I build the Internet for a living and the main thing that helps me sort out the concepts is to separate who from where because they aren't fixed, and as technology and society move, the actor can and will start to show up in different places.
Application -- Applications are the software facilities supplying particular a function for people
Application Services --Services are the software facilities supplying a particular function for applications
Infrastructure Services -- Services are the software facilities supplying a particular function for infrastructure
Infrastructure -- Infrastructure is the basic facilities for compute, connectivity, and storage
The actor that a piece of software does something and who it does that action for is (relatively) clear cut. In your example, Zoom is an application because it supplies a function to people as it's primary purpose, while DNS and BGP are infrastructure services because they help machines that connect together to form the Internet make those connections. But where an actor exists is less clear.
Customer Edge -- The final device, typically owned by the customer. Examples include: IoT device, smartphone, laptop, router, or smartTV.
Access/Network/Mobile Edge -- Cellular Radio towers and warehouses filled with computers operated by ISPs; the limit of the ISP's control, a location nearest the user. Examples include: 4G & 5G; ISP's firewalls, policy enforcement points; ISP's caches & video optimization servers, Network Address Translation; Netflix Open Connect Appliances; Industrial IoT gateways.
Service Edge -- The mid-point between the user and the application Examples include: CDNs; Cloudflare workers; WAFaaS; Auth-aaS; ad networks.
Data Center -- Warehouses filled with computers Examples include: The cloud; FAANGs & other hyper-scalers; DNS root servers; Equinix and other data hotel providers.
Core -- big cables and data centers that connect ISPs, Data centers, Countries, and Corporations together. Examples include: Internet Exchanges, Internet backhaul providers (Level3, etc.), BGP routing.
Zoom the application, like most applications, has a part on the customer device and a part in one or more data centers. When the customer device part is a Web browser we tend to ignore that.
What is important about the physical layout of the Internet, with respect to content moderation, is to separate Infrastructure and Infrastructure Services -- which start to take on utility-like characteristics as they mature and commoditize -- from Applications and Application Services. Facebook is an application because, as we just saw, you can turn it off and the Internet is fine; you go to Facebook (and any other Application). If you turn off Verizon, on the other hand, 100+ million people are off the Internet; you go though Verizon (or any other Infrastructure provider).
That holds even when you start to talk about Edge Computing because putting an application at the Customer Edge or in a cell tower, or in a ISP data center doesn't change the fact that you still go to it, even when it is more local.
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I build the Internet for a living and the main thing that helps me sort out the concepts is to separate who from where because they aren't fixed, and as technology and society move, the actor can and will start to show up in different places.
The actor that a piece of software does something and who it does that action for is (relatively) clear cut. In your example, Zoom is an application because it supplies a function to people as it's primary purpose, while DNS and BGP are infrastructure services because they help machines that connect together to form the Internet make those connections. But where an actor exists is less clear.
Zoom the application, like most applications, has a part on the customer device and a part in one or more data centers. When the customer device part is a Web browser we tend to ignore that.
What is important about the physical layout of the Internet, with respect to content moderation, is to separate Infrastructure and Infrastructure Services -- which start to take on utility-like characteristics as they mature and commoditize -- from Applications and Application Services. Facebook is an application because, as we just saw, you can turn it off and the Internet is fine; you go to Facebook (and any other Application). If you turn off Verizon, on the other hand, 100+ million people are off the Internet; you go though Verizon (or any other Infrastructure provider).
That holds even when you start to talk about Edge Computing because putting an application at the Customer Edge or in a cell tower, or in a ISP data center doesn't change the fact that you still go to it, even when it is more local.
Techdirt has not posted any stories submitted by Ian Smith.
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