You're right that in the CURRENT state of affairs, high speeds don't do much for web applications as we know them to exist today. The web is here to stay, but not in the form we currently know it.
I disagree that "more bandwidth...will be more of the same." The reason is when I look at other aspects of computing that have gotten better in the past, and what they've enabled, it seems like that's not true.
a couple decades ago, 1MB RAM was unfathomable. What would you possibly do with all that space? We can write programs in 64kb! Well, looks like we added layers and layers of abstractions to make it easier for programmers at the expense of more work for computers.
The miniaturization of hard drives and the increase in their capacity has changed the game a quite a bit. iPods would not be possible without small hard drives. While it's not the only reason, without it or other similar technology, we wouldn't have had a change in consumer music and culture.
Like your edit says, with huge bandwidth, your computer here is just as good as a computer "there" Imagine if your internet connection is as fat of a pipe as the one going from your hard drive to your motherboard. SCSI, ATA100, whatever. Remote desktop applications will be just as fast as locally running one nowadays.
If that's the case, 3D gaming can be completely remote, and subscription based gaming can become the norm, rather than purchasing boxes and CDs.
If video and TV really do make it on the internet, I imagine it can change the way we watch it. No longer do we see disjointed segments of content, nor will we have 'channels' where we have to wait to watch something. We will be able to pick and choose what we watch, even entire archives of past shows at our whim. On demand won't just be for movies anymore. (Well, that's given that the noose of big media doesn't strangle innovation)
My guess is more bandwidth won't be much more of the same. We'll see more "wasted" bandwidth according to our present defn, but they'll be used in entirely different ways.
I disagree that "more bandwidth...will be more of the same." The reason is when I look at other aspects of computing that have gotten better in the past, and what they've enabled, it seems like that's not true.
a couple decades ago, 1MB RAM was unfathomable. What would you possibly do with all that space? We can write programs in 64kb! Well, looks like we added layers and layers of abstractions to make it easier for programmers at the expense of more work for computers.
The miniaturization of hard drives and the increase in their capacity has changed the game a quite a bit. iPods would not be possible without small hard drives. While it's not the only reason, without it or other similar technology, we wouldn't have had a change in consumer music and culture.
Like your edit says, with huge bandwidth, your computer here is just as good as a computer "there" Imagine if your internet connection is as fat of a pipe as the one going from your hard drive to your motherboard. SCSI, ATA100, whatever. Remote desktop applications will be just as fast as locally running one nowadays.
If that's the case, 3D gaming can be completely remote, and subscription based gaming can become the norm, rather than purchasing boxes and CDs.
If video and TV really do make it on the internet, I imagine it can change the way we watch it. No longer do we see disjointed segments of content, nor will we have 'channels' where we have to wait to watch something. We will be able to pick and choose what we watch, even entire archives of past shows at our whim. On demand won't just be for movies anymore. (Well, that's given that the noose of big media doesn't strangle innovation)
My guess is more bandwidth won't be much more of the same. We'll see more "wasted" bandwidth according to our present defn, but they'll be used in entirely different ways.