Abstract

By the time you read this, most of what is written in this chapter might be outdated. It is probably unwise to use a technology perfected in the fifteenth century (printing) to explain a constantly evolving technology of the twenty-first century (the Internet). Authors, industry experts, and researchers frequently try to nail down global conclusions about the Internet, only to find that, before the ink is dry, some new upstart has rewritten the rulebook and forced us to rethink our assumptions about communications.