Baby Internet

Recovered from Archive.org – Apr 29, 1997

There was a man who once proclaimed that he was shutting down shop. He ran the local Patent Office. He bellowed at the top of his lungs his exasperation,

“Everything inventable has been invented. There is nothing more that can be done.”

Eighteen months later a man by the name of Edison filed a Patent for the electric light bulb.

The Television will never last, It’s a FAD!

This new computer the 386 is so powerful, we will never need to make an upgrade!

The story is all the same. I’ve heard from my own relatives that the Internet has no uses and that it is just a fad. It will pass just like Atari and PacMan. I have one point to make to those who agree and those who disagree. I am not going to defend the Web.

The web is a medium like oil paints, the post office, cable TV or yelling through the air. It carries abstract ideas through it and allows the participants the opportunity to communicate . Like all mediums it has a period of experimentation and acceptance. The Internet is a virtual infant just barely able to hold its neck up on its own accord. No amount of money or wishful thinking is going to change the fact that the Internet is slow and limited in its scope. We must as a society admit this, this Internet doesn’t do much right now.

Keep in mind that the Internet is doing this. It is in Beta. Everything we do now will be considered archaic in five years. By the time broadband arrives, which might be sooner than we think, (I think 1997) then the net might have learned to crawl. Just keep that image: un-potty trained, sucking milk and spitting up, costing a fortune in diapers, and getting the most attention in the room. It’s cute right now, but it is fragile. This baby is gonna grow up big and strong. Just be patient.

 


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