Not long ago there was publicity about the computer, the network, and a slick way to glue all this together seamlessly. "The network is the computer" was the mantra, and Java was going to enable our toasters to talk to our iceboxes and stuff like that. Well, this kind of infrastructure, which is dependent on fast and reliable bandwidth, is slowly becoming real, and the snapshot of where we are now shows some value.
For example, storage. I need to store stuff and get to it from anywhere, when I want. Email, passwords, financial records, my favorite bookmarks, whatever. Some of this works pretty well.
But it's chaos.
My email address is... let me think, because I have at least ten of them available to me, and three or four that I use for various things. One for work, one for friends, one for my son's soccer stuff, one to back up my files, one for spammers.
I store things I need at... hmmm, have to catalog all those places where I have megabytes and in a couple cases gigabytes of storage available to me, using ftp, http, vpn, or even CD burner, usb flash drive, or "mp3" hard-disk player.
My latest thoughts are collected in... a notebook, my blog, random documents on hard drives, emails.
No wonder I'm confused.
We are all still learning how to do this. It's a point in the history of our connected world that will be seen as an amusing transition to something much better down the road. We're experimenting, and we're learning and making it better every day. There isn't going to be an end point, but you can fix your own at any time. Just stop learning and trying new things, settle on that set of technologies you're comfortable with, plant your feet and put your hands on your hips and exhale. Frown at how this all seems to be spinning out of control and leaving you bewildered. Good thing the rest of us aren't doing that...
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