Writes John Robb: “I have 95% of my PC’s processer available at any given moment. In a year that will probably be 98%, in three years it will be 99%. This model of the Internet is so messed up. The fact that over 90% of the computing horsepower on the Internet sits idle at any given moment is insane (in fact, 98% of my DSL connection is dead too). It is going to change. It has to change. The notebook (the shift to notebooks is going on at a furious pace — soon will be the day that fewer than 1% have two machines) will be the center of everyone’s computing life. It will be the personal producivity tool, the server, the media station, the entertainment console, publishing system for writing and multimedia, etc. At a 1:1 (one computer to one person), computing hit it’s sweet spot.”
There is another way to look at it — from the viewpoint of the world’s emerging markets. The power-packed desktop PC now becomes the (Thick) Server, capable of handling 25-30 Thin Clients on the network. What this does is brings down the cost of a computing a notch (by a factor of 10) as the world’s older PCs can be used as the desktops for the ones who do not currently have computers.
On the software front, one should make available the latest software to these new users, so that they now have the opportunity to catch-up or even leapfrog in terms of productivity.
