Article is from 2004.
Yes, but it may as well have been written yesterday
Alan Kay: "We're running on fumes technologically today."
21–22 of 22 posts
Re: Alan Kay: "We're running on fumes technologically today."
#22Earlier quoted context omitted.
I think that the reason for this is that businesses are very reluctant to adopt revolutionary technologies. It's no surprise that the revolutionary technologies of the internet were developed and deployed by (gasp) the Government. It wasn't until the internet was already well-established that commercial interests started to pay attention.
It's no surprise that the revolutionary technologies of the internet were developed and deployed by (gasp) the Government. It wasn't until the internet was already well-established that commercial interests started to pay attention. Actually, the initial development was done almost entirely by think tanks (Rand Corp., BBN, etc.) and academics, with the crucial piece being supplied by the concept of packet switching,…
Transistors are an interesting case. AT&T was a government-supported monopoly, allowing it to pursue expensive blue-sky research. And since transistors were expensive, the government purchased 100% of the advanced transistors until they were viable on the market.
http://tech.mit.edu/V128/N51/chomsky.html
The New York Times discusses how technology flows from federally-funded research to industry. http://www.nytimes.com/2005/04/02/technology/02darpa.html
I agree that national states are centralized institutions, but corporations are another type of hierarchical power structure with their own set of disadvantages.