Cory Doctorow at Boing Boing shares a link to the 100 oldest .COM names in the registry, and wonders about the “visionaries” who might’ve realized they needed a “.com” domain in 1985.

But many of those companies likely weren’t thinking about commercial Internet possibilities. They just happened to be involved in the academic, scientific and defense contracting fields, either directly or tangentially, and according to the rules in the registry, they had to be “.com” to show they were commercial enterprises, unlike the majority of the Internet nodes at the time, which were .edu or .gov (and a few .orgs I guess, might’ve been the minority? Hm. )

Anyway, I mention this not just to be persnickety, but because I think it’s interesting how easy it is to forget what the context was 20 or hell even 12 years ago. I’m fascinated at how quickly the ‘net became a “land of opportunity” as opposed to an under-the-radar propeller-head network, and how to some degree we’re all coming back to the ‘net’s DNA of community (which has always been prevalant, it’s just not gotten the press because the ‘real’ community happening online isn’t necessarily connected to any IPO’s).

The market isn’t using the net for its own ends. People are using the market to utilize the net for their own ends… and as always, people are mainly interested in connecting with, sharing with, creating with other people.

For once, I’m not the last person to hear about something months later.

Google Talk sounds exciting. No voice-capable Mac client for it, but Adium and iChat both work. If nothing else, it’ll educate the masses about the “Jabber” protocol.

Google does have gobs of cash, and it’s lots of fun seeing what they can do with it. What I wish they’d really do is start a mobile phone company, because I would imagine it wouldn’t suck nearly as much as Verizon and others. But that’s merely a pipe dream.

Anyway, it’ll be interesting to see how this affects IM users, if it’ll catch on or not. I still don’t understand why AIM and MSN and others don’t open up their protocols. Maybe Google is what it takes to get people to realize if they use an open protocol (Jabber) they can talk to *anybody.*

However, I wonder if Google plans on using its ads technology for scanning IM’s and displaying ads while chatting or the like? That would kill it for me. I can put up with it in emails, somehow. It’s unobtrusive, and they’re giving me a couple of gigs of space. But for IM’s … for some reason that would cross a line for me. Not sure why.

It will be fun, though, to see if they can do a lot of cool integration like they’ve been doing with their other services. Phone messaging, search, blogging, etc.

Companies of the world, pay attention. These are your future customers.

Pay attention not just to the fact that they’re online, but what they’re doing and how. Pay attention to how integrated their physical space is with their infospace, and how relational their infospace has become. They bounce between applications, they earn and spend “virtual” money in massive multiplayer environments. They live in this place.
And your cute little web-widgets that *might* be finished at the end of their 3-5 year development programs are going to feel to them about as sophisticated and useful as a tire swing feels to a circus acrobat.

Pew Internet & American Life Project Report: Pew Internet: Teens and Technology

Today’s American teens live in a world enveloped by communications technologies; the internet and cell phones have become a central force that fuels the rhythm of daily life.

The number of teenagers using the internet has grown 24% in the past four years and 87% of those between the ages of 12 and 17 are online. Compared to four years ago, teens’ use of the internet has intensified and broadened as they log on more often and do more things when they are online.

via JOHO/Blog