Again and again, the things that fundamentally change our lives and our culture looked like toys when they first started. That doesn't mean every toy is worthy

Again and again, the things that fundamentally change our lives and our culture looked like toys when they first started. That doesn't mean every toy is worthy of our attention, but people in tech should know better than anyone that you simply can't tell which toys will be important. When the radio transmission was in wide use, radio as we know it today (as a music box) didn't exist. When it was proposed, a potential investor asked of the inventor: "The wireless music box has no imaginable commercial value. Who would pay for a message sent to nobody in particular?" Fast forward a couple years later, the inventor of the radio music box said of the television: "While theoretically and technically television may be feasible, commercially and financially I consider it an impossibility, a development of which we need waste little time dreaming." So it is with software and hardware, and now social. If you're interested, I've written about it before: http://iamwil.posterous.com/who-would-pay-for-a-message-sent-to-nobody-in http://iamwil.posterous.com/who-would-pay-for-a-message-sent...