In the bad old days, computers were scarce and users would all share one enormous mainframe computer, which they had to access in a central workplace.
The PC revolution of the 1980s was about giving a computer to every user. This was a good idea because:
But the PC era is seen now as defined by the fact that networks were nonexistent or at least slow and unreliable.
Of course, networks are still that way, and we are still as a result in the PC era.
But if communications were much faster, "always on", and very reliable, then it does seem that PCs are a bad idea:
The professional knows how the machine works, and has nothing else to do with his time except keep it running smoothly for his hundreds of users, upgrade software, etc.
v.
The amateurs have no idea how it works, don't want to know, and are far too busy doing their real jobs to have any time to learn. If they spend time fixing and maintaining the computer it is money down the drain, since they are not paid to do that. Billions of person-hours a year are lost by amateurs wrestling with incompatible software, upgrades, installation and system crashes, all because we bought into this PC idea in the 1980s.
I am a computer professional and I do not want a PC. I'm sick of maintaining software, incompatible upgrades, missing DLL files. It bores me. I've got real work to do.
I want an account at some central operation with a paid professional at the other end of the line keeping it running for me, making backups, installing upgrades, etc. I want to be able to access my account no matter where I am in the world. Issues to be resolved:
As a historian I am interested in the long-term, something technologists generally pay no attention to.
Consider where most human data is kept in electronic form. How does a business keep its long-term records (e.g. land ownership records) viable for 50, 70 or 100 years? How does a family store its digital photo album for 50 or 100 years?
You can't store it yourself on floppies, tapes or CDs, since these media decay quickly, and anyway the formats will be incompatible and unreadable in a few decades time.
The only way to store long-term data is through an NC-type operation, a company that you pay to manage your data, copy it into new formats and new media, etc.
But what happens if you stop paying your subscription to the NC company? Perhaps the service is combined with libraries (who keep long-term data of all sorts) and banks (who do long-term storage of valuables for a fee). Perhaps if you stop paying your subscription, the data is not destroyed, it keeps on being re-copied and saved, but you have to pay the arrears to actually see it.
Packet readable by every machine it passes through, like a postcard.
Eavesdropping harder since messages travel different routes. Also messages broken into packets on different routes. Also (for non-government eavesdropping) where to eavesdrop? - Most of route is along "respectable" government/academic links, not hobbyists / small business.
Also packets mixed with other packets, binary data, etc. Also sheer volume. Manpower to eavesdrop expensive. Software not very powerful.
Still, only real privacy/security is encryption.
Email is all very well, but most busy people on the Net are drowning in email. It is simply too easy to send someone a message.
If you have web pages about any even remotely popular topic, expect to get a non-stop flood of useless messages, trivial questions, demands for help or advice (mainly illiterate and unsigned), and just plain old junk mail. In an attempt to control the flood coming into their Inbox every morning, many people now make it difficult to email them. e.g. See Jakob Nielsen. Or indeed me:
It is also rarely recognised that email is a very inefficient method of communication (compared to telephone or meeting in person) because email is 1 way. Someone asks you a question, but their message is garbled and semi-literate. You reply asking what do they mean. Sometime later, they reply clarifying their question. You reply to that. Then they reply and finally you come to a conclusion. The process takes days, whereas it could have been solved in 5 minutes if you met face to face.
Finally, as well as being illiterate and incomprehensible, for some reason people are also much more rude and aggressive over email. Flaming away at each other in chatrooms, newsgroups and blogs, using stupid anonymous handles, they forget to switch mode when they talk to anyone else. Having existed in a happy email free-for-all since 1987, it was the constant stream of rudeness that was the last straw that made me finally get serious about blocking my email in 2000. Life since has instantly become much more peaceful and civilized.
The future is not a future of ever-increasing email - that is the naive view of someone who has clearly only just discovered the medium.
"Spam should be illegal" - else everyone will get 10,000 messages a day. No reason not to send them.
"No need to make it illegal" - Sysadmins can deal with this problem themselves, by forming networks, sharing info in automatic filters. No need for the law to get involved.
Micropayments may solve the spam problem. Just charge 1 cent to send an email to me. If that doesn't solve it, charge 5 cents to send an email to me.
Until spam is made illegal in the advanced countries, and countries that allow spam are treated to international sanctions, this is the long-term future:
When spam goes properly illegal, infection may become the major way to send spam.
Long-term solution: Email needs to be completely re-designed with security and perhaps payment in mind.