The Internet, Bicycles and Telephony
Surely the bicycle isn’t the best invention since 1800, as a national survey held in the UK claims? Okay, it’s a decent mode of transportation, best of its kind in fact – unicycles have a rather steep learning curve and tricycles simply don’t have any class – but it’s not like it has revolutionized the face of modern civilization, or made us look at the world in a completely new way, or any of these things shampoos claim to do.
My nomination for ‘best invention since 1800’ would be the internet. Yes, I know, it does lean on a number of other great inventions, like the computer or electricity. Then again, arguably the primary function of computers these days is the internet, and furthermore, electricity was invented by God way before the year 1800, so it does not qualify.
Apart from electricity, God invented life, the universe and pretty much everything. Civilization could start only after his patents expired. Meanwhile God abandoned his creations, angered by the fact that his investments never saw a return value.
Why do I pick the internet? Because it is the ultimate form of communication. We can use it to communicate, instantly, and in whichever way suits us best. We can talk to one person, or several at once. Some keep the entire world up to date on their day to day activities. A popular feature of the internet is the possibility to ignore these people.
Another check on the ‘ultimate form of communication’ checklist, is the possibility to take the internet with us wherever we go. Having a connection on our phones is becoming commonplace, and considering the internet can do everything, you’d think that would make ‘traditional mobile products’, including calling and texting, obsolete. Mobile operators seem to think differently, and try to prohibit the use of internet applications that substitute functionality offered by their own services.
Why do mobile operators try to preserve those obsolete services? Because there is more money to be made that way. The internet is an all-in-one package that can only be sold once. In contrast, there are more mobile products than there are species of insects, and several new ones are discovered every day. I’m confident that soon we’ll see plans giving discounts on calling the person on the exact opposite end of the world, using the internet whilst the constellation Orion is visible or texting from under the shower.
Ants can carry loads several times their own weight. Also, they use Vodafone. Why? We asked an ant: “Well, we kill insects several times our own size and need some way to bring them back to our colony … oh, about Vodafone, sorry … ahem … Because Vodafone is the best mobile operator for strong and good looking insects like ourselves. That okay?”
The possibility to put together your personal perfect mobile plan might seem a big money-saver, but don’t be fooled; calls, texts, internet, it’s all just bytes hitching a ride from A to B. By selling one product as ten different products, mobile operators greatly increase their profit margins.
Nothing illustrates this better, than the fact that a single text message costs about the same as one minute of telephone conversation, while the amount of data transferred is more than a factor thousand smaller. Those are the better profit margins; I suspect every mobile operator has a department, the sole job of which it is to provide maniacal laughter every time a text message is sent.
It seems to me that at this point, telephony is the last, large form of day-to-day communication still functioning more or less separated from the internet. It won’t last. Ideas tying the internet and telephony together are already knocking on the door, and no matter how hard mobile operators try to block it; at some point in the next couple of years a company like Google will code a storm ram big enough to knock it down. Then the internet will be our de-facto standard and only form of communication.
I don’t usually see the internet as something that’s still busy defining its place in our lives, but it’s developments like the ones in the mobile market, that show us there’s still a number of big milestones ahead of us. So if you’re not yet convinced the internet is the best invention since the year 1800, you might still change your mind.
Then again, the bicycle too might prove itself in new ways in the future. Maybe the next economic crisis will bankrupt the entire car industry, making the bicycle our primary form of transportation. Maybe the first atlantic crossing on a bike will forever change people’s perception of the size of the globe. Maybe the great bicycle charge of 2034 will be instrumental in ending World War III. You know, one of those things shampoos claim to do.