THE number of internet hosts fell for the first time since 1993, according to the Internet Domain Survey, published twice-yearly by Internet Systems Consortium. Hosts are separate computer “addresses” that are contacted when a website or domain name is called up. Their number fell by some 6m in January 2007 to 433m, the first decrease ever. Generally, more hosts means more websites, more computers and a growing internet. However this is not necessarily the case. Instead, it may simply be that counting hosts accurately is getting more difficult: for instance, in Wi-Fi and corporate networks, hundreds of computers can share one address and so count as just one host.

AFP