Prof: Don't fear the exaflood

The telecom industry within the last year has been dealing with forecasts of worsening Internet congestion, a demand for bandwidth moving far ahead of availability, but at least one Internet observer says the sky is not falling. Professor Andrew Odlyzko, director of the University of Minnesota's Interdisciplinary Digital Technology Center,said that according to data collected from Internet exchange points, Internet traffic growth rates worldwide have not changed in recent years.

Odlyzko does not deny that an exaflood is coming or already exists, but contends that extreme reactions by the telecom industry to spend more to radically expand capacity may be unnecessary. He told Telephony that he estimates average current monthly Internet traffic in the U.S. to be between 900 and 1550 petabytes per month, up from 750 to 1250 petabytes in 2007.

For more:
- see this coverage at Telephony

Related articles:
Nemertes Research last year said Internet resources could be exhausted by 2010. Nemertes report
Exaflood today, zettaflood tomorrow. Exaflood report