2007/08/06 13:45 Teruyasu Murakami, "The Ubiquitous Network and Challenges to the Information System", ISSS Tokyo 2007
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Jim Kijima
Teruyasu Murakami, Chief Counselor, Nomura Research Institute, Tokyo, Japan
[Teruyasu Murakami]

The Ubiquitous Network and Challenges to the Information System
Met Boulding when a student, visiting Chicago
Impressed by how humble Bouding was, with students
Ubiquitous: does the average Japanese student know what this means?
- 24% knew
Famous as 1988 "ubiquitous computing", by Mark Weiser from Xerox PARC
- 1998 Nomura Research Institute used "uniquitous network": network access more important
- Around 2000, NRI started publishing "ubiquitous network"
- 2001 Nikkei had conference on ubiquitous society
Major companies started using "ubiquitous" in their organization names
ICT policy development in Japan: 2001 e-Japan strategy recast in 2001 e-Japan Strategy II, focused on ubiquitous networks
- Defined as always one, everywhere on, whatever on the network
u-Japan Strategy, objective to attain frontrunner targets for 2010
Ubiquitous Network Society (UNS) Strategy Program
- Universal communications
- New generation networks
- Safety and society
Council for Science and Technology revised plan for 2006-2010
IT New Reform Strategy: ubiquitous and universal
Evolution of IT paradigm in Japan
- 1955, Nomura Security starting using a Univac-120, mainframe
- 1980s: client-server
- Just as completed client-server, new paradigm of web computing, terminals attached to Internet
- Boom period, everything moved to web space, but bursting of IT bubble producing a vacuum
- Then broadband paradigm: aimed at fixed networks, e.g. ADSL
Ubiquitous network wasn't just wired network, but also wireless, including broadcast (terrestrial digital networks) and transportation (navigation systems) and real (RFID)
Policy in Japan has been subdivided
Everywhere on:
- Internet, but once we leave the PC, we're not connected
- NTT Docomo started iMode service, signalled the flowering of new technologies
- At home
- Store, stations, hotels, etc.
Always on:
- 2001, ADSL started in Japan
- Japan Broadcasting Corportion (NHK) at 2001, PC utilization time averaged 2.41 hours, which is the amount that it's always on
Whatever on:
- Not only PC to PC, but Person-to-Person, and other equipment, e.g. PDAs as Person-to-Object e.g. vending machine
- Object to object is now RFID
u-Korea also widely discussed
- 8 services: WiBro (wide broadcasting), DMB ...
- 3 infrastructures: Broadband Convergence, Ubitiuous Sensor
- 9 growth engines: Mobile Telecom / Telematic ...
Became the u-IT 8-3-9 Strategy
China: Gave talk in 2005, then in 2006 they had u-China (no place where it doesn't exist)
Europe: World Summit on the Information Society
United Nations commitment: future target to build ICT network infrastructure
Will information systems be able to adapt to the ubiquitous network system? 3 challenges
- 1. Numeric explosion, depletion of IP addresses, will have a shift from IPv4 to IPv6
- This solution ensures people can obtain sufficient IP addresses, but will IT systems survive?
- Diagram, use of networks by a single person, could attach through 100 terminals or devices
- 2. Diversity explosion: future information systems, using addresses in different layers
- Next Generation Network: having at least two layers in the network environment
- 3. Embedded Software Explosion: e.g. RFID
- Real-time nature of activities with no latency
- Real position requires proximity
- In real world, scheduling and changes of task timing (not done in Windows today)
Kenneth E. Boulding: "We make our tools, then they shape us"

