Will You Be Part of the Internet2, Too?

Sequels of any sort always walk a fine line between completing a picture or pushing a frontier and tainting the original while trying to wring every last dollar from a particular idea. The "Rocky" series gives us perfect examples of both. The first few movies all told compelling stories of struggle and triumph over adversity, but the public was eventually force fed a stream of "Rocky v. the Martian President" type of fare that quickly approached the absurd. While many sequels take this track to our wallets, some genuinely seek to enhance the enjoyment of the viewer (or reader). In the scientific community today, we have one of these more righteous endeavors, namely the Internet2 project.

Like its big brother, the Internet, Internet2 has sprung to life from the hotbed of intellect provided by the United States' universities. More than 170 universities are already working on this project with government and industry collaborators, and they are actively seeking even more quality participants. Because of the special information technology needs present in a university setting, academia has spearheaded this movement. Couple that with the abundance of technical talents already on-site at our nation's schools, and the marriage makes perfect sense.

That's who's playing, but what is their game? Well, Internet2 is designed to be a fertile breeding ground for the design and development of new network application and engineering technologies. Internet2 is also seen as the supporting network that will help people working on important IT problems to quickly gain access to the newest technologies.

In the coming weeks, we'll take a deeper look at the origins of Internet2, who is involved, and what it will all mean to the average technology worker. In the meantime, you can visit the Internet2 web site at http://www.internet2.edu for more information. It's a pretty safe bet that this sequel will not be a waste of our time

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