Posted by tourdemars to Interplanetary Internet at February 19, 2002 12:00 PM

If you thought setting up a DSL connection was tough, try setting up a multi-planet connection. Under the aegis of NASA Jet Propulsion Labs and its interplanetary communications project, WorldCom executive Vint Cerf—often called the father of the Internet—hopes to bring Internet connectivity to the rest of the solar system. By establishing TCP/IP networks on Mars or on orbiting crafts and tying these networks to earth via an interplanetary protocol known as bundles, the team hopes to have a two-planet Internet as soon as 2008. "And then," concluded Cerf, "we'll eventually create a backbone for interplanetary communication."