NETWORKED COMPUTERS, AS REVOLUTIONARY AS THE PRINTING PRESS

From an interesting article in Los Angeles Times:

Think of television as the great downloading device, a one-way flow of content produced by few and consumed by many.

The networked computer, on the other hand, allows for as many producers as consumers and for individual or universal distribution.

This is what makes it as revolutionary as the printing press.

Downloading can be a great thing, giving poor schoolchildren access to online encyclopedias and e-textbooks that they could never afford otherwise.

But it is the Internet's unique capacity for uploading our own music, images and opinions that makes it central to the development of 21st century culture.

Via Rodrigo Lara Mesquita, RadiumSystems.