Network World, 01/04/99

GEORGE GILDER PRESIDENT, GILDER TECHNOLOGY GROUP

If you haven't heard George Gilder - writer, thinker, futurist, pundit - speak about networking, you've missed one of the industry's real treats. In his sometimes humorous, sometimes esoteric, always enlightening way, Gilder gets you - and the industry's most powerful executives - thinking about how networking will change the economy, our society and your own life.

A contributing editor to Forbes ASAP, a senior fellow with the Discovery Institute and the author of several influential books, including Microcosm and the upcoming Telecosm, Gilder envisions a world restructured by the exploding availability of bandwidth.

"For the last 30 years or so, we've been using our computers like cars in the jungle without ever coming to terms with the fact that the real magic of computers comes in conjunction with networks," Gilder told industry muckety-mucks at Bob Metcalfe's Vortex conference in May. "If you've got enough bandwidth, you don't have to worry about error correcting or compression or any other smart means of compensating for the bandwidth scandal of the copper age."

Not everyone likes Gilder's predictions - particularly the incumbent telcos that he sees being overturned by the crashing waves of bandwidth. But everyone agrees that Gilder is helping to shape our thinking about the future of networks and the network world.

GILDER'S CHALLENGE: This futurist game is a tough one. The future has a nasty habit of going in directions you didn 't envision, and Gilder, as a leading pundit, has a growing body of predictions to stand behind.

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