Latin American Tech Trends

Latin Trade, Jan, 2001 by Greg Brown, Matthew Estevez, Gabriela Calderon

IF YOU REPEAT A TECHNO-MANTRA LONG ENOUGH AND LOUD ENOUGH ("WAP! Broadband! Clicks-and-mortar!") people will begin to believe the hype, at least long enough to make some cash on the IPO. Dot-com revolution, anyone? Nevertheless, global pools of hungry investment capital will seek, and find, the new new thing, if only because the bond market is no place to be while interest rates stay low.

LATIN TRADE asked industry leaders and Wall Street gurus for pointers on the months ahead. We tackled four categories--wireless, clicks-and-mortar, infrastructure and dot-coms. Some companies were hot, and got mentioned more often, but all won high marks from at least two independent analysts in our top-of-mind survey.

For good measure--and for fun--we asked several fiction writers for their vision of the tech future. Separating the fact from the fiction, well, that's up to you.

IT WAS 1955. I WAS 10, MY LITTLE BROTHER MATTHEW, SIX. We lived at the country place of my grandfather, an old grouch who hated children, cats and sunsets. In that order. One day we decided to play a joke on him--we never imagined that he would go so crazy because of our innocent prank--so we caught an enormous, hairy disgusting spider and put it in one of his riding boots. The next morning, upon dressing and putting on his boots, he felt the horrible sting of the venomous spider and let out an unearthly scream, called us into the living room, nailed us there with a wicked stare and cast upon us this curse:

"When you are big you will spend eight hours a day in front of a screen with billions of tiny points of light that will, bit by bit, penetrate into the curves of your brain, into the center of your soul, damaging your senses in a terrifying way, but you, without taking note of your misfortune, will continue to live in front of the screen, using it to communicate with the world and there will come a moment when practically every part of your lives will occur through this screen, 'online,' and through it you will do your shopping, make bank deposits, rent homes, play bridge, get jobs, send letters to friends, fire employees, select presidential candidates and very soon do your work, which you will save on the screen's memory Every once in a while, from this same screen, there will emerge the subhuman voice of a woman, a voice drenched in the smoke of some virtual cigarette, which will tell you, without hesitation, without soul, without heart: 'Warning, your access to the remote control has been disconnected du e to error 43RX,' and the screen will immediately go black, throwing hours of your work into the void, where you will never recover it and then you, without losing hope completely will turn the screen back on but, again, the voice will emerge from the millions of points of light, 'Warning, your computer has been improperly disconnected, please turn it on again,' and everything will turn off and when at last you will have put things in order, a storm will begin and a bolt of lightning will travel up to your screen and destroy letters to your friends, the boss's contracts, interesting articles, photos of grandchildren, clients' addresses, essays and papers, a complete novel, love notes and the only copy of my will. And then you two, realizing with horror what your lives have become, will begin to cry and a plastic angel with green wings will emerge from the screen and say: 'Nothing, absolutely nothing can be recovered from the inky void of cyberspace'...This is what I hope for your future."

We stood there looking at him with our mouths hanging open, and we didn't doubt in the least bit that he had gone mad.

Elizabeth Suhercaseaux was born in Santiago, Chile. A journalist and a writer, she has published seven novels, three political essays, four humorous books on machismo and her short stories have been anthologized. Her articles, essays and interviews have appeared in newspapers and magazines across Latin America, the United States and Europe.

HE CAREFULLY SEPARATED THE BRANCHES OF THE BUSH TO catch a glimpse. The aroma from the soft leaves caressed his sense of smell. There he saw her amidst a clearing in the woods. She tiptoed toward him, smiling, her eyes slightly squinted. Her skin was a perfect combination of gold with roses. Her perfume gave off a scent of temptation. Her eyelids opened to reveal her big blue eyes.

"Caress me" she whispered.

His fingers touched her cheeks, her neck, her shoulders. He gently grazed her breasts, descending toward her waist.

"Come," she said nervously her arms extended toward him.

He moved on top of that perfect body that fervently longed for him.

"You are mine. Only mine," she said hoarsely, digging her nails into his back.

The stench made him shudder. He opened his eyes, startled by the suddenly bony feel to the body he embraced. He tried to escape from the horrifying skeletal figure as the yellow-teethed monster lunged toward his neck. The creature's arms were like those of a diabolical crustacean. Terror petrified him and the last thing he sensed was the smell of wet soil mixed with rotten leaves that fell from the jaws of the monster.