1. With the NSF out of the picture, how is network-related research conducted? I can't imagine those academic researchers were too pleased when the Internet went commercial. I bet this was tantamount to Dylan going electric.

Well, maybe for some, but we don't think a commercialized Internet was viewed in the same light as Dylan going electric. The latter was totally unexpected and represented a revolution in the music industry. The former was more of an evolution and hence was expected. Getting back to your question, though, the NSF is not really out of the picture. In addition to the current "commodity" Internet, several additional Internet backbone initiatives have been developed. These include the very high performance Backbone Network Service + (vBNS+), Internet2, the Next Generation Internet (NGI), and the National Information Infrastructure (NII). A brief review of each initiative along with a corresponding Web site address where more information is available follows.

vBNS+ The very high performance Backbone Network Service + originated as an NSF-funded research and educational network. The contract to develop and operate this network was awarded by NSF to MCI WorldCom in 1995. When initially developed, the network was called the very high performance Backbone Network Service (without the +) and provided researchers with an appropriate testbed-research environment for deploying and evaluating new high-speed internetworking technologies. The original vBNS also maintained a strict usage policy: Access to the vBNS was restricted to only those organizations that received...