Computer says get a life – and we have

Last week hundreds of young people queued overnight to watch Andrew Murray play a game of tennis. Tickets were reportedly changing hands for £2,000. Yet the game could be watched on any television or computer screen, in the comfort of home, pub or work-place. Last year the market clearing price for a ticket to December’s Led Zeppelin reunion was £7,425. Yet every note was available for free on download. What is happening? Futurology seminars have long been obsessed with one question: what next after the internet? The answer is always the same, a new electronic gizmo. There will be a novel way of downloading into the ear or eye, a new web phenomenon or interactive device. Since the invention of the telegraph and gramophone, innovation is interested only in kit that yields profit. What is becoming plain, even under the strains... [read full story]