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to
be available.
With
Internet game playing, the player plays a commercial or
shareware
game on their computer and their opponents,
rather
then the application itself on their computer, are real
live
people doing the same on their own machines where ever
they
live.
Event
Broadcastingis one of those remarkable things about the
internet.
Limiting the number of visitors to what is
essentially
a live web site which permits the visitor to see and
hear
a conference or special event. The Canadian Juno music
awards
are online this year as have been many conferences
and
some concerts. The technology for this is largely web
related
as they use web browsers but supplement its
capability
with RealAudiotechnology for sound and
QuickTimevideo streaming
for video. (some use of MPEG
is
also used for both audio and video transport)
Push
technology is a commercial service that uses the Internet's
connectivity
to direct to your computer information,
entertainment
and news. The cost of these services is borne
by
the advertising that is part of the project. PointCast is one
of
the best known such services but there are more then a
dozen
services of this type and they either continuously
download
data into your machine in the background while
you
are on line or they are set to dial up and download at
intervals.
Services of this type may begin soon to shape the
sort
of thing the Internet will become as streaming video
becomes
more workable, it is conceivable that much of what
use
we make of television may be served by Internet push
technology.
From
this discussion you can see that it is unlikely that limits will appear to curtail
the growth and development of the Internet and the variety of things it now provides.
Without a doubt, the Internet is the most technological cultural significant shift
since the advent of the printing press, the coming of radio in the twenties and television
in the fifties. What we know, how we know it and what we value will all be tested
by this technology. Like the other media developments its significance will not be
seen immediately but will only become apparent as our dependence on it becomes accepted
and unconscious. Newspapers and books were responsible for revolutions, radio shaped
the response of a world to the Axis nations and television both produced and ended
the Vietnam conflict. The Internet will continue to be as influential and important
as these and perhaps even more so because the lack of definition and its pervasiveness.
The challenge is as it has always been, to acknowledge reality and use it to best
further our personal and collective needs. |
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