4 ms·

So what's improved since then? 1. Bandwidth 2. Hardware 3. Language ease of use With respect to the implementations of these "services", things were actually

So what's improved since then? 1. Bandwidth 2. Hardware 3. Language ease of use With respect to the implementations of these "services", things were actually better back in the day. That's because users were generally more responsible (because you had to take an interest in how the network worked in order to use it) and there was no NAT. Peer to peer connections were the norm. By comparison, todays "web" (which people confuse with the internet), is crippled, functionally. So all of these "services" use ugly hacks. Like trying to stay in touch with people you know through some sociopathic stranger's website. As if that was "connectivity". Or trying to run programs through a "web browser". NAT forced people to use the web, and forget about the internet. The future lies in moving beyond NAT, and beyond a port 80, web browser-centric model of what people call "the internet" (which is actually just the crippled web). We will never get the full functionality of the internet through only "the web".

dxbydt 14y ago
NAT vs P2P is small fry. What really bothers me is the death of ATM at the hands of IP. A protocol which had a much better design, addressing present future and futuristic use cases dies at the hand of a protocol that had the marketing musclepower of cisco.
- deleted 14y ago
  [deleted]
- mcguire 14y ago
  I just wanted to mention a couple of things: * 48-byte cells. * ATM had the marketing muscle of the entire Telco industry. As the Wikipedia page (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asynchronous_Transfer_Mode http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asynchronous_Transfer_Mode) (which sounds somewhat like it was written by the ATM Forum) says, "ATM became popular with telephone companies and many computer makers in the 1990s. However, even by the end of the decade, the better price/performance of Internet Protocol-based products was competing with ATM technology for integrating real-time and bursty network traffic."
NathanKP 14y ago
Isn't there something to be said for the standard port 80 website that the average person can use with their built in web browser without the need to install custom apps? I'd rather see everyone using a "sociopathic person's website" to stay in touch than see a fragmented environment in which some people use one program to stay in touch on port X using one protocol while other people use port Y, while you don't like either but instead want to use port Z.
- pokesomesmot 14y ago
  There is a lot to be said for standards. But that has nothing to do with the focus on the web to the exclusion of all else that is possible. As someone said, TCP/IP became a standard, even though there were superior alternatives. The benefits to us that you observe are in the adoption of a common standard, not in the choice of the protocol. Client-server is standard. NAT is standard. Firewalls are standard. When everyone adeheres to standards, it's a good thing. But these choices are poor and do not benefit us as much as better alternatives would.
icebraining 14y ago
NAT didn't force you to use the web, just to use a client-server model, which is a very different thing.
- pokesomesmot 14y ago
  That's a good point. The web is but one example of client-server, albeit a large one. It's client-server that is the most insidious problem.
lnanek2 14y ago
It's sort of been worked around already anyway. I see two Android phones connect directly all the time nowadays when running various software. There are whole libraries and STUN servers designed for the correct hole punching procedures, which work most of the time. Some apps don't even have the code path written for piping all the video call data or whatever they are usually sending directly through a server anymore. If they can't go direct, they just don't support users on that network.
- mcguire 14y ago
  "There are whole libraries and STUN servers designed for the correct hole punching procedures,..." Which was a gigantic mess, for many reasons. Check out www.cs.ucla.edu/~lixia/papers/NAT-in-Retrospect.pdf [PDF]. "...which work most of the time." Exactly.

dxbydt 14y ago

NAT vs P2P is small fry. What really bothers me is the death of ATM at the hands of IP. A protocol which had a much better design, addressing present future and futuristic use cases dies at the hand of a protocol that had the marketing musclepower of cisco.

deleted 14y ago
[deleted]
mcguire 14y ago
I just wanted to mention a couple of things: * 48-byte cells. * ATM had the marketing muscle of the entire Telco industry. As the Wikipedia page (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asynchronous_Transfer_Mode http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asynchronous_Transfer_Mode) (which sounds somewhat like it was written by the ATM Forum) says, "ATM became popular with telephone companies and many computer makers in the 1990s. However, even by the end of the decade, the better price/performance of Internet Protocol-based products was competing with ATM technology for integrating real-time and bursty network traffic."

NathanKP 14y ago

Isn't there something to be said for the standard port 80 website that the average person can use with their built in web browser without the need to install custom apps? I'd rather see everyone using a "sociopathic person's website" to stay in touch than see a fragmented environment in which some people use one program to stay in touch on port X using one protocol while other people use port Y, while you don't like either but instead want to use port Z.

pokesomesmot 14y ago
There is a lot to be said for standards. But that has nothing to do with the focus on the web to the exclusion of all else that is possible. As someone said, TCP/IP became a standard, even though there were superior alternatives. The benefits to us that you observe are in the adoption of a common standard, not in the choice of the protocol. Client-server is standard. NAT is standard. Firewalls are standard. When everyone adeheres to standards, it's a good thing. But these choices are poor and do not benefit us as much as better alternatives would.

icebraining 14y ago

NAT didn't force you to use the web, just to use a client-server model, which is a very different thing.

pokesomesmot 14y ago
That's a good point. The web is but one example of client-server, albeit a large one. It's client-server that is the most insidious problem.

lnanek2 14y ago

It's sort of been worked around already anyway. I see two Android phones connect directly all the time nowadays when running various software. There are whole libraries and STUN servers designed for the correct hole punching procedures, which work most of the time. Some apps don't even have the code path written for piping all the video call data or whatever they are usually sending directly through a server anymore. If they can't go direct, they just don't support users on that network.

mcguire 14y ago
"There are whole libraries and STUN servers designed for the correct hole punching procedures,..." Which was a gigantic mess, for many reasons. Check out www.cs.ucla.edu/~lixia/papers/NAT-in-Retrospect.pdf [PDF]. "...which work most of the time." Exactly.