This revolution, the information revoultion, is a revolution of free energy as well, but of another kind: free... — Steve Jobs

This revolution, the information revoultion, is a revolution of free energy as well, but of another kind: free intellectual energy. It's very crude today, yet our Macintosh computer takes less power than a 100-watt bulb to run it and it can save you hours a day. What will it be able to do ten or 20 years from now, or 50 years from now?

Author: Steve Jobs

Insight: There's something almost quaint about Jobs wondering what computers might do in 50 years—we're basically living in his answer now. But what still resonates isn't the prediction itself; it's the deeper insight buried in it: that technology's real power isn't measured in speed or storage, but in how much mental energy it frees up for what matters to you. Think about what happens when a tool works well. You stop thinking about the tool and start thinking about your actual problem. A bad email system eats your whole morning; a good one disappears into the background. That's the revolution Jobs is really talking about—not fancier computers, but ones that demand so little from us that we have more left for creativity, learning, and simply being present. We still haven't fully figured this out, honestly. We've built tools that can do almost anything, but many of them demand constant attention and emotional labor. The underrated part? Jobs assumed that freed-up intellectual energy would naturally flow toward something better. He was optimistic that way. What you actually do with those saved hours is entirely up to you—and that's where most of us still stumble.

Source: Playboy Interview: Steve Jobs. Interview With David Sheff, reprints.longform.org. February 1985