Featured Blogs

The Upcoming 5G Confusion

Until now, the 5G industry has spread a lot of hype, but it hasn't affected customers. That's all starting to change as the cellular carriers are starting to offer 5G phones. Many customers who spend extra for 5G phones are going to quickly be frustrated and disappointed as they try to participate in the new 5G world. Consider both AT&T and T-Mobile. Both companies are introducing both a low-band and a high-band 5G phone, and customers who want 5G will have to choose... more

Landmark IPv6 Report Published: State of Deployment 2017

On the fifth anniversary of World IPv6 Launch, we're excited to share a detailed report on the State of IPv6 Deployment in 2017. It really is staggering how far IPv6 deployment has progressed in five years. In mid-2012, Google measured less than 1% of users accessing their services over IPv6. Today that figure is getting close to 20%. Since World IPv6 Launch, several major operators are now delivering the majority of traffic from major content sources like Google, Akamai and others over IPv6. more

Keeping Track of Satellites

The topic of satellite broadband has been heating up lately. Elon Musk's StarLink now has over 540 broadband satellites in the sky and is talking about starting a few beta tests of the technology with customers. OneWeb went into bankruptcy, but it is being bought out by a team consisting of the British government and Bharti Airtel, the largest cellular company in India. Jeff Bezos has continued to move forward with Project Kuiper, and the FCC recently gave the nod for the company to move ahead. more

Using AM Radio Towers in Designing Wireless Networks

One existing resource that is often overlooked in designing wireless networks is AM radio towers. For the most part, companies deploying fixed wireless and microwave antenna have avoided these towers. This is due to the nature of AM radio, which transmits at such a low frequency that the entire tower is effectively used as the transmitting antenna. The entire tower is energized with the AM signal, and the typical AM tower sits on a base insulator that blocks the tower from being grounded.  more

ICANN’s Two Decades of Evolution

In the fall of 1998, I was present at the first meeting of the ICANN Board which was then made up of very senior, prominent parties from a broad spectrum of sources. Much to her credit, Esther Dyson accepted the position as the first Chair of the ICANN Board for the newly birthed organization. I was in attendance in support of the nomination of Michael Roberts as the first ICANN CEO. It was a time of uncertainty. more

White Spaces: The NAB vs. Reality

One of Washington's most powerful corporate lobbies is at it again. Raising a dust cloud of lies in a last-ditch effort to stop new technology that could better the lives of millions. For more than five years, now, the television broadcast lobby has tried to deny the American public access to white spaces -- unused airwaves that sit vacant between TV channels. Technology now exists that would tap the near limitless potential of these airwaves and deliver high-speed Internet services to tens of millions of people now left on the wrong side of the digital divide. more

Matter - The New IoT Standard

Anybody that uses more than one brand of Internet of Things (IoT) device in the home understands that there is no standard way to connect to these devices. Each manufacturer chooses from a range of different protocols to communicate with and control its devices, such as BLE, LoRa, LTE-M, NB-IoT, SigFox, ZigBee, and others. more

New gTLDs: Are You Rich?

Did you know about these new domain name extensions which focus on wellness, wealth and ego? Well, I listed them and there is an interesting one... which really is unique... Many want to be famous and some industries should have a look at this list of extensions since they are keywords dedicated to very powerful industries: Gold and Diamonds, for example, have their own new gTLD for domain names ending in ".gold" and ".diamonds". more

A Climate of Change for the Caribbean Internet

Spring storms with winter qualities clobbered North America this week, threatening Canada with slow-moving storms, and pounding the United States with near-record snowfall in the midwest, low temperatures in the south and tornadoes further east. You could say change was in the air. And although the unseasonable weather didn't reach as far south as Florida, the climate of change still dominated the atmosphere at the fifteenth regional meeting of the Caribbean Network Operators Group (CaribNOG). more

Data, Applications, and the Meaning of the Network

Two things seem to be universally true in the network engineering space right this moment. The first is that network engineers are convinced their jobs will not exist, or there will only be network engineers "in the cloud" within the next five years. The second is a mad scramble to figure out how to add value to the business through the network. These two movements are, of course, mutually exclusive visions of the future. more

A CENTR White Paper on Creating More Standardized and Streamlined Domain Registry Lock Services

CENTR has published a white paper separating registry lock services into two standardized models. This categorization and the included recommendations can help top-level domain registries (re)design their registry lock services. The aim of the paper is to reduce fragmentation in implementation between registries to explain the value of registry lock to domain holders more easily. more

France the Latest Showcase for National Fibre Public Funding

The French are good at 'doing' infrastructure. The country takes pride in a civil service which has been progressively centralised since the efforts of Cardinal Richelieu in the mid-17th century. The well-funded health system is among the best in Europe. The generously subsidised rail service, the SNCF, also rates highly. These and other components of the modern French State cost money, and the government has rarely proven shy in supporting big ideas, particularly if they are so readily equated with public welfare and benefit. more

Submarine Cable Resiliency in the Face of Disruptions

I have on my desk a rather small tube. It's a little under 2cm in diameter, 6 cm long, and looks like it's made from a dull white polycarbonate material. At the end, I can see a copper inner tube, and inside that, another polycarbonate layer, and then a smaller steel tube that holds a thin steel thread and some fibre optic cables. There are no layers of steel jacketing, nor any other additional wrapping at all. more

Developing Models for the Prediction of Domain Name Renewal Rates

One of the key issues for the Domain industry is how to accurately predict year-on-year how many customers will renew their domain names. It's fairly common that a registry in the first year has around a 60% renewal rate, and following the first year, that increases to around 80 and 85 percent on the remaining domain names. But how can we understand better why this is so, how can this be more accurately predicted, and what can be done to help maximize these opportunities? more

The Christmas Goat and IPv6 (Year 14)

A new year and a new goat with new conditions, the goat was slowly eaten by jackdaws, and in the end, almost only the frame remained. This was really slow TV for the devastation… You can read more on Wikipedia about the devastating jackdaws and the straw... 36% IPv6 is equal to last year, and I had high hopes as Telia (AS3301) has made great progress in IPv6 and that Sweden should be the dominant country.  more