"It will never catch on"

With a few quotes about technology predictions to help get the audience in the right state of mind, Peter Day of the BBC and David Richards of The Stationers' Company opened this city livery company's summer forum.

The full title is The Worshipful Company of Stationers and Newspaper Makers; it dates back to 1403. The Stationers' Hall is a beautiful building near St Paul's Cathedral in central London. During a brief tour I learned about Caxton (who introduced the printing press to England) and it was explained to me that books would sometimes be burned in the courtyard (in previous centuries of course, alternating between books of protestant and catholic observation - depending on the persuasion of the regent).

This year's summer forum looked beyond the printed word representing a departure from earlier forums that rarely strayed far from the 'ink-on-paper' history. "It will never catch on" was chosen as the tongue-in-cheek title of the forum. With speakers from The Daily Telegraph, Orange and Apple, the discussion touched on the digital newsroom, mobile services based on IMS and podcasting in education.

I was asked to speak about the changes that use of the internet is bringing about and the implications for existing means of communication and sources of information. "It should all be done without slides or overheads, merely an eloquent and persuasive address", I was briefed. Presenting without using slides as a crutch was something I hadn't done before, but compared to being asked to share my thoughts on ideas barely a decade old with an organisation of 600 years' standing that part of the challenge faded in significance.

Using what I see as the main trends today (open, free, social, simple, mobile) I described how technology and an ever more connected world is leading to decreasing barriers to entry and increasing choice. Those tools that prove themselves on the open internet get adopted by organisations allowing them to tap into the benefits brought about by decreasing transaction costs; not just cost of mechanical or financial transactions but complex ones involving people connected to each other in formal and informal social networks. The cost of experimenting with technology is also coming down and as such it is easier to test if something is likely to ever catch on.