Web Secret 500: the best of iWebU - The World Is Changing Fast

This is my 500th post - how fitting that it is the first of 2018. On August 15, 2018, I will be celebrating 10 years of iWebU.

Leading up to that momentous date, I am re releasing the "best of iWebU", starting in 2008.

These are the posts that stand the test of time and remain as valuable today as they did then.

And so, I revisit Web Secret #121: The World Is Changing Fast.

Why? Because we are all struggling with how quickly events, scientific discoveries and changing social mores develop and impact us. My hip replacement in October was performed by a robot. I rest my case. In 2010, when I wrote this post, many of us were just beginning to realize that this was not your mother's world. And we were beginning to understand the importance of turning our devices off.

Web Secret #121: The World Is Changing Fast - September 29, 2010

Recently, I watched a brilliant TED India presentation on "6th Sense Technology." Basically, this genius guy created a wearable device that enables new interactions between the real world and a computer. He did this using the innards of two computer mice.

Honestly, I was kind of zoning out during his talk, (maybe because the air-conditioning in my house had broken and it was about 90 degrees in my office.) But, what caught my attention was the mice - because they looked, well, antiquated. I checked the date of the presentation - November 2009. Figure my guy did his work in early 2009, maybe late 2008 - from my 2010 perspective the mice looked old.

I started to think about how fast the world is changing. I came across a video that made that point vividly, Shift Happens 2.0:



The video pointed out:

• The top 10 in demand jobs in 2010 did not exist in 2004.
• Current students are preparing for jobs that don't yet exist, using technologies that haven't been invented, in order to solve problems we don't even know are problems.
• The amount of new technological information is doubling every two years.
• By 2013, a supercomputer will be built that exceeds the computational capability of the human brain.

What does it all mean?

Honestly, I don't believe anyone has a clue. This exponentially accelerated change is unprecedented in human history.

I do have one piece of advice.

TURN IT OFF. Your computer, iPad, smartphone, cable TV with 400 channels, satellite radio, Facebook, Twitter. One week per year, one day per week, one hour a day.

Whatever you can handle.