7

Outside World

The Network Is the Computer™

(company slogan)

Sun Microsystems, Inc.

Some have predicted that computers will “disappear” in the future. This is not some neo-Luddite forecast but rather the suggestion that computers will continue to shrink in size and increase in number such that all of our computing functions will be ubiquitous and pervasive. That is, they will disappear into our everyday articles. The idea is that there will be many embedded computing systems distributed throughout things such as our clothes, entertainment devices, home appliances, packaging, public infrastructure, and so on — making the need for conventional, general-purpose computers moot. The strength of these small devices, however, will not be in their individual ...

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