] Little by little, we're turning into a planet of techies. ] ] Which should come as no surprise. It has happened before. ] Time and again, attractive new technologies have trickled ] out of the labs and into homes and offices, forcing ] ordinary users to develop skills that once would have ] seemed far too advanced for them. Early automobiles were ] so unreliable that drivers carried tool kits and learned ] ] ] ] to fix the balky machines. Early radio sets were ] handbuilt by avid hobbyists. "This is all part of a ] fairly predictable pattern," said Harvard Business School ] professor Debora Spar, author of "Ruling the Waves," |