Meanwhile, a whole mess of political and commercial troubles face the Net. The telcos, who see the Internet as a delivery medium that they control, want to try to charge content providers a second time for that delivery -- first, for using the bandwidth in the first place (the current pay structure), then again for "prioritised delivery" of that content. The scheme is called tiered Internet, and it would create classes of content delivery the way airplanes currently have classes of seating. Companies that could pay what Preston Gralla has so eloquently dubbed cyberextortion would have a better chance of seeing their content delivered in a timely and reliable fashion.

Companies, individuals, start-ups, or nonprofit corporations who couldn't or wouldn't pay? Well, you get less legroom in coach, buster. That's just how it goes. And one of the primary targets of tiered Internet accusations is that big old bandwidth hog, Google. Consider that Google has been buying dark fiber for a while and hired Internet pioneer Vint Cerf to help build a network infrastructure that, realistically, has every chance of becoming a separate GoogleNet, and you start to see that a future fracture is all too possible. And GoogleNet could be just the beginning.

Want porn? Hang out at PornNet. China could build its own ChinaNet and have no more fears about Google or Yahoo indexing dissident speech and making it available to its nicely sequestered citizens, or about blogs creeping in with their capitalist, democratic, totalitarian, pedestrian, or hey, pornographic viewpoints. Parents could safely deposit their children on KidNet and restrict access to any other Internets, while they hang out downstairs and do secure banking on MoneyNet. We'd visit various Internets the way we now visit various Web sites and blogs, but without any outside chatter, interference, nefarious information, viruses or spam sneaking through.

Each Net will have a different interface, a different connection paradigm -- forget about using one browser interface to get to one Web site, unless, of course, you're determined to stick to that old saw, the World Wide Web. (I mean, who even uses that anymore?) Some might be text-based, some might look like applications, some will, of course, build their own "browser" interfaces -- and imagine the patent lawsuits that will result from that, eh? Some Internets will be free, most will probably be subscription, some might be invite-only, a fair number will be free but advertising-supported -- and that's an advertiser's dream, right? I mean, talk about a targeted audience.

Illegal file- and movie-sharing could become a thing of the past, since it will be relegated to TorrentNet, and once the streams are narrowed to a specific set of routers and fibres, it'll be a cinch to track down every single user. But on the other hand, you might just as well see an explosion of darknets, in which small groups create fast, agile, mobile Internets that are used exclusively for file sharing or who knows what else. Imagine if organised crime could have its very own Internet; imagine if Osama bin Laden fans or terrorists, instead of blathering in Orkut forums for all the world to see and renounce, were quietly building more virulent support in the safety of an unmoderated, unrestrictive, uncritical TerrorNet?

In sum, we'd visit, subscribe to, restrict ourselves to, or be restricted to these various Internets the way we currently absorb Web sites. So, what's the problem? Well, for one thing, information disappears and becomes harder to access. Google won't work in the new Net order, that's for sure: sure, they'll find a way to search across multiple Internets, but they'll be locked out of private networks, secure networks, darknets, and pure commercial Internets. The consumer cost could increase dramatically -- especially if most private Internets are subscription-based. ISPs would become IsSPs -- Internets Service Providers. No one provider, most likely, could offer access to more than a few different Internets, so you'd be limited by subscription packages available from the telcos, or you'd be looking at multiple monthly bills or confusing à la carte choices.

You'd face staggering interoperability issues. Imagine if you couldn't call someone's mobile phone unless they were on the same network as you. Suddenly, you'd have that problem with e-mail, with link-sharing, with instant messaging. No more Skype, if Voice over IP works only on networks that actually use IP. With multiple networks to support and maintain, outages would be more common and reliability would dwindle. And then, of course ... and you know it's coming ... you lose all of the innovation, all of the information sharing, all of the openness, all of the revolution that a single, messy, worldwide, insecure, porn-filled, Wild West, speech-freeing, wonderful, World Wide Web-enabling Internet.

The problem is, I'm not sure an Internet splinter is avoidable. There are already Internet separatist treatises out there on the Web -- how ironic. And it's possible that it's just our human nature to split off into the groups and communities that make us most comfortable. Our differences in politics, morals, ideologies, and governments will probably force the inevitable upon us -- not to mention our human desire to make ever-increasing piles of money off of our best inventions. Nevertheless, I'm keeping hope alive. I hope we can save the Internet from ourselves. I like the idea of having at least this one thing that we all share, that works for all of us, and that can change all of our lives with just a couple of keystrokes. The Internet is possibly the best thing we humans have ever built. It'd be all too tragic to see us turn around and cannibalise it.

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