The Internet runs on cables. I mean, yes, you've got all those massive servers, but without the cables, they're not worth much. That's a fact which is pretty easy to forget. At the end of the day, all of our futuristic Web 2.0 stuff is just running on a bunch of physical cables, stretching from continent to continent, somewhere deep down at the bottom of the ocean.
Greg's Cable Map provides more than a glimpse into this fascinating world of underwater cables. You don't see the stuff within each continent. It just shows you the interconnections that make the Internet truly global.
In the screenshot above, you see a ton of connections going into the Eastern seaboard. So, that's a lot of physical redundancy right there, which is great for the US. (Let's not forget that the US is pretty much the hub of this whole Internet thing.)
Not all countries are so fortunate, though. If you scroll around the map a little bit, you'll soon discover that some countries and islands are connected via just one or two undersea cables. The thought is mind-boggling; just one or two very thin (relative to their length) cables, stretching on for thousands of miles, is all that connects a whole country to the World Wide Web. Whoa!
Some countries have satellite uplinks too, but the bandwidth is negligible compared to what the undersea cables offer. Speaking of bandwidth - the map includes the capacity of each underwater link, so you can figure out how much bandwidth an entire continent or country is getting. It's pretty impressive stuff.Greg's Cable Map is a treasure trove of information about the Internet's layout originally appeared on Download Squad on Fri, 10 Sep 2010 15:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.Read | Permalink | Email this | Comments
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