Blog 3: Who Does the Internet Belong To?

How much is too much? This is a question that quickly crossed my mind as Blum briefly explained how Google came to acquire an important piece of networking real estate in 2006. Google purchased a gigantic building spanning an entire block in Manhattan for $1.9 billion, one of the top three most important network meeting points in New York as stated by Blum. This caught the eye of Internet infrastructure as the established search-engine giant amassed the large network meeting point that had a far-reaching global presence. Which leads us back to the question, how much is too much?

As of January 2016, Comcast owns over 50 percent of the 25mbps subscriptions in the United States. In an article titled "Comcast and Charter may soon control 70% of 25 mbps subscriptions", it's explained that Comcast's plans to purchase TWC was thwarted by the FCC because they feared Comcast would abuse their market share to harm online video sources. If the FCC is stopping a company from acquiring another company based on the fear of monopolization, perhaps that is too much. Is google acquiring the 111 Eighth fiber highway in New York too much? 

Blog 1: The Internet is Alive

The way that Andrew Blum gives the internet a physical embodiment within the first couple of sentences of the prologue captured me. "Not the whole internet, only the section that resides in a dusty clump beside my living room couch (Blum 1). Blum starts his novel off by bringing an entire global computer network to the eye level of less tech savvy consumers like you and I. He goes on to put into words what most of us experience on a daily basis, connecting to the Internet without really knowing what we're connected to. You plug a cable into your computer that's connected to a box that's connected to the wall and voila, entertainment and resources to get work done are readily available using a computer as a medium. But have you ever thought of exactly what it is that you're connected to? Most consumers, myself included, see internet as a staple household commodity that's taken for granted until the connection is lost and a flurry of unplugging and restarting ensues. Another idea to think about is the vastness of the internet. How big is the internet really? Can it even be measured in a volume sense? I have a strong feeling that these questions will be touched upon as I continue to be introduced to what the internet is through Blum's work, and I hope that my limited knowledge on the subject will be broadened as well.