NEWS RELEASE

Contacts: DCI Media Relations
(978) 470-3870

The Weber Group
(617) 520-7089

Release Date: February 20, 1997

Will Internet Crash? Respondents to DCI's Internet Expo Poll Say 'No'

Industry Professionals Do Not Agree Fully with Metcalfe's Prediction of Internet Meltdown; Recognize Need for Change

San Jose, CA -- As the nation's leading IT and business professionals converged at DCI's Internet Expo (San Jose Convention Center, February 18-20, 1997) to discuss the latest issues affecting business practices on the Internet, DCI conducted an informal survey to gauge perceptions about one of the industry's hottest debates: Bob Metcalfe's prophesied crash of the Net. Survey results reveal that although an overwhelming majority of industry professionals (77 percent) disagree with Metcalfe, they do agree the Internet is experiencing massive overload and recognize changes need to be made to the infrastructure.

While many take issue with Metcalfe's controversial prediction, many do believe (46 percent) that brownouts -- or temporary system failures -- will inevitably happen due to "information overload." The majority of respondents, however, feel the industry will invest money into the backbone and develop network upgrades that will forestall a major outage. Of the hundreds of poll participants, 16 percent agree with Metcalfe's prediction, citing the recent outages at America Online as a warning signal for the industry, while 7 percent were not sure about the future of the Internet.

Although an Internet "gigalapse" -- a billion denied user-hours in a single outage -- did not occur (as he predicted in 1996), Metcalfe, inventor of the Ethernet networking system and founder of 3Com Corporation, still stands by his prediction of an Internet meltdown. "The Internet is inexorably bogging down -- the World Wide Wait -- and intermittently collapsing," says Metcalfe. "But I'll admit that I went too far in predicting a 1996 gigalapse. We were lucky, and I'll probably be eating my InfoWorld columns over that soon. Nevertheless, the Internet's security, reliability and performance problems, which have been driving companies in droves to build intranets, will get worse before they get better. So beware, there are gigalapses ahead."

Sampling of poll respondent comments:

"Solutions are being developed to prevent this. There are too many people with commercial interests to allow a crash."
- Hugo Traeger, Interactive Week

"It will self-correct. The Internet is designed to have no single point of failure."
- Geoff Bock, Senior Consultant, Patricia Seybold Group

"There's enough energy and public commitment to address the problem. I mean, just look around you here at DCI's Internet Expo."
- Alan Harris, Amdahl Corporation, Sunnyvale, CA

"All the smart people here wouldn't make a cent if they allowed that to happen."
- Dave Millman, President, Tactics/Marketing Research, San Jose, CA

"There's too much awareness behind the issue. Enough people are working to increase bandwidth and develop infrastructure."
- Mike Potts, Senior Vice President, America Operations, Client Server Technology

"I've got one word -- Commercialization!"
- David Lane, Lucent Technologies/Independent ISP

"Private enterprise will bail out the Internet. They will spend to preserve their marketing tool."
- Tom Ellenburg, Lightspeed Software, Bakersfield, CA

"When it was originally designed, no one predicted its current state. Unless massive changes to the Internet take place it will not sustain its own weight."
- David J. Mahoney, Product Manager, Alpha Software

"There are just too many people using it! The way it's going, a collapse is inevitable."
- Benjamin Loomis, 11 years old, entrepreneur

"I'm not sure. The demise of the Internet will be economical not technological."
- Greg Brenner, Director, Worldwide Marketing, Eudora Division of Qualcomm Inc.

DCI's Internet Expo, the nation's leading Internet and messaging event, highlights the latest issues affecting business practices on the Internet, Web, and EMail and plays host to the nation's leading industry visionaries. With three U.S. venues each year -- San Jose, Chicago and Boston -- over 150,000 people, 1,500 exhibitors and 1,000 press will attend DCI's Internet Expos. To register for a free press pass to cover DCI Internet Expo Chicago (April 22-24, 1997), contact DCI Media Relations at (978) 470-3870 or EMail at ashulman@DCIexpo.com. Further information can be accessed through DCI's home page at http://www.DCIexpo.com.

DCI, located in Andover, Massachusetts, is a world leader in producing conferences and expositions for the high-technology industry. DCI's 1996 schedule of 100 major shows and events worldwide featured more that 3,000 consultants and speakers, attracted more than 10,000 exhibitors and nearly 1 million attendees.