Keith H. Hammonds (khammonds@fastcompany.com) is a Fast Company senior editor.

Sidebar: Additional Survey Results

Of this list, which product from the past five years do you think had the best design? In other words, which product best combined appearance, ease of use, performance, and a certain coolness?

Palm Pilot .......... 36%
Nokia's cell phones .......... 28%
Volkswagen Beetle .......... 14%
Apple iMac .......... 13%
Porsche Boxster .......... 8%
BlackBerry interactive pager .......... 1%
(comments)

There's a reason why the Palm is the de rigueur plaything of new-economy titans -- and of the titans' underlings, for that matter. It's both elegant and intuitive. Its handwriting-recognition software is blow-us-away cool. Once you enter all of your %#$@ contact information, it's insanely easy to use. Our survey audience is a tech-savvy crowd, so it's not shocking that two techie gadgets dominate this list. But Volkswagen's fun, retro-cool Beetle also had plenty of fans, as did the candy-colored iMac. Why did the BlackBerry fare so poorly? The tiny, two-way communications device has a rabidly devoted following. But relatively few people know that it's out there. And compared to the Palm, it's tough to learn how to use it. What will win this prize in five years' time? Any of these products? Or will it be a device that has yet to be invented?

Which statement do you think is closest to the truth?

"The Internet is overrated. It won't change everything. In the next five years, we'll see incremental advances in Net technology. But basically, what we see now is what we're going to get."

7%

"The Internet is still in its infancy. Over the next five years, we'll see enormous technological leaps that will make the Net more and more pervasive in our work and in our lives."

93%

From this list, choose the most defining moment of the new economy in the past five years:

Soaring stock market .......... 44%
Dotcom spree and meltdown .......... 31%
Microsoft trial .......... 12%
AOL - Time Warner merger .......... 8%
AT&T breakup .......... 4%
Daimler-Chrysler merger .......... 1%

When you think about business leaders over the next five years, which traits do you think will best define those who are successful? Are each of these traits very important, somewhat important, or not important at all?