Government Computer News

Many think the Internet is mainstream now, but that’s only true for nonpaying use, such as surfing for free information. As of 2003, commercial operations involving monetary exchange were limited to about 23% for broadband, 10% for e-tailing, 12% for B2B, 10% for distance learning, and 5% for music. And these are the most popular Internet applications. Others hardly register in adoption levels at all.

TechCast, a virtual think tank tracking the technology revolution, suggest that more-complex applications - online voting, e-health, the virtual university, virtual reality, and the global grid - are likely to follow later. These forms of e-commerce lag because they involve more exotic and costly technology, difficult institutional changes, and new forms of consumer behavior. Making the virtual university a reality, for instance, requires professors to switch from traditional lectures to communication technologies that are poorly developed, college administrators to justify the economic feasibility of more expensive systems, and students to feel comfortable and trusting in a virtual setting. E-health demands a similar transformation among physicians, hospitals, and patients.

Remaining developments - taxation, privacy and security, computerized research, telesurgery, and equal access - should appear at varying times throughout the next two decades. These applications differ because they do not serve major new social needs but involve modifications of existing systems.

Interwoven through these advances in e-commerce are other trends leading to a new generation of intelligent systems expected to emerge during the same time period. The TechCast project calls it TeleLiving - a conversational human-machine interface that allows a more comfortable and convenient way to shop, work, educate, entertain, and conduct most other social relationships [see THE FUTURIST, January-February 2003]. Advances in speech recognition, artificial intelligence, powerful chips, virtual environments, and flat-screen wall monitors are likely to produce this intelligent interface.

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