Time magazine asked Tim O’Reilly, publisher and technology advocate, about his views on what innovation will most alter how we live in the next few years. O’Reilly replied that it is collective intelligence.

I think we’re at the first stages of something that will be profoundly different from anything we have seen before, in terms of the ability of connected computers to deliver results. We’re entering an era in which software learns from its users and all of the users are connected.

I read this from an article of TIME Magazine dated October 16, 2005. This article assembled some of the smartest people including O’Reilly to identify the trends that are most likely to affect our future. I like the above quote and it is in connection with my thoughts about the Web.