…netbooks
….microsoft azure
… google apps, chrome OS
…mobile internet devices
…internet-enabled televisions and set-top boxes

We take it for granted now, but it was over 25 years ago that a man by the name of John Gage said it first: “The Network is the Computer“.   At the time, he was one of the first few employees at a small startup in Santa Clara, and this prescient statement became their unofficial motto.

That company was Sun Microsystems.

Time passed, Sun became known as a company with better technology than management, and tomorrow (July 16th), the company’s shareholders will vote ‘yes’ to ending it all as Oracle’s latest acquisition.

It’s a good time, then, to give John Gage the credit he deserves: 25 years later,  and only the slightest modification  is needed:  “The Internet is the Computer“   … or perhaps “The Networks are the Computer”.

Via its more-popular-than-ever Java programming language, Sun was out there in front on hardware virtualization too - however, sometimes getting the technology right offers little protection against getting the business wrong.