0:00:00.995,0:00:12.702 (Music) 0:00:12.702,0:00:16.082 (Applause) 0:00:16.082,0:00:20.855 Some time ago, a man named Bob Metcalfe invented the Ethernet, 0:00:20.855,0:00:25.133 in 1973, about a mile and a half from where I was working at Stanford, 0:00:25.133,0:00:26.874 working on the Internet. 0:00:26.874,0:00:32.972 And a few years later, Bob announced that the Internet was going to experience a gigalapse, 0:00:32.972,0:00:35.228 and he published an article on the subject. 0:00:35.228,0:00:36.939 And it didn't happen. 0:00:36.939,0:00:40.863 And, to his credit, he took his newspaper article, 0:00:40.863,0:00:43.925 ran it in a blender, and ate it on the stage. 0:00:43.925,0:00:45.164 (Laughter) 0:00:45.164,0:00:48.291 After first checking to see if the ink might be toxic or not. 0:00:48.291,0:00:49.172 June Cohen: (Laughs) 0:00:49.172,0:00:54.352 Vint Cerf: Now, it's absolutely true that the Internet is getting bigger and bigger, 0:00:54.352,0:00:56.441 and more and more ubiquitous. 0:00:56.441,0:01:00.570 It's going to be in just about every appliance we can think of. 0:01:00.570,0:01:04.428 The question is, does that mean it's all going to collapse? 0:01:04.428,0:01:06.033 I don't think so. 0:01:06.033,0:01:09.426 But I am willing to accept the proposition that 0:01:09.426,0:01:11.419 we should think about that. 0:01:11.419,0:01:16.578 Already there are changes being made to the Internet to make it more resilient, 0:01:16.578,0:01:18.605 to make it more resistant to some of the problems 0:01:18.605,0:01:20.638 that you see in the headlines every day. 0:01:20.638,0:01:24.491 This is not a static system. 0:01:24.491,0:01:26.386 This thing is still evolving, 0:01:26.386,0:01:29.563 Even though the design was done 40 years ago, 0:01:29.563,0:01:32.328 it has evolved over that period of time, 0:01:32.328,0:01:34.441 and it continues to change. 0:01:34.441,0:01:38.446 That's the one thing that makes this network so unusual, 0:01:38.446,0:01:42.366 it wasn't designed to do any thing in particular. 0:01:42.366,0:01:45.486 And that's why it's been able to do almost anything 0:01:45.486,0:01:47.887 we can think of to program. 0:01:47.887,0:01:53.444 So I'm ready for Plan B, if Danny has a specific idea, 0:01:53.444,0:01:57.405 but I have the feeling that by making it more and more ubiquitous, 0:01:57.405,0:02:00.843 it's going to be pretty hard to shut it down. 0:02:00.843,0:02:03.413 When you look at all the things that happen, 0:02:03.413,0:02:06.261 the various and sundry attacks, which really do happen, 0:02:06.261,0:02:09.339 the malware that floats through the network, and everything else, 0:02:09.339,0:02:13.242 aren't you amazed that it still works? 0:02:13.242,0:02:15.471 I mean, look, if you know too much about something 0:02:15.471,0:02:17.543 it's always astonishing that it works at all. 0:02:17.543,0:02:19.613 Every time I get a web page that comes up, 0:02:19.613,0:02:20.836 I'm sitting here thinking 0:02:20.836,0:02:23.284 "Holy Crap, it actually worked." 0:02:23.284,0:02:24.959 (Laughter) 0:02:24.959,0:02:27.341 And, you know, when you know all the things that have to happen, 0:02:27.341,0:02:29.434 you think "Ha! That's impossible." 0:02:29.434,0:02:32.160 So, it has been stunningly resilient. 0:02:32.160,0:02:35.264 It has grown by a factor of a million or more, 0:02:35.264,0:02:38.539 since it was first turned on in 1983, 0:02:38.539,0:02:41.864 but something new could come along. 0:02:41.864,0:02:43.469 I'll give you a good example. 0:02:43.469,0:02:46.235 There was this thing called the telephone network. 0:02:46.235,0:02:49.556 It was invented around 1876. 0:02:49.556,0:02:53.823 Today, the telephone network is turning into the Internet, 0:02:53.823,0:02:56.820 because all the voice is being run over IP, and everything else. 0:02:56.820,0:02:59.610 So that means you can build a big thing, 0:02:59.610,0:03:01.788 and that doesn't mean something else won't come along. 0:03:01.788,0:03:05.735 So it may not be Plan B to preserve the Internet, 0:03:05.735,0:03:09.614 it may be Plan C to invent something new. 0:03:09.614,0:03:12.913 Actually I believe it would be prudent to do two things. 0:03:12.913,0:03:16.954 One of them we've already started doing, this is called "clean sheet." 0:03:16.954,0:03:19.918 The question is, what if we started over and redesigned the network, 0:03:19.918,0:03:21.301 what would we do differently? 0:03:21.301,0:03:26.247 I know one thing I would do, I'd pick 128-bit address space instead of 32 -- 0:03:26.247,0:03:30.280 JC: Who wouldn't? [br]VC: -- so we wouldn't have to go through the IPv6 transition. 0:03:30.280,0:03:33.371 And I'd also work hard on more security. 0:03:33.371,0:03:38.372 But, nonetheless, I think that the clean sheet phenomenon, 0:03:38.372,0:03:40.523 the clean sheet exercise, lets you do two things. 0:03:40.523,0:03:43.070 It lets you see what would you do differently, what would it look like, 0:03:43.070,0:03:44.671 and then you can ask, well, 0:03:44.671,0:03:47.805 can I retrofit any of those ideas into the existing network? 0:03:47.805,0:03:49.654 That's happening. 0:03:49.654,0:03:52.781 The second thing, I think, is to ask the question, 0:03:52.781,0:03:56.043 what could I do to create a communication environment 0:03:56.043,0:03:57.835 that's even better than the Internet? 0:03:57.835,0:04:00.740 I don't know what the answer is, although it might turn out to be 0:04:00.740,0:04:05.328 quantum communication, which the physicists tell us is not possible, 0:04:05.328,0:04:07.716 but then, they told us a lot of things are not possible, 0:04:07.716,0:04:11.493 so, who knows? In 10 years' time maybe we will see something different. 0:04:11.493,0:04:14.995 Right now, I think we'll manage okay.