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Communication Technologies:
Peter
S. Yao
Mar 20 2002
It's unanimously acknowledged that every one of the three industrial revolutions was the ultimate driving force pushing the subsequent global economy to a faster pace of development. The first technological revolution happened the United Kingdom, bringing the country to the most powerful economy in 19th century. The second and the third both took place in the United States, whose strong economy has met no rivals thereafter. Now, we are facing, if possible, the fourth one. IT has undeniably widespread applications in todayˇ¦s industry, granting business a golden opportunity to boom. For Asia-Pacific countries, this really appears to be a rare opportunity for development---he who dominates this 4th wave of industrial revolution will dominate the global economy in the 21st century. We have superb software engineers in India, vast human resource in China and highly mobile capital flow in Hong Kong. If these advantages could ever be combined to establish a kind of ˇ§IT allianceˇ¨ in our region, then U.S. will not be a competent enemy any more.
We youth master this century. We youth hold a central role in the IT wave. We youth are the cadre developers of global economy in the next generation. Now we are talking about intellectual economy. Education and knowledge have never before been put so much weight. We youth are in the most valuable age to learn, therefore, weˇ¦ve got advantageous chances to equip ourselves with sufficient knowledge ready for the future. Itˇ¦s true that economic development relies on people, but more specifically, it relies on intellects. The cheap labor in the past can now be replaced by advanced technology---robots produced in Japan can handle extremely tough work that no human being could ever do, and they can have the equal amount of knowledge as a human worker. However, hi-tech needs management by intellectual people. Another case in point is the modern war, which is often undertaken in a very short period in the form of hi-tech controls. Similarly, the person behind those controlled weapons is the genuine attacker. The world is going to be run by hi-tech, and hi-tech needs to be run by smart persons.
We are youth. We have a mission, for the good of our world.
Quoting from a last century Chinese leader, Deng Xiaoping, development is a must. When bracing for the hi-tech dominated century, what should us youth do? Everyone should contemplate.