Is this overload? 9.57 zettabytes of information flows in the world's enterprises | Trends in the Living NetworksTrends in the Living Networks

A recent report titled How Much Information? 2010 Enterprise Server Information written by several UC – San Diego academics says that in 2008 the world’s servers processed 9.57 zettabytes (zettabyte = 10 to the power of 21), or 9,570,000,000,000,000,000,000 bytes.

A couple of analogies from Physorg illustrate these amounts:

* 9.57 zettabytes is equivalent of a 5.6-billion-mile-high stack of books from Earth to Neptune and back to Earth, repeated about 20 times a year.

* By 2024 the world’s enterprise servers will annually process the digital equivalent of a stack of books extending more than 4.37 light-years to Alpha Centauri, our closest neighboring star system.

This is 12GB of information daily per worker, or 3TB per year. Another study showed that American households consumed 3.6 zettabytes of information in 2008, or around 10TB per individual. (Note that not all of the 3.18 billion workers covered in this study work in information-intensive industries or countries.)

As shown in the diagram, two-thirds of the total information processing is done by “entry-level” servers costing $25,000 or less.

Of course this information is now well out of date. The study showed that server performance doubled every two years, with most of the performance improvement coming from low-end servers, though that doesn’t mean that information processing increases at that pace.

However what is interesting is that this study, in contrast to a number of other prominent studies on the amount of information in the world, focuses on flows of information rather than storage. This is in many ways a more interesting statistic.

jim hockley

this is about living locally

still been trying to get this internet logistics service going and end the crisscrossing commute so people can work near home and not be sitting in their cars for thousands of hours polluting our air and water. have blogged this idea in every crack and crevice i could find on the net but for some reason it gets no response so far. it’s the best idea i’ve researched for helping our planet and ourselves. most politicians and even think tanks seem to be barking up the wrong tree thinking that better gas mileage is the answer. or bigger government. or funding the epa. bull. the answer is reducing our driving and the best way to do that is to organize jobs logistically so people can exchange jobs and eliminate the commute. the internet is the perfect tool for this. not all jobs will be effected at first but enough to make a significant difference. from there it will snowball. (skyrocket?)

the place to start is large cities. mountain and desert communities present a different situation.

this is about using the net to logistically organize so people can be enabled to work close(r) to home.

with all that commute time (and gas money) saved people can begin to turn their shocking green wasteful lawns and goof courses into productive food producing orchards, vineyards, and veggie gardens among other things. they can have the luxury of spending more time getting to know their families, neighbors, pets, and participate in local arts, sports, clubs, foods, and music, etc.

if anyone has a better idea for helping this planet i’d like to see/hear it. i’ve paid attention. have shared this idea for 3 decades now; joined the pepsi challenge, richard branson’s virgin earth, al gore’s website, bioneers, care 2, environmental groups, and lots more. for some reason it keeps getting overlooked. no response at all. for some reason people just don’t get it. maybe i have to explain it better i don’t know but

if done right, this could be a great money maker too. i want to make a big difference for my planet before i leave and the quickening is accellerating. we need to slow it down. any ideas or inspiration would be greatly appreciated. giving thanks, jim hockley