Abstract
Using network analysis, this article examines the structure of the international Internet as a global communication system. The number of inter-domain hyperlinks embedded in web-sites for 47 nations were gathered using Alta Vista. Data were also obtained on the bandwidth connections among 63 nations. The results indicate that theU.s. is most central nation in the hyperlink network, followed by the Australia,U.k., China and Japan. Most peripheral are Uruguay, Luxemburg,Uae., and Thailand. A cluster analysis found a single group centered about theU.s. The analysis of the bandwidth network revealed that theU.s. is the most central nation, followed by theU.k., Germany, Hong Kong, Singapore and Japan. Most peripheral are Iceland, Lithuania, and Morocco. This network had three groupings, 1) the English-speaking countries with Scandinavia, Belgium, The Netherlands, and East Asia, 2) South America, and 3) Franco-German Europe. The correlation between the two networks indicates that the physical infrastructure is an important determinant of hyperlink communication. However, it is not the only determinant, others may be cultural or linguistic. The results are discussed in terms of world system theory, the evolution of Internet and globalization.
Résumé
En utilisant l’analyse des réseaux, l’article examine la structure de l’internet international en tant que système mondial de communication. Les hyperliens interdomaines insérés dans des sites sur la toile de 47 pays ont été comptés en utilisant Alta Vista. Les données ont aussi été obtenues sur la largeur de bande des connexions entre 63 pays. Les résultats indiquent que les Etats-Unis constituent le pays le plus central du réseau d’hyperliens, suivi par l’Australie, le Royaume-Uni, la Chine et le Japon. L’Uruguay, le Luxembourg, les Emirats arabes unis et la Thaïlande sont les plus périphériques. Une analyse d’amas révèle un seul groupe centré autour des États-Unis. L’analyse du réseau de largeurs de bande montre que les Etats-Unis constituent le pays le plus central, suivi par le Royaume-Uni, l’Allemagne, Hong-Kong, Singapour et le Japon. Les plus périphériques sont l’Islande, la Lituanie et le Maroc. Ce réseau comprend trois groupements : les pays de langue anglaise associés à la Scandinavie, la Belgique, les Pays-bas et l’Asie du Sud-Est ; l’Amérique du Sud ; l’Europe franco-allemande. La corrélation entre les deux réseaux montre que l’infrastructure physique détermine de façon importante le communication par hyperliens. Ce n’est toutefois pas le seul déterminant, d’autres sont culturels ou linguistiques. La discussion des résultats fait intervenir la théorie des systèmes mondiaux, l’évolution de l’internet et la mondialisation.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Albert (R.), Jeong (H.), Barabási (A.L.), Diameter of the world wide web.Nature, 401, pp. 130–131, 1999.
Almind (T.C.), Ingwersen (P.), Informatic analyses on the world wide web: Methodological approaches to “webometrics”.Journal of Documentation, 53, pp. 404–426, 1997.
Barabási (A. L.), Linked: The New Science of Networks. Cambridge,Ma:Perseus Publishing, 2002.
Bar-Ilan (J.), Search engine results over time: A case study on search engine stability.Cybermetrics, 2/3(1) 1, 1998–1999.
Barnett (G. A), The social structure of international telecommunications. In Sawhney (H.) and Barnett (G. A.) (Eds.). Progress in Communication Sciences: Advances in Telecommunications. Greenwich,Ct:Ablex,15, pp. 151–186, 1999.
Barnett (G.A), A longitudinal analysis of the international telecommunications network: 1978–1996.American Behavioral Scientist, 44, pp. 1638–1655, 2001.
Barnett (G. A.), Choi (Y.), Physical distance and language as determinants of the international telecommunication network.International Political Science Review, 16, pp. 249–265, 1995.
Barnett (G. A.),Chon (B. S.),Park (H.W.),Rosen (D.), An examination of international Internet flows: An autopoietic model, Paper presented to theInternational Communication Association, Washington,D.c, May 2001.
Barnett (G. A.), Chon (B. S.), Rosen (D.), The structure of international Internet flows in cyberspace.Netcom (Network and Communication Studies), 15(1–2), pp. 61–80, 2001.
Barnett (G.A.), Jacobson (T.L.), Choi (Y.), Sun-Miller (S.L.), An examination of the international telecommunication network,The Journal of International Communication,3, pp. 19–43, 1996.
Barnett (G. A.), Salisbury (J.G.T.), Communication and globalization: A longitudinal analysis of the international telecommunication network.Journal of World System Research,2(16), pp. 1–17, 1996.
Barnett (G.A.), Salisbury (J.G.T.), Kim (C), Langhorne (A.), Globalization and international communication networks: An examination of monetary, telecommunications, and trade networks.The Journal of International Communication,6(2), 7–49, 1999.
Barnett (G. A.),Sung (E. J.), Culture and the structure of international communication. Paper presented to theInternational Communication Association, San Diego, May 2003.
Barnett (G.A.), Wu (Y.), The international student exchange network: 1970 and 1989.Higher Education,30, pp. 353–368, 1995.
Beyer (P.), Religion and Globalization. London:Sage, 1994.
Bharat (K.),Chang (B.W.),Henzinger (M.),Ruhl (M.), Who links to whom: Mining linkage between web sites.Proceedings 2001 IEEEInternational Conference on Data Mining (Icdm), pp. 51–58, 2001.
Björneborn (L.), Small-world linkage and co-linkage. Communications of theAcm,48, pp. 133–134, 2001.
Bollen (K.A.), World system position, dependency, and democracy.American Journal of Sociology,48, pp. 468–497, 1983.
Bonacich (P.), Factoring and weighting approaches to status scores and clique identification.Journal of Mathematical Sociology,2, pp. 113–120, 1972.
Borgatti (S.), Everett (M.), Freeman (L.), Ucinet 6 for Windows.Harvard,Ma:Analytic Technologies, 2002.
Brin (S.), Page (L.), The anatomy of a large-scale hypertextual web search engine. Computer Networks andIsdn Systems,30, pp. 107–117, 1998.
Broder (A.), Kumar (R.), Maghoul (F), Raghavan (P.), Raiagopalan (S.), Stata (R.), Tomkins (A.), Wiener (J.), Graph structure in the web.Computer Networks,33, pp. 309–320, 2000.
Brunn (S.D.), Dodge (M.), Mapping the ’worlds’ of the World Wide Web: (Re)Structuring global commerce through hyperlinks.American Behavioral Scientist,44, 1717–1739, 2001.
Castells (M.), The Rise of Network Society. Cambridge,Ma:Blackwell.
Chakrabarti (S.),Dom (B.E.),Kumar (S. R.),Raghavan (P.),Rajagopalan (S.),Stata (R.),Tomkins (A.),Gibson (D.),Kleinberg (J.), Mining the web’s link structure.Computer, August, pp. 60–67, 1999.
Chase-Dunn (C), Global Formation: Structures of the World-Economy.London:Basil Blackwell, 1989.
Chase-Dunn (C), Grimes (P.), World systems analysis.Annual Review of Sociology,21, pp. 387–417, 1995.
Chen (T.), Barnett (G.A.), Research on international student flows from a macro perspective: A network analysis of 1985, 1989 and 1995.Higher Education,39, 435–553, 2000.
Ciolek (T. M.), Networked information flows in Asia: The research uses of the Alta Vista search engine and “weblinksurvey” software. Paper presented toInternet Political Economy Forum 2001: Internet and Development in Asia, The National University of Singapore, September 2001.
Deutsch (K.), Nationalism and Social Communication: An Inquiry into the Foundation of Nationality. Cambridge,Ma:Mit Press, 1953.
Freeman (L.C.), Centrality in social networks: Conceptual clarification.Social Networks,1, pp. 215–239, 1979.
Galtung (J.), A structural theory of imperialism.Journal of Peace Research.8, pp. 81–118, 1971.
Galtung (J.), Geopolitical transformations and the 21st-century world economy. InNordenstreng (K.) andSchiller (H.) (Eds.), Beyond National Sovereignty: International Communication in the 1990s, pp.28–58. Norwood,Nj:Ablex, 1993
Gorman (S. P.), The network advantage of regions: The case of the USA, Europe, and China. Paper presented at theNorth American Regional Science Association Meeting, Charleston. Retrieved August 14, 2002 http://www.networkgeography.org/network_advantage_prepub.pdf, 2001.
Halavais (A.), National borders on the world wide web. New Media and Society,2, pp. 7–28, 2000.
Hargittai (E.), Weaving the Western web: Explaining the differences in Internet connectivity amongOecd countries. Telecommunications Policy,23, pp. 701–718, 1999.
Hofstede (G.), Cultures and organizations: Software of the mind. London:McGraw-Hill, 1991.
Huntington (S.P.), The clash of civilizations: Remaking the world order. New York:Touchstone, 1996.
Ingwersen (P.), The calculation of web impact factors.Journal of Documentation,54, pp. 236–243, 1998.
Internet Software Consortium, Distribution of Top-Level Domain Names by Host Count. http://www.isc.org/ds/WWW-200207/dist-bynum.html, July 2001.
Kim (K.), Barnett (G.A.), The determinants of international news flow.Communication Research,23, pp. 323–352, 1996.
Kleinberg (J. M.), Authoritative sources in a hyperlink environment. Journal of theAcm, 46, pp. 604–632, 1999.
Kleinberg (J.), Lawrence (S.), The structure of the web.Science,294, pp. 1849–1850, 2001.
Krackhardt (D.), Porter (L.), The snowball effect: Turnover embedded in communication networks.Journal of Applied Psychology,71, pp. 50–55, 1986.
Leydesdorff (L.),Curran (M), Mapping university-industry-government relations on the Internet. The construction of indicators for a knowledge-based economy.Cybermetrics, 4. available at: http://www.cin-doc.csis.es/cybermetrics/articles/v4ilp2.html, 2000.
Mcluhan (H.M.), Understanding Media: The Extension of Man. New York:Beacon, 1966.
Monge (P.R.), Communication structures and processes in globalization.Journal of Communication, 48(4), pp. 142–153, 1998.
O’Brien (R.), Global Financial Integration: The End of Geography. London:Pinter, 1992.
oecd, Working paper on telecommunication and information service policies: Internet infrastructure indicators. Paris:Oecd, 1998.
Park (H. W.), Presence of Taïwan on the World Wide Web in South Korea, Dynamics of digital and geographical presence on cyberspace.International Information & Library Review, 36(4), pp. 329–340, 2004.
Park (H.W.), Barnett (G.A.), Nam (I.Y.), Hyperlink-affiliation network structure of top Web sites: Examining affiliates with hyperlinks inKorea.Journal of the American Society of Information Science and Technology,53, pp. 602–611, 2002.
Park (H.W.), Kim (C.S.), Barnett (G.A.), Socio-communicational structure among political actors on the web.New Media and Society, 6(3), pp. 403–423, 2004.
Park (H.W.),Thelwall (M.), Hyperlink analyses of the World Wide Web: A review.Journal of Computer Mediated Communication, 8(4), http://www.jcmc.indiana.edu/vol8/issue4/park.html, 2003.
Richards (W.D.) Jr.,Barnett (G. A.) (Eds.), Progress in Communication Science,12. Norwood, NJ:Ablex, 1993.
Rogers (E.M.), Kincaid (D.L.), Communication Networks: Toward a New Paradigm for Research. New York:Free Press, 1981.
Rousseau (R.), Daily time series of common single word searches in Alta Vista and Northern Light. Cybermetrics, 2/3. available at: http://websearch.about.com/internet/websearch/library/weekly/aal20399.htm, 1999.
Salisbury (J.G.T.), Barnett (G.A.), A network analysis of international monetary flows. Information Society,15, pp. 31–49, 1999.
Smith (A.G.), A tale of two web spaces: Comparing sites using web impact factors.Journal of Documentation,55, pp. 577–592, 1999.
Smith (D.A.), White (D.R.), Structure and dynamics of the global economy: Network analysis of international trade, 1965–1980.Social Forces,70, pp. 857–893, 1992.
Snyder (D.), Kick (E.), Structural position in the world system and economic growth, 1955–1970: A multiple-network analysis of transnational interactions.American Journal of Sociology,84, pp. 1096–1126, 1979.
Snyder (H.), Rosenbaum (H.), Can search engines be used as tools for Web-link analysis? A critical view.Journal of Documentation,55, pp. 375–384, 1999.
TeleGeography, Global Internet Geography 2003. Washington:TeleGeography, Inc, 2003.
Thelwall (M.), Web impact factors and search engine coverage.Journal of Documentation,56, pp. 185–189, 2000.
Thelwall (M.), Exploring the link structure of the Web with network diagrams.Journal of Information Science, 27, pp. 393–401, 2001a.
Thelwall (M.), The responsiveness of search engine indexes.Cybermetrics, 5(1), 2001b. http://www.cindoc.csic.es/cybermetrics/articles/v5ipl.html.
Thelwall (M.), Tang (R.), Price (L.), Linguistic patterns of academic web use in Western Europe.Scientometrics,56, pp. 417–432, 2003.
Thelwall (M.), Smith (A.), A study of the interlinking between Asia-Pacific University Web sites.Scientometrics, 55(3), pp. 363–376, 2002.
Townsend (A.M.), Network cities and the global structure of the Internet.American Behavioral Scientist,44, pp. 1697–1716, 2001.
Wallerstein (I.), The Modern World System. New York:Academic Press, 1976.
Wellman (B.), Berkowitz (S.D.) (Eds.), Social Structures: A Network Approach. Cambridge:Cambridge University Press, 1998.
Wellman (B.), Haythornthwaite (C), The Internet in Everyday Life. Oxford:Blackwell, 2002.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Barnett, G.A., Park, H.W. The structure of international internet hyperlinks and bilateral bandwidth. Ann. Télécommun. 60, 1110–1127 (2005). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF03219838
Received:
Accepted:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF03219838
Key words
- Internet
- Internationalization
- International network
- Hypermedia
- World Wide Web
- Statistical analysis
- Social aspect