ISPs and Backbones

So, there are a variety of ways to an ISP's "point of presence" (POP). But what happens from there?

Again, the role of an ISP is to take a customer from the ISP's point of presence to a network access point (NAP), which is a kind of "ramp" onto the backbone.

Calvin College's Internet Service Provider (ISP) is Merit, a long-standing network company. Merit provides MichNet, a network joining educational institutions and non-profit organizations throughout the state.

1. Click on the MichNet map to see a larger view.
   
   As the map illustrates, most of Calvin's Internet traffic travels through either Kalamazoo or Lansing (cities with large universities). From there, packets are routed either to Chicago or Detroit, two major NAPs—points at which backbones converge. You can think of a NAP as a kind of "on-ramp" to a backbone.
   
2. Click the map to the right to see a larger view of the North American backbones of a major network company.
   
   • Where are some of the key network access points in North America?
     

   And what of the rest of the world?
   

3. Click on the map to the right to see this company's global backbones.
   
   • Does this infrastructure look like a truly "worldwide Web"?
   • Where do the most backbones appear to be concentrated?
     

• Much of the packet traffic to Africa goes through Europe. Do you find social significance in this, given the post-colonial relationships between Africa and Europe?

When we surf the Web with our Web browsers, all we are shown is a little animation in the upper-right corner of the browser window to represent the operations of the Internet behind the scenes. But an examination of the Internet infrastructure reveals, once again, that the paradigm of graphical user interfaces—i.e., "hide the dirty details from the end user, who doesn't need to know"—also hides some of the social and geopolitical relationships inherent in information systems. Clearly, the Web is not yet a "worldwide" one; nor is it a system of "equal opportunity." We must not be lulled into believing that this global infrastructure is simple or neutral.

This chapter was written by Jeff Nyhoff and Joel Adams. Copy editing by Nancy Zylstra
©2005 Calvin University (formerly Calvin College), All Rights Reserved

If you encounter technical errors, contact computing@calvin.edu.