Loading tweets...Technology Predictions
The PC recently celebrated its 30 year anniversary this year. It’s easy to look back on the last 30 years and see where we came from. It’s not so easy to look ahead at the next 30 years and see where we’re going.
Over the last few weeks I’ve read numerous articles by supposed techno big-wigs and futurists as they waxed poetic on what the world of technology holds for mankind. The one thing that they never print in these articles is a disclaimer stating that the opinions are just that – “opinions,” and that they usually push a philosophy or agenda.
As evidence of just how wrong ”big thinkers” can be, I’ve collected a list of some of the biggest blunders of techno think.
Enjoy.
Everything that could be invented has already been invented
- Charles Duell, commissioner for the U.S. Patent Office, 1899
Computers in the future may weigh no more than 1.5 tons.
- Popular Mechanics, 1949
I have traveled the length and breadth of this country and talked with the best people, and I can assure you that data processing is a fad that won’t last out the year.
- Editor of Prentice Hall business books, 1957
There is no reason anyone would want a computer in their home.
- Ken Olsen, 1977 (founder and CEO of DEC, Digital Equipment Corporation, {Out of Business})
No one would need more than 637kb of memory for a personal computer and 640 ought to be enough.
- Bill Gates , 1981
We will never make a 32-bit operating system.
- Bill Gates, 1989
Spam will be a thing of the past in two years’ time.
- Bill Gates, 2004
Next Christmas the iPod will be dead, finished, gone, kaput.
- Sir Alan Sugar, 2005 (founder of the electronics company, Amstrad)
