N.C. State researchers presented a paper in Hong Kong yesterday about a new protocol they developed that could send TCP into the history books. The new protocol, BIC (Binary Increase Congestion)-TCP, is 6,000 times faster than any of today's DSL services

"The problem, Rhee said, is the inherent limitations of regular TCP. “TCP was originally designed in the 1980s when Internet speeds were much slower and bandwidths much smaller,” he said. “Now we are trying to apply it to networks that have several orders of magnitude more available bandwidth.” Essentially, we’re using an eyedropper to fill a water main. BIC, on the other hand, would open the floodgate."