Compression

Compression

I had one of those "aha" moments the other day when I saw these powerful charts for the first time. It's not that I didn't realize that we humans have been adopting new technologies faster and faster over the last century (that would be a "duh" moment).  It's that I didn't realize just how much faster the adoption had gotten relative to other technologies.

The first chart here, from a report issued by the Dallas branch of the Federal Reserve, shows the U.S. household penetration of new technologies on the vertical axis and years from date of introduction on the horizontal axis.

And in case that wasn't a clear enough visual representation, here's the critical tabular data.

It just makes me wonder -- what's next on the list, and how vertical will its line be?  Thanks to Carl Turza for pointing me to this interesting data.

Comments

[Faisal N. Jawdat]

What are their criteria for "invented". The internet was approaching adolescence by 1991.

[Dave Hendricks]

I think that the chart is interesting for showing the increasing with which innovations are adopted by larger and more diverse groups over time. Previous innovations apparently influence the dependencies.

As far as the internet entering adolesence in 1991, I think you are referring to Arpanet. The browser-based internet must be what they are referring to in that example.

In any event, it is clear the adoption of the internet is the fastest mass event tracked on that interesting chart.

I

[Mark Neely]

Hi,

I am not sure if this is an acceleration of adoption per se than an acceleration of out ability to learn and hear about new technologies and their benefits. In this sense, the world gets smaller each year, and we learn of innovations almost immediately they are launched, regardless of where in the globe they initiate.

Mark