When the University of California introduced the world to the internet on 3rd July 1969, few could have imagined the revolution that first piece of network equipment, the Interface Message Processor, would start.
Since then the way we communicate via the internet has advanced from just sending words, to sending images, video clips and face to face live time chat. The mechanisms that we use to access the internet have also changed. Gone are the days of stationary “block” home computer systems. We now carry our computers in our handbags, wear them on our wrists or even as eyewear.
In 1989 Tim Berners-Lee brought the internet to a new level with the introduction of the World Wide Web (WWW). The invention should have made Berners-Lee a multi-millionaire (probably even billionaire!) but he took the decision to make his ideas available freely, with no patent and no royalties. He went on to found the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C), who ensured that its standards were based on royalty-free technology, enabling them to be easily adopted by anyone. The first case of cyber-philanthropy? In his talk ‘The next 5000 days of the web’, Kevin Kelly analysed the changes that have occurred in cyberspace since the invention of the World Wide Web. He also takes some guesses at what the next 5000 days might bring.
One thing that struck me about Kelly’s talk was how every piece of technology starts out with just a few users, who then go on to recruit other users. It is an interesting way of viewing things and made me thing about this new phenomenon of ‘cyber peer-pressure’ that we, and especially the younger ‘digital natives’, are living in. There’s a constant and insatiable desire (maybe even pressure) to have the latest technology. When Apple launched the iPhone 5s in September 2013, they sold 9 million units on the weekend of its release, breaking Apple’s sales records for iPhones. I’m sure the demand for the iPhone 6 and 7 will be even stronger.
We’ve come an enormous way since the invention of the internet all those years ago, yet there’s a sense that we’re still only half way there. Technology is advancing at an alarming rate, and the ‘latest’ gadget is becoming the ‘older version’ in an ever decreasing timescale. Kevin Kelly believes we have to ‘believe the unbelievable’ when considering the future advancements in technology. Perhaps he’s right, or perhaps its the impossible we need to believe.
Karen Twomey Cybercultures 