The Future of the Web

Future Threats: Four Trends That Could Cripple the New Internet

No Net neutrality: Congress is evaluating whether to give big telecom companies the right to charge companies for a guarantee of faster access. But once Big Telecom gets its way, critics fear, small, innovative new companies could be crowded out by the Microsofts and Googles, which can afford to pay for good access.

Copyright complaints: In August, the reporter who caught the Rodney King beating on tape sued YouTube because someone uploaded the video to the site. Universal Music Group may sue YouTube and MySpace over users uploading copyrighted video. Kill the messengers, and we could lose vital outlets for public opinion and discourse.

Security concerns: The pace at which customers are moving to online banking has slowed, in large part because they are worried about online security. Banks have investigated interesting concepts such as using secure RSS feeds, which would allow you to receive, for example, credit card activity alerts in a feed--though banks have their own security concerns to worry about if they add such services. Until the Web gets safer, these kinds of issues won't be resolved.

Crappy connectivity: Upstream bandwidths are still constricted, making uploading things like video files a time-consuming task. Furthermore, usable mobile bandwidth still costs an arm and a leg, and some carriers impose annoying limitations on how you can employ Web access.

Special Report: Tomorrow's Technology

Alan Stafford is the senior writer for PC World.