We wouldn't have Google, if we did not have the internet, and we could not have Faxes before we had telephones. Just as we could not have Blockchains before the Internet. Technology just as most things in life are just part of a greater evolution.

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I believe everybody in the world knows who Microsoft is and what they do. Being in the IT industry since 1995, I have seen many great companies come and go, but Microsoft has always been around and I believe they will still be around for quite some time.

There are techies in the world that absolutely loves Microsoft, and there are those who do not like Microsoft at all. I personally have a lot of respect for Microsoft in what they've accomplished over the past few decades. I do not really have a preference of operating systems, as I believe that the core operating system is just a means to an end.

What did Microsoft do right?

Well, in short, they had a vision of getting a computer into everybody's house and office, and they managed to do it. They had a few major breakthroughs in their early days, when they created one of the first major operating systems which turned into the Windows most of us use today on some or other computer. I believe the second major breakthrough was their Office Suite of products, like Word, Excel, Outlook and PowerPoint. The third major breakthrough in my opinion is Microsoft SharePoint which are now used by most companies in the world, for their Intranet, Document and Records Management systems.

The bottom line is that Microsoft entrenched themselves in most of our lives and can be seen as a trustworthy partner in the computer industry

The internet changed all our lives

Not many people are in the position to visualize a world without the internet. Google became a household name and I don't believe there are many people in the world who believes that Facebook can be taken out from a library.

Technological advances are moving at the fastest pace in the history of mankind. That is now if there weren't another civilization before us, that were more advanced than we are now. I am not a specialist on the subject of civilizations and there might have been, I do not know. What I can tell you is that every generation has something that were invented or discovered during their lifetimes.

Similar questions are always asked, but just about different things:

• How did we world work without the radio ?
• How did we world work before telephones?
• What as the world like before television?
• What was the world like before Faxes?
• What was the world like before Cellular phones?
• What was the world like before the internet?
• Was Google not there when you were younger? That is just not possible.

What is interesting though is that we will always need something to happen before the next thing can be implemented.

I can promise you if the human race and our planet is still around in a few hundred years, every generation will have new questions about what the world was like before whatever is going to be discovered or invented.

The future of the internet

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Another thing that will change in my opinion is the internet, especially the underlying technology. Blockchain will play a massive part in the underlying technologies, especially now that the technology is going through a development cycle, where it is becoming faster and easier to develop. If we look at Blockchains like Graphene, Steem, Bitshares and soon to be EOS, they are far superior than everything out there.

Crypto Currencies, might soon become a form of payment that will be accepted by a widespread audience, as it is inevitable that the masses will adopt this as a standard, but that also depends if some or other government or large organisation does not find a way to stop this ever-growing snowball before it hits home.

There are a lot of speculation of what will and what can happen, but only the future will tell. For me the next step of the evolution, should be some sort of digital identity or logon credential that is globally accepted. We should not need to have a Facebook account, and a Google Account and a Steemit Account and a logon at the office and a Logon for your Bank and and and… to be honest, why do we even need a cellular phone number. As long as you are logged into your device with your digital identity I should be able to contact you on the device when it is showing your Green Presence indicator.

The digital identity of the future.

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I have written various posts about Digital Identities in the past, and in my opinion one of the next steps for our technology evolution should be a Digital Identity standard accepted by everybody everywhere. The technology already exists, but the problem will be who will win the fight to dominate the space of digital identities.

It might be one of the larger companies, like Google, Facebook, Twitter, Microsoft or it might even be a company like CIVIC initiated by well- known serial entrepreneur, Vinny Lingham, who is building a decentralized identity on top of the Bitcoin Blockchain. Only time will tell.

Vinny, should you ever read this, please move your blog to Steemit :) I always read your blog posts, and you can earn some Steem at the same time, with which you could buy Bitcoin of course :)

I do like the possible future approach from Microsoft, which they highlight in a recent article. Their approach should be to not only have a digital identity, which allows you access to their eco-system, but to the wider internet. If you look at Facebook and Google, they allow you to use your Facebook credentials to log into most sites in any case, but again, that is for other reasons, and not necessarily to help the world. They just want more data for your dossier as explained in this post.

Please provide your opinions on having a single digital identity in the comment section.

Happy Steeming!

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