As for the biggest story of the last five years, the Internet, usage rates may still be climbing but just about every cyberspace veteran I know is beginning to use the Web less as a form of entertainment and more as another necessary, but tiresome, tool. Meanwhile, VCs, still flush, are turning away new money not just to focus on saving some of their dog investments of the last two years, but also because there aren't enough thrilling new business plans floating around. So, as we glance at catalogs and fliers and shop windows, it's pretty hard to get turned on by anything we see. Yeah, I guess. The high-tech revolution is dead.
Silicon Valley is dead.
A generation's dream is dead. The economy is in free fall. Believe me, I wrote my share of them. But one of the few advantages of getting older is that you begin to detect patterns that were invisible to you at 20 or 30. One of these patterns is the regular, but widely spaced, moments when most of the major technological waves trough at the same time.