The only way you can predict the future is to build it.
Perl is another example of filling a tiny, short-term need, and then being a real problem in the longer term.
An important technology first creates a problem and then solves it.
The computer is simply an instrument whose music is ideas.
The protean nature of the computer is such that it can act like a machine or like a language to be shaped and exploited.
It's all about long-term, sustaining relationships.