I graduated from Michigan in 1984.  Fax machines were just appearing.  I remember the office managing partner complaining about fax machines.  “Why can’t people wait until the next day?  Why do I have to have a mailroom employee dedicated to the fax machine?”  He had a good point on the second one.  I don’t know how he took to email.

Fax machines now seem old school.  Email is so much easier and faster.  The documents come out nice and clean on the other end.

I’m finding myself using email less and the message capabilities of Facebook and LinkedIn much more.  Some of my clients and other contacts I never email – I know they don’t chuck email much, but they are always on Facebook.  We don’t currently have a client portal, but I know we will at some point.  That too will cut emailing things to people.

Could the predictions come true?  I don’t see social networking sites taking over just yet.  They aren’t secure enough yet, nor do they seem to have the ability to easily send attachments.  I can, however, picture this happening.

One more thing – two years, three tops until the iPad or something similar becomes a significant tool to use at client locations.