ANNUAL SYMPOSIUM

Australia's science future 3-4 May 2000
Full listing of papers

Dr Roger Kermode holds Master's and PhD degrees from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology's Media Lab, where he conducted research into content-based video coding and highly scalable media delivery architectures based on IP multicast and distributed caching. He subsequently joined Motorola Labs in Chicago in 1998 and now heads the Communications and Networks Laboratory at the Motorola Australian Research Centre in Sydney. His lab focuses on the development of commodity wireless access devices and architectures for scalable media delivery to the home. He is a Melbourne University graduate, a Fulbright Scholar, and currently co-chairs the Internet Engineering Task Force Working Group on Reliable Multicast Transport.

Symposium themes - IT, telecommunications and control in the Web era

Moving towards the user-friendly, invisible Internet
by Roger Kermode

Abstract
Over the past five years the Internet has moved from a tool primarily used by academics to a consumer product that is used by the general public for business and personal use. The key driver for this shift was the emergence of the Web, which has become so popular that it is commonly mistaken for the Internet. While the Web has significantly changed the way the Internet is used, it is important to realise that even greater changes are taking place. Dr Kermode will identify several key trends and then extrapolate them to paint a picture of how we will use the Internet in the years to come. These extrapolations will show that the Internet is in the process of morphing from an arcane academic tool into a collection of user-friendly services and applications that focus less on PCs and technology itself and more on ubiquitous access, adaptable interfaces, personal mobility and socialisation. He will then explore how Australia can benefit from this shift and take advantage of the opportunities it will offer.