Cutline Speaks

Congestion on the Information Superhighway

posted by Lauren on March 14, 2008

The increasing prevalence of and access to rich content on the web is a great thing. However, as the New York Times noted in their piece yesterday, this content is consuming larger and larger amounts of bandwidth. I won't pretend to know how much overall bandwidth exists (or even how to quantify it), but I'm personally amazed that a) it is possible to run out of space and b) if that's the case, we haven't run out of space already.

Can there ever be such a thing as too much information, or at least an oversaturation of data? While this doesn't mean the end of the Internet (or the end of new content past a certain date), it does mean slower download speeds and connectivity. According to a study mentioned in the article, digital traffic on the global network is growing about 50 percent a year. This rapid growth rate is causing a strain on local networks, and will require a large investment from cable and telecommunications carriers, Internet companies, media Web sites and consumers to address this problem. I doubt there is a quick fix, but I also strongly believe that users won't give up their speedy access to content without a fight. Will consumer demand be enough to change the current system?

Tags for this post: news