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Title:
The World's Technological Capacity to Store, Communicate, and Compute Information
Authors:
Hilbert, Martin; López, Priscila
Affiliation:
AA(Annenberg School of Communication, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA 90089, USA; United Nations Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC)), AB(Information and Communication Sciences Department, Open University of Catalonia, Barcelona 08018, Spain)
Publication:
Science, Volume 332, Issue 6025, pp. 60- (2011). (Sci Homepage)
Publication Date:
04/2011
Category:
COMP/MATH
Origin:
SCIENCE
Abstract Copyright:
(c) 2011: Science
DOI:
10.1126/science.1200970
Bibliographic Code:
2011Sci...332...60H

Abstract

We estimated the world's technological capacity to store, communicate, and compute information, tracking 60 analog and digital technologies during the period from 1986 to 2007. In 2007, humankind was able to store 2.9 × 1020 optimally compressed bytes, communicate almost 2 × 1021 bytes, and carry out 6.4 × 1018 instructions per second on general-purpose computers. General-purpose computing capacity grew at an annual rate of 58%. The world's capacity for bidirectional telecommunication grew at 28% per year, closely followed by the increase in globally stored information (23%). Humankind's capacity for unidirectional information diffusion through broadcasting channels has experienced comparatively modest annual growth (6%). Telecommunication has been dominated by digital technologies since 1990 (99.9% in digital format in 2007), and the majority of our technological memory has been in digital format since the early 2000s (94% digital in 2007).
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