My first day working at RBC Dominion Securities was nearly 30 years ago on October 11, 1994. The way we received and consumed information back then was so completely different than it is today that it defies belief. I had a computer in my office but I didn’t have one at home. We didn’t have email addresses when I started and I didn’t get a cell phone until 1998. Today, I have one cell phone for work and one personal and both are indispensable communication and productivity tools. This and many other changes in our lives are a direct result of the internet and looking back, I don’t think we could comprehend the magnitude of the coming shifts in business and society.

For example, do you remember the last time you picked up a phone book to look up a phone number? My phone book was delivered the other day and I’m sure the only number I will look up there is my own to make sure they got it right. An investment in the company that produces this book, Yellow Pages Ltd., hasn’t done very well. The company went public in 2003 at a value of about $1.5 billion. Today the company is worth about $130 million. Other casualties of the internet were companies like Blockbuster and ways of shopping like the Sears Catalogue. If you’re old enough to remember, it is a bit overwhelming to think about how much things have changed.

Back then, one of the ways I tried to keep up on investment trends was subscribing to magazines like Forbes and Fortune. For whatever reason, I kept the December 26, 1994 issue of Fortune magazine. It’s a bit tattered but what is really astounding about it is that there is not a single mention of the internet or website or email address. Not one! Can you imagine trying to explain to someone back then how are lives were going to be transformed by the internet? Here is a hilarious clip from the Today Show in 1994 where Katie Couric and Bryant Gumble try to explain it!

It got better in 1997. I still have the March 3, 1997 Fortune magazine “Investor’s Guide” and nearly every advertisement has a website you can visit and email addresses you can email. This is a picture of one of the ads for the now obsolete Palm Pilot. When it came out, it was the leader and the standard for hand held communications. Then the Blackberry came out and became the standard for business, essentially putting the Palm Pilot out of business. Little did we know then that 10 years later, in 2007, Apple would introduce the first iPhone and slowly but surely, put Blackberry out of business.

I mention all this because I believe we are in the midst of a new technological era that will make the last 30 years look like we were going in slow motion. The emergence of artificial intelligence (AI) is beginning to transform how we live and work and may be one of the most compelling investment opportunities ever. I will be talking more about this in the months ahead but if you want to whet your appetite on what artificial intelligence is and how it may shape our lives, this is a good article to start with from Capital Group: Global investing and the AI opportunity.

And just a reminder that taking advantage of this opportunity will be much trickier than it looks. I lived through the internet bubble and easily 95% of those companies who purported to be “internet companies” didn’t survive. I expect a similar experience in this case. More to come on that!