Summary
Driving forces:
- Internet user growth 8.4M => 28M US users (15 mos)
- Computer power doubling every 12-18 months
- new applications, WWW, Internet phone, VR, Video ...
Since Apr-95, no single management for planning, trouble reporting etc.
ESnet performance good to acceptable, N. America poor (~6% packet loss avg), International poor (~7% packet loss avg)
Bottlenecks at interchanges
Notes:
National survey by FIND/SVP (reported on front page of SJ Mercury, May 7, 1997): 20M Americans now regard global computer network as “indispensable” part of lfe; 9.3M others tried in past yr and gave up. 27.7 M Americans over 18 identified as regulat Internet and WW users. 15 months ago the number was 8.4M. 17% of US households are using online services. A survey by Compuserve/Nielsen Media Internet Demographics in Mar 1997 founf nearly 25% of all people over 16 in US & Canada have surfed the Net in last month (correlates to 50.6M people).
More users now access the Net thru an ISP than thru AOL (8M AOL users)