Email and the web have traditionally been the two ubiquitous services on the internet (prior to the web, it was email and usenet). Podcasting (and vidcasting/vodcasting) is now becoming another ubiquitous service. The reason I mention this was an interesting quote on BBC news today in a story about the web’s birthday. Despite the story having nothing to do with podcasting, it’s intro’d as follows (@ 25:00):

The world wide web is 15 years old. While podcasting is relatively new, it's difficult for many of us to remember a time before email and websites. </blockquote> For a long time, I tried to use games as an example of the difference between the net and the web, to point out to non-techies that the net is more than just surfing. No longer. There's another service becoming ubiquitous as well: telephony (IM alone never got past early adopter stage). In the aforementioned story, the BBC's futurologist points to mobile as the next big thing. I tend to agree, and this is a case where the "leapfrogging" buzzword will come into full play. So much depends on mobile telephony regulation and the degree of innovation within the telco industry. Right now, mobile internet rates are laughable in most countries, and development platforms remain as fragmented and obscure as ever.