> If you look at where Cloudflare and some of the big clouds are going with their private networks, private backplanes, and "secure your traffic by putting it all over our network" zero trust plans it seems to be going that way.
All the networks of the Internet are already private, just like the networks of AOL and CompuServe were private back in the day: your ISP's network is private, YouTube's network is private, AWS' network is private. It's just that those private networks agree to talk to each other.
Otherwise your ISP would have to re-create YouTube and Reddit/forums and eBay/marketplace and…, and YouTube would have to buildout (inter)national network to connect their video services to people's homes.
Just like AOL and CompuServe had to build out information services and a connectivity infrastructure back in the day.
Now each of the previously walled gardens (messaging, forums, marketplaces, connectivity, etc) is done by its own entity, each taking a slice of the monetary pie for the service(s) they provide.
The Internet is a 'network of networks', but it is also an agreement: an agreement for everyone to talk to everyone else.
I think that's kind of semantic. The agreement is what I'm talking about. It makes the Internet open. I can just send you a packet. That's what's in danger here.
All the networks of the Internet are already private, just like the networks of AOL and CompuServe were private back in the day: your ISP's network is private, YouTube's network is private, AWS' network is private. It's just that those private networks agree to talk to each other.
Otherwise your ISP would have to re-create YouTube and Reddit/forums and eBay/marketplace and…, and YouTube would have to buildout (inter)national network to connect their video services to people's homes.
Just like AOL and CompuServe had to build out information services and a connectivity infrastructure back in the day.
Now each of the previously walled gardens (messaging, forums, marketplaces, connectivity, etc) is done by its own entity, each taking a slice of the monetary pie for the service(s) they provide.
The Internet is a 'network of networks', but it is also an agreement: an agreement for everyone to talk to everyone else.