Thread by @davekarpf

For today's #wiredarchive segment, I'd like to discuss a topic that'a bit more speculative in nature: is the pace of the "digital revolution" slowing down?

Let's take a trip through some of the recent revolutions that weren't.
(1/x)

First, to set the stage, take a look at "10 Years that Changed the World" wired.com/2005/08/intro-…

It's a 2005 retrospective, on the anniversary of the Netscape IPO (which lit the fuse of the dotcom boom). (2/x)

The striking thing in reading this piece is *just how much change* was packed into that decade. The Internet of 2005 is so different than the Internet of 1995. And it wasn't just one key change. (3/x)

Packed into that decade we have the browser wars, the copyright wars/Napster, the rise of Google, the Linux wars, the rise of the iPod, the blogosphere/web 2.0/social networks, AND WiFi.

That is constant, unabated change as experienced by the mass public. (4/x)

The following three years, 2005-2008, still witness some dramatic changes. Those are the years of Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and the iPhone becoming household names and indispensable elements of the information environment.
(5/x)

If you could send a reverse time capsule back from 2005 or 2008 to 1995 or 1998, the changes in the digital experience would take a *long* time to explain.
(6/x)

But now let's think about the past ten years. What would be in a reverse time capsule from today to 2008?
-Here's the new iPhone. The screen is bigger and there's no headphone jack.
-FB and Twitter got huge and mean. Here are a bunch of misogynist trolls.
-(cont'd)
(7/x)

-Here's an Amazon Alexa. We're still deciding whether these things are too creepy to actually install in our homes.
-Here's a list of Netflix's recent releases. TV has gotten, like, crazy-good.
-Here's an Apple Watch. No, that's fine, you can keep it. I wasn't using mine.
(8/x)

And it's not just that today's Internet would make plenty of sense to us in 2008. It's also about the expected digital revolutions that keep not-quite panning out.
(9/x)

Check out 2010's "How the Tablet Will Change the World." wired.com/2010/03/ff_tab…

The iPad looked like a *radical* breakthrough. Instead it's... basically just a bigger iPhone.
(10/x)

Also in 2010, @chr1sa wrote about the Maker movement, in "Atoms are the New Bits." wired.com/2010/01/ff_new…

3-D printing might indeed one day change the entire industrial economy. But, 8 years later, it's still a lot more DIY than I would've expected. (11/x)

Now check out 2013's "Why Wearable Tech Will Be as Big as the Smartphone," by @billwasik. wired.com/2013/12/wearab…

Five years later, wearable tech is still mostly just exercise gear. (Side note: I should really go the gym more. Gotta get in those steps!)
(12/x)

We've never really collectively reckoned with the non-adoption of Google Glass. Google Glass, wearable tech, 3-D printing, tablets... they all LOOK LIKE THE FUTURE. They figure into our collective imaginary. But they've kind of sputtered. (13/x)

In May 2014, the @WIRED cover story was Palmer Luckey's Oculus Rift. wired.com/2014/05/oculus…
Virtual Reality had finally arrived, it seemed.

Today, Luckey is insanely wealthy... and you probably don't know a single person who owns a pair of Oculus goggles.
(14/x)

In April 2016, the cover story was about Magic Leap, the "mind bending" new Mixed Reality headset. wired.com/2016/04/magic-…

Two years later, we're still basically waiting on Magic Leap. But the latest reviews have been far from kind. technologyreview.com/s/610523/even-…
(15/x)

The Internet of Things, Wearable Tech, Blockchain, 3D printing, and VR/AR/MR all keep appearing as the next big game-changer in tech. But they've all managed to tread water for 5+ years without making a much of a dent. (16/x)

Take a look back at this 1998 interview with Bill Joy: wired.com/1998/08/joy/

"We know Moore's Law will run out sometime around 2010. It's probably not going to be a crash into the wall. Things will just start slowing down. We've been getting a free ride with Moore's Law..." 17

(cont'd) "We can write worse and worse software, and the machines just get faster and faster and cheaper and cheaper - and they cover our tracks."

When I think about the tech roll-outs of the past 5 years, they've mostly been about improving the software/smoothing out code. 18/x

It's definitely possible that one or more of these breakthrough technologies is, in fact, just on the verge. Maybe we're about to find the killer VR/IoT app. Maybe the 3D printing inflection point is just around the corner. Maybe this is just a lull. (19/x)

But the biggest surprise for me in reading through the #wiredarchive was just how much the pace of change seems to have slowed.

Today's tech looks like a more polished version of 2008's tech. 2008's tech looked like magic to 1998.

(20/x)

And, here's where I'll leave you: IF the frontier era of the Internet has, in fact, come to a close... then we have to start thinking about how that closing of the frontier changes the economics and sociology of the web going forward. (21/x)

I won't say more about that here, because I've only just begun to think about it.

But it's worth pondering, during those moments when we're not all grappling with the daily barrage of oh-my-god-what-just-happened-are-we-going-to-be-okay?

(Which... I dunno... Maybe not?) (fin)