Media - Internet

For the first time in its history, the Internet is running a real risk of fracturing into multiple and perhaps even incompatible networks. At a meeting in Geneva last week, the Bush administration objected to the idea of the United Nations running the top-level servers that direct traffic to the master databases of all domain names. That's not new, of course--the administration has been humming...

From the start, the World Wide Web has been a vessel of quasi-religious longing. And why not? For those seeking to transcend the physical world, the Web presents a readymade Promised Land. On the Internet, we're all bodiless, symbols speaking to symbols in symbols. The early texts of Web metaphysics, many written by thinkers associated with or influenced by the post-60s New Age movement, are rich...

GENEVA -- The United States was isolated on September 30 as it sought to defend its monopoly over regulation of the Internet against the European Union and other countries that are demanding a share of the action, officials said. "On the issue of Internet governance, very big differences of opinion exist," the head of the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) said following a preparatory...

In a last-minute change of heart, European Union officials have put their support behind proposals to wrest control of the Internet from the world’s last superpower, the USA. The US elected to reject the proposed changes during a meeting last Friday. The event transpired during preparatory talks for the second phase of the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS). Its effect will be to...

Online advertising revenues are expected to grow by as much as 25 per cent this year. Online ad revenue will be to the tune of Rs 150 crore this year � up from Rs 120 crore in 2004. The figure might even touch an estimated Rs 350 crore in 2009, more than 100 per cent over the 2005 estimate. Consumer advertisers continue to represent the largest category of advertisers (at Rs 82 crore), accounting...

THE WORLD has a problem. Its biggest communication tool is controlled by the most powerful superpower. There is an argument, usually made by Americans, that this is not such a bother. The Americans invented the thing, and besides the Internet is running OK. However the fact the US military splashed out cash to develop the Internet does not mean that it has the right to run it. It has grown bigger...

GENEVA -- A senior U.S. official rejected calls on Thursday for a U.N. body to take over control of the main computers that direct traffic on the Internet, reiterating U.S. intentions to keep its historical role as the medium's principal overseer. "We will not agree to the U.N. taking over the management of the Internet," said Ambassador David Gross, the U.S. coordinator for international...

Talks on regulating the digital traffic of the 21st century ended without agreement on Friday, but the United States won some backing for its refusal to cede its sole control to an international body from groups representing ordinary Internet users. Many Web surfers may not like the effective control the United States has over the Internet through its supervision of the Internet addressing system...

The US has rejected calls by European Union (EU) officials to give control of the net over to a more representative United Nations (UN) body. Wrangling over who should essentially be the net police, managing domain names and net traffic routing fairly, has been going on for some time. The matter is supposed to be discussed at November's World Summit on the Information Society in Tunisia. But at a...

The United Nations' International Telecommunications Union is ready to take over the governance of the Internet from the United States, ITU head Yoshio Utsumi said on Friday. The United States has clashed with the European Union and much of the rest of the world over the future of the Internet. It currently manages the global information system through a partnership with California-based Internet...