The New Pirates of Silicon Valley - Older Still
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I will go out on a limb and say that Napster is one of the biggest pieces of software since Windows or Office. The program was short lived, but the consequences are still sending shock waves through the Internet. This historical program wasn't invented by some computer programmer that had been programming professionally for years, but by Shawn Fanning. He didn't make it to make money, but to solve a problem him and his friends were facing.
The issue was that Shawn and his friends wanted a quicker, more efficient way to find music. They would spend hours looking through IRC and web sites for music, which was a painful process. Originally only for a few close friends, it rapidly grew. Some universities estimated that peer to peer bandwidth accounted for nearly 70 percent of all Internet traffic.
As quickly as it took off, it got killed off by the RIAA, but that hasn't ended illegal file swapping. Every time a program gets shut down, a new one, bigger and better, comes out.
This program that has changed the world and made headaches for the RIAA was created by a college student. He found the need for such a program, and with his programming skills he whipped it up.
So what makes college-aged people more "revolutionary," at least where technology is concerned? I think one of the major factors is that each generation is becoming more wired (or wireless). Bill Gates' generation, at the time he was in college, had punch cards and very little computing power. The typical person had no idea how to use a computer, let alone program one. Now a typical person in his generation knows how to use a computer efficiently and some are power users or full-fledged programmers.
This next generation, of which I would consider Shawn Fanning a part, has an abundant set of computer skills and the programs to transform their ideas into executable applications. Many of these students are taking classes which inspire them and also provide the tools to succeed with their ideas. How many of you had classes in Internet marketing, computer programming or SEO? Unless you went to college less than ten years ago, except for computer programming, these classes didn't even exist -- and even if they did, you could not major in those fields.
I think that it is easier today for younger people to revolutionize the world, because of the increasing amount of training and resources available to students these days; there is much greater access to information and technology than there was 20 years ago. All schools have computer labs fill with computers which are loaded with software such as Visual Studio, Photoshop and Office. When Bill Gates went to school, you'd be lucky if your school had a computer or two.
Along with the school providing these base programs to build your applications, many software manufacturers provide some kind of educational discount. Microsoft is one of the leaders in providing free software to students. Their DreakSpark program offers many application-building programs for free. Programs such as Visual Studio, XNA, and Windows Server are only a handful of the available software. This also gets new college graduates hooked on Microsoft software.
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