Intelligent complexity in Internet addressing schemes: can the Internet solve its own problems?

The Internet, including all the people connected to each other via the Internet´s infrastructure, has become the collective brain of mankind. The Internet currently has a huge problem. Its main addressing scheme (IPv4) is running out of addresses. The extreme size and complexity of the Internet make this problem extremely difficult to solve, as the decade of unsuccessful attempts to introduce IPv6 has made clear. This makes the addressing scheme an interesting case in intelligent complexity, the complexity that arises from the interactions within a large group of people. The case study leads to conclusions about the behaviour of such groups. Applied to Internet addressing, we conclude that addressing heterogeneity in the Internet will remain an unsolved problem for many years to come.