It is an indespensible tool for me. Searching on the internet is easy if you enter the right data. Garbage in, garbage out. Search engines are a good tool if you use it right. A banana makes a lousy hammer.
I took the plunge and got me an iPhone. It is like a third arm. Because of the internet, I have access to a buttload on infomation all at my finger tips. I can forward pictures to my co-workers from the field. I travel a lot and weight is a premium so I need to be light and compact. Because of the internet, I can download catalogs and manuals. If I like them, I can save them for future reference, even without internet access. Currently I have thousands of pages of catalogs and manuals on my phone that I could not possibly lug around with me. All this because of the internet.
The internet I feel is moving forward still. Just like any other infrastructre, It can only grow as fast its existing system capacity. The original brains behind building the infrastuctre may not have had the foresite of what the internet would be today. It will eventully hit a point that will slow down progress.
Sure there is alot of junk on the internet. Someone's junk to you is someone else's useful info. You Tube for example, to me is 99% garbage. That 1% has given me excellent video for training purposes and cheap entertainment. Everything has a value to someone out there in the www. That is why it is there.
Just hired a helper for this winter. With all the red tape the govt lives in, without the internet, it would of been hell to shuffle all the paperwork between Minnisota, Alaska, New Mexico, and Wisconson.
A few years back. I was involved in a online meeting that lasted all week with coworkers from all over Alaska and one from Denver, CO. Instead of all of us flying to a meeting place at great expense for travel and hotels, we did it via video confrencing. At the end of each day, everyone went home and slept in their own bed thus saving thousands of dollars. It was made possible by the internet.
Because of the internet, we have email, links to remote offices, instant messanger, texting messaging and execellent information resources like this message board.
I feel it is still moving forward. It is all how you measure it.
