With the Declaration of Independence of Cyberspace, information and knowledge have become free, and it is no longer necessary to learn data, but only to know right from wrong. For those who once thought that Meccano persons did not and would not own computers, how mistaken they are being proved to be. Even in China, computers are outstripping the acquisition of bathrooms. We now live in Cyberia, and the future is here.
With the computer, we can manage ideas and thoughts in a non-linear way, and not necessarily in computer files. Our lives have been vastly changed, and it is a very speedy process. The medium has become the message. There is no one who does not feel that Meccano persons on the Internet are travelling rapidly down new road.
One has become astonished at the manifold and differing expertise of Meccano persons. The Internet has influenced our Meccano society. Of the first importance is its influence on ourselves. We have to interface ourselves to the machine, to change our way of thinking. The web has become a mental extension of ourselves, and the PC an extension of our memory. Our functionality has improved.
Although we are solitary, yet we are not alone. The Meccano community has strengthened, and we have moved closer together sharing similar interests and activities.
With our march towards greater utilisation of the new technology has come discussion of WebSites, Email, Internet relay chat, desk top publishing, Digital cameras, video, file compression and data storage, computer aided design, electronics and more. Subjects perhaps quite foreign to us a few short years ago. We are constantly having to learn new skills. These are for the benefit of a wider brotherhood, for model builders and collectors all. We have become surfers, and it is good to catch the right wave, and not to hold on. Ask yourself what you would feel like if your computer broke down.
Material which would have become lost is now shared freely. We can all enjoy our computers almost as much as Meccano itself. The medium has become the message.
Who can tell where we will be even a few years from today as Meccano and the Internet march towards the future?
Michael Adler - February 1999
Last modified 17 February 1999
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