I wrote about convergence in one of my final-year papers at Uni. It's funny that it was always viewed as how computers and TV would merge, given that computers are massively more powerful and useful. It stands testament to the 'old order'; the TV generation who grew up during the medium's peak. Me, I've never been much of one for TV. Give me a computer and I'll find ways to amuse myself for days on end.
Paul Graham has written a piece about why TV has now lost the convergence war (funny, I don't think anyone realised it was a war, but it makes sense now). It's worth the read, but a great excerpt is:
One predictable cause of victory is that the Internet is an open platform. Anyone can build whatever they want on it, and the market picks the winners. So innovation happens at hacker speeds instead of big company speeds.
The second is Moore's Law, which has worked its usual magic on Internet bandwidth.
The third reason computers won is piracy. Users prefer it not just because it's free, but because it's more convenient. Bittorrent and YouTube have already trained a new generation of viewers that the place to watch shows is on a computer screen.
Read the full article at Paul Graham's site. Article originally seen on Slashdot.
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