May 2009
Summary
Réalités industrielles
Information and communication technology
Complete issue
This issue was coordinated
by François Cholley
This issue was coordinated
Editorial
By Pierre Couveinhes
Introduction
By François Cholley
Ingénieur général des Mines
A sector still full of surprises
Twenty years, or the prehistory of cyberspace
By Yves Gassot
How did we switch from the model that, based on national monopolies for providing a single (telephone) service, prevailed during the 1970s to the current system where several internationalized operators compete to provide a wide range of services?
What will the digital world look like in 2030?
By Michel Gensollen
The technical progress made in information-processing is changing society and shifting power relations. After the invention of writing and the printing press, the mass media, digitalization and the Internet have opened the way toward rapid innovations in a society made up of anonymous contributors. The socialization of taste, the decentralization of knowledge and “virtualization” challenge forms both of coordination by the marketplace and of hedonistic individualism.
Information, knowledge and computer science in 2028
By Jean-Pierre Corniou
It is now being assumed — without strong feelings or controversy — that thousands of intelligent objects will be connected to the Internet in the near future. These prospects might gladden hearts or scare weaker souls. They are, day after day, ever more likely…
Competition, regulation, or both? High-speed broadband in Europe
By Martin Cave
High-speed data transmission is a transforming technology for suppliers, customers and regulators. It forces access-providers to replace with optical fiber the copper transmission medium they have been using for decades. It opens unprecedented possibilities for both households and small and medium-sized businesses, which will thus be able to run advanced applications. It also represents a challenge for regulatory bodies, whose actions can postpone or advance the offer of new services, and influence their competitive structure.
A technology still making progress
Ever smaller and better electronic components
By Laurent Gouzènes
The spectacular progress made over the past fifty years in microelectronics is not coming to an end. Besides the gains still being made along the classical axis of miniaturization, impressive advances are now possible in new fields of technology and, as a consequence, in new applications.
Accumulating know-ware: From programming to cloud computing
By Jean-Paul Figer
The word logiciel (software) was coined in 1973 to refer to the programs and processes used to process data by computers. This apparently simple and logical activity has turned out to be much more complex than expected…
The power of radio
By Jean-Marc Chaduc
The radio obviously has a separate place in the vast field of ICT. For the public, it is both intimate and mysterious.
But how does the Internet work?
By François Cholley et Jean-Pierre Dardayrol
How can we so easily have access to Internet services scattered everywhere around the world? How is the Internet funded? Who manages this network? Is it as reliable and resilient as claimed? Might it not be on the verge of collapsing?
How the Internet and ICT are changing our lives
The development of satellite navigation systems
By Raymond Rosso
Work on satellite navigation systems started in the early 1970s in the United States. The outcome was the Global Positioning System (GPS) in 1993. The quality of its performance and the proliferation of its military and then civilian applications (in particular for cell phone users) has spurred the development of several competing projects, in particular Galileo in Europe.
The new ICT, a vector of cultural diversity: Creating, diffusing and consuming audiovisual contents during a period of digital convergence
By Guillaume Blanchot
Technological convergence in the new information and communication technology holds out a wonderful promise to the consumers of culture. However, the digital age is not automatically at the service of cultural diversity, whence questions about adapting public regulatory tools to this audiovisual landscape.
Telephone operators and television companies: A new form of competition
By Charles Bebert
Television has undergone major technical changes since the 1980s as new channels of transmission (satellite, Internet) have developed and, more recently, HD was launched. In parallel, tastes have evolved as the “audience” has splintered with, as a consequence, an increasing number of TV stations. Given this context, what strategy should television companies pursue to cope with a new, dangerous source of competition, namely from mobile telephones?
Misuses of the Internet and cyberaddiction: Fact or fiction?
By le Docteur Dan Véléa
Massively multiparty role-playing games, porn websites, virtual casinos, or mere chat groups and on-line stock markets… the Internet has multiplied the occasions for contracting addictive behavioral patterns.
The Internet, security and freedom
By Isabelle Falque Perrotin
Internet’s business model is mainly based on gathering personal data from surfers. How to enable people to preserve the part of their private lives that they do not want to show to others? Might the desire to be shielded from risks lead to placing the population under surveillance? How to define a new social pact for guaranteeing a judicious balance between security and freedom?
Information and communication technology at the service of sustainable development
By Michel Petit
Sustainable development and the ever growing part played by ICT in contemporary society are two complementary issues marking the start of the 21st. century. Two questions merit consideration. What to do to minimize ICT’s ecological footprints? How can this technology reduce the harm done by industry and the services, and in everyday life, to the environment?
Internet tools concern firms of all sizes, in all sectors: All jobs are undergoing a transformation
By Jean-Michel Yolin
The Internet offers tools in response to the needs arising out of all operations in a firm. These tools might be used for the benefit of the two strategic axes in a firm: competitiveness and development.