$ - You miss the point of the entire post...there is no comparable historical precident for the web...either in terms of beneficial financial impact, nor in terms of scale, nor speed...
To ignore the true (but indirect) fiscal benefits of the web is to close ones eyes. The closest historical precidents I can think of were things like: agriculture, bronze, iron, steam, railroads, electricity, radio, automobiles, airplanes, computers.
Even the last, the computer, has only recently begun to delivery its full benefit to society...mostly due to the web-brought ability to communicate to other computers.
I say again, NERO-SPAN |