WITH the release of its new line of servers, including the Netra Internet Server, Sun Microsystems was signalling its confidence that the momentum which has caused such massive growth on the Internet and brought it into the realm of the PC-based desktop would continue.
According to Eric Schmidt, the company's chief technology officer, most people can't envisage how the Internet will unfold, but it is still obvious the world-embracing network-of-networks will eventually invade every individual's desktops, and most of those are PCs.
In fact, Mr Schmidt clearly feels that the scope of Internet to affect humanity and society is greater than most people realise.
'The Internet is a phenomenon that is . . . changing the world,' he said in an interview last week. 'It is much deeper and bigger than anyone thinks.' Mr Schmidt attributes this depth to the fact that no one individual or entity is in charge of the Internet, a fact that is not likely to change even as big business takes its first tentative steps into cyberspace.
In fact, Mr Schmidt welcomes the commercialisation of the network and even feels this will contribute to the breadth of activity on the Internet rather than consolidating it in the hands of a few powerful corporations.
'I think anyone who thinks that a global network is free is naive. Someone has to pay for it,' he said, comparing it to the dawn of the television era when few thought that advertisements would become common-place.