Internet on Fleek

March 3, 2016 8:34 AM

Internet Map 2015 Such great beauty you have internet!
posted by ArticTusk (14 comments total)

Can I zoom in or anything at all? Or is it just a pretty bunch of fireworks?
posted by sparklemotion at 9:00 AM on March 3, 2016

I think you'd get the most glossy effect off this spectacle from this wikipedia link the project has been updating since 2006. The updated map is available in many different resolutions. Wikimedia 240x240 480x480 758x768 1,024x1,024 1,280x1,280
posted by ArticTusk at 9:18 AM on March 3, 2016

I like the concept of this type of map, but this visualization doesn't convey much but "it's a lot of blobs and a big spaghetti in the middle". I'd like to see this map focussing mostly on the backbone, with somehow segregating the regional ISP fanouts so they don't have much visual weight. What I'm most curious is if "the backbone" even makes sense in the modern Internet era. There's a lot of mutual peering these days; the BGP networks for Google and Amazon's CDN alone are probably better connected than any backhaul network provider was back in 2000.

Here's a fun very nerdy take on BGP in January 2016, for some technical details on what's behind this kind of map.
posted by Nelson at 9:36 AM on March 3, 2016 [3 favorites]

This map ain't right, Goonswarm haven't controlled Querious in years...
posted by PenDevil at 9:41 AM on March 3, 2016 [6 favorites]

Nelson, that's a good article. Thanks!
posted by rmd1023 at 10:00 AM on March 3, 2016

Oh, and "the backbone" doesn't make sense any more, I don't think. I think the rise of CDNs are what changed everything.
posted by rmd1023 at 10:01 AM on March 3, 2016 [1 favorite]

I think the big spaghetti is the most interesting part of the mindscape. What are these white spaghetti; Why are they the backbone? Are these spaghetti like untouchable Greek life seniors? Is that Tessier-Ashpool's space station Freeside? Is the international space station on this map?
That's quite the article Nelson, I love it. This Smithsonian link is what sparked my interest here. I am not a computer guy. I did take a networking class and I imagine IPv6 being a definitively large picture for each countries nodes. I haven't seen a collection of the routers specifically used. "Try to learn something about everything and everything about something."
Wikipedia has cataloged this as one of their best images. I'm surprised it wasn't posted before.
When there's an oculus rift simulation for nodes and an indexed OSI overlay for us to pilot through like a brain stem I'll bookmark it! Meanwhile I only have this, this (mobile friendly) and this [linked-in].
Make your own connection map for linked-in? Kudos! Have a open source 2.5 GB image that's open source? No kudos for you! :)
posted by ArticTusk at 10:25 AM on March 3, 2016

If you liked that BGP article you might like the rest of ISP Column too. It's by Geoff Huston, a big cheese in Asia/Pacific networking. He has a particularly interesting view from Australia seeing the growth of Internet in Asia and he writes well. And seldom enough that when he posts it's always interesting.

Bonus map link: the Atlas of Cyberspace, a 2000-era effort at mapping the Internet. By Martin Dodge and Rob Kitchin, it was one of the first serious efforts I saw to apply cartography to networks.
posted by Nelson at 10:34 AM on March 3, 2016 [2 favorites]

It's not even clear to me, from this map, who MetaFilter is eligible to attack.
posted by Wolfdog at 10:45 AM on March 3, 2016 [3 favorites]

It's not even clear to me, from this map, who MetaFilter is eligible to attack.

Metafilter has always been at war with Eastasia.

While completely useless, vismaps always could use more cyberpunk paradigm. Point and zoom is cool and all but I want to ride my digital motorcycle up and down the wasted strips of digital real estate whilst avoiding snowcrash. Nobody ever gets beyond a couple of squiggles but dang its always fun to watch.
posted by Ogre Lawless at 11:00 AM on March 3, 2016 [3 favorites]

It's not even clear to me, from this map, who MetaFilter is eligible to attack.

It's a one-hex zone of control, so RedState is two turns away.
posted by the sobsister at 2:26 PM on March 3, 2016

I'd like to know what the very isolated starbursts are (one surrounded towards the upper right for example).
posted by MattWPBS at 7:44 AM on March 4, 2016

The huge red dot with one backbone coming out of it has to be China, right?
posted by East Manitoba Regional Junior Kabaddi Champion '94 at 8:30 AM on March 4, 2016

Folks might also be interested in these posters.
posted by one weird trick at 5:06 AM on March 5, 2016