Internet Centralization on the The Hedge
Lixia Zhang and myself discussed Internet centralization together with Russ White, Alvaro Retana and Tom Ammon on The Hedge podcast.
Recent years have witnessed the consolidations of Internet applications, services, as well as the infrastructure. The Decentralization of Internet Research Group (DINRG) aims to provide for the IRTF/IETF community both an open forum to discuss the Internet centralization phenomena and associated potential threats, and a platform to facilitate the coordination of efforts in identifying the causes of observed consolidations and the mitigation solutions.
DINRG's main objectives include the following:
- Measurement of Internet centralization and the consequential societal impacts;
- Characterization and assessment of observed Internet centralization;
- Investigation of the root causes of Internet centralization, and articulation of the impacts from market economy, architecture and protocol designs, as well as government regulations;
- Exploration of new research topics and technical solutions for decentralized system and application development;
- Documentation of the outcome from the above efforts; and
- Recommendations that may help steer Internet away from further consolidation.