Interesting read, Acadia, thanks.
Sadly I sometimes wonder just how much technology is stolen from the US population. Before I initially left Ohio in 1987 I was addicted to a few science journals. I remember two cases that make me make the statement of 'what has been stolen'.
#1 In 1985-1986 there were reports in a few journals about an optical modem. The modem was actually working at 20/GBaud. Almost 30 years later this is still MUCH faster than anything available to the public. It disappeared from the journals over night. My guess is that our government annexed the thing.
2) One of the west coast universities was working on organic memory in, I think the last time I read was 1987. This organic memory uses a protein lattice as a framework for the memory. The actual 'on/off' memory switches are controlled by 'poop' excreted by a form of bacteria.
Sigh, both of my above examples are from the mid-late 1980s.
There are MANY interesting aspects to Acadia's link but I think that the local system speed has already reached its useable limit. Look, we are talking a situation where MS Office is more and more web based just to show one example.
If we are going to talk about a person's experience it used to be the hard drive that was the bottle-neck. Even with a spinning drive that is no longer the case. The bottle neck is the internet, It is just plain SLOW compared to local systems.
Hey, I'm in the top 2% as to internet speed within the US yet, compared to local access, that is still VERY slow.
