Tell Me The Future Article

http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2007/dec/03/mondaymediasection.internet

1. Who is Chris De Wolfe and what does he say is the future for social networking? What impact will portable hardware have on this area of technology?
Chris De Wolfe is the CEP and co-founder of MySpace and believes that social networking, like his MySpace, is eclipsing online; and offline worlds and is strongly affecting industries like music, politics and advertising. He states that social networking is a lot more personalised to the consumer themself and will only grow in popularity and worldwide use.

2. Who is Chad Hurley and what does he say is his company's goal? Is he a positive or negative technological determinist?
Chad Hurley is the CEO and co-founder of YouTube. He says that their goal, as a company, is to allow every person on the planet to participate by making the upload process as simple as placing a phone call. He is definately a positive technological determinist as he strongly believes that the technology will only grow further and further until, in five years time, users will be at the centre of their video experience, you will have more access to more information, and the world will be a smaller place.

3. What does Maurice Levy say is the challenge for advertisers and what is 'liquid media' compared to 'linear media'?
Maurice Levy says that it will grow increasingly more challenging from an advertisers point of view because people do not want to sit through commercial breaks that have interrupted their film or other television entertainment. This means that them, as the advertisers, have to come up with incredibly creative solutions in order to successfully interact with people in adverts and engage them whilst being genuine and honest. Linear media is fast giving way to liquid media, where you can move seamlessly in and out of different settings.

4. What parallels does Norvig draw between Edison inventing electricity and the development of online technology in terms of searching for information? (tricky question - read this section carefully)
Norvig explains that when Edison invented electricity he couldn't even dream of powering appliances by electricity that we do today. And like Edison couldn't see the rapid development of technology with electricity, we cannot begin to imagine what is in store in the future. He describes how the technology we currently have enables us to progress further and further at a high rate to build more advanced appliances.

5. What are the issues for the developing world? How is this evidence of a 'digital divide'? (socio-economic divide due to access to technology)
Technology has had a major impact on the economy, its been known that under-developed countries are being provided with less power, cables, and other equipment to perform more advanced technological tasks; e.g. the internet. If this continues at such a rate, then it is extremely likely that there will be an economical divide between developed and under-developed countries as one will have regular, good access to the internet under a high-power, while the other will not.