Tan Tin Wee, Chairman: A*STAR Computational Resource Centre

At this 18th APRICOT conference, we route back to Singapore once again, where APRICOT was conceived in 1995 and born in 1996. The past two decades of the Internet's phenomenal growth in the Asia Pacific has been facilitated and catalysed by many people in this community. The Internet today is the global information infrastructure, which many of us use as the third half of our brains for instantaneous access to information, for near telepathic speeds of communication, for mass mobilization of people whether it is the next tsunami or an Asian Spring. The things we will be using the Internet for in the future are probably not invented yet. But we do have some vague ideas, probably some premonition or prediction of the future. Will it still be as technology-driven as before? Probably yes, and this talk will highlight a few urgent needs in terms of network infrastructure to support new applications and new demands. Or will it shift towards being more socially-driven? Will the centre of gravity of Internet users shift towards the billion people in China and India as smart phones proliferate and multilingual content expand? What technological contributions will we have to contribute to the global community? While we might want to avoid unproductive maker/taker-type debates, we do really need to ask for a report card on our capability and capacity in the Asia-Pacific to invent new ideas and to create new goods and innovative services over the Internet. As we reminisce over the history of Asia's Internet, perhaps it is also a good time to reflect on the past and ponder the future, even as we take stock of the present.

Lim Choon Sai

Maemura Akinori

Philip Smith

Chalermpol.Charnsripinyo & Lalida Lim