By 2010 there will be more Barbie Dolls on-line than Americans, and soon after, there will be more machines on-line than people. Everything will ultimately be on line – all white and brown goods, cars, vending machines, jewellery and clothing will all be addressable. The Internet will grow up to become a real network of things - with bandwidth, reliability, and high performance. The term wired will be a misnomer as most things linked by radio and optical links.

The worry that IT is creating a have and have-not society will be quelled by dramatic cost reductions. Digital TV will become a primary port for net access and newspapers, radio and TV, will be overtaken by web-casting. On-line banking, commerce, trading and shopping will become dominant. Personalised tele-education and training will be a major enabler in an economy dominated by bits and not atoms.

A faster paced society will emerge with the half-life of companies, education and jobs reduced to a few years. Governments and their associated institutions will have even less influence than they do today. A major economic indicator will be the number of new start-up companies per week, and the number on new millionaires created per year.

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