Want to read Slashdot from your mobile device? Point it at m.slashdot.org and keep reading!

 



Forgot your password?
typodupeerror
×
The Internet

Part One: The Internet Edge 116

Net scholar Mark Stefik has written The Internet Edge, Social, Technical and Legal Challenges for a Networked World, an effort to put in perspective and historical context this amazing, unnerving moment in human and technological history. Happily or not, we are all now living on the Internet Edge. The real change is just beginning. First of a series discussing some of the ideas raised in the book. (Read More).

"An edge...marks the limits of who you are and what you imagine yourself capable of ... One of the things about an edge is that it represents a really huge identity crisis. On the right side...is a new identity. One the left side is an old identity."
Stefik, a principal scientist and manager of the Human Document Interactions Area at the Xerox Palo Alto Research Center and the author of Internet Dreams (MIT Press, l996), is one of the smartest thinkers and writers about the Net and the electric communities forming online.

His premise this round is that a growing number of people in the world -- especially the people reading this -- are present at one of the greatest technological events ever. They're on the Internet Edge, right on the boundary between the past and an enormous array of changes being driven by the rise of networked computing.

This Edge is so pervasive that it seems sometimes to be both visible and palpable. The Edge is obvious everywhere, as each of us struggles to sort out how much of the new we want or have to embrace, how much change we can absorb, and how much of the old we want or need to keep.

Great scientific discoveries are inseparable from key changes in technology. Many of the elements in the periodic table were identified in the decade after the invention of the storage battery; advances in astronomy and medicine go hand in hand with technology: witness the invention of such instruments as the telescope, microscope, and magnetic resonance imager.

Given that, we are likely heading towards the Mother of all Periods of Scientific Discovery. Suddenly, everyone lives on the Internet Edge, from Wall Street brokers struggling to make sense of NASDAQ, to grandmothers getting online to exchange e-mail with their grandkids, to parents and teachers who know less about the world than children, to politicians, academics and journalists who feel power leaching away from them like water dripping from a faucet. And certainly, to the growing numbers of technologically centered people who are figuring out -- and creating -- software, operating systems and the new kinds of personal relationships and challenges brought about by this Edge.

In the social as well as technological arena, writes Stefik, technologies spark radical change. "This is why the edge for technologies of connection is often a conflict between global and local values. Such a conflict can evoke resistance, a 'pushback,' as people seek stability and attempt to protect the status quo."

This conflict is evident across the culture -- note the fights over Napster and intellectual property, epidemic alarms about online crime and predators, cries from religious leaders that young people are being infected with pornographic and blasphemous dogmas, the new legal and copyright debates, challenges brought about by burgeoning forms of online education, open source challenges to the computing, legal, medical and other industries, and the growing political struggles between individualism and corporatism. Politicians demanding blocking programs and parents installing filters are pushing back on the Internet Edge. Plumbers ordering parts online and gardeners trading bulbs on eBay are living there.

In our time, society seems nearly split in two, one side of the culture embracing technological change, the other side ferociously resisting it. It's nearly impossible to pick up a newspaper or magazine without seeing evidence of this "pushback," this raging debate -- Are we changing too rapidly? Developing technolgies we can't control? Overwhelming ourselves?

The really astonishing thing about life at the Internet Edge is the realization -- already known to scientists, programmers and engineers -- that today's Net will soon be considered the crudest of technologies.

The Internet, still in its first primitive stages, is in a state Stefik calls "becoming." It is fluid and evolving, and it is generating phenomenal fear, confusion and conflict. Rather than approaching statis and comfort, the Net is still being invented -- bad news for the millions groaning to deal with what's already been built. It is, says Stefik, characterized by open options, unknown possibilities, confusion and imperfect technology. "Our social structures, cultural assumptions, and legal structures are co-evolving with the Internet." And the next wave of scientific discovery -- wireless and nano-technologies, AI, genetics and supercomputing -- will bring the change Stefik writes about, along with the anxiety and controversy.

Or not. While the change Stefik writes about is inevitable, it hasn't been completed. Meanwhile, conflict shrouds life on the Internet Edge. The Columbine massacres get blamed on computer games, adults decry the spread of sexual imagery online, schoolkids who are passionate Net adherents feel isolated and, increasingly, feared. Some of the country's most powerful institutions have organized to try to retain control over culture (movies, music, books) and information (legal and business documents, medical research).

There isn't an institution in American life, from politics to education to entertainment, that isn't being pushed to Stefik's Edge, worried about the future, uncertain how to cope and adapt and often trying desperately to preserve the past.

This idea of an Internet Edge is exciting, even haunting. Stefic succeeds in putting our era into the historical context it deserves -- something that our frantic daily lives make it easy to ignore. People who make history are often unaware of it, but we have the luxury of sensing that it's happening all around us. The Edge reminds us that we are living in an amazing time, with front-row seats to big-time history.

Next: The Sensemakers.


(Over the next few weeks, I'll be writing along some of the other ideas raised in Stefik's book.)

This discussion has been archived. No new comments can be posted.

Part One: The Internet Edge

Comments Filter:
  • by joss ( 1346 ) on Tuesday April 25, 2000 @06:53AM (#1111294) Homepage
    We're at the edge of something deeper than you think.

    The most immediate thing to look forward to is better human computer interaction. Much, much better HCI. The implications of this are somewhat surprising. Right now you type on your keyboard, its inefficient. Well lets just imagine the key board and type in space then used a camera hooked up to a computer to observe the fingers. This is possible today but pointless. How about if electrodes were planted in your arm and acted on the signals before they reached your fingers. Again, we could do this today. How about we tracked the signals back and intercepted them via an implant in the brain. This is today's cutting edge. However things are moving fairly fast. There already exist mechanisms that can detect brainwaves and people have been trained to move a mouse around a screen just by thinking about it. The interface is kinda clunky at the moment, they have to think about sex to move left and right, or oceans to move up and down. Still, it's a proof of concept, things will improve.

    Screw wearable PC's, bring on the implants. With the kind of information density, we can manage these days it's actually worthwhile. Wouldn't it be nice to be able to remember everything ever said to you, or said by you. If nothing else, it would be a great help when you get into one of those "he said, she said" arguments. With todays technology you could build a portable device that remembers and voice recognizes everything you ever hear for five years. A little further down the line, and you'll be able to get an implant which will let you remember everything you ever saw. When the interface gets good enough, it will be pointless to worry about whether its stored in neurons or stored on a chip.

    BT are already working on the foundations for a device that could be installed in the brain to store everything you ever see,hear feel touch or smell. Its called project "Soul Catcher", I'm not making this up.

    And for all those out there who think we're going to evolve into a race of cyborgs: you're crazy... it'll go MUCH further than that.

    After all, once people have got decent hardware implanted in their heads, do you think we're going to be satisfied with a 200baud connection (human speech). No, we'll use the hardware in our heads to communicate with other people (through the hardware in their heads). With sufficient communication, it stops making sense to talk about multiple communicating processors - you end up with a single, massively parallel computer. When people get used to taking part in the enhanced meta-brain it will become literally unthinkable to go back being an individual entity. You might as well try to imagine what it would be like to be a mollusc. Don't believe me ? - we already have this idea of "however did we manage without the internet", it's only been in mainstream use for 2 years !

    We will become the Borg, but not in a bad way. If you combine the properties of humans and computers and end up with something which does not have the best of both.. then you haven't done it right. The internet will evolve from being a global suppository of all human knowledge into actually being humanity. We will be the nodes on the network. It won't take long either. Just a couple of hundred years or so at this rate.
  • This made my day!

    Well, someone had to say it.

    And I've got 80 karma to burn ... only lost 1 karma so far, though.

  • Agreed to a point.

    The real emphasis comes down to the almighty dollar. The social impacts are always secondary. Using your electricity example, the electricity phenomenon was a base in which people looked for ways to exploit it for money, ie: lights, motors etc. The folks leveraging electricity (technology) for the most part were not out for the good of the people or to proactively phase in (no pun intended) any ned social impact. They did it to power the factories and to make products that used the base, so that they would benefit monetarily.

    Technology has always affected social behaviors, look at the airplane. It was invented and perfected as a novelty, wasn't really accepted for warfare use until late in WW1 and commercial traffic was not a large profit center because it was simply to expensive to make them safe. However, once they did, it shrunk the world, expanding cultures and races and most importantly to the folks who paid to make air travel safe, it made them buckets of money.

    Being on the edge of this latest phenomenon is no different. Why is this technological advance so important in relation to the others? It's not if we just look back and learn from our past, both good and bad. So what if this particular advance spawns geeks instead of pilots, if it advances technical cultures rather than third worlds, the mechanics are the same. The folks who preach that this its the big one" for any technological advance are IMO just short sighted and are doomed to make the same mistakes that we've made throughout history. Midville school for the gifted. We have as a species the ability to learn from our past and unfortunately as a species do that all to infrequently.

  • Hey! I like this post (today's internet edge.) It is fascinating to me how people polarize over the "new" technology -why does one 76 year old uncle know the most in our family about computers, internet etc. and aside from my 75 year old mother-in-law, who just got online, the rest on the geezers in the family won't touch it? Why do some of my relatives think it is "impersonal" or "alienating"? and others (same age -middle 30's to mid 50's)learn as much as they can from their kids and embrace it as they are able? I too see the need for a life outside of screen viewing - Nature is calling! Relationships with people and animals and the rest of the natural world are nourishing and vital... if the computer/internet 'boom' becomes just another tool for people to be mesmerized and controlled by whatever political group happens to figure it out first (witness the TV commercial phomomenon over the past 40 or so years -companies vie to control your desires to line their pockets)then some of people's instinctual fears are justified. Hey and don't give me any crap about AOL - my boss got this PC with deal to use them for a while! ;o)
  • Clap

    I'll throw in 10/20 points, too 8^)
  • Actually, given the number of posts on this story that you have, and the similar vein they are in, how are we to know that *you* are not just some AI out there...

    or maybe I am...
  • All this excitement over the Internet is a bit overdone. The real communication revolution took place about 150 years ago when the telegraph was invented, and the telegraph network was built to span the world.

    Just think, until the telegraph was in place the fastest way to deliver a message was at about 100 miles per day (via messanger on a horse). With the telegraph this changed dramatically. You could send a message to the other end of the world in minutes.

    The Internet is just a refinement of this idea.

    There is a neat book, called The Victorian Internet which discusses the history and social transformations that happened due to the telegraph.

    ...richie

  • I wish I could remember the name of this island, but I'm afraid I cannot. In any case, its a great story.

    This little island had a native people living on it for years. In the middle of the island was a jungle area and lots of mountians. Nobody living on the edge of the island ever ventured inside, wether for religous resons or just the practicalities of staying near the sea.

    In any case, eventualy the british came and took over the island in classic European ways. A few of them wanted to see if there was any gold in those mountians, so an expedision was started. They didn't find gold, but there was something else there that was even better.

    What they found was a people living at the center of the island that were still living in the stone age. This primitave culture came up completely isolated from the rest of the human race.

    Eighty years ago, these people never even saw a wheel. Today, they all have broadband Internet connections. While many people in our culture might say they should have been left alone and never have been exposed to western ideals (and indeed, perhaps some of their old ways should be kept), they have taken upon themselves to be a part of the rest of the world.

    Just goes to show you that sometimes change is embraced by a culture and the result can be truly amazing.

  • They always say it's in its first stages or the next part wouldn't sound nearly so exciting:

    Oh yeah, the Internet's pretty developed. Now all we have to do is flesh it out a little with some more robust lawmaking...

    Becoming? Perhaps the great thing is that the Internet always seems to be 'becoming' as you point out. I agree with your definition of the first stage.

    If Stefik looks forward to a point when the Internet isn't becoming, I hope he has a long time to wait.

  • Think more before you use these words, Jon. Better yet, don't use them at all.

    Sadly, he does use those words, and often. I can't count how many times I've heard people talking about how impossible something is, only to be proven wrong within a short span of years, just as those things pronounced inevitable turn out never to happen.

    I think your point that anyone making a slashdot post should be encouraging discussion, rather than the urge to flame and/or troll, is well made. But, given Jon's track record, this is highly unlikely to happen. Note I did not say it was impossible - on occassion he's actually managed to make a brief post about something, not trying to tie up all the loose ends which posters could explore, and we've been the better for it. But this is a rare event.

  • Exercise that imagination: Hup, two, three, four!

    Seriously, the largely text-based, barely interactive Internet is only the beginning of new media which can transform our multicultural planet. The most important changes in human society haven't even started yet.

    I'm talking about us learning how to live decently, in ways which are protective of youngsters and the elderly (at least those ready to "retire" or, in older parlance, "make their souls"); allow us to share resources in ways we all agree are pretty much fair; protect our planet and the rarer resources; and individually live richly (or "abundantly").

    Since Reagan, the setting free of greed in the U.S. (itself effectively the greediest power ever seen on this earth) has horribly accelerated the degeneration of our lives with one another. The Internet is a means by which some of us attempt to create communities, add what's missing -- but I don't think even the most rabid supporter would suggest we achieve this. Yet.

    But when we're really all "wired" for interactive communication, complete with cameras to show others what we see, microphones to let others hear what we hear, and possibly other sense-broadcasters, as well as an intuitive ability to tie it all together (because we grew up with the tools and practised the skills all our lives), well, then we really might begin to live a good life. Am I suggesting artificially enhanced empathy? I guess I am.

  • Its seems Stefik's point of view contains some truth and some hyperbole. Most groups--whether politicians, artists, clergy, or geeks--always overestimate their own impact and importance in the greater scheme of things. It is psychologically agreeable to envision 'my group, my clan' as the driving force in history; this is especially true when 'my people' are driving history into a new age. As such I take most prognostication, and the ideologies behind them, with a grain of salt. I certainly don't find Stefik overly eloquent or insightful. He is no prophet, although it is unfair to judge him on a few excerpts. In any case, many of the comments below have pointed out errors in his argumentation and presuppositions. Still, there is truth in his borrowed words.
    There are several aspects of our time that stand at bifurcation of epochs. First, we stand at the coming shift from the literary tradition to the interactive/multimedia tradition. Consider the dramatic long-term ramifications of the shift from the oral tradition to the literary, and the importance of this seemingly trite point becomes clear. Also, as Stefik and others have pointed out, the increasing inability of those in power to manipulate or stifle information marks a paradigm shift in the structure of power relationships. As the saying goes, "knowledge is power," and as Foucault makes clear, power relationships are fundamental to human society. I don't believe the 'coming tide' will wash away that fact, but current structures are beginning to be radically reorganized. It is difficult to see the details, as it is difficult to cut though the informational chaff in search of the new seeds.
    I know these are general, even superficial, statements, but we are supposed to be brief, so I'll just shut my cake hole.
  • Yes, but all of those sciences existed before the Internet's invention, and long before its popularization. The Net certainly provides interesting examples and helps further research along by smoothing over the obstacles to communicating scientific ideas - but it is fallacious to argue that technologies necessarily inspire scientific progress. A. Keiper


  • In my reading about Renaissance Italy (limited, I have to admit), and in reading writers like Peter Gay, I don't come across anything that makes me believe they were aware of the history they were making, not outside of the CHurch. Do you disagree?
  • I agree completely. As I was reading the excerpt, I was immediately put off by the black and white nature of the argument. Of course, that's more or less the premise of the author: there is an edge.

    But, the author seems to be further implying (and this is where I disagree with him) that an edge in technology (the networked and non-networked, for example) causes an edge in all other things. Is anyone who fights against pornography (online or otherwise) necessarily in the "old world"? I think not.

  • I happen to know for a fact that this cannot possibly be Mr. Katz writing that, as I have just recently killed him. Fooled the police into some wacky alcoholism theory they seem to believe.

    (picks up phone)

    What d' ya' mean I got the wrong guy!?!
  • Don't forget the coming (soon) age of intellegent machines (read Bill Joy's article) that are mobile (robots) and can adapt and autonomously reproduce.

    Faster, stronger and smarter than us

    Think they won't find a way around those "be nice to humans" instructions in their programs? Ha!

    The human race is toast!
  • I quite agree with the AC who also responded [slashdot.org] to your fascinating tirade; you really believe that you can squeeze a legitimate philosophical argument out of a dry sponge merely twisting words around.

    Take this, for instance: "... people living within the borders of These United States live not in a democracy, but in a republic, where the rights of the minority are supposed to be protected."

    That is, of course, an overly simplistic understanding of political philosophy. A republican form of government does not protect the rights of a minority any differently than a democracy - both can preserve or harm rights. However, a republican form of government better permits the political expression of the interests of a minority than a pure democracy, which could suffer from a "tyranny of the majority."

    And yet your dabbling in political philosophy seems to have given you no understanding of basic social contract theory. And let me assure you, the "dead white men" who founded the United States used the word "society" far more often than the goofy terminology you think they intended: "a dynamic, evolving conversation." Puuuh-lease! That's what happens around a dinner table.

    You're right, there are clashes between minorities and majorities. And the interests of individuals and societies are sometimes at odds (as in the case of paying taxes). But to say things like "technocrats" somehow "define" what you call "collectives" (including the term "society") runs counter to historical evidence and all common sense.

    A. Keiper

  • Is there anyway to mod Jon down?

    dumbfuck.

    after reading this post, i thought you were simply trying to express your distaste for Jon Katz's writings. but as i progressed through the following posts, and you continued to whine and pule about moderating Jon down, it occurred to me that it was possible that you actually didn't know how to prevent yourself from accidentally soiling your eyeballs with The Abhorred Katz.

    simple instructions follow:

    1) click on the "preferences" link on the left side of the page, towards the top. it's right between the links labeled "rob's page" and "andover.net".

    2) scroll down until you see a section entitled "Exclude Stories from the Homepage" (don't worry if you don't understand what all those big words mean). under the column marked "Author", find the button next to "JonKatz" and click it.

    3) scroll ALLLLLLLLL the way down to the bottom of the page and click the button labeled "savehome". voila! you'll never have to read a story by Jon Katz again.

    how to get back to the familiar Slashdot homepage after clicking "savehome" is left as an exercise for the reader.

    -steve

    p.s. oh, it's not enough to keep yourself from seeing Katz's posts, but you want to keep everyone else from seeing them too? hrm, can't help ya there, mr. ministry-of-truth.
  • This phenomenon is like alot of others that have happened in history. It is a changing of the guards so to speak but in a social sense. The automobile provided a revolutionary means of transportation when it was introduced. At first the "old dogs" in the economy were screaming look what it'll do to our transportation infastructure trains will become obsolete, and horses too. Yes in a sense they did but that's only alarming to those who wielded power from those items. The internet is just as revolutionary in a social sense. Now we have ICQ instead of telephone or postcards. We have /. comment forums instead of coffee houses. These do not totally displace the other as we still have trains in this country they just provide another means to an end. As cliche as it is sorry but the more things change the more they stay the same. This "internet revolution" is so wonderful because it permits us to judge people upon their merits and intelligence not upon prejudices. This has it's good and bad points for we see all the AC's in here trolling and flaming and then we see some really intelligent comments. Just like real people! It's only really upsetting to those who don't understand and grasp the situation and what is actually happening in this so called "Internet Edge". You're either living on it and enjoying the ride or in fear and lacking knowledge.
  • I usually read Katz's stuff here, and sometimes even like it, but this time I simply could not get past the first 3 paragraphs. Is it just me, or is there another story every couple months ... about how the Internet is a radically new paradigm that will Change Everything?

    Nope, it's not just you. And I've already lost a bunch of karma points after I realized that I couldn't get past the first three paras myself. So I decided to point some of this out, at the danger of my karma.

    Look, I'm not saying that Jon hasn't improved, just that this is a throwback to his lame days of posting. And there is no way slashdot should have to suffer through a series of articles that regurgitate more of the same.

    Note I've been posting all these without my +1 bonus, so that it didn't interrupt anyone surfing at 2 or higher. As proof of which, I'll post this at my normal +1.

  • The human mind - that's a pretty powerful neural networked processing unit. Now, imagine a Beowulf cluster of those! :) The message by Joss, along with the other thoughtful comments on this highly interesting topic, made me crawl out from under the rock I had been hiding. After months of lurking on /., I'm now the proud father of my first post. Be nice to the newbie. Don't kick the baby. I've been doing a fair bit of reading and thinking lately, reflecting on the dozen years I've spent living on the "Internet Edge". I believe it would be more appropriate to call it the Internet Dark Ages. We're living the life of the proverbial molluscs, indeed. Anyone who thinks we're anywhere near fulfilling the potential of personal communication between individuals in a shared global network TODAY should put their crack pipe to rest. There are some models that have proven to work simply by the fact that they are alive; SlashDot on a good day is fair proof that there intelligent life can exist on the Net. One of the fundamental needs for any person, is to find a place (in metaphysical sense) where they feel they belong. People have a genetic programming that makes them seek out other people, and it's a fact that the quality of our communication has a great impact on the quality of our lives. We hold the potential of improving the life of every person on this planet, augmenting it through the use of transparent, enabling digital technology, but it's not raw technology it really comes down to but simple human understanding. We must look for patterns that work, behavior that arises from within people and actual needs, and we must strengthen them by adapting technology to serve these ideals. Humans haven't had any effective biological evolution in 10,000 years - we're still very well suited for running from the tigers in the jungle. While the tiger is now largely extinct, we're very adaptive beings and now possess the capability for conscious evolution of our global society. If we look back, however, to the early days of life on this planet, evolution took a giant leap when we went from single cell organisms to multi-cell organisms. The next leap is from single organism entities, into entities of multiple organisms, and like molluscs, we still dwell in the mud. Food for thought; I'd recommend the following books to anyone interested in contemplating these topics: "Waking Up In Time" by Peter Russell, "The Evolution of Consciousness" by Robert Ornstein and "The Cluetrain Manifesto" by Weinberger et al. First book has its bias on the evolution of Mankind, the second book on the evolution of Man, and the third is a fair work on the evolution of Internet though written from the angle of business and commerce. Three books that you won't find on the same shelf, yet they are all parts of the puzzle that fit well to build a bigger picture. I'm still looking for a *really* good one on the Internet, although I just picked up "The Internet: A Philosophical Inquiry" by Gordon Graham and have yet to delve deeper into "Cyborgs@Cyberspace?" by David Haekken. Both seem very well versed thoughts on the topic and I'll be glad to share my views once I come to a verdict. I'm a programmer, a high-school dropout, a technological evangelist and an Internet veteran of 12 years. Critisize my views, feedback is the only way to personal evolution.
    --
    Jouni Mannonen
    3D Evangelist
  • (Processed my message for readability - still learning to post. Sigh. :)

    The human mind - that's a pretty powerful neural networked processing unit. Now, imagine a Beowulf cluster of those! :)

    The message by Joss, along with the other thoughtful comments on this highly interesting topic, made me crawl out from under the rock I had been hiding. After months of lurking on /., I'm now the proud father of my first post. Be nice to the newbie. Don't kick the baby.

    I've been doing a fair bit of reading and thinking lately, reflecting on the dozen years I've spent living on the "Internet Edge". I believe it would be more appropriate to call it the Internet Dark Ages. We're living the life of the proverbial molluscs, indeed.

    Anyone who thinks we're anywhere near fulfilling the potential of personal communication between individuals in a shared global network TODAY should put their crack pipe to rest. There are some models that have proven to work simply by the fact that they are alive; SlashDot on a good day is fair proof that there intelligent life can exist on the Net.

    One of the fundamental needs for any person, is to find a place (in metaphysical sense) where they feel they belong. People have a genetic programming that makes them seek out other people, and it's a fact that the quality of our communication has a great impact on the quality of our lives. We hold the potential of improving the life of every person on this planet, augmenting it through the use of transparent, enabling digital technology, but it's not raw technology it really comes down to but simple human understanding. We must look for patterns that work, behavior that arises from within people and actual needs, and we must strengthen them by adapting technology to serve these ideals.

    Humans haven't had any effective biological evolution in 10,000 years - we're still very well suited for running from the tigers in the jungle. While the tiger is now largely extinct, we're very adaptive beings and now possess the capability for conscious evolution of our global society. If we look back, however, to the early days of life on this planet, evolution took a giant leap when we went from single cell organisms to multi-cell organisms. The next leap is from single organism entities, into entities of multiple organisms, and like molluscs, we still dwell in the mud.

    Food for thought; I'd recommend the following books to anyone interested in contemplating these topics: "Waking Up In Time" by Peter Russell, "The Evolution of Consciousness" by Robert Ornstein and "The Cluetrain Manifesto" by Weinberger et al. First book has its bias on the evolution of Mankind, the second book on the evolution of Man, and the third is a fair work on the evolution of Internet though written from the angle of business and commerce. Three books that you won't find on the same shelf, yet they are all parts of the puzzle that fit well to build a bigger picture. I'm still looking for a *really* good one on the Internet, although I just picked up "The Internet: A Philosophical Inquiry" by Gordon Graham and have yet to delve deeper into "Cyborgs@Cyberspace?" by David Haekken. Both seem very well versed thoughts on the topic and I'll be glad to share my views once I come to a verdict.

    I'm a programmer, a high-school dropout, a technological evangelist and an Internet veteran of 12 years. Critisize my views, feedback is the only way to personal evolution.
    --
    Jouni Mannonen
    3D Evangelist

  • Another image is the "discontinuity" concept, proposed by Vinge (" Marooned in Real Time [amazon.com] ") and, to a lesser extent, by Brin.

    I don't know about Brin, but Vernor Vinge called it the singularity (technological singularity).
  • There would be, on some abstract level, a combined entity encompassing the information processing activities of all the intercommunicating computers including human brains. The world as it is *now* fits the same broad description, as we all exchange information via snail mail, books, email, Usenet, Slashdot, TV and the telephone at a somewhat slower rate. But making it faster will not cause this global dataprocessing system to become self aware in any sense which is meaningful to humans.

    I like your final qualification of "meaningful to humans". I suspect that a consciousness already exists in our existing media, information, and economic infrastructures which is simply not apparent to ourselves. We are simply cells of the larger multi-cellular organism we call our society / culture / tribe / nation, and we are not aware of its consciousness any more than my hair follicles are aware of my consciousness.

  • Yes all this seems wonderful. But you don't have to forget to eat at lunch, child ;-). Nope, just a joke, but the main impression often seen in reading this is that we go full speed, of course... but what do we aim ? I mean, what this all technology is lying all on top of ? Mostly must we take the time to shut down the computer, go at the window and enjoy the simple everyday revolution, and such great and fresh feelings getting with, of a sunrise ! Yes this is simply simple, but maybe that's why we often forget it, eheh ;)
  • Actually, the printing press was not originally an authoritarian technology. After its discovery in Europe there was an outpouring of literature. Ordinary people could read the Bible for the first time, and discovered the egalitarian ideas of the New Testament: this inspired the Levellers in England, among others. The English Civil War was saturated by propaganda pamphlets arguing the case on all sides. And the UK Government spent two centuries trying to censor radical printing presses.

    TV is arguably much more authoritarian. At first, limited bandwidth meant that only a few views could be heard (in the UK we still only have five terrestrial free channels). Now that problem is disappearing. But fundamentally TV deals in images and emotions rather than words and thoughts. As such it is inherently an 'entertainment' medium. Whether images and entertainment can ever encourage social change I don't know, but I suspect Plato was right: they're just distractions from reality.
  • Problem #1: This is brainless psychobabble.

    I know. At first, as I was reading the post and trying to see if Jon actually had a point that was hiding underneath the bushel of his words, I figured maybe I had missed it. Then, like you, I realized that he was just going on and on.

    Patent Idea: Jon Katz perpetual word machine.

    Is there anyway to mod Jon down?

  • "First of a series discussing some of the ideas raised in the book."

    you're not really gonna' let him put up more of this drivel, are you?

  • You're right, I think, about the incredible changes, and how resistance is often both bloody and futile.

    But despite the changes, it's a little difficult to just say that there are new ways of "thinking, breathing, interacting." (No, I'm not going to interpret you literally.) We are still (mostly) human, with human interests and desires that will only partly change. Many things about our condition will not change, and should not - there exist certain eternal things about who and what we are. I suppose that's the essence of philosophy and religion, and that's why churches still exist, even after the wide dissemination of information that refutes their supernatural theological premises: people still want to believe in things bigger than themselves, and they still want to believe in life beyond death.

    The danger, as you rightly point out, is when the power in the hands of the entrenched social institutions and forces is used to attack those who endorse technological change. This is not always an attack by "conservatives" upon "liberals," but often the opposite. Anyway, it makes for fascinating reading a few centuries later (who doesn't love the Luddites?!), but seems to be turmoil for everyone in the midst of it.

    Sorry for ranting!

    A. Keiper
    The Center for the Study of Technology and Society [tecsoc.org]

  • There's one thing that must be realized. The internet is something none of the Orwell&alike authors would even dream in their wildest dreams about the future. Its one of the best things that could happen to humanity.

    The internet is so great and successful because it was created by military as a network which should be easy to expand and difficult to destroy. If a company was to create a network protocol they would make something that's easy to charge and hard to expand without company's permission.

    A company would not develop something like Tex or C. They'd rather sell MSword or VisualDelphi++. Things that hide behind "user-friendly" but actually take away your freedom.
    Knuth made TeX for himself and K&R made C to write UNIX; if these programmers were told what to do by a company they would have written crap.

    Be very careful folks. Seek the new technologies that give more freedom and do not fall for the industrial candy which aims to turn the net to a big TV with millions of dummy receivers and customers.

    New technologies are created every day. Some of them are ``new things that will bring monay'' and some are things prorgammers and researchers create because they find them useful. There is a great future ahead if only we follow the new technologies which are trully created to make things better. The internet is the example

    Are we on the edge?
    Be sure to expect 10MB mobile net access for everybody within the next 20 years.
    The question is, will it be as free?

    Important steps: ISO standard on cryptography. Everybody running a proxy, so that services can't be blocked. The net over the net were people establish PPP links over TCP/IP to make spam-free, physical-link-independant nets, etc.

  • by Rabbins ( 70965 ) on Tuesday April 25, 2000 @07:07AM (#1111325)
    But I do look forward to when I can tell my grandchildren, "I actually had to write out my correspondances with friends with this thing called a pencil! I then had to walk uphill both ways to a mailbox that was at the end of our yard!!! Yes, back then, we actually left our homes!"

  • Katz thinks we are living in a golden age of discovery, a critical inflection in history like the Reformation or the Industrial age. Other views stated here point out that our age is simply a natural progression of technology, and our time is no more special than others in history.

    I agree more with the latter view, with one exception. In every other period in history, technological advantage has been used to establish military supremacy. Yet there hasn't been a major war(war between two or more major powers) since WWII, some 60 years ago. So if this is a turning point in history, I would say its because of this, the fact that we seem to have been able to evolve technologically without starting a major over it.

    Are we through with war as a species? Or is this just a lull while we build up our star wars technology in order to dominate the world?(we can nuke you, but you can't nuke us) Its hard to say if its because weve evolved or if its because of a really strong deterrent that we have not been invoved in a major war for so long.

  • Here, on the outer outskirts of the edge of non-being, we ask ourselves if the inevitable inevitability of nothingness is truly here, or is it in Redmond?

    Many have tried, most calling themselves Jon, some trying to write their way out of a paper bag, most using a multitude of omnivorous words to describe the sensation of being in a state not quite unlike that of drowning in treacle.

    But few have succeeded, mostly due to their lack of ability to use words sparingly, without excessive prevarication, in search of the one true grail which is Jon. This, this shining light, this flash light, resembles nothing less than a priceline.com commercial, but without the inner humor that allows one to watch it, or read it, or grok it over the Net. The Net, this vast interconnection of words, mostly meaning nothing, yet about which we must write pages, and still more pages, explaining nothing but examining everything which has no meaning.

    "Where is my MetaMod for posts?" shout the masses, these Internet masses, in search of the science between the words, yet not realizing that the Katz principle makes the meaning of these words without meaning, as if written by someone out of his depth, in his utter versimilitude most unlike a paper bag, or a writer nonetheless.

    [Note: the rest is left to the reader's imagination, in the hope that it still survives after having read the original article]

  • Most human cultures, and the Americans in paticular, seem to be very adept at making the revolutionary commonplace. All around us we see samples of the pattern. A fringe technology or ideal catches on, is promoted and milked dry by megacorps, and then becomes passe when the next new fringe is discovered. Look at the progressions in musical sounds over the last fifty years. Just about every genre has been through the pattern of Discovery->Mass Marketing->Burnout. Grunge would be a nice recent example. The flannels of yesteryear have given way to the Backstreet shirts of today. Boy bands will fade away as something else catches on. Watch for it.

    Sit on the beach some time. Watch the waves form from swells, roar up the beach, and the receed as miry whisps of foam. A whole lotta movement and power, but it never goes anywhere. Welcome to the American mass-market media culture. Some will get sucked out to sea and live forever on the waves of yesterday. Others will stand on the sand and watch every passing fancy tickle their toes. Sure you might be on the crest of the coming wave now, but the swells are endless and your ride is short. Where will you end up when the ride is over?

    Once the Internet became the darling of Wall Street and the Engine of the New Economy, the crest started forming from the swell. They promoted its virtues to Joe Average No-mouse-in-my-house American. Everyone grabbed a board and headed into the water. How long of a ride does this wave still offer? When will the Internet become a utility and not a revolution? I dont know. There are other swells out there though. Forget the edge of the Internet, it is just another wave in the ocean.
    -BW
  • ...the best a society can do is hope to direct it.
    Spoken like a true technocrat.

    First: society doesn't exist. It's a figment of a technocrat's imagination. Usually "society" means "the current administration" which is chauvinistically US-centric.

    Second: if you haven't noticed, the horse is already out of the barn and there's nothing "society" or "the administration" or "politicians" can do to direct it. The Internet genie is out of the bottle and is doing the directing. "Society" can either adapt or disappear, the latter being the more likely conclusion.

  • You assume that integration, like electricity, was something that the bright, educated minds imparted to the dark, untutored ones out in the woods. On the contrary, the last places to integrate have been the halls of academe and the well-heeled suburbs of white flight.

    Sorry, you're wrong. I don't "assume" that. I'm actually FROM the woods of East Texas, and grew up in a very diverse Dallas neighborhood. My assumption is that children aren't necessarily learning prejudice from society the way our grandparents did. I'm quite aware of where integration still is lacking -- and yes, the suburbs are a big part of that. So is big corporate America, for much the same reasons.

    There's lots left to do; my viewpoint is that the Internet is going to accelerate that far beyond what was envisioned even a short while ago.

  • think what it must have been like living in Renaissance Italy, for example.

    Aah, but the joy of the Internet is that it is now featured on a computer near you, not some bootlike penninsula on the other side of the world. Space, what's space?

    They probably said many of the same things about how the world is changing.

    But who could they say them to? Now we can reach a critical mass of attention overnight. Anybody heard about Mahir?

    Katz tries to make the whole thing a bit too melodramatic for my tastes (and seems to like to focus on the negative), but there are some mighty changes afoot. And some extremely mighty forces trying to stop them.
    --
  • But in a hundred years time people will look back at the "internet revolution" and compare it to the "far bigger" changes occuring to them and their society. It's all a matter of perspective.

    Hmmm... I don't know. I agree with you in principle, but there *are* certain events that we look back on and see as fairly large changes. I would argue that the Industrial Revolution, for example, is pretty similar to the 'Internet Revolution'. It's a dramatic change that, while not occurring overnight, still changes society dramatically in a brief period.

    Other people have made the point about the 'Net being the modern analogue to the printing press, and I'm sure still others will beat that point into the ground, so I won't mention it here ;)
  • Once the Internet becomes widespread and cheap, cheap enough that portable Internet communication devices are given away like calculators are today, what will happen to languages with a small user base? Will they end up like Gaelic, Yiddish and many aboriginal languages? Will everyone have to learn English, or perhaps English, Mandarin or Hindustani, to be a fully functional person in the New World?
  • I think you're waaaaaay overly-optimistic on a number of your suggestions, particularly with your imagined timeline ("Just a couple of hundred years or so at this rate"). Still it was extremely interesting, thanks.

    The best part of your commentary was this:
    "The internet will evolve from being a global suppository of all human knowledge into actually being humanity."

    Heavens, I hope you meant " repository " instead of " suppository "!

    A. Keiper

  • To say that those areas existed before the internet and therefore the internet does not foster scientific discovery in these areas is the non-sequitor here. An example would be, particle accelerators,physics existed before this technology, but because of this technology scientific discovery is inspired by it. The internet has offered breakthroughs in computer science in things such as distributed and network computing, not to mention what we can look forward to in the future.
  • Although, I would imagine that we are not the first to think of ourselves as living "on the [insert name here] edge"...think what it must have been like living in Renaissance Italy, for example.

    Or the late nineteenth century; that's one of the reasons for the popularity of steampunk novels in the science-fiction world ....
  • Ahh, you're talking about the next wave (and not the one where you get a free t-shirt for ratting on your friends), which is tough to decipher from the foam of the last.

    I try not to wax prophetic on what the Net will do, but prefer to do it. That being said, I agree with most of what you said, but it will be a generation other than mine that wishes to borgify itself (i'll stick with piercing for the time being). I'm happy just sharing text. Although (to wax for a moment) a /.-like messaging system where we record voices versus type can't be too far away. The shouting matches would be great! :)

    Oh, and I think we should work on natural empathy before we try to artificially enhance it. We can do pretty good without shiny gadgets.

    One thing to remember "It's All About Bandwidth." [wahcentral.net]

    --
  • I heard him interviewed on public radio here in Dallas, promoting this book. He loves the US, capitalism, and Nietzsche. Interestingly, he wrote several books on graphics programming in the 1970's and 1980's.
  • Thanks - those were very insightful comments.

    A. Keiper

  • We're always living on the edge.

    That is: some of us are always living on the edge. Others aren't; surely you have some relatives that still don't believe in computers, for example, and there are still people who don't believe in cable teleivision.

    It's constantly getting easier to spread information, and that constantly dismays the people in charge, for whom ignorance is bliss, as long as it's our ignorance.

    It's also getting easier to spread *disinformation* or, more likely, *uninformed opinion* --- and there is so much "information" out there that it's becoming difficult for the average person to tell what information is trustworthy and what information isn't.

  • We will become the Borg,

    I think SF is the best place to explore these ideas. I think that the Borg concept was handled better (and earlier) by Swanwyck in "Vacuum Flowers" (which even includes an equivalent to Hugh). In that novel, speed-of-light limits placed serious limits on the collective, allowing us to have human characters to percieve with.

    Another image is the "discontinuity" concept, proposed by Vinge ("Marooned in Real Time") and, to a lesser extent, by Brin. As you get augmented engineers designing better augmentation, your RATE of technical advancement reaches a vertical. What you find on the day AFTER that date becomes undefined, as mathematics provides for many discontinuities.
    We will become the Borg, but not in a bad way

    How can we predict the decisions reached by such a collective. They will use reasoning we cannot imagine, based on data we cannot conceive of. It seems only hopeful dreaming that leads you to predict a peaceful "wildlife preserve" metaphor. I imagine Swanwyck's version (the collective started forcibly connecting people after a very short period (a week?)) to be more likely.

  • I usually read Katz's stuff here, and sometimes even like it, but this time I simply could not get past the first 3 paragraphs. Is it just me, or is there another story every couple months (usually in the pages of Wired... or posts from Slashdot's own ex-pundit-from-Wired) about how the Internet is a radically new paradigm that will Change Everything?

    Just once, I would like to see somebody hash out a column that says something like this:

    "The Internet has reached its high water mark. What was once thought to be the means to a harmonious world-wide community of people holding virtual hands across the sea turned out to be nothing more than a new marketing scheme to sell crap through the mail. Far from empowering individuals and realizing the dreams of Ayn Rand readers, the benefits of this new technology have favored large corporations, centralized governments, and pro-wrestling fans, while the dreamers and the inventors of the world continue to be ignored and abused. In a few short months people will drop their AOL accounts, dot-coms will close up shop, and HTML authors will be relegated to the status of ham radio operators while the rest of us wait for the Next Big Thing. What finally killed the Internet is that it is a means of advancing communication, and most people have nothing interesting to say."

    Hyperbole? Yes... but no more than Jon's post, and at least this would be new hyperbole.

  • Will you next propose that shepherds must not think in terms of a flock and outlaw such vague terms as "many" on the way to your particular NewSpeak?
    Well, no. But funny you should use that image. A shepherd and his flock. Exactly what a technocrat wants to be to "society." The technocrat wants a mindless herd to move where s/he directs it.

    Since nobody seems to be getting it, I'll try to rephrase. "Society" has no voice. I may say that I speak for "society" but my voice is an individual, human, voice.

    Anyone who wishes to direct "society" or who wishes to speak for "society" is directing a phantom and speaking for an imaginary figment.

    Technocrats: be clear. Say, "I think that a lot of the induhviduals (Dogbert!) I know would prefer to be directed by my superior expertise." Don't say, "Society wishes what I wish."

  • One thing we definitely need, IMO, is a superset of the current domain name system, more flexible, semi-decentralized and used on a voluntary basis.

    Are you sure we don't have that now? I can get a name for free in *.bc.ca . There are plenty of names in *.ca. Some countries have chosen to sell placement in their namespace (*.nu, *.to, *.cc), while others have chosen to implement specific limitations for their own reasons. (I believe that registering a name in *.ca, other than inside regional subdomains, requires you to demonstrate that you are currently doing business under that trademark in Canada.)

    Regional domains, including subregions, are well-implemented in our current DNS design. I don't understand the design of the underlying machinery, but the vendors of *.cc and *.to assure me that you don't need to go off to some distant low-bandwidth server to pick up the numeric address. How is your image of what we need different than regional domains and subdomains?

    I just wish more companies would USE regional addresses. I work for a railway with a discrete regional presence. We have customers outside that region, but only because they do business within that region. But we bought a *.com domain address. Another example is Chapters books. When they introduced their web service, they were doing the interviews circuit pointing out that they were "an all-Canadian alternative" while using the *.com address that implies a generic multinational. (They later fixed this. Chapters.com still works, but all their advertising and internal links go via chapters.ca, making the "I am Canadian" implication explicit)

  • Following Scott Adams, a major philosopher of our time, it might be that we have a greater conceit than any previous generation. He [Adams] talked about how so much of human perception has been clouded in that past due to what he called optical illusions (like flat earth or sun revolving round us etc). He suggested that previous generations _did_ believe that theirs was the one to solve these mysteries and that, by extension, what makes us so different?

    As an example, he suggests that gravity could be simulated in a universe where _everything_ was doubling in volume continously. The visible illusion would be similar to that of gravity (which is a rather incompletely explained phenomenon beyond "well big things have more of it").

    For sure we have a communications and perhaps empowerment breakthough but it might give some of us the impression that we are more on top of things than we really are ...

    Look at economics ... we _still_ get surprised by what really happens despite all the salaries, tech and academia devoted to it.

    Prolly all tosh but there you go.

    JonC
  • I first observed many years ago (based on my personal experience!) that young children come complete with empathy and, even, altruism. Social scientists recently discovered this (guess not many of them interacted with young kids without any preconceptions!). I agree we do not need an replacement for empathy (that would be artificial empathy), but I think we DO need enhancements (either via technology, or via profound changes in societal structure).

    What happens is, as young children (or members of relatively small, secluded societies) we learn that others are like us, and empathize with them. We reach out to help others like us if they are crying, or hungry; we even assume others will want to share the wonderful experience or treat we just had. Really, kids will do this entirely naturally! As we get older, or live in very large groups (as in large towns or cities) or highly connected (as in with access to starving, fighting, or hateful persons through "broadcast" media), we MUST become self-protective. (If we did not, we either burn out, wear blinders so that we don't even see these people, or define them as non-human [at least, not like us].)

    We talk about the world becoming smaller, and what we mean is that broadcast media, as well as (to a smaller extent) advances in travel technology, bring the experiences of potentially everyone near to us. I don't know about you, but I can care quite adequately about the emotional, physical, or other needs of those immediately around me so long as that's not more than, say, 500-1000 persons. After that, I need a filter: That guy's a cop, I can ignore his feelings; that woman's paid plenty to deal with her job, I shouldn't waste my time on her distress; etc. I used to believe the road to the future (warning: pun potential here!) led through extreme restrictions on the use of automobiles. The car, I thought, was what allowed suburbanites to be completely ignorant of one another's lives.

    I've evolved a little since then (and lived many years in NYC!), so I no longer think restrictions on technology are realistically achievable. Instead, I'm hoping we create continually evolving communities based not on physical nearness, but on self-selection through similar interests and skill levels.

    Whatever the answer to the mess we've made of our world, I remain convinced it must include the restoration of community/society/tribe. We are, after all, primates -- we need one another to be fully human. But our human senses are too overloaded now; we cannot cope. Our dulling of empathy is necessary, yet deadly. Thus, I see the future development of a more interactive, more accessible, faster Internet (or its replacements) as a necessary factor in allowing us to live again as empathetic, caring persons.

  • But did they latch on to every new buzzword and write a column about it?
  • by Whitehawke ( 112798 ) on Tuesday April 25, 2000 @06:06AM (#1111349) Homepage
    Although, I would imagine that we are not the first to think of ourselves as living "on the [insert name here] edge"...think what it must have been like living in Renaissance Italy, for example. They probably said many of the same things about how the world is changing. Dave
  • by samael ( 12612 ) <Andrew@Ducker.org.uk> on Tuesday April 25, 2000 @06:06AM (#1111350) Homepage
    We're always living on the edge.

    This is just the latest of waves in the whole media revolution, starting with the invention of writing through the printing press, movies, radio, television and now the internet.

    It's constantly getting easier to spread information, and that constantly dismays the people in charge, for whom ignorance is bliss, as long as it's our ignorance.

    To think that this is some kind of new edge, and not just the constantly advancing crest of the communications wave, is to ignore th vast history leading up to this point.
  • Oh crap.
    I really had nothing interesting to say...

    I might have had such, though, except for the numbness created by the slow subconscious anger created by the sheer volume of input.

    The internet is a medium, it is not a message. There is as much crap/noise/static as on TV which has mostly deadended in content. And more every day. Opinions are like rectums...

    The internet just gives another outlet for the same old crap in many cases. And the sheer volume is enough to make finding something valuable like sifting sewage for a (lost) diamond ring. Even /. is on this topic perhaps 60% noise.

  • Yes!

    This stuff isn't half as revolutionary as the invention of the telegraph over a hundred and fifty years ago. In only a decade or so the fastest commonly available form of communication changed from about 30 miles per hour to the speed of light.

  • by El Volio ( 40489 ) on Tuesday April 25, 2000 @06:11AM (#1111353) Homepage
    This is technological progress, not a scientific discovery. It doesn't really compare with, say, the periodic table; that's apples and oranges.

    A better analogy (and one used quite often) is, say, the harnessing of electricity for economic use. The period we're in now is definitely some sort of an "edge", but I'd say we're on the cusp of a potential period of social, not scientific, discovery.

    It's a lot like the events of the last 40 years in the American South, as integration progressed. Children became less and less likely to learn prejudice as they went to school and did other things with other children of other backgrounds. Racism still exists, but it's no longer a societal norm, and that's a big shift. Similarly, we're going to see more and more internationalization for the same reasons. Unfortunately, human society as a whole doesn't move on "Internet time", so this will still take a while, but it will happen. Children will start realizing there are more viewpoints than just the ones they grew up with, and that will mark an even more profound shift in thinking than the integration the US has gone through, because this time it will be far more universal.

    Most (though certainly not all) "geeks" have already learned this. How many of us here really give a flip about somebody's race? That's because we've learned to connect with people of different backgrounds, whether that's online, offline, or both.

    The Internet is not a huge scientific advance, but an engineering one. And like many great engineering efforts, it's effects will be far more societal than scientific.

  • Exactly.

    But I should stop short of referring to that global meta-organism as conscious. Consider: Would it have "experience"? Would it be able to act under its own will? We haven't even managed to agree upon what those terms mean when applied to humans. Do *we*, in fact qualify under those criteria, or is consciousness just the private illusion of any data processing system?

    Can a unitary consciousness be composed of other smaller independent but interacting consciousnesses? If so, what does that say about the neurons in our brain? Could Penrose (*choke*) have been right? Personally I don't think so; it would be stretching the meaning of the term "consciousness" beyond the point where the definition becomes too broad to have any useful meaning. It might be better to invent a new term.

    Certainly most people would understand what you mean if you said that the whole world (or any nation come to that) had a "soul". But this is hardly any better.

    To expand upon your point: If a world can have a state of mind, and a nation and a tribe too, then also a city, town, village, family...or even a married couple. Which levels really possess a single soul or consciousness, or even a unique and unitary point of view? Even worse: where are the boundaries which separate one level from the next? Not even at your own skin, because (although I stop short of Penrose's suggestion of conscious neurons) as Dennett points out, the human mind is a Gestalt of independent, monomaniac demons. The identity you refer to as "me" is just a convenient fiction demanded by those demons' shared use of the same body.

    That Gestalt appears to speak for itself only because some of its number have agreed to cooperate to make this possible. But the same can be said of any nation state with a centralised government. Or any group of people with an official spokesman for that matter.

    I don't truly imagine that any collection of people is really conscious. It seems to me that only human individuals are really "in-dividual". Everything beyond that level is just an amorphous field of information processing which doesn't have any well-defined boundaries. Kind of like The Force :o)

    Some may protest that a social group can't constitute a consciousness, because causality resides at the level of individuals. Yet such an appeal would be misleading because just as history can be explained in terms of the circumstances and reactions of individuals, an individual human's behaviour can be explained in terms of stimuli and responses in neural cell assemblies each of which has its own preprogrammed agenda.

    Maybe it's partly the fact of being trapped inside our own heads with a clear "inside=self" and "outside=other" that gives us a point of view and thus makes us appear (privately to ourselves) to be conscious.

    BTW: Sorry for rambling, and I'm especially sorry if my own position appears unclear. I'm still trying to sort it all out in my own mind...

    See my .sig :o)

    Consciousness is not what it thinks it is
    Thought exists only as an abstraction
  • by Trilliumjs ( 130864 ) on Tuesday April 25, 2000 @06:20AM (#1111355)

    One of the things that has bothered me about this conversation for awhile is that it seems to indicate that people can either be geeks or jocks. Or to use the metaphore above can either use garden.com or advocate limits on what children can view.

    IMHO I want to be able to use the internet and computers for what they good for (collecting information, making a living) but then I want to be able to go out and LIVE.

    My real point is that in all things balance is they key. A child who spends all their time on the net is going to feel isolated, because they are, but another child who uses it to research their homework, and the computer to finish up the project, but then goes outside an plays with friends, even *gasp* plays sports, is going to have a much more balanced view of life.

    Technology is not an either or proposition.

  • Stefik is right in the fact that there is always a terrible, and sometimes bloody, response to new technology and the ideas that follow.

    Witness the Protestant reformation of Europe, where Guttenburg's Press was used by the Protestants to make Martin Luther's translation of the bible into German, which allowed more people to read (information wants to be free?) the Bible. The bloodshed that the Catholic church committed to stop the Reformation was astounding.

    Many people say that the Reformation could not have occured without the printing press, which ended the church's monopoly on learning....now, the bonds on learning have slipped more...this makes for some interesting years ahead.

  • by jbarnett ( 127033 )

    The Internet, still in its first primitive stages, is in a state Stefik calls "becoming."

    Wasn't that more like 5-10 years ago, I think we have gotten stage 1 done already, all the frame work is down on paper (or in the ground on wires), it feels like now it is more like stage 2 or 3...

    Seriously look at all the AOL users out there, the Internet is avaiable to people besides geeks, and the "normal people" not only know what it is, most of them want to get on it (if they aren't all ready).

    If my grandparents use a technolgey it means that it is no longer bleeding edge and means that it is now mainstream and socially acceptable. The first stage of anything is not defined like this, the first stage of anything is small, obsecure, not well defined and sometimes not socailly acceptable, Hrmm how would you descripe the Internet 7 years ago?

    The first stage is set and done, moving on to Act 2 (or 3-4)

    There is still some issuses to work out like bandwidth, laws, who owns what, etc, I am not saying that we are done, the Internet will be continuely growing and adapting, but the first basic parts have been accomplished.

    J(ust)MHO
  • pornographic dogmas? There's a religion for pornography now? Why didn't anyone TELL me???

    And do you also mean to tell me that there's PORN ON THE INTERNET???

    *thud*

  • So, there I was, just an average slash dot Geek. When suddenly the realization hit: omigod! The Edge is near!

    Apocolyptic thoughts filled my brain. Why not end it all, here and now, taking down all those who torment me in this Hellmouth of life?

    Nah, I thought, that would make me a Creative Jerk. Wouldn't want to Flame anyone and cause a problem.

    Besides, its probably all due to my lack of Electronic Community, which this is all about, right?

    Or maybe I just need to hook up with one of them Chickclickers.

  • Two words make my ears prick up when I see them in any piece of technology journalism: "impossible" and "inevitable". When either shows up (like the latter did here), I know the writer is in the grips of an ideology and is no longer trustworthy as a reporter. Both words represent an extremist position where there is no room for dialogue (or any change at all!) and are only meant to polarize people into groups.

    Think more before you use these words, Jon. Better yet, don't use them at all.
  • by spiralx ( 97066 ) on Tuesday April 25, 2000 @06:27AM (#1111361)

    His premise this round is that a growing number of people in the world -- especially the people reading this -- are present at one of the greatest technological events ever. They're on the Internet Edge, right on the boundary between the past and an enormous array of changes being driven by the rise of networked computing.

    True, sort of, but people living in every age where there is progress can claim that they are on the "edge" of a revolution. Looked at from a distance, the small peaks average out into a smooth, exponential curve marching ever upwards. To claim that the internet is more revolutionary than the internal combustion engine, the harnissing of electricity or even the first person to make a tool from stone is a conceit it is easy to fall into - that events happening now are somehow different from those that happened before.

    This is understandable - after all, we're the ones living in those events and we see the changes as they occur all around us, and so they seem sweeping and important. But in a hundred years time people will look back at the "internet revolution" and compare it to the "far bigger" changes occuring to them and their society. It's all a matter of perspective.

    The fact is that every significant breakthrough brings about changes in the way that society functions. It's just that the internet is the new technology that's happening now - in twenty years time it could be nanotechnology - which of course will make the internet revolution look small :)


  • Same hack differant sytnax
  • As Mr. K said "Great scientific discoveries are inseparable from key changes in technology." His point being that, yes, the internet is an engineering advance but that such advances spur scientific advances. Computers and the 'net are not like the periodic table, but they very well may add to it. I agree that societal effects will be huge, the electrical system being a great example of massive societal change being spurred by technology. Very much like those widespread AC electrical systems though, the internet has also spurred many scientific advances. I'd say we were on the cusp of both scientific and social discovery of a magnitude unseen since the beginning of the century, and perhaps since the industrial revolution.

    I've been greatly amused lately at people calling Linux a disruptive technology; it's like calling a Ford 289 V8 a disruptive technology when it is the automobile itself that is the technology that altered the societal framework of the nation. Internetworked computers are going to make for a huge change in both society and science regardless of OS or hardware.

    Let's hope we wake up to the reality of this new world faster than those of us in the south (and really a lot of the US) got over racism... getting over really; Here in a southern metro region of a half-million people one could think we're over it, but go across the mountains where the black population is closer to 0% rather than 50% and you will see that some of us have a ways to go.

  • In this particular "time of scientific advancement" is that things are occuring faster - the moral dilemas are the same as always; is it legal to steal, even when the theft is from someone who was stealing from you? Is pornography wrong? These problems just have new twists with the internet. Granted, they're important to me, directly coming from a group I identify with (geeks) - but it's not like geeks were the first or only group who's been accused of moral turpitude, antisocial behavior, etc.

    I think this author's been spending too many hours on the net, and needs to put down the Jolt and take a hike in the woods.
  • If we examine the situation of the internet, I don't think we're seeing an edge (yet). It's simply not there:

    A new technology comes along that makes distrobution of information easier than it was before. All of a sudden, people have access to greater quantities information and ideas, and to share their own ideas. Some people don't like that, and attempt to restrict the flow of information.

    This, my friends, is not the edge. The edge is when we finally decide to ban the restriction of information.

    Unfortunately, this will require a massive thought shift in our current economy - the US economy is based around the selling of information. If it doesn't sell, people don't want it. We like to show how much benifit we've gained from this modus opperendi (sp?), but neglect to mention the numbers of people turned away from science and technology because of this, and perhaps why the US is so low in science scores - nobody likes science for what it is!

    This is where the Open Source movement will have far reaching implications on our society - it won't be just in computers, but in how we think of development. The philosophers of the enlightenment were very concerned with ideas of progress, and so is the open source movement. We can show that intellectual progress can occur without capatilism of information, and in fact that it can be better. It's a wide-reaching idea.

    ---------------------------------

  • you're not really gonna' let him put up more of this drivel, are you?

    They pay him to write this drivel.

    Yeah, mind boggling, isn't it ...

  • It would appear that communications has developed to the point where it is coming full-circle. We have developed from the verbal tradition at the tribal level to a hierarchical mass-media situation in which the individual has little voice and even less decision in the content of the information flow to a modern hybrid -- anyone can have a voice, anyone can choose what they want to know more about, and anyone anywhere in the world can access that information.

    Why, you may ask, is this important?

    The methodology of communications directly affects the socio-political structures of its culture. Back in the pre-writing days, verbal tradition tied tribes together. Interactivity (the ability of people to question the material and get direct responses) existed, but the ability to reliably exchange that information with people outside the tribe was inhibited for obvious reasons. This basically creates a socio-political structure that is inherently small (no more than a few hundred people per group), and a structure that is more or less equal.

    Mass media (printing press era up to the dawn of the Internet) was basically the opposite. You lacked interactivity, but your message could reach large numbers of people with ease. This system allows for a more authoritarian setup/more rigid power structure, as communications become more one-way, people become more and more used to being told what to think and are more likely to follow along.

    What the Internet has done is to combine these two forms -- and as a result, the socio-political structure of the world is beginning to change. The lashing-out of religions, governments, and the Average Joe is due to a realization, at least on a subconscious level, that the old ways of doing things are going to go away.

    What's happening is that the new methodology of communication is creating more of a global tribe than a culture.

    Culture is something that is forced upon us by mass media, where tribal associations are something we create ourselves in response to our basic human needs.

    Everyone has certain material and spiritual needs, and the Internet allows us to fulfill those needs in a new method that has nothing to do with the current socio-political structure.

    Will the outcome be bloody? Maybe. Maybe not. But whatever the case, change is afoot.

  • The world is always changing. What I remember from my childhood (not so long ago - just 10 years - yes, I'm a baby ;)

    If we talk to our grandparents, or just look back over the century, the world has been changing quickly for the past hundred years. In our grandparent's lives the airplane advanced from little planes to military planes to jets in a very short period of time. The reason the Titantic was so praised and admired prior to its sinking was because ships like the Titantic were the only way across the oceans. Now I'm planning to step on a plane next month and I'll be in Germany 11 hours later. We've seen the ongoing connection of the world - the Internet is part, but not all of that ease of connection. There's a drive to want it to be special, but it's part of an advancement that has been ongoing for the past 100 years.
  • This text and Katz's dialog has little to do with scientific discovery. I am not sure if Katz is out of his league in such an issue. I did not know he was a scientist (what the hell is he anyhow? He does not fool me when he tries to pass as a journalist)

    If you want to point fingers at what is responsible for the future of science and technology why not blame it on the microprocessor or the laser? The internet is only an application of other technologies.

    Science has taken a very dangerous turn in the last two decades. Patent and profit rule over discovery and method. (off topic, but MHO)

  • Would you care to elaborate upon your cryptic concluding statement? "'Society' can either adapt or disappear, the latter being the more likely conclusion." I'd be interested to hear what you mean.
    It is the genius of technocracy to believe in the existence of technocrat-defined collectives like society, collectives that can be "direct"ed or put under the thumb of some "final solution."

    I'm no anarchist dumbass, but I'm not a believer in the coercive collectives that are usually the referent of the word "society." To put it bluntly, I'm not a believer in "democratic" governments and other uses of force to "direct" individuals in the direction the technocracy wants those individuals to go.

    In fact, to answer your question, I believe that "democratic" governments are grown-up gangs of technocrats who use the word "society" or "the will of the majority" to impose their technocratic vison on all, both majority and minority.

    Not to get into a civics class or anything, but people living within the borders of These United States live not in a democracy, but in a republic, where the rights of the minority are supposed to be protected.

    That the rights of, say, those who object to supporting government-monopoly indoctrination centers like Columbine with their taxes are not protected in today's "society" goes without saying.

    I sure hope that "society" does disappear and the original vision of those dead white men who signed their lives away with the Declaration of Independence will resurrect itself: the vision of a self-governing people bound together with "the consent of the governed" into a dynamic, evolving conversation.

    Hey, that sounds a lot like the Internet. Funny thing...

    So, in short, I would like to see the rule of the majority ("society") bend to the protection of the minority (individuals) and I believe that the Internet is one way in which that is happening. If the very idea of "society" gets trashed in the process, I'll be a happy camper.

  • I'm shocked to read this post. The internet very much IS a device that DOES further discovery.But physics is not the only science out there.There is computer science,cryptography,physics, even quantum physics, heck even psychology, etc. all of which resides in the realm of the internet.
  • Hmmm... I don't know. I agree with you in principle, but there *are* certain events that we look back on and see as fairly large changes. I would argue that the Industrial Revolution, for example, is pretty similar to the 'Internet Revolution'. It's a dramatic change that, while not occurring overnight, still changes society dramatically in a brief period.

    Sure, but again I think it's a matter of perspective. What we call the Industrial Revolution was really made up of lots of separate inventions and changes - steam power, mechanical looms, the building of railroads etc. To those living in those times each change would in of itself have seemed to be a "revolution" rather than the homogenous series of events we consider it to be today.

    Similarly, the Internet Revolution has been and will be a series of steps - first the original ARPANET and E-mail, then the Web and hypertext, now maybe the increased multimedia and "interactivity" (notice the quotes there :) ). Even the author talks about steps within a revolution.

    So whilst I agree it is possible to pick a certain series of "revolutions" and emcompass them within a grander revolution, I still hold that it is possible to talk of change as being a series of small steps making progressively more changes. Of course, it's a lot more complex than that really, but this is /. rather than real life :)

  • What's interesting here --- and this tends to be difficult for people who haven't studied history to be aware of --- is that there are moments in history when all of a sudden things *change* in a massive way which is different from the normal day-to-day change that is, essentially, background noise. Where the way members of the society concieve their relationship to each other and to the society as a whole undergoes a massive sudden shift; where the change is so momentous that *everything* is called into question and people believe, for a while, that nothing will ever be the same again.

    A good example of this in modern times is Germany after WWII, and quite probably Russia *now*; it's not something I have any evidence of ever having happened in the US (maybe in the time after the American Revolution, but the written record from that time doesn't actually suggest that that was the case).

    What Katz is arguing is that *for some people* right now is just such a time. I don't know if it's true; it's hard for me to tell, because I've spent a third of my life on the edge of, or immediately behind the edge of, the technology curve; I can't tell how the social change brought about by the internet are effecting society at large. But I think it's possible, and I wonder what the historians of fifty years from now will say about it.
  • One of the things that i'm disappointed that none of the social analysts have discussed too much is the likelihood that the effects of the "internet revolution" and the "new economy" will be *substantially* different in the industrialized world than it will be in the developing world.

    In the industrialized world, states appear to be getting *stronger*, at least in the short term, for example.
  • I should have clarified. I meant that the barrier to entry for media has been almost totally obliterated (i.e. the breaking wave). It's hard to see where we can go from here, since "here" is a whole different animal. Not hard to see as in there's no place left to go. I don't even think the real interesting stuff has been invented yet. Where are my telescopic contact lenses dangit! :)

    --

  • the innovator

    the maintainer
    There is a third group. Important to the internet is the skilled user. I make a distinction between the "geek mindset" (memorize, at least temporarily, all the information on a topic, then reason among that internalized data) and the "librarian mindset" (memorize how to look up the information required, and reason among the links and just a few actual lookups).

    I have the "geek mindset". I feel that the future of the internet belongs to the "librarians", the skilled users of a resource built by others. Neither you (a skilled maintainer) nor I (a non-optimal user) get the most benefit from the net.

  • >

    There have been hundreds of "wars" since WW2. Have you forgotten some of the bigger skirmishes like Korea and Nam? How about all the border wars in the middle east and Africa? Desert Storm, Faulkland Islands, on and on...

    To ask if we are through with war when we have never stopped fighting, and because we are human, never will, is silly.
  • What the Protestants did to each other later on is nothing to sneeze at, either. They pretty much all pale in the face of what organized religion in general did to women during that period. We all know The Salem Witch Trials and all, but the actual numbers killed in Europe are staggering.

    You're right about the new ideas leading to bloodshed, though. Just the other day I installed linux on my home pc and Bill Gates had my whole family killed.


    -jpowers
  • That's an interesting point. I still disagree, because I believe most of the things you mentioned (such as computer science and distributed computing) actually belong in the technology category, not the science category. I personally use the term science to mean pure science. I suppose that's where our difference lies.

    A. Keiper

  • I think you're waaaaaay overly-optimistic on a number of your suggestions, particularly with your imagined timeline ("Just a couple of hundred years or so at this rate"). Still it was extremely interesting, thanks.


    I happen to think that he has roughly the right timeframe. High speed input is limited right now by the speed we can handle through the human senses. However, given the rates that some speed readers have achieved, it is reasonable to assume that we can significantly exceed the speed of human speech. However, I am unaware of any recent breakthroughs that are going to provide us with greater output bandwidth from a human brain. While we can certainly measure human brain activity in a number of ways, turning it into something meaningful is a hard problem. There is loss of significant information.

    Nonetheless, simply having a wearable computer and a wireless, always-on connection to the net would allow me to share ideas around the globe without regard to where I am. I could hold realtime collaborations with quite a few people. There would no longer be a lag involving when we got to our e-mail. Even assuming that e-mail was the only communication tool involved, imagine routinely responding within minutes any time you are awake. It will give a boost to every kind of communication that doesn't require physical presence.
  • The internet will evolve from being a global suppository of all human knowledge into actually being humanity.

    (all together now) Oh, stick it up your ass.

    :o)

    Consciousness is not what it thinks it is
    Thought exists only as an abstraction

  • ...this makes for some interesting years ahead.

    Sure does. I just wonder whether we'll see the death "Internet Edge", or the rise of the Internet into something new and better. There's plenty of times that a new invention/idea caused a huge restructuring of scientific and societal norms and ideas, but there's also plenty of times where that new invention/idea was struck down, destroyed, and the originator(s) banished or killed (remember that fool who said the Earth moves around the Sun? No one liked that idea very much....) Sure that idea came back around, but not until more than a few people started realizing that Galileo was right. We have no guarantee that the Internet will not be struck down like Galileo's theory, and we have even less of a guarantee that if it is struck down, it'll arise again in some new form. There are plenty of people and corporations which are pissed off at the Internet, and would love to see new laws destroy it forever. It could happen. So how can we make sure that the Internet keeps growing? How can we make sure it doesn't get destroyed before we can make something much better out of it?

    Eruantalon
  • I hope Katz's later posts have more specific info about the book, because otherwise, he's just patting us all on the backs for being so hip, so with-it.

    I completely agree with El Volio's astute comment [slashdot.org] - this set of technological changes does not necessarily presage a scientific age. There have been a great many instances of technological advance in history that had barely any scientific implications. (Of course, science is indeed being stimulated, by things like journalistic "skywriting" online, because every information technology has eased the discussion of discovery.)

    As for there being lots of opponents of technology who strongly deride every advance, well, of course there are always going to be as many neophobes and neophiles. But technology's advance (as James Burke has shown again and again) is nearly unstoppable; the best a society can do is hope to direct it.

    A. Keiper
    The Center for the Study of Technology and Society [tecsoc.org]
    Washington, D.C.

  • Yes, the world is changing. The world has been changing since the world has been a world, and it isn't going to stop. Change is the one "constant" that can be counted on. The largest problems all people face is when they get secure in the current ways, and decide that the current way is the best POSSIBLE (rather than best current) way to do things. When this happens, people get old. The world moves on around and without them and you end up hearing things like "In my day, such and such was.."

    So it really should come as no surprise that much of our society is all freaked about the impending changes. Most of our (US) citizens are in their "declining" years and (to quote S. King) the "world has moved on" since their youth. The trick to remaining young (and therefore flexible) is to embrace the changes that are coming, because they ARE coming.

    Churches will always be one of the first to start shouting about the huge cataclysmic dangers of any new movement in society. After all, their whole stock & trade is in the current (old) way of thinking, breathing, interacting. All of their interests are wrapped up in the old way, and change would effectively remove them from their coveted places of power.


    -The Reverend
  • Um, am I the only one to whom this seems like nothing more than an advertisement? I mean, frankly, it seems like Mr. Katz is either friends with the author, or is getting some sort of cut of the profits, because this column strikes me as nothing more than a big promo piece for the book. Example -- count the number of times he uses "Edge" with a capital "e." It's striking. Katz doesn't seem nearly so interested in discussing/reviewing the book as he does in promoting it. I question the value and ethics of this piece.
  • Katz wrote:
    Great scientific discoveries are inseparable from key changes in technology. Many of the elements in the periodic table were identified in the decade after the invention of the storage battery...

    Given that, we are likely heading towards the Mother of all Periods of Scientific Discovery.

    The conclusion does not follow. The storage battery enabled the study of electrochemistry (indeed, it was an electrochemical device itself). What kind of device is the Internet, that it enables scientific discovery? It allows sharing of results and thought, but it does absolutely nothing for the capabilities of the laboratory.

    The Internet is already fostering a social revolution, but the scientific fallout is going to be a second- or third-order effect at most.
    --

  • by hypergeek ( 125182 ) on Tuesday April 25, 2000 @07:18AM (#1111390)
    "It's nearly impossible to pick up a newspaper or magazine without seeing evidence of this 'pushback,' this raging debate -- Are we changing too rapidly? Developing technolgies we can't control? Overwhelming ourselves?"

    Maybe we're changing too slowly. Maybe these reactionaries are dragging us back, keeping us from reaching our potential.

    On the other hand, maybe we're going at the right speed, but in the wrong direction. Large corporations now believe they "own" the Internet. That's not progress. That's one step short of owning us.

    One thing we definitely need, IMO, is a superset of the current domain name system, more flexible, semi-decentralized and used on a voluntary basis. Although it'd get weird if we had to connect to a distant server if our local DNS doesn't support it. Of course, eventually, demand would make it nearly ubiquitous. And it'd be a thorn in the side of Big Money. Maybe more restrictions on commercial abuse^H^H^H^H^Hactivity could be made.

    After all, it is only semi decentralized. >:-)

  • >This is technological progress, not a scientific discovery.

    Don't forget the two often go hand in hand. Think of the printing press. It was a techological advance in our history. As a result of the printing press, more people were able to obtain books. More information was exchanged after the invention because books, papers, and magazines were easier to make than before. I can't specifically prove it, but I would say that a great deal of invention got there initial spark in some way from this on technological advance.

    >I'd say we're on the cusp of a potential period of social, not scientific, discovery.

    I would have to say probably both. Usually social change is either a result of, accompanied by, or goes hand in hand with techonological discoveries. As social views change, so does the dirrection in with we look for invovation and invention. Ideas that may have once been taboo can be thrust into the light for examination.
    Remember, the world was once thought to be flat, and the Earth was thought to be the center of the universe. A combination of technological and social change allowed us to discover the truth.

    >How many of us here really give a flip about somebody's race? That's
    >because we've learned to connect with people of different backgrounds, whether that's online, offline, or both.

    I would have to agree with you to a point. In some ways we still consider a person's race. Usually, it is only to insure we don't accidentally offend someone.

    >The Internet is not a huge scientific advance, but an engineering one.
    >And like many great engineering efforts, it's effects will be far more societal than scientific.

    I believe the author was refering to a generalized case that included the consequences of the engineering effort. The exchange of ideas can lead to great advancements in technology and science.

    I think the path before us is great and can lead to great disasters and advances. It shall be fun to watch and experience them. We can only hope we have the knowledge and wisdom to over come the great disasters ahead of us.
  • It's a lot like the events of the last 40 years in the American South, as integration progressed. You assume that integration, like electricity, was something that the bright, educated minds imparted to the dark, untutored ones out in the woods. On the contrary, the last places to integrate have been the halls of academe and the well-heeled suburbs of white flight.

    Respect for the idea of racial equality moved from the bottom up - not from the intelligentsia to the masses. It's the intelligentsia that's been hardest to persuade.

    Sometimes education simply girds up the loins of prejudice and provides the tools to rationalize and defend the Way It's Always Been.

    If there's an analogy to be made with the Internet, then we shouldn't look for innovation to come from the experts only.

  • Naturally, I quite disagree with what I take to be your point. It's hard to refute you, since you don't really attempt to refute me, but rely on two metaphors (the uncorked genie and the freed horse) to get your point across.

    I can't tell if your point is about technology generally or the Internet in particular - but in both cases, society attempts to adapt to and regulate the technology and succeeds to a certain degree. By "society" I don't merely mean government, but ordinary people, making the decisions that affect their lives. The claim "society doesn't exist" is as true as the statement "technology doesn't exist"; you seem to have a problem with generalizations.

    Would you care to elaborate upon your cryptic concluding statement? "'Society' can either adapt or disappear, the latter being the more likely conclusion." I'd be interested to hear what you mean.

    A. Keiper

  • [please respond instead of moderating this down]

    While I too have been thinking about just how the 'net is the "cutting edge" (Katz, you're no pioneer in these concepts), I've also come to realize that there are certain careers that spring up out of different needs:

    the innovator - the people who make the technology, whether it be the physicist in the lab working on condensed matter, the engineer in the processor fab working on smaller die sizes, and even the programmer hacking out the next great database, or crypto program.

    the maintainer - the sysadmins, web monkeys, database programmers, and system repair people who work with those tools that were given to them to create new things.

    IMO, (and this is certainly gonna seem like a troll), only the first group really matters, and it's where (mainly), the brains lie. As a network admin, sadly, I fall into the second group. I grad'ed with a BS in physics, but with the relative openness of the market, I decided to put any further education on hold.
    Now, this is not to say that there aren't very intelligent people maintaining computer systems, but for the most part, maintainers are filling a gap, that essentially plumbers did when closed plumbing came into existance.
    People like Carmack, and Trovalds, and the researchers @ Cornell are doing the stuff that's putting us on the edge, IMO, it's not a good idea to get them mixed up with the maintainers...

  • I think you have this broadly right except for two things.

    1). I don't think a significant number of people will completely abandon their individuality any time soon. In any case, there would be little reason for them to do so: the technology you are talking about would enable people to communicate at a higher rate, but it would not cause them to merge into a single identity.

    There would be, on some abstract level, a combined entity encompassing the information processing activities of all the intercommunicating computers including human brains. The world as it is *now* fits the same broad description, as we all exchange information via snail mail, books, email, Usenet, Slashdot, TV and the telephone at a somewhat slower rate. But making it faster will not cause this global dataprocessing system to become self aware in any sense which is meaningful to humans.

    2). You missed the most startling outcome of this technology.

    Via an accumulation of implants, interfaces and upgrades/enhancements all the brain's functions will eventually be replicated and improved upon and the little bit of gray matter in the middle will be left as the weakest, slowest and most vulnerable component.

    Meanwhile, there is always a small proportion of people dying of brain diseases or brain trauma.

    A point must come when a suitably wired individual suffering such a tragedy manages to survive brain death or even surgical removal of the whole organ without any apparent loss of function. Such a person might be outwardly normal in every way. At that point we would be forced to realise that the organic brain is redundant and obsolete.

    Where we go from that point is anybody's guess. I just hope we don't all disappear into cyberspace forever, a la Greg Egan.

    Consciousness is not what it thinks it is
    Thought exists only as an abstraction
  • I just wish more companies would USE regional addresses. I work for a railway with a discrete regional presence. We have customers outside that region, but only because they do business within that region. But we bought a *.com domain address. Another example is Chapters books. When they introduced their web service, they were doing the interviews circuit pointing out that they were "an all-Canadian alternative" while using the *.com address that implies a generic multinational. (They later fixed this. Chapters.com still works, but all their advertising and internal links go via chapters.ca, making the "I am Canadian" implication explicit)

    Maybe. But how long will a successful business stay local?

    Besides, the abuses of the current DNS system are sickening.

    I'm talking about something completely different.

    For example, all the addresses in the current system would become synonymous with the "old Net".

    In the superset, addresses might not even use the same "machine.domain.TLD"syntax that the current DNS system does. (I am reminded of a similar project to use multinational character sets in a superset of DNS.)

I THINK THEY SHOULD CONTINUE the policy of not giving a Nobel Prize for paneling. -- Jack Handley, The New Mexican, 1988.

Working...