No Organization Can Force a Standard: teacher key

The Internet, grade 12 edition, written for 12th grade and up. No organization can force all the networks of the internet to adopt a new standard. See how volunteers write standards, how a few shared lists keep names and numbers from clashing, what early thinkers imagined about linked information, and why counts of people online keep being revised.

Read the book. Print this page for the key.

Questions and answers

1. Who can take part in writing internet standards through the IETF?
   • Anyone, through a mailing list or a meeting (answer)
   • Only members who pay
   • Only ICANN staff
2. What does ICANN not do?
   • Coordinate domain names
   • Control what is on the internet (answer)
   • Exist since 1998
3. What did Licklider's memos imagine?
   • A Memex
   • An Intergalactic Computer Network (answer)
   • A hop limit
4. What does an ISP lower the cost of at an exchange point?
   • Carrying each bit of its traffic (answer)
   • Writing standards
   • Cable repairs
5. Why do counts of internet users change?
   • They are estimates that get revised (answer)
   • Cables are cut
   • Standards are free

Words

• decentralized: not centrally run
• hypertext: linked text
• registries: public lists
• hierarchy: ranked levels
• backbone: main network