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Dr. James Martin has been called the guru of the Information Age and is an authority on the social and commercial ramifications of computers and technology. He received a Pulitzer Prize nomination for his book The Wired Society: A Challenge for Tomorrow based on his predictions and progressive views about technology.

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Business Strategy Review

Winter 2004

The wired society: Interview with James Martin

Why did you decide to found the James Martin Institute for Science and Civilization? The first part of the 21st century has some extreme dangers and opportunities. They are examined in my forthcoming book. This entire subject needs thorough research and accurate data collection. Because the consequences of getting it wrong are so immense, it is, perhaps, the most important subject we should be studying today. Society needs a School for Civilization, not just a School for Business. You are famous for predicting future trends particularly in technology. But isnt the work of futurists ultimately just guesswork. After all many people were predicting technology would create more leisure time but we instead we appear to be working harder than ever. In my view, responsible studies of the future are logical explorations based on what we already know. Understanding the future is a matter of logic, history, science, and the understanding of complex organisations. Many things about the future are uncertain, but demographics are not. Also, much can be predicted about future technology because of the lengthy time lag between research in the lab and application in the field. For example, when I wrote The Wired Society in the mid-1970s, there were no personal computers, and the internet was little more than an idea about how large computers could be interlinked. Some 25 years later the book was hailed as an astonishingly accurate forecast of a world using the global internet. There are other major trends that are foreseeable, some with a fair degree of accuracy. I call these macrotrends in the book that is, an ongoing trend that has substantial consequences and seems either inevitable or very difficult to change. Much can be predicted, at least roughly, about future technology for example, the globalisation of new media, and some of the consequences of genome mapping. Some of todays macrotrends will create spectacular business opportunities.
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ames Martin is founder and chairman emeritus of Headstrong, a global consultancy that helps leading companies create real business value from digital technologies. He has acted as an advisor to the UK government on restructuring telecommunications in the UK and changing the role of the Post Office, and consulted on planning, product and service strategies for the long term future with AT&T, IBM, Honeywell, Texas Instruments, and Xerox. He has been a member of the software Scientific Advisory Board of the US Department of Defense. In its 25th anniversary issue, Computerworld, ranked Dr. Martin fourth among the 25 individuals who have most influenced the world of computer science. After the recent opening of the James Martin Institute for Science and Civilization in Oxford, James Martin talked to Des Dearlove about the current state of technology and how it is likely to impact on business in the future.

The wired society: Interview with James Martin

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 There have been many dramatic technological advances in recent years. What do you think have been the most significant ? They would certainly include: The web, fiber optics, real-time business-to-business communication, micro-sensors, wireless technology, data mining, medical imaging, genome mapping. The most significant changes are perhaps in research and not yet in products nanotechnology, medicine related to a persons genes, genetic modification, the grid, focused psychotropic drugs, technology for automated evolution, intelligent robotics, fuel cells, fourth-generation nuclear power, carbon nanotubes.
Do you see the pace of technological change ever reaching a plateau? The rate of change is relentlessly increasing. Technology is like an avalanche gaining momentum and force as it hurtles down the mountainside. Each generation of technology provides better tools for designing the next generation, and generations follow each other increasingly quickly. The industrial revolution set the avalanche going, moving slowly at first, but now it is thundering down the mountainside with awesome momentum. And we can be sure that

Thirdly, in America and Europe: inadequate education and inadequate resources for the highestquality education. Technology isnt always beneficial. What is the potential downside for civilization? Low-cost weapons of mass destruction, especially biological weapons, producible by individuals or groups rather than governments. The need to build a counter-terrorist infrastructure in Western societies, with a consequent redefinition of what we mean by privacy. Extraordinary divergence between the most capable and least capable countries. Within each country, a growing divide between the most capable and least capable people. Children with low attention span (ADHD), and growing acceptance of violence. Increasing use of more sophisticated drugs by children (beyond Ritalin) with unknown consequences. The serious growth of a skill/wisdom gap. The brightest people are driven intensely into ever more demanding skills needing deeper and narrower knowledge. Wisdom may be scarce when we need it most.

Either we learn how to control technology or it will destroy us, in one way or another.
avalanche is not going to slow down now. On the contrary, it will increase in speed and power for the rest of this century. Only a catastrophe of unspeakable scale could stop it. Many factors will drive the relentless acceleration, including highly developed computer intelligence feeding on itself, and the intriguing potential of automating evolution. So how is technology going to impact on business in the near future? Growing innovation; a growing need for entrepreneurship; a growing need for freedom of trade globally. There will be long-term on-going increase in productivity, perhaps about 2.5 per cent per year in advanced countries; a much higher rate of growth in China and India. Plus a massive increase in Chinese imports and exports. For the consumer: increased choice, increased pressure, but not necessarily increased happiness. What are the big issues relating to technology facing business? Firstly, important and inevitable e-business transitions were put on hold in many corporations in 2000 to 2003. They now need to be implemented. Secondly, there is a steady movement of jobs, including hightech jobs, from affluent countries to China, India and other countries.
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All technology has the capability for good or evil. The extraordinary technology of the 21st century has the capability for great good or great evil. The spectrum from good to evil is becoming much larger, and the larger this range, the greater the need to accelerate the best technologies and suppress the worst. It doesnt make sense to embrace technology just because its there, as we have done in the past. We need the wisdom to recognize that some new technologies are a Godsend and others could wreck civilization. Energy technologies that will stop the greenhouse effect are vital; plutonium and smallpox should be banished from the planet. We have to realise that as the avalanche gains momentum, theres going to come a time when it will become very difficult to control. Either we learn how to control technology or it will destroy us, in one way or another. And the upside? A change from very narrow cultural diversity to extreme cultural diversity. Advanced intellectual power tools. Access to an extraordinary diversity of such tools on networks of immense bandwidth. Affluence and new technologies will give us the opportunity to rethink what civilization means. New and different civilizations will develop in different parts of the world.
The wired society: Interview with James Martin

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Business Strategy Review

Winter 2004

James Martin: hardwired

Why is it that many technological solutions fail to deliver on their promises? Is this likely to change? Irrational over-enthusiasm; inadequate implementation skills; inadequate attention to valid calculations of return on investment; failure to have high-quality understanding between business leaders and leaders of technical innovation; inadequate understanding of the broad-spectrum consequences; these are just some of the reasons. Is it likely to change? Probably not, but the most savvy executives get it right. What will it be like to be a CEO in the future? Being a top CEO will be an increasingly demanding job, with an increasing ability to increase shareholder value. Almost every industry needs radically reinventing. The increasing complexity and globalism will require increasing teamwork to integrate the requisite forms of professionalism. Much greater attention will be needed to social and global problems. New forms of CEO-like leadership will be desperately needed in dealing the worlds grand-scale problems.
The wired society: Interview with James Martin

London Business School Regents Park London NW1 4SA United Kingdom Tel +44 (0)20 7262 5050 Fax +44 (0)20 7724 7875 www.london.edu A Graduate School of the University of London

Are you optimistic about the future? Given our advancing knowledge, if we fail to create a great civilization it will be because of avoidable problems caused by greed, lack of education, massive vested interests and bad governance. It may be because companies drive excessive consumerism and maximize profits by focusing on the lowest common denominator. It may be because false mythologies prevail instead of science. It may be that science misleads us by focusing only on things it can measure. It may be because the West is stuck in its past. A wealthy society could be like Huxleys Brave New World; it could be a society of drug-damaged shop-till-you-drop imbeciles addled with garbage television, or it could be a society educated to enjoy the finest pleasures of civilization. The task of the 21st century is to achieve survivability to eliminate the factors that could destroy humanity. Many actions are needed; many leverage factors are available to us. The corrections need to be made sooner rather than later. The longer we delay, the greater the risk. I
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