ABSTRACT
The information revolution is an illusion, a rhetorical gambit, an expression of profound ignorance, a movement dedicated to purveying misunderstanding and disseminating disinformation. Technology by itself is comparatively easy to hypothesise about, but such activity is of limited value. The technological determinist vision, in both its promise and curse variation, proposes revolutionary change but in a very curious way. Technological determinists generally have a very poor grasp of the world and the people in it. Certainly there is more information in the world — there are, after all, more people in the world too. In general, it is possible to take a quite opposing view and argue that increasing complexity is slowing the date of innovation and diffusion. The professionalisation of engineering was necessitated by the railroads, a charter for an Institute of Civil Engineers being secured as early as 1828.
