Thomas Friedman Quotes

Just as we could have rode into the sunset, along came the Internet, and it tripled the significance of the PC.

The Internet, like the steam engine, is a technological breakthrough that changed the world.

We're still in the first minutes of the first day of the Internet revolution.

This is … a time when there is increasingly no such thing as a high-wage, middle-skilled job — the thing that sustained the middle class in the last generation. Now there is only a high-wage, high-skilled job. Every middle-class job today is being pulled up, out or down faster than ever. That is, it either requires more skill or can be done by more people around the world or is being buried — made obsolete — faster than ever

You’re going to have some very amazing capabilities in the economy. When we have computers that can do more and more jobs, it’s going to change how we think about work. There’s no way around that. You can’t wish it away.

The globe is shrinking, the information age is bringing a lot of changes. People are anxious about their future and their children's futures.

This is a very exciting time in the world of information. It's not just that the personal computer has come along as a great tool. The whole pace of business is moving faster. Globalization is forcing companies to do things in new ways.

The world is poised on the cusp of an economic and cultural shift as dramatic as that of the Industrial Revolution.

Because I do think - not just in building AOL - but just the world in which we live is a very confusing, rapidly changing world where technology has accelerated.

People can get information - on entertainment, politics, finance - much easier than before. That will change the way people do business, the way people live.

The speed of communication, the speed of information transfer, the cheapness of communication, the ease of moving things around the world are a difference in kind as well as degree.

People are talking about the Internet as though it is going to change the world. It's not going to change the world. It's not going to change the way we think, and it's not going to change the way we feel.

Just as the PC bled back into industrial economy, I think the Internet is going to bleed back into our overall economy and have a transformative effect on major sectors that we don't yet foresee.

I spent my whole career in the technology business, and I was convinced of the importance, at a grand scale, of the development of global connectivity.

In my world view, clearly the Internet is a huge force multiplier for Indian media because it has not crept up on us like something invisible; we've seen it all play out in the West.

The story of the Internet is this incredibly strong, exciting change.

We are entering a new phase in human history - one in which fewer and fewer workers will be needed to produce the goods and services for the global population.

This is a very different world. Much of it is new. What has happened is that information technology has politicized the world…It’s a world where most of the big problems spill over national boundaries.

… post-industrial society

By 2005, it will become clear that the Internet’s impact on the economy has been no greater than the fax machine’s.

We changed the world many ways with the Internet.

The Internet isn't just itself a revolution - it sometimes starts them, too.

Mankind had the agricultural revolution, the industrial revolution, and now this third one, the information revolution.

We have something very powerful in our hands with the Internet, and we still don't really understand fully its power.

While the digital transformation of industries will be profound, we must keep in mind that it will have wider economic and social impact, too, as with previous revolutions driven by steam and coal, electricity and computers.