शून्यताMy most bizarre prediction was made in 1980, when I said that the small computer would, by the end of the millennium, bring down totalitarian #Communism. The argument was simple enough: armies without sophisticated computing power would be unable to compete. All aspects of modern military power, from outer space to smart bombs to battle management to logistics to tank interception, depend on sophisticated technology, which itself depends on small computers both its development and its deployment.
So long as the U.S. had even a marginally rational strategy of technology, the U.S.S.R. was faced with an intolerable dilemma: import or develop computing power, or give up all pretense of being a modern military power. Moreover, such computing power must be **distributed**; keeping a few great Hulking Giants under careful control isn’t going to do the job.
As early as 1946, #ArthurKoestler said that the sufficient condition for the destruction of totalitarian Communism would be the free exchange of ideas in the Soviet Empire. Distributed computing power automatically brings the free exchange of ideas. The small computer is the ultimate in samizdat (self-publishing) capability. It is literally impossible to prevent people with small computers from communicating with each other, nor is it possible to censor what kinds of informatiion they exchange. (j p) #Byte #ByteMagazine #Anno1990
Earlier this decade, a Presidential Commission on Education reported that “if a foreign government had imposed this system of education on the U.S., we would rightly consider it an act of war.” (j p)
Large U.S. corporations are already concerned that the schools aren’t producing graduates with enough education to be put to work without extensive reeducation and training. Most companies remain snowed by educationist hype, but'business by its very nature demands results; and there will come a time when business itself will, in self-defense, begin educating not only its employees, but their children. (j p)