The number of users and devices hooked up to the Internet is rising dramatically every day. This had led to an exponential increase in traffic of data moving on the information superhighways that sustain the Internet and will probably cause a collapse in the not-so-distant future. To keep this from happening and reap the full potential of the Internet, in 1998 Internet 2 was created. It is an American consortium led by more than 200 universities that are working with the main high-tech companies and the government. From the outset its goals were clear: built a top-line network for researchers around the world, implement revolutionary applications that actually work and take full advantage of this network, and assure that in the future, all these services and features are available to the public in general.

Dizzing speeds
The Internet 2 project, which is formally called the University Corporation for Advanced Internet Development is not for profit, and it is estimated that in a couple of years it will reach technological maturity. Its first advances show how different it is from the current Internet. It allows transmission of data equivalent to a 30-volume encyclopedia in just one second. This is up to 9 billion pieces of data per second, or 300,000 times faster than current Internet connections. To make this possible it was necessary to build a giant fibre optic network and naturally that cost a lot of money. The initial investment in the project was 500 million dollars. And although the project is still in the experimental phase, the goal is for this network gradually to unclog the current Internet and replace it over the long term.

As for applications, the ones that stand out most are in the field of medicine, as the new network has allowed the computer systems of different hospitals to hook up. Thanks to the system's dizzying speed, it has been possible, for instance, for a doctor to examine in real-time a scan of a patients thousands of kilometres away.

Other initiatives
This initiative by American universities has prompted other organisations and countries to do the same. In Canada and Japan, for instance, networks based on fibre optics and with characteristics similar to Internet 2 are under construction. In Europe, the main Internet 2 network is called G�ant. It is a project sponsored by the European Union and with participation from several former eastern bloc countries. In Spain, the main experiment of next-generation Internet technology is taking place in Catalonia. It involves universities, hospitals, companies and the regional government. The first experiments done so far were based on laboratory research, such as transmitting clinical records, holding teleconferences on health education in schools, carrying out telesurgery, or exchanging information with hospitals abroad.

Technological novelty
Titanio 5000 MP3 player from Energy Sistem
A small player with 512 Mb of memory for storing the equivalent of 40 audio CDs. One of its main features is Direct Encoding, which allows it to receive an audio signal from a DVD player, television, sound card or any other piece of equipment and record it directly into the player's memory. The data transfer is done through its USB port. The player also has an FM radio tuner and a microphone. Its equaliser has 5 different modes (Live, Classic, Normal, Rock and Pop) and it has a back-lit LCD display.
Price: 298.00 euros