We are facing a future of unbounded complexity. Whether that complexity
is harnessed to build a world that is safe, pleasant, humane and
profitable, or whether it causes us to careen off a cliff into an abyss
of mind-numbing junk is an open question. The challenges and
opportunities--technical, business, and human--that this technological
sea change will bring are without precedent. Entire industries will be
born and others will be laid to ruin as our society navigates this
journey.
There are already many more computing devices in the world than there
are people. In a few more years, their number will climb into the
trillions. We put microprocessors into nearly every significant thing
that we manufacture, and the cost of routine computing and storage is
rapidly becoming negligible. We have literally permeated our world with
computation. But more significant than mere numbers is the fact we are
quickly figuring out how to make those processors communicate with each
other, and with us. We are about to be faced, not with a trillion
isolated devices, but with a trillion-node network a network whose
scale and complexity will dwarf that of today's Internet. And, unlike
the Internet, this will be a network not of computation that we use,
but of computation that we live in.
Written by the leaders of one of America's leading pervasive computing
design firms, this book gives a no-holds-barred insiders' account of
both the promise and the risks of the age of Trillions. It is also a
cautionary tale of the head-in-the-sand attitude with which many of
today's thought-leaders are at present approaching these issues.
Trillions is a field guide to the future--designed to help businesses
and their customers prepare to prosper, in the information.
