Network Laws

We currently live in a digital era. Information has become more accessible and more digital to the point that it moves trough online networks. If we look at what a network is we must understand that it two or more networks that are linked in order to exchange information.  For instance, we have a local network that revolves within a small area. There is also a wide are networks, which connects networks in a greater demographic area.

However, the emergence of networks has caused the emergence of network laws. There are three main laws that have tried to find the value of networks. A more traditional law is Sarnoff’s law, which says that the value of the network increases linearly with the number of people on it. In other words, this law is how traditional broadcasting works. A second law, however, known as Metcalfe’s Law says that in communication network, each member is proportional roughly to its square of the number of connected members. In other words, this law says that the more people who are connected to a network in which they can communicate with others, the more valuable the network becomes.  This leads to a third lay known as Reed’s Law. This relatively new law deals with the new immersion of social networks and says that the value of a networks increases exponentially with the size of the network. One major problem with defining the value of networks is that the term value itself is not very well defined and therefore can mean different things to different people.

From the three laws that have been mentioned, I would agree more with Metcalfe’s Laws just because when we join a network we automatically make connections with other members. Although the connection might not become very interpersonal, the network itself increases because of how many people overall is connected. In other words, the greater the number of users inside the network means a more valuable service for the members of the network of that same network.

Technology changes everyday. It is hard to imagine what will happen in five years. Every year there is a new innovation, and that affects the way we communicate, and also they way we received information. As of today, most of the people received their information trough social networks that are already installed on their phones. That is to say that we can find anything as long as we are connected trough a network, and as long as we have our phones. I do not have a doubt that ne social networks will emerge in five years, and information will travel much faster than today. For instance, I have newspaper applications on my phone and that is how I update my information each day.  I wonder how the television networks because everyone will be getting information at the same pace. The information will travel in the same speed for everyone else.