As an industry analyst I spend a lot of time traveling the world and talking to communications users, equipment and application vendors, service providers, entrepreneurs, investment bankers, venture capitalists and investors. What they all have in common is a strong belief that Internet technology will lead the way into a future communications age rather than an information age. In every sense of the word, technology will be the driving force of the future. The spring decrease in the valuation of technology companies on the Nasdaq and the reduction in initial public offerings are examples of rejection of hype rather than rejection of technology.
Stock markets seem to go up and down on perception rather than reality.
Communications technology will have an enormous impact on the national and global economies in the next five years - greater, in fact, than in the past 100 years. Today, we think of the Internet as a global ubiquitous communications entity that is in its infancy. Change occurs on a daily basis, with new applications and consortia creating portals of community or trading interest. What was once thought of simply as an e-mail vehicle soon became an information access tool, and now has morphed into a business sales and trading portal. The Internet, as we know it today, is constantly changing through the addition of more and more enabling intelligence and applications.