The IT revolution is far from over. Much like the Industrial Revolution transformed the world when the development of the steam engine, railroads and factories led to all sorts of amazing innovations, products and markets, so the continuing advancements in IT are leading to radically different ways of living and working.
The Google company epitomises the constant change and enhancement. Started as a search engine by just two guys, it is now a multi-billion-dollar empire with a quarter of a million (yes – 250,000) servers driving their activities. Not only has Google expanded way beyond being just a search company, they are pushing the frontiers of what can be done and how it can be done, and making it all accessible to everyone.
Of course, Google operate like many large companies – they both undertake their own research and development, and they buy up smaller companies that have come up with a great idea. Consider just some of Google's services ;
email (Gmail, with massive personal storage, all searchable and cross-referenced)
chat (integrated into Gmail, option to retain all your conversations)
news (searchable from any online publisher, customisable to your tastes)
RSS (no need to go to your favourite websites for news – let them come to you)
spreadsheets (share and collaboratively work on them, online)
literature (Google Books, great for academic research and referencing)
All of these are part of a continuing theme – putting information and services online, making them easily accessible anywhere in the world, and perhaps most incredibly, doing it all for free or at substantially lower cost. There is still a lot more to come. How about ditching Microsoft Office completely and doing all wordprocessing, spreadsheets and presentations online? Imagine not needing to save documents in folders any more, just put them all in one online storage space and search by keyword, title, author, date or whatever. Imagine being able to run a presentation from anyone's computer, needing only an internet connection. Imagine managing all your finances online, including bank balances, budgets, and statement reconciliations. Imagine running your whole business, including accounting, from a fully protected and backed-up online package.
The drive is to remove the need for you to ever install any software. Huge progress has already been made, but there is so much more. Isaac Asimov wrote many science-fiction stories based on the far-fetched idea that there would be a global computer network that would do everything... another generation and it is likely to be true.
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- Tony Phelps is part of the Merlin Pacific IT team, dedicated to effective & efficient business IT.
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