You can do just about anything and everything online these days. Most companies have Web sites where you can peruse and buy their products. More and more TV and movie companies are posting their videos online for people to buy and watch. You can even order food for delivery from the comfort of your computer. All of these services are based on a highly successful Internet system that is both worldwide and affordable.

However, the Internet we have known and grown to love may not be around for much longer.

The first problem involves a dispute between nations. Most people do not realize that the addresses for the “.com’s” and “.org’s” that they regularly visit are organized by the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN). This nonprofit corporation was created by the United States. government in 1998 to ensure that each Web site had a unique domain name. For example, ICANN ensures that the domain name “thedaily.washington.edu” only refers to the The Daily’s Web site.

Many nations object to the influence that the U.S. has over ICANN and want the job to go to the U.N.’s International Telecommunications Union. Last year’s successful effort by the Bush administration to prevent the creation of the “.xxx” domain for pornographic sites has only intensified opposition to ICANN. The impasse may lead to a breakup of the Internet, where Web site domain names change based on which country you are located. Google.com may no longer lead to Google’s Web site for everyone in the future.

Another troubling problem strikes closer to home. Remember in the early days of the Internet when your dial-up service provider used to price Internet access by the hour?

Several companies may be bringing that concept back. Time Warner Cable is testing a consumption-based billing system in Beaumont, Texas, where consumers will be charged based on the amount of data they transfer over the Internet rather then on a specific bandwidth. The system is similar to most cell phone plans: instead of minutes, you get a set amount of gigabytes per month and pay overage fees when you exceed that limit.

The plan is a response to “bandwidth hogs” who violate the company’s fair use policies by overutilizing their networks. Time Warner defends its consumption-billing plan by saying it is targeting the 5 percent of subscribers who use more than half the bandwidth. With the increased popularity of streaming video and other bandwidth-intensive services, the term “bandwidth hog” may soon come to define most Internet users.

Of course, no discussion of the future of the Internet would be complete without mentioning net neutrality. The concept is simple: Internet traffic should not be prioritized base on its content. For many companies, the barrier for this content-based prioritization is not technological. Several service providers already use “packet-shaping” technology to control the speed of certain data based on a predetermined ranking system. The targets were heavy P2P users who would use up valuable bandwidth during peak usage hours.

AT&T has taken the concept a step further by developing a filtering system to combat Internet piracy. The filter would block the transfer of certain copyrighted material over its networks. The most extreme example would be the Internet censorship occurring in China.

Companies such as Google, Microsoft and Yahoo have developed ways to adhere to China’s strict Internet regulations so that they can expand their services to millions of Chinese.

The Internet has become so ubiquitous in our daily lives that it will never truly disappear. However, the days when a pajama-wearing revolutionary could change the world may soon be over. This may be preferable to some people, but I find this vision of the future disturbing, and I hope we can find a way to avoid it.

[Reach columnist Mike Noon at opinion@thedaily.washington.edu.]