I think new economies is a good proxy. The computer invented an entirely new economy. So did the automobile, computer networking, television, radio, the telegraph, electricity, air travel, moving pictures, recorded audio, the light bulb, washing machine, dishwasher, etc. All of these things created not just the immediate industry, but an entire ecosystem of products and services related to the industry.
You could probably also measure it in terms of essential inventions: we can't live without the internet, but if Instagram or Facebook went away tomorrow, we'd have lots of alternatives for sharing photos and talking to our friends. Instagram and Facebook make those things nicer, but don't allow us to do anything we weren't doing before. The internet (or, I guess, the web) allowed for entirely new forms of communication and commerce.
From my perspective, we haven't seen a new economy emerge in the last decade, at least. The internet (maybe molecular biology) was the last invention to really create a new industry, and that was the mid-90s. Maybe robotics is the next one, but it's hard to tell prospectively.
By that standard, surely Airbnb is a "new economy". And Google certainly qualifies, given the number of firms dedicated to nothing but optimizing AdWords.
I don't know about AirBnB. People have been renting rooms for as long as they've been traveling, and vacation rentals existed long before AirBnB existed -- but they certainly make things more efficient than the way they used to be. That said, if I'm counting "washing machines", then perhaps AirBnB should count, too (or anything that increases efficiency of a thing we already do by an order of magnitude; it's an interesting debate, and I'm not sure which side I'm on).
I agree with you on AdWords, though. That was really the first time advertising was made quantifiable on a large scale (the innovation), and it resulted in a new industry.
You could probably also measure it in terms of essential inventions: we can't live without the internet, but if Instagram or Facebook went away tomorrow, we'd have lots of alternatives for sharing photos and talking to our friends. Instagram and Facebook make those things nicer, but don't allow us to do anything we weren't doing before. The internet (or, I guess, the web) allowed for entirely new forms of communication and commerce.
From my perspective, we haven't seen a new economy emerge in the last decade, at least. The internet (maybe molecular biology) was the last invention to really create a new industry, and that was the mid-90s. Maybe robotics is the next one, but it's hard to tell prospectively.