1 Internet traffic growth trends Andrew Odlyzko Digital Technology Center University of Minnesota
2 Main points: Internet traffic growth slowing Hype accelerating Even very biased hype is occasionally correct: trustworthy data collection desirable There are huge sources of potential future traffic Future traffic levels result of interaction of complex feedback loops
3 Internet Growth Hype: “… bandwidth … will be chronically scarce. Capacity actually creates demand in this business…bandwidth-centric names are good values at any price since nobody can predict the true demand caused by growth.” -- Jack Grubman, April 1988 “Over the past five years, Internet usage has doubled every three months.” -- Kevin Boyne, UUNET COO, Sept “If you are not scared, you do not understand” -- Mike O’Dell, UUNET Chief Scientist, May 2000
4 Blatant implausibilities in Internet bubble stories Mike O’Dell, May Audio presentation: claimed consistent 10x annual growth Slides: domestic UUNET network: growth only 7x mid – ,281 OC12-miles mid – ,485 mid – ,794 Extrapolating back to mid-1994 using 10x annual rate: 5 OC12-miles 2,000 T1-miles ??????
5 Demand estimates difficult: “It’s tough to make predictions, especially about the future.” Yogi Berra Underestimates of demand for high-tech products common computers mobile phones …
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7 ESnet: longest available run of reliable traffic statistics: Traffic accepted by ESnet in June of each year year TB to 2007 compound annual growth rate: 85%
8 Hong Kong: intriguing slowdown year growth rate in Internet traffic over the previous year, for October of each year % Per-capita traffic intensity in Hong Kong is about 6x the U.S. level.
9 Huge potential sources of additional Internet traffic: Storage Year-end 2006 worldwide digital storage capacity: 185,000 PB Year-end 2006 worldwide Internet traffic: about 2,500 PB/month Broadcast TV Year-end 2006 U.S. Internet traffic per capita: 2 GB/month Year-end 2006 U.S. TV consumption per capita: 40 GB/month (soft figure, assumes 3 hr/day, at 1 Mbps, no HDTV,...)
10 Revenue per MB: SMS:$1, cellular calls:1.00 wireline voice:0.10 residential Internet:0.01 backbone Internet traffic: Volume is not value, but is an indicator of ecosystem health and growth!
11 Further data, discussions, and speculations in papers and presentation decks at: