I'd like to write a thank you note to technology - communications technology in particular.

The house where I live in London was first occupied in 1901.

It seems very strange to think that 100 years ago someone might have sat at the same window I am sat at now and wrote a letter with pen and ink to a family member living all the way down at the bottom of the world in New Zealand.

Their letter would have travelled by ship for months before it could be read by the recipient, and months more would pass before a reply could be received.

Today, as I sit by this window, I press a button to turn on my laptop and in seconds I am connected to high-speed wireless internet that allows my letters back home to be instantly received and replied to.

If this isn't amazing enough, with the webcam and microphone in my laptop I can log into Skype - an internet service that enables users to make voice and video calls over the internet - and I find myself face to face with my parents (and the family cat).

The entire planet between us seems to disappear completely and we chat as if we were in the same room together.

Mum tells me that my sister is doing her radio show in Auckland at that moment, so I reach for my mobile phone, flick to the internet radio application I downloaded and there she is, announcing the next song to Auckland city ...and her brother in London.

Mum calls my sister's mobile phone and puts her on speaker so the whole family in 3 different locations can all speak to each other at once.

I request a song and next thing I know, the song being played in Auckland comes through the speakers on my phone in London.

It all makes me wonder who will be sitting at this window in another 100 years and what distant galaxies they might be writing letters to.