Letters to the Editor
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Internet:Telephone with pictures?
According to McLuhan, there have been very few new technologies, and many new uses for old technologies. The metaphysical issue, however, is that a computer allows you to be in two places at the same time. This creates unbearable tension.
If the technology revolution were a designed program, it would get poor grades. By analogy imagine a highway offramp for Dallas in New York City. As the current economy, which allows net designers to overcome, wily nily, all obstacles, collapses, as a result of it's own design flaws, the net will contract, into something more workable, and less ambitious, and more like the telephone with pictures. Terrorists living far away simply won't be able to dial up US military databases without going through regional connections. These limits are going be a matter of economics, because the economy we have now is completely wrong.
The second technology revolution will grant people food shelter and transportation for little or no money, almost free. Once that happens all current social, political, and religious conflict will disappear. No more competing for vital resources. It's a beautiful thing, but you can't dial it up with any telephone.