In 2007, the age of acceleration in technology happened practically overnight and changed the world forever. According to author Tom Friedman’s latest book “Thank You For Being Late,” three major acceleration forces included 1) market forces (globalization and price collapse of connectivity making the Internet and computers cheaper, 2) mother nature affecting our environment and biodiversity, and 3) Moore’s law, whereby the speed and power of computing power doubles every 24 months.
Because of these forces, Apple introduced the iPhone (aka smartphone or powerful mobile computer capable of making phone calls, accessing the Internet, taking photos, and much more), Facebook and Twitter went global and now affects billions of users as a primary source of communications, Amazon introduced Kindle (forerunner of the tablet) and eventually Alexis (interactive artificial intelligence (AI) service), Google introduced Android, now the most popular worldwide computer operating system, IBM introduced Watson (AI service), and Silicon Valley used new technologies in making Moore’s Law happen on a grand scale.
Interestingly, it also has changed our workforce, eliminating older industry jobs in manufacturing and creating new jobs from innovating new technologies. Japan and the USA were known as the countries with lifetime employment, but fell to heavy competition from other countries with cheaper labor. Our manufacturing almost became extinct overnight. Innovation like robotic manufacturing has replaced manual labor, but also created new jobs for Americans in new industries such as solar and wind power, artificial intelligence, robotics, genomics, and soon, driverless vehicles and faster manned spacecraft among others.
Globalization affects the entire planet. The key is to keep innovating and have all countries working peacefully in producing a global economy. Technology will play an important part!
~ Bob Larson is a former engineer, photo-journalist, technologist, and Marketing Director at 50 Plus Media Solutions