August 30 was the 30th birthday of the Internet. On that day in 1969 a group of scientists and technicians at UCLA plugged two computers together through a refrigerator-sized box designed to let them talk to each other–and it worked. Originally involving just four university-based computers used by only a few dozen people, the Internet today boasts more than 100 million users.
Ubiquitous as the Internet is now, it’s going to become more so. In fact, it’s probably going to become your home’s primary connection to the outside world, thanks to the increasing power and decreasing cost of computer equipment, and an explosive growth in bandwidth.
Bandwidth is the ability of a communications “pipe”–a phone line, for instance, or a TV cable–to carry information. The amount of information that can be sent through these existing lines is growing larger and larger, and many new buildings have even larger “pipes,” in the form of fibre optic cables. Within a few years, experts say, bandwidth will become essentially infinite–which means the transfer of even enormous amounts of information will be, as far as you’re concerned, instantaneous.
Combine that with “ubiquitious computing”–that is, computers in everything–and a huge number of possibilities open up, some of which are already in the prototype stage, some of which are just ideas, and some of which sound like far-fetched hooey.
Let’s begin in the kitchen. Already, a company called CMI is offering the Advantage 2000,” the first interactive information appliance for the kitchen.” This device combines television, stereo audio and video CD playback and Internet access. Soon, the company says, home appliance will have special chips installed to deliver information to the Advantage 2000, so at a glance you’ll know what’s in the refrigerator and whether the roast is burning.
Speaking of refrigerators, Electrolux has built prototype Internet refrigerators that control their own internal temperature, keep track of what you have on the shelves, and use the Internet to order what you need from a supermarket. Next step: voice recognition.
Then there’s the smart garbage can, which keeps track of what’s thrown away (by reading the barcode) and automatically orders more of it. (Just one problem: what if you threw it away because you didn’t like it?)
Out in the living room, the most obvious beneficiary of unlimited bandwidth is the television. You’ll be able to download full-length movies over the Internet in seconds. Interactivity will increase, so that you could use a remote control to point at an object on the screen and read more about it in on the Internet–or even buy it.
Increased bandwidth probably means more video screens everywhere. You might have several, built into the walls, for “family reunions” to which no one has to travel: crystal-clear real-time images sent over the Internet will let everyone see and hear everyone else.
If you’d rather read a book, go ahead–simply download it from the Internet into your fine leather-bound “electronic paper” book, whose pages, only slightly thicker than regular paper, display text and images electronically. (Another application for electronic paper? Files stored on it and placed in an Internet-connected file cabinet could be accessed just regular computer files.)
You’d rather listen to the radio? It may well be coming to you over the Internet, as well. Already, with a high-speed connection, you can listen to crystal-clear stereo music from radio stations anywhere around the world.
Your clocks could use the Internet to automatically set themselves; your doctor may be able to keep a virtual eye on you at all times thanks to monitoring equipment wirelessly linked to the Internet. In schools and universities, students may work with other students from halfway around the world on common projects, all immersed in the same virtual environment, assisted by an expert instructor who doesn’t have to leave her office.
Can’t make it down to the mall to try on a dress? Your favorite store will send you a three-dimensional image of yourself wearing the latest styles it thinks might interest you, based on the preferences you’ve indicated or the clothes you’ve bought in the past. Of course, you can buy the dress on-line, too.
Thirty years after it was born, the Internet is still just a shadow of what it will become. In the immortal words of Bachman Turner Overdrive, “Baby, you just ain’t seen nothin’ yet.”
Hang on to your computerized, wirelessly networked, Internet-connected hat!
