How has technology changed - and changed us - in the past 20 years
How has technology changed
Just over two decades ago, the dotcom bubble burst, causing the stock prices of numerous technology companies to plummet. While some businesses, such as Amazon, quickly regained their value, many others were left in ruins. Technology has advanced in numerous ways in the two decades since this crash.
Today, many more people are online than at the turn of the millennium. In terms of broadband access, only about half of Americans had it at home in 2000. Today, that figure exceeds 90%.
This expansion of broadband was most emphatically not an American phenomenon. On a global scale, similar growth can be seen; while less than 7% of the world's population was online in 2000, over half of the world's population now has internet access.
Similar trends can be observed in the use of cellphones. There were 740 million cell phone subscriptions worldwide at the start of the 2000s. Two decades later, that figure has surpassed 8 billion, implying that the world now has more cellphones than people.
Simultaneously, technology became more personal and portable. Apple introduced the iPod in 2001 and the iPhone six years later, ushering in a new era of personal technology. These changes have resulted in a world in which technology pervades nearly every aspect of our lives.
Over the last two decades, technology has transformed numerous sectors, including media, climate action, and healthcare. The World Economic Forum's Technology Pioneers initiative, which recently marked its twentieth anniversary, illuminates how emerging technology leaders have influenced and responded to these changes.
The media and its consumption
The last two decades have had a significant impact on how and where we consume media. In the early 2000s, many technology firms were still focused on expanding workplace communication via advanced bandwidth for video streaming and other forms of media consumption that are now common.
Others followed suit by diversifying their media outlets beyond traditional outlets. As more people became online, early tech pioneers such as PlanetOut enabled this by providing an outlet and alternative media source for LGBTQIA communities.
Following these initial forays into new media, new communities, and alternative media, came the meteoric rise of social media. In 2004, Myspace had fewer than one million users; Facebook had not even launched. By 2018, Facebook had grown to 2.26 billion users, while other websites grew to hundreds of millions.
While these new online communities and communication channels have created wonderful spaces for alternative voices, their increased use has resulted in an increase in misinformation and polarization.
Today, numerous technology start-ups are devoted to preserving these online media spaces while also mitigating the potential for disinformation. Recently, several Tech Pioneers have taken on this issue, including TruePic – which specializes in photo identification – and Two Hat, which is developing AI-powered social media content moderation.
Climate change and green tech
Many scientists today believe that technology will eventually lead us to a carbon-neutral world. While renewed attention is being paid to climate change today, these efforts to find a technological solution are not novel. In 2001, green technology provided a new investment opportunity for post-crash technology investors, resulting in a boom in investment in renewable energy start-ups such as Bloom Energy, a 2010 Technology Pioneer.
Over the last two decades, technology start-ups have only increased their focus on climate change. Many organizations today are concentrating their efforts on initiatives other than clean energy to mitigate the effects of climate change.
Numerous start-ups, including Carbon Engineering and Climeworks, this year's Technology Pioneers, have begun to commercialize carbon capture technology. These technologies directly remove CO2 from the air, allowing scientists to mitigate some of the damage caused by previously burned fossil fuels.
Another area of growth for young technology companies today is food system innovation. Numerous companies, such as Aleph Farms and Air Protein, are developing innovative meat and dairy alternatives that are significantly more environmentally friendly than their conventional counterparts.
Biotech and healthcare
Additionally, the early 2000s saw the culmination of a biotechnology boom that began in the mid-1990s. Numerous businesses are devoted to advancing biotechnologies through enhanced technology research.
Actelion Pharmaceuticals was one of these early technology pioneers. The technology developed by Actelion examined the single layer of cells that separates each blood vessel from the blood stream. As was the case with many other biotechnology companies at the time, their primary focus was on precise disease and treatment research.
While many technology companies continue to focus on disease and treatment research, others have shifted their focus to healthcare delivery. Telehealth has grown in popularity over the last few years, with many young technology companies expanding virtual healthcare options. Individuals are receiving healthcare via new technologies such as virtual visits and chatbots, particularly during Covid-19.
Numerous companies are also directing their healthcare technology efforts toward patients rather than physicians. For example, Ada, a symptom checker app that was originally designed for doctors, has shifted its language and interface to prioritize providing information to patients about their symptoms. Other companies, such as 7 cups, are focused on providing mental healthcare directly to their users via their app, rather than through established offices.
Over the last two decades, healthcare technology has become much more personal and focused on care delivery rather than just medical research.
In the early 2000s, many businesses were still reeling from the collapse of the dotcom bubble. Since then, we've seen a significant shift in how tech innovators approach new media, climate change, and healthcare delivery, among other areas.
Simultaneously, we have seen technology companies rise to the challenge of addressing issues arising from the first group, such as internet content moderation and expanding climate change solutions.
The 2020 cohort of the Technology Pioneers marks the community's twentieth anniversary – and a look at the most recent awardees can provide insight into where the next two decades of technology may be headed.
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