Surfing into a second decade, wondering what wonders the Web will offer
Welcome to the second decade of the Online Guy column.
In real years this piece is a mere 10 years old, which translates to at least three times that in "Internet Years." You know, kind of like "dog years" that have one human year equating to seven canine years. In the early days, I'd say an Internet year was a 1-to-5 or 1-to-6 ratio. But today it's probably closer to 1-to-3, as businesses have understood the importance of having a strong Web component.
My weekly missives have shifted from sharing how businesses use that newfangled Internet to how just about everyone connects today via desktop, laptop or mobile phone. The disconnected are the minority, and the Internet Year keeps shrinking as the Web keeps evolving.
When this column launched, far fewer than half of you were connecting to the Web or using e-mail regularly. Just about all home users relied on dial-up modems that lead to slow-loading pages that designers hadn't yet figured out how to run efficiently.
Today the majority of users in the United States have high-speed connections at home and work, and wireless broadband means more people are using mobile devices to access the Net.
Thank you, Steve Jobs, for opening the floodgates to this area with your iPhone.
I can't fathom what will happen in the next 10 years, but I have a hunch that anyone who wants to find or share practically any information will be able to do so from nearly anywhere on the planet. Yes, I think there will still be home and work computers, but the connected experience people have while they're not at home or work is what intrigues me. What will that wonder device look like and how will people interact with it?
Stay tuned, and pay attention to both this space and my Tidbits blog at reviewjournal.com. I'll be watching closely.
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Webby Awards
Comedian Stephen Colbert was named Internet Person of the Year in the 12th annual Webby Awards. He'll be honored, along with dozens of other recipients during a June 8-10 celebration in New York. I encourage you to check out the winners and the nominees in each category. It's the best of the best, and worth your time. You'll see just how far the Web has come.
Other winners in the dozens of categories include:
• Flickr (www.flickr.com) -- Community category
• The Onion (www.theonion.com) -- Humor category
• National Geographic Magazine (www.ngm.com) -- Magazine category
• Post Secret (postsecret.blogspot.com) -- NetArt category
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Online Survey
There's still time to participate in my unscientific user survey (www.lvrj.com/20questions). I plan to share results in future columns.
Share your Internet story with me at agibes@reviewjournal.com.
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