Since the day the first symbols were etched on standing stones, through the first papyrus scrolls, the invention of money and morse code, humans were destined to communicate through virtual networks.

Mr Ray Hammond, renowned futurologist and author of The On-line Handbook and Digital Business believes that the Internet and instantaneous virtual communication is a natural extension of being human.

In 1984 he accurately predicted that the linking of computers around the world was going to have far-reaching effects. He wrote that the spread of knowledge, the interchange of ideas and the dissemination of information were going to produce a revolution in our society.

He sees the Internet as no different than the series of virtual inventions, from the first money to credit cards, whose value is based solely on agreement of the people using it.

Mr Hammond has no time for the people who are sceptical about the Internet's business potential or about the high value being put on new technology companies going public.

He said "the pundits are screaming it's a bubble but they're wrong".

However, Mr Hammond said that a correction of 50 or 60 per cent would be expected in some overvalued stocks that were being driven by people looking for a quick killing on their shares.

Crucially, though, he said the Internet has changed the nature of economies fundamentally. The Internet and technology are and will be the way forward for industry according to Mr Hammond.

"When the significant correction in the value of technology stocks does come about, everybody will scream I told you so. But the same thing happened after the computer boom of 1981-82 and the spread of the personal computer became a wave, a movement that was profound and real.

"This isn't just a one-day wonder. Things have changed, the speed of money has increased," he said.

Although fashion and fear have contributed to the meteoric rise of technology stocks, Mr Hammond said that investors looking for larger than average growth in stocks were also pushing up values.

He happened on the huge potential of computing when living in California in the late 1970s. Mr Hammond, a mild dyslexic, struggled with getting what he wanted to say on paper. However, some of the pioneers of the personal computer were living next door.

They gave Mr Hammond a piece of software for his primitive computer which would allow him to go back and correct his spelling mistakes. Although seemingly a minor thing, "It was like the sun coming up," he said.

After this, he was struck by the power that computing had to improve the lives of people. He returned to study programming, physics, and computer science and discovered the potential of the Internet and the future of an online world.

Mr Hammond said the speed at which money moved was central to the new wave. The more frequently money is used and reused in any one day the more value it has.

Electronic commerce has facilitated use and reuse of money over and over again in a short period of time.

He said that you can see that the Internet has profoundly changed the way retailing, banking, travel, broadcasting and the print media operate.

The main barrier he sees to businesses, no matter how large or small, in developing electronic capabilities is language.

No matter how many conferences or seminars a business person goes to, people need to sit down and learn the language (technobabble), how it is used and what it means according to Mr Hammond.

Only then will they be able to see potential ways of improving their business and generating cost savings with new technologies.

Recently, predictions surfaced that 75 per cent of Internet companies would fail in the next five years. Mr Hammond believes that the rate of failure could be even higher but that for the companies which do succeed the scale of success will be huge.

Fifteen years ago Mr Hammond predicted much of what has happened with the Internet, now he believes that mobile communications will be the way forward and Europe is well-placed to take advantage of that.

"There is a wave breaking all over Europe and I'm sure this will be followed by wave after wave after that. It is not just a passing bubble," he said.

He believes the dominant organisations to emerge from the technology revolution will be those incorporating mobile (WAP) and Internet technology with people doing everything from remote or mobile devices.

He said Vodafone and other such companies were well-positioned to take advantage of the tech revolution.

The explosive growth in demand for mobile phones coupled with the growing use and interest in using networks, including the Internet, to communicate, is going to lead to more and more demand for portable technology.

If he were starting out in business he would be providing people with an up-to-the-minute event guide for their local area over their mobile phones, with what is going on in every nightclub, theatre and bar in the city.

The future will be in the vein of WAP enabled mobile phones, laptops and palm technology, he said.

Improvements in speech recognition, and speech and visual computer interfaces will also facilitate this movement, according to Mr Hammond.

Advances in biotechnology and genetics will have major implications for the human race, with scientists soon being able to map the complete genetic make up of the human body, he said.

The day when microscopic computers, using nanotechnology, are routinely incorporated into the human body may not be far away, he said. All companies can take enormous advantage of new technologies and the Internet.

Mr Hammond sees it as an opportunity for companies and industries to rethink the whole workings of their operations from start to finish from procurement and inventory, to production, recruitment and human resources.

He believes that the Republic has a strong high-tech base and that although it is vulnerable to a world economic downturn, because of the openness of the economy, such economies are now able to react more quickly.

The Asian recession did not sweep around the world as everybody expected, he said. And while cycles of recession have not disappeared they have become gentler, according to Mr Hammond.

He believes economies are now more responsive to changes and governments and banks are able to fine tune their interest rates and polices to adapt to changing conditions.

The down side to the creation of a new economy is the emergence of the mega-merger and giant transnational corporations more powerful than nation-states yet without being accountable, Mr Hammond claims.