the phone bill with her Internet usage. Even though they can opt for having the entire stuff installed by the ADSL provider, they are […]
At the closing ceremony of What The Hack Rop Gonggrijp reflected on the event. He opened by congratulating the 1500+ attendants: “We pulled it off!”. It had not been easy to organise the event, partly because of misconceptions about the relation of hackers to society. These hackers are not anti-social, they just tune to different […]
Sometimes, a memory from the past comes back.I remember walking around Washington square park in Manhattan, it must have been around 1987 as I was living in New Jersey (the ultra west side :-)), appreciating the street artists. The talent mix was incredibly wide, from jugglers keeping 7 balls in the air to kids banging […]
