The Next 1,000 Years Edition

ACM decided they would try to predict what the next 1,000 years might bring in software and technology.  Ambitious or what?  Especially when it's hard to predict what the next six months will bring.

Phil contributed an article, on the theme of "The Business of Software" to the pot.  When the magazine arrived at the door.  On the cover were all the names of the contributors:
- Dan Bricklin (the inventor of the spreadsheet),
- Edsger Dijkstra (the inventor of structured stuff),
- Grady Booch (of OO fame),
- John Glenn (the astronaut and senator),
- Gordon Bell,
- Hal Berghel,
- Larry Constantine,
- Ray Kurzweil,
- David Parnas,
and many more...  and top of the list...
- Phil! 

Now, a test: the names are in what order?:
(a) Contribution to software development
(b) Good looks
(c) Height
(d) Alphabetical

 

    Software as Currency

In the article, I made the equation that in the future software = currency.  

Here's the rationale:

1. The asset of the future is knowledge.  Many people have stated this, including such luminaries as Peter Drucker and the Pope--and who could disagree with both Prof. Drucker and the Pope?

2. Software is not a product, it's a medium (see the first CACM article)

3. Software's purpose is the storage, transportation, exchange and execution of knowledge (see ditto)

4. One of the roles of any currency is to provide a medium for storing, transporting, exchanging and realizing (making manifest) asset value.

5. Therefore software is the currency of the knowledge asset and is thus the currency of the future.

QED

Software as Currency...