Connor's Thoughts

From an article found on ZDNet, written by Marc Orchant;

Article

" So David from 37Signals dropped the f-bomb in a particularly myopic post wherein he tries to argue that we don't need offline functionality from online applications because, "like dude… we're all connected ll [sic] of the time and why don't you read a book or something when you're on a plane?". This unsurprisingly (and perhaps by design?) screed has generated an emotional comments thread (now 200 deep and sure to get bigger) in which folks from around the world do their best to educate the author (and presumably his pals at the company) as to the reality outside the world of a developer living in a major US city. It's great intertubes drama if you're a fan of that sort of thing. "

The whole post starts about offline versus online applications, then transitions to how the web is changing.

As for what I think about offline versus online applications, I think that offline applications should still exist. I wouldn't trust both the server and my connection to said server when making something important. Without a stable internet connection, it's a real pain. I'd much sooner trust my computer than my internet connection. I would say that I'm personally very biased towards offline applications.

From the same article;

" The net generation has never known a world without the network. They have different expectations and experiences than I (we) do. As a result, their comfort level about working online is profoundly different. They approach the idea of work and career differently that we have and they use mobile and net technologies in a dramatically different, and much more personal, way than most of us in the pre-net generation.Have you watched twenty-somethings use MySpace? I have – I sta next to my daughter (22) and her roommate (20) yesterday watching them cruise their social networks – and it's nothing like the way I use the tubes. "

I don't know how these wunderkinds use the internet, but I can say that an adult and a child both use the internet differently. I will agree that the net is changing, and so are the people that use the internet. However, the past is not always wrong. just because the office model seems antiquated nowadays doesn't mean it can't work for future generations.

Well, that's more than my 2 cents worth.