Man is God. He is everywhere, he is anybody, he knows everything. This is the Prometeus new world.
All started with the Media Revolution, with Internet, at the end of the last century. Everything related to the old media vanished: Gutenberg, the copyright, the radio, the television, the publicity.
The old world reacts: more restrictions for the copyright, new laws against non authorized copies. Napster, the music peer to peer company is sued. At the same time, free internet radio appears; TIVO, the internet television, allows to avoid publicity; the Wall Street Journal goes on line; Google launches Google news. Millions of people read daily the biggest on line newspaper. Ohmynews written by thousands of journalists; Flickr becomes the biggest repository in the history of photos, YouTube for movies. The power of the masses.
A new figure emerges: the prosumer, a producer and a consumer of information. Anyone can be a prosumer.
The news channels become available on Internet. The blogs become more influential than the old media. The newspapers are released for free. Wikipedia is the most complete encyclopedia ever.
In 2007 Life magazine closes. The NYT sells its television and declares that the future is digital. BBC follows. In the main cities of the world people are connected for free. At the corners of the streets totems print pages from blogs and digital magazines. The virtual worlds are common places on the Internet for millions of people. A person can have multiple on line identities. Second Life launches the vocal avatar.
The old media fight back. A tax is added on any screen; newspapers, radios and televisions are financed by the State; illegal download from the web is punished with years of jail.
Around 2011 the tipping point is reached: the publicity investments are done on the Net. The electronic paper is a mass product: anyone can read anything on plastic paper.
In 2015 newspapers and broadcasting television disappear, digital terrestrial is abandoned, the radio goes on the Internet. The media arena is less and less populated. Only the Tyrannosaurus Rex survives. The Net includes and unifies all the content. Google buys Microsoft. Amazon buys Yahoo! and become the world universal content leaders with BBC, CNN and CCTV. The concept of static information – books, articles, images – changes and is transformed into knowledge flow. The publicity is chosen by the content creators, by the authors and becomes information, comparison, experience.
In 2020 Lawrence Lessig, the author of ‘Free Culture’, is the new US Secretary of Justice and declares the copyright illegal. Devices that replicate the five senses are available in the virtual worlds. The reality could be replicated in Second Life. Any one has an Agav (agent-avatar) that finds information, people, places in the virtual worlds.
In 2022 Google launches Prometeus, the Agav standard interface. Amazon creates Place, a company that replicates reality. You can be on Mars, at the battle of Waterloo, at the Super Bowl as a person. It’s real.
In 2027 Second Life evolves into Spirit. People become who they want. And share the memory. The experiences. The feelings. Memory selling becomes a normal trading.
In 2050 Prometeus buys Place and Spirit. Virtual life is the biggest market on the planet. Prometeus finances all the space missions to find new worlds for its customers: the terrestrial avatar. Experience is the new reality.
@Sander, zou je even kunnen kijken naar je links vanuit de rss-feed? Die kloppen nu niet (er wordt dubbel doorgelinkt, bijv naar: http://vint.sogeti.nl/http://vint.sogeti.nl/?p=91)
en dat is wat lastig lezen vanuit een rss-reader.
I wanne bet that this looks as rediculous in 2050 as 1984 by orwell or any other SF ever written looks today. When do people learn that you CAN NOT predict the future. You can’t even take a close guess, ’cause you’ll never know what technologies we have in 2030. I mean… Who could have guessed in 1960 or 1970 that some years later the internet would be born? And what about the flying cars we would have around the year 2000 alot of SF writers have written about since the early 20th century? Ever seen one of those? It doesn’t work like that. However, I am convinced the internet is a big step forward in global awareness and in the speed at which technology advances… So who knows :)!
yes of course, but not already 2050
plus:
i would like to have this embedded within myself
see for instance: http://www.dw-world.de/dw/article/0,2144,2578832,00.html
@The Jay Man
1984 by orwell is anything but ridiculous.
it is slowly becoming reality.
the only mistake orwell made sofar is choosing the year 1984.
he wrote the book in 1948 and simply reversed 48 to 84.
but big brother is on the doorstep and i hope sincerely that you are right and it turns out to be a ridiculous view of the future.
without the ‘older brother who protects you from evil and knows what is good for you and keeps you safe’
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Well..what can I say? this is totally insane. We don’t have even the glimpse or idea of what happens to us every second of everyday. I think that the author of this article is over reacting to internet euphoria.