I think it was a massive thing. Not so much for the technological aspect - more that we had the bravery and desire to do it.
In the 60's, space travel was like XTR. Everybody wanted it, but only a few could have it. But the technology, materials and ideas are clearly trickling down the Deore, SLX and XT that most of us buy nowadays. The average family can afford to fly all over the world on holiday, we ride bikes made of carbon, and can send messages around the world via satellites. Hopefully one day, the benefits will become so cheap that they trickle right down to the Acera range to give kids in Africa clean drinking water.
The thing that concerns me is not that the moon landing wasn't really such a big thing in the 60's, its more that I'm not sure what the XTR equivalent spearhead is nowadays...
A space elevator would do it, but that will probably be built for commercial gain (not that this is necessarily a bad thing). As I see it, the next people to walk on the moon will be tourists. Mars is a long way off (in both senses), I suspect that if we do get there, it will be on a craft that can support life indefinitely and the people living on it will just be going there because there are bored of open space.
I would like to see huge developments in exploration and answering the fundamental questions just like everyone else, but there is more to gain from spreading our knowledge across the world's population, looking after the planet, and trying not to completely **** things up before we get the chance to really explore.
To put things into perspective:
“Most educated people are aware that we are the outcome of nearly 4 billion years of Darwinian selection, but many tend to think that humans are somehow the culmination. ... It will not be humans who watch the sun’s demise, six billion years from now. Any creatures that then exist will be as different from us as we are from bacteria or amoebae.”
- Martin Rees
We have plenty of time to get to Mars. The last few decades of advancement have been good enough for me.
