As the Internet grows more complex, diverse, and deeply embedded in society, visualization plays an increasingly vital role in understanding its structure, behavior, and evolution.
From classic time series to immersive interactive maps, visual tools help expose anomalies, reveal hidden geometries, and make abstract patterns tangible—not just for experts but also for broader audiences. In some cases, visualizations can become the most memorable aspect of a research study and become the standard by which future papers present results and findings.
The inaugural Internet Visualization Exhibition (IVE), happening at SIGCOMM 2025, celebrates this creative dimension of Internet research. IVE aims to foster dialogue between disciplines, promote visual thinking as a research skill, and inspire new ways of representing complexity at Internet scale.
We invite researchers, practitioners, and artists to share novel visualizations, images, animations, and interactive artifacts that distill insight from data, making Internet infrastructure more legible and elucidating details of complex systems and protocols.
How to Participate
This session will showcase creative visualizations, animations, or other representations of Internet data, topology, systems, and protocols. We’re looking for bold new contributions that convey insights that may not be possible with current techniques or that just look cool.
The format for this session will be diverse. It may include posters or projected video accompanied by optional creator commentary, followed by an informal discussion where contributors and attendees can share reflections on visualization as a research practice: what works, what challenges arise, and what opportunities lie ahead.
If you’ve got something innovative, please submit it!
If you need any additional information or have any thoughts on how to participate, please contact me ([email protected]) or Paul Barford ([email protected]).
- When: Thursday, 11 September from 11:45—12:30 (UTC+1)
- Where: SIGCOMM 2025, Coimbra, Portugal
- Website: sigcomm/2025/nonpaper/nonpaper-ive/
Loqman Salamatian is a PhD candidate at Columbia University, researching Internet measurement, model analysis, and Riemannian geometry, aiming to develop models that bridge virtual and geographical spaces.
The views expressed by the authors of this blog are their own and do not necessarily reflect the views of the Internet Society.
Image by Loqman Salamatian and Louis Petiniaud.