The world is a much different place now than it was a century ago; that's an obvious statement.

And in the previous three installments of this series, we've looked at how that's happened.
First, technology has made great leaps forward.

"The Industrial Era has been just remarkable, primarily for it's pace of technological change, and all the benefits that has brought to American life," says Gregory Summers, Associate Professor of History at the University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point.

People's attitudes and values are also quite different.

Connie Sexauer, Associate Professor of History at the University of Wisconsin-Marathon County says, "The changes in morality have been vast, and I don't want to necessarily judge whether that's good or bad, but it's certainly a huge difference we've seen, especially over the last 50 years."

"Things that we took for granted as being moralistically sound back in the 60's and 70's have changed a lot today," adds Ann Applegate, Associate Lecturer of Music at UWMC.

And through talking to kids of yesterday and today, we've found that while the base experience is still the same, childhoods have changed somewhat as well.

80 year old Mark Zelich says, "Not having television, not having disposals, not having microwaves, (we had) none of that..."

"We have a lot more technology stuff than playing with a little hula hoop on a stick and pushing it around," adds 11 year old Katy Pozorski.

And all of that really shows how much has changed in recent history, but where do things go from here?

We've definitely seen a technological boom, but will the changes keep coming?

"If you think about it, in the last 200 years or 250 years, the pace of technological change is certainly escalating, and like I said, I don't think it's likely to get any slower in the near future at least," says Summers.

Sexauer adds, "Unless something drastically happens, I think we'll continue with these improvements, and I think they will come at quicker paces."

And will attitudes and values continue to loosen? Will musicians continue to shock us?

"In terms of where things go from here, that's a good question. I don't think anyone really knows..." says Jeff Erickson, Director of Instrumental Music at UWMC. "Can we go farther? I guess, I mean the performers could be completely nude, but I'm not sure how much farther we go."

Applegate adds, "Nothing sits still, we could look at the world of fashion, we could look at the world of architecture, we could look at the world of cars... The innovators, the people that really want to be, and are trying to be cutting edge, and are trying to do different things, sometimes do things that people of a previous generation will view as controversial."

And while these changes seem like giant leaps forward, how will they look to people in the future?

Summers says, "Five hundred years from now if there's people looking back at this period of time, the 19th, 20th, and 21st centuries, I think you're going to look at this period as a period of major upheaval and major technological change, and it sort of depends on how we handle that change, whether they're going to look back and blame us for something, or whether they're going to look back and say, 'This is where things took a real turn for the better.'"

Sexauer adds, "Overall I would say that it's changes for the better, I mean I think that our lifestyle is certainly a lot more comfortable, and we have access to a lot more information."

So through the course of all of these reports, it's become clear that we are living in an incredibly important time.

But by the same token, the world will continue to evolve, as generation after generation continues the generation of change.

To view previous reports in this series, click the links below.