http://www.reuters.com/resources/flash/include_video.swf?edition=US&videoId=97787
This year, more people than ever attend the World Economic Forum at Davos. As this video asks: Why attend? We are now capable of sharing so much information virtually.
It will probably take several generations, if ever, for the humans to become natural at virtual meetings. In the recent seminar I organized about building a large factory/showroom facility in 6 months, the people who made it happen all said that they had many face to face meetings to speed up the problem solving and decision making.
General information sharing, can be done virtually. As a matter of fact, we have been doing this liberally now for about 200 years in the form of printed books. Over the past 100 years, we expanded the sharing by audio and visual media like radio and television. We just started doing this more intensively on internet over the past 20 years. But when the matter is important and/or urgent, we will need to meet face to face.
FUJIKO SUDA 