The Internet of Things…Made in China

Internet technology is steadily improving by becoming faster and more adaptable while bringing more and more new internet-based technologies to the table.  Logically, internet penetration to users will continue to grow even beyond its current levels.  Earlier this year, the last of the 4.29 billion addresses of Internet Protocol version 4 (IPv4) were sold, but yet internet usage rates keep going up.  Fortunately, this was a long foreseen issue, and IPv6 is already up and running in some places to take over for the 30+ year-old IPv4.

Wait, what happened to IPv5?  It was developed in the late 80s, but it was never released for public use.  It was more of a stepping stone for modern internet applications, particularly streaming data.

Anyway, IPv6 offers 2¹²⁸ addresses, or around 30 quattuordecillion (45 zeroes), which is nearly 600 quadrillion (15 zeroes) per every square millimeter on the planet.  Seems like overkill, right?  Well, not so much when you consider the possibilities of every device you have being assigned an IP address.  A true worldwide web, if you will.  “No way,” you say, “that’s just crazy.”  Preeminent technology developers don’t think so.  IBM, as well as many others, expects The Internet of Things to be the future.  All of our technology will communicate with each other to make our lives more efficient and easier.  Corning, one of the largest glass and optical fiber manufacturers, has a wonderful vision of what the future can be with all of our tech working together.  It is not just a pipe dream, either; it is already happening as RFID (radio frequency identification) chips are included in all kinds of consumer goods these days.  IPv6 provides the platform for all this to become possible.

Of course, there are some potential downfalls to this new technology, but that is always the case with major advances in technology.  Technology, no matter how noble its intent, can always be used for “evil,” so to speak.  If all of our devices and goods can be tracked on the internet at any given moment, we have to wonder if we will ever have privacy again.  Not to mention I’m pretty sure I saw a movie about this sort of über network of machines.  It had to do with terminating oddly designed time traveling robots which were predisposed to terminating waitresses and annoying teenagers for some reason.  The title eludes me at the moment, however.

With a grin like that, how mean could he be?

Still, we cannot fear what might go wrong.  If our species was ruled by fear about what could be, we would have died off long ago, while we still lived in caves…naked, dirty, and cowering in our own filth.  Besides, we humans have done rather well so far in terms of inventing new things while managing to avoid completely unraveling society and life as we know it.  Well, mostly.

The powers that be may never forgive us for this.

Beyond the extra space, IPv6 is more efficient in just about every way, is more secure, and offers better support for mobile devices, use of which are on the rise globally.  IPv6 is not yet the primary platform for the internet in most places, but China happens to be one nation which is already putting it to use.  Particularly, they make use of IPv6’s ability to keep an IP address assigned as you move from network to network, essentially creating a sustained mobile connection across great distances.  Additionally, the overabundance of IP addresses offered by IPv6 solved China’s problem of having more high-speed internet users than they did IP addresses, and now China has plenty of room for growth in the next generation of internet technology.

Simply having near endless IP addresses is just the tip of the iceberg, however.  By developing IPv6 early, China is expected to move into the forefront of internet technology, as well as becoming a science and technology force to be reckoned with.  We all are aware of the whole outsourcing phenomenon which built China’s position as a manufacturing leader, but their work with the international organization that deals with the development of the internet—the Internet Engineering Task Force—to develop new standards has allowed them to have substantial input on the development of IPv6, which, in turn, provides China a significant advantage in the coming age of internet technology.  China is expected to have the capability of transferring data 100 times faster than currently possible, to stream video at unprecedented levels, and to have companies at the forefront of IPv6 infrastructure worldwide.  Besides global positioning, China will be able to launch CERNET2, linking over 160 various educational, government, and research institutions with the technology to conduct research and experiments in ways the world has never seen before, further securing China’s role as a science and technology leader well into the future.

I think this is a clear sign America needs to step back up to the plate.  If China can manage to stay on the cutting edge of technology while in their industrial revolution, we should be able to lead the way.  IPv6 technology will allow companies to operate at unheard of levels of efficiency than ever before.  Supply chain management would be flawless if companies knew exactly what we needed to buy before we go to buy it.  Easy integration of mobile applications will allow workers to do more while out of the office, as well as offer more ways for businesses to interact with customers (both to attract and retain), and open up whole new location-based markets.  We need to look forward to pull ourselves out of this economic slump.

On a side note, translation technology is on the rise in order to prepare for the inevitability of the various dialects of Chinese will become more rampant online.  Currently, English rules the internet, but the rise of Chinese text online will not mean English-speakers will be left in the dust, however.  I think we are on the verge of having on-the-fly universal translators straight out of science fiction.  Plus, cultural exchange online should increase exponentially with the language barrier decimated, and learning about other cultures is never a bad thing.