http://www.forbes.com/sites/gilpress/2015/12/27/a-very-short-history-of-digitization/
The expression of data as ones and zeros facilitates its generation, replication, compression, and dissemination (see A Very Short History of Big Data); its analysis (see A Very Short History of Data Science); and its organization (see A Very Short History of the Internet and the Web). It also encourages the replacement or augmentation of the physical with the virtual or online presence (see A Very Short History of the Internet of Things).