Internet, Amazon, and Jeff Bezos

This morning I had an interesting conversation with one of my student workers. I don't even remember what precipitated the question, it may have been after I spent time researching a purchase online earlier in the day and we marveled together over the relative ease of locating the desired information. But one thing lead to another and we began discussing, hypothetically of course, what did we do before the Internet? The kicker? This particular student turned 21 only a few months ago. That means she really does not remember not having Internet.

It, the Internet, has become so much a part of mainstream life that I had to stop and think back to purchasing my very own computer and getting online for the first time. It was in the middle 90's and I remarked to her my first online purchase (it all went downhill from there) was from Amazon.com. She was appropriately shocked my first online purchase ever was a book. So, I wasn't a librarian then. Reading has been my drug of choice for years.

This evening, while channel surfing after being annoyed I would not get another Pirates vs Cubs baseball game, watched parts of a History Channel program about Jeff Bezos @ Amazon.com. Even with the strange little vingettes on business, it was fun to see how the company has grown since opening in Bezos's basement to a billion dollar venture. Probably more eye-opening is how the scope and landscape of the Internet has changed in the last ten years. Heck, even the last two years. Who know about blogs before 2000? Now there are millions of blogs created every minute.

Tags: Internet, Amazon.com, Jeff Bezos, Blogs, Blogging