YAHOO NEWS (UK & IRELAND): The internet, as we know it, could be obsolete within a decade.
Forget dial-up; forget broadband: The future, it seems, is The [sic] Grid.
It's the brainchild of CERN, the European Organisation for Nuclear Research based in Geneva.
It's there that Sir Tim Berners-Lee first invented the internet, so it's appropriate that the next stage in its evolution should emerge there.
But what is the Grid?
In fact, it is a spin-off from another major research project. For several years, the particle physicists at CERN have been building a device called the Large Hadron Collider.
Knowing they would need massive processing capability to cope with the data from the new device, the scientists set about integrating thousands of computers all around the world.
Professor Tony Doyle, technical director of the project, says: "We need so much processing power, if all the computers were here at CERN there would be a problem getting enough electricity to run them.
"We had to have a new network powerful enough to send the data instantly to research partners in other countries."
That network of linked computers - connected by superfast fibre-optic cable and combining together to act as one giant super-computer - is the Grid and, one day, it won't just be for scientists. We'll all be connected to it. Unlocking the Internet of the Future >>>
The Dawning of a New Dark Age (Paperback)
The Dawning of a New Dark Age (Hardback)
