Robert Metcalfe re-post

VIDEO IS GREEN! Ethernet Inventor Robert Metcalfe Tells the Purple Channel

Robert Metcalfe, the inventor of Ethernet, the standard for connecting computers in a network, says that the promise of video is to limit the need of physical meeting which means less travel and greater energy conservation. He told me that this could be a "huge benefit to all mankind."

I taped this interview with Dr. Metcalfe last September in the MIT Museum. It is the most popular video ever posted on Beet.TV. I am pleased to repost it and I hope you enjoy viewing it.

Online video platforms from video chat to web meeting programs are emerging and gaining a growing audience. I believe that we are at just at the beginning of the transformation that Dr. Metcalfe envisions.

Soon, live, streaming video, with the qualities of broadcast television, will be accessible to all with a browser and broadband connection. It's being pioneered by the folks at Microsoft, Adobe, Apple, Cisco, the CDN's and others -- we will cover this closely in the months ahead.

It's all happening. Just think, I can shrink my carbon footprint with my handy Panasonic!

--- Andy Plesser

Posted on Monday, August 20, 2007

Category:

People & Blogs

Tags:

• Ethernet
• Metcalfe
• Green
• conservation
• video

[cupidvogel]

Jesus. He invented Ethernet. He's a genius...

[Mr123poppy]

I have always enjoyed the intelligent talk of Bob. This is just one more addition.

[MadPutz]

There's a cool article on PhysOrg about Metcalfe on the future of energy and how its similar to how the internet developed. Excerpt:

First off, he doesn't like the label "green." The green movement, he says, conjures up "anti-capitalism, anti-technology, anti-Americanism." Why not blue tech? Blue for power coming maybe from the sky (sun) or the oceans. Global warming? It could be happening, but it's overblown by the media and others. The United States' skittishness about nuclear power? Silly.