What world changing event happened ten years ago this month?
August of 1995 was the month that Netscape, the first broadly available web browser, went public. As Thomas Friedman says in his "The World is Flat", that event changed the world. Previously, the file exchange part of the Web and the message and communication part of the Web were being used- though on a limited basis. With the advent of a browser, access to content and the idea of what kind of content might be accessed via the Web expanded phenomenally.
While this isn't a novel observation in itself, I'm struck by how it demonstrates the incredibly rapid pace of change. Ten years ago, my youngest kids were nine and five. So more than half of their lives has been lived in this universe of ever expanding connectivity. An iPod with 4,000 songs downloaded from the Internet was not a concept that had any substance in 1995 and yet now they each have one. A Live Journal, My Space, Blogging, instant messaging netspace used regularly by people of all ages, educations, interests, and abilities was not imagined. Streaming video or instantaneous webcam or satellite images accessed by the average person was not in reach. Perhaps there were early adaptors or technogeeks who were muddling over such things, but none of this was on the horizon for a young dad and small children.
And we were a pretty techno family. We had a little computer- an Atari- with a cartridge that allowed you to write Basic programs and execute them. I remember the first real computer we bought: the Mac Classic. We actually ended up having two. One of them sits downstairs in my hall closet. Still runs.
Ten years. That's just a blink of time and looking back to that August, I am astonished that it has only been that long. If I think about the changes in any previous ten year stretch of my life, nothing compares in its impact on individual people and the workplace.
So make a note, kids. It's August 2005. Can you imagine what we'll be looking back to ten years from now? I know enough to think about the question-something I believe more people are doing as a matter of course. But I'd be lying if I said I had an inkling of how things might change. That leads me to the thought that, as wonderful as many of the changes so far have been, the rate of change is so great that bad changes can happen just as fast. In an instant.
Don't blink!
While this isn't a novel observation in itself, I'm struck by how it demonstrates the incredibly rapid pace of change. Ten years ago, my youngest kids were nine and five. So more than half of their lives has been lived in this universe of ever expanding connectivity. An iPod with 4,000 songs downloaded from the Internet was not a concept that had any substance in 1995 and yet now they each have one. A Live Journal, My Space, Blogging, instant messaging netspace used regularly by people of all ages, educations, interests, and abilities was not imagined. Streaming video or instantaneous webcam or satellite images accessed by the average person was not in reach. Perhaps there were early adaptors or technogeeks who were muddling over such things, but none of this was on the horizon for a young dad and small children.
And we were a pretty techno family. We had a little computer- an Atari- with a cartridge that allowed you to write Basic programs and execute them. I remember the first real computer we bought: the Mac Classic. We actually ended up having two. One of them sits downstairs in my hall closet. Still runs.
Ten years. That's just a blink of time and looking back to that August, I am astonished that it has only been that long. If I think about the changes in any previous ten year stretch of my life, nothing compares in its impact on individual people and the workplace.
So make a note, kids. It's August 2005. Can you imagine what we'll be looking back to ten years from now? I know enough to think about the question-something I believe more people are doing as a matter of course. But I'd be lying if I said I had an inkling of how things might change. That leads me to the thought that, as wonderful as many of the changes so far have been, the rate of change is so great that bad changes can happen just as fast. In an instant.
Don't blink!
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