Santa Monica, Calif., Kleinrock was a key figure in the development of the Advanced Research Projects Agency network, better known as the Arpanet, the precursor to the Internet.
While there is no doubt that large Internet-infrastructure owners have taken advantage of their size in business negotiations, Kleinrock and many executives who deal with the Internet on a day-to-day basis agree that no coterie of big players has so much power that it can shut down competition.
Kleinrock sums it up: "The bottom line is that no one is in a position to close down the Internet."
Nancy Weil writes for the IDG News Service.
