Silicon Insider: The Uncertain Future of the Net

B U R L I N G A M E, Calif., Jan. 30 -- This week, the world's leading figures in technology, business and politics are meeting at the Davos conference in Switzerland to discuss the future of the Internet. One question: How the hell would they know?

If we've seen one thing proven in tech in the last five years, it isthat no one — especially no one in a position of authority — has yet been able to accurately predict where the Internet is going.

Those who saw it as a flash in the pan looked like fools when it took over the wired world; while thosewho saw it as a techno-utopia that would enlighten (and enrich) the world,now hold stock options that are under water.

All those dot-commie ex-millionaires sure didn't see what was coming — that's why they're all fleeing back into business school. Venturecapitalists, those veteran investors hired precisely because they coulddivine the high-tech future, didn't know either — that's why they are allalready bobbing and weaving over the health of their rapidly maturing funds.

And God knows the so-called experts in the field didn't have a clue — justask reporters at those Sears catalog-thick New Economy magazines that nowcould be printed on an envelope. Even the two guys who got it right thefirst time, Jim Clark and Marc Andreesen of Netscape, are looking a lotless brilliant these days.

Illiterate Glitterati?

Of the two celebrity speakers this week on the subject, Bill Gatesmissed the Net completely, then tried to make up for lost ground with the usualMicrosoft policy of annihilating anyone ahead of them. The other, PierreOmidyar of eBay (trust me on this, because I was there), was just as amazedby what happened as everybody else. He just happened to make billions fromit. Besides, if either of these estimable gentlemen actually saw a hugeuntapped opportunity in cyberspace, do you think they'd tell us?

In other words, the opinions about the future of the Net held by theassembled glitterati at Davos are no more — and probably less — valid than those held by the anti-globalism protesters setting fires outside. In fact,given that these protests were probably organized worldwide (no small ironythere) over the Net, probably means the protesters sense of the Internet'sfuture are probably even more accurate.