Forecasting the Internet: Understanding the Explosive Growth of Data Communications

Citation

du Preez, M. (2003), "Forecasting the Internet: Understanding the Explosive Growth of Data Communications", Online Information Review, Vol. 27 No. 3, pp. 211-212. https://doi.org/10.1108/14684520310481454

David Loomis addresses issues of forecasting, demand analysis, pricing and planning in Forecasting the Internet, aspects which are not usually analysed by authors discussing issues related to Internet economics. He further hopes to educate the reader about how traditional analytic techniques can be used to assess Internet growth and how new approaches can better address the pricing, planning and regulatory issues of Internet growth by offering an historic view of Internet availability and communication developments. The research presented in this volume focuses on forecasts of Internet access and applications, as well as planning and pricing tools for telecommunications. The scope of this volume includes residential demand for Internet access and applications.

Demand forecasting questions that are addressed include the demand for high‐speed access to the Internet, Internet demands in the UK, Internet/online access, the residential datawave, the demand for e‐commerce, the economics of networks, a technological approach to bandwidth forecasting, the importance of broadband services and its reflection in European telecommunications regulation, Internet market and regulatory conundrums, and US broadband pricing and alternatives for Internet service providers.

One of the biggest problems experienced in forecasting the Internet is defining the goods that need to be analysed and how to approach Internet demand in a traditional demand analysis framework. Existing studies of Internet demand have steered clear of these problems by taking a very simple approach to access and usage, making no distinction between regular dial‐up (narrowband) and high‐speed (broadband or cable‐modem) access. Papers in Forecasting the Internet cater for this need, since they focus on the demand for cable‐modem access to the Internet and Internet dial‐up minutes as a proportion of total local telecommunication minutes in the UK.

The authors employ a wide variety of forecasting procedures that range from standard regression to Gompertz curves and from techno‐economics to systems dynamics. The Gompertz curve is employed to assist in the forecasting of digital service demands like the overall size of the high‐speed Internet access market over the next couple of decades, while Internet availability studies follow the Fisher‐Pry model.

The volume includes a useful index. Some terms, such as “online access”, are not included in the index, and the odd page reference is incorrect. Page numbers could also have been combined to avoid confusion and make the index more user‐friendly.

Forecasting the Internet is a well‐researched volume – all of the contributors are academics, researchers and engineering specialists involved in telecommunications, information science and economics. It can be recommended to all persons working in the field of information science, information communication technology as well as information economics.