Progress And Disruption

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The Realities of Progress and Disruption
The "Idea of Progress" is a theory stating that, advances in technology, science, and social organisation inevitably produce an improvement on the wellbeing of mankind. The theory implies that progress is virtuous and driven by conscious human endeavour.
Over the past century of “progress”, mankind has endured two World Wars, the Great Depression, and the potential of a nuclear holocaust, environmental catastrophe, and more recently the global financial crisis. The notion, at least philosophically, that progress is always good, appears fallacious. When contemplating change in today’s environment, it may no longer be appropriate to reference such change in terms of progress but rather “innovation”.
In …show more content…

In academia centuries old educational institutions are threatened by online learning. Traditional manufacturing is being displacing by three dimensional printing. In transportation we observe a company called Uber, (a mobile-app-based transportation network), which has, within a short space of time, reengineered our experience of public transport. Treating a virus is no longer the sole domain of a medical practitioner and bank robbers look less like Val Kilmer and more like Dilbert.
As computing power increases and more things connect through the internet, disruption will not only expand into new realms but the speed at which it does so will increase exponentially. From an asset management perspective the implication of disruption manifests in uncertainty, increased volatility within financial markets and the threat of a permanent loss of capital in investments previously considered as …show more content…

Hertzog in 1915 as a publisher & printer of newspapers and magazines. It is unlikely that the Company would have survived the modern age had it not taken, in 1985, what was then deemed a risky decision to form an electronic pay television business, M-Net. The company used digital technology to disrupt traditional broadcasting in South Africa, built a dominant position domestically and subsequently entrenched itself in the rest of Africa. Today Naspers has evolved into a global internet platform provider and operator with principal operations in internet services, especially ecommerce, pay television, and print media with a presence in more than 120 countries. Through its 35% ownership of Tencent, Naspers is exposed to one of China 's largest and most used internet service portals and is one of the largest internet companies globally, ranking amongst Google, Amazon, EBay and

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