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Technology

HOW WILL INTERNET

CHANGE THE WORLD?

BY ANDREW CHAKHOYAN

When Estonia is contemplating a launch of its own What impact does mobile have on society? How can
digital currency (Estcoin), Deutsche Telekom is we find a balance between accelerating technological
running pilots on a 5G connection, and America progress and governments’ responsibility to improve the
ponders the future of Net Neutrality, we witness economic conditions and raise the level of wellbeing for
various manifestations of the same dilemma: how will their citizens?
the increased digital connectivity revolutionise our Competitiveness offers a useful framework for consid-
technologies, reform our societies, and change our ering such questions. As the IMF warns about economic
lives in the ways we can hardly anticipate? slowdown, markets grow more volatile, and pundits become
increasingly pessimistic about growth prospects, enlightened
he rollout of 5G is expected to enable and widely policy-makers across the world have made the pursuit of
disseminate technologies, such as: the Internet of competitiveness, rather than GDP, their principal economic
T Things, self-driving cars, autonomous drones, and goal. Competitiveness is about the fundamentals and the
Star Wars-inspired hologram phones. What was considered positioning for a successful future, unlike GDP, which is
VFLHQFH ÀFWLRQ MXVW D GHFDGH DJR LV FXUUHQWO\ EHLQJ susceptible to Kondratiev Waves and is often dependent
prototyped, tested, and piloted. A $1 billion investment in on natural endowments, commodities super-cycles, mone-
a New Mexico “ghost town” speaks for itself. And, as we tary policies in some of the world’s biggest economies, and
enter the era of 5G, the formerly futuristic gadgets might other external factors.
just become commonplace. What then is the best way to improve competitive-
But what are the broader policy implications of ever- ness? As with all the other complex problems, there isn’t
improving connectivity? a single solution. Different strategies apply to countries

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