|
Predictions... ... That Didn't Quite Make It
|
| "Nobody will ever need more than 640k RAM!" Bill
Gates, 1981
“I think there is a
world market for about five computers.” “This 'telephone'
has too many shortcomings to be seriously considered as a means of
communication. The device is inherently of no value to us.”
Western Union internal
memo, 1876
1. "Computers, in the future, may weigh no
more than 1.5 tons."
-- Popular Mechanics, forecasting the
relentless march of
science, 1949.
2. "I think there is a world market for,
maybe, five computers."
-- Thomas Watson, chairman of IBM, 1943.
3. "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."
-- The editor in charge of business books
for Prentice Hall,
1957.
4. "But what is it good for?"
-- Engineer at the Advanced Computing
Systems Division of IBM,
1968, commenting on the microchip.
5. "There is no reason anyone would want a
computer in their
home."
-- Ken Olson, president, chairman and
founder of Digital
Equipment Corp.,1977.
6. "This 'telephone' has too many
shortcomings to be seriously
considered as a means of communication. The
device is, inherently,
of no value."
-- Western Union internal memo, 1876.
7. "The wireless music box has no
imaginable commercial value.
Who would pay for a message sent to nobody
in particular?"
-- David Sarnoff's associates in response
to his urgings for i
nvestment in the radio in the 1920s
8. "The concept is interesting and
well-formed. But, in order
to earn better than a 'C,' the idea must be
feasible."
-- A Yale Univ. management professor in
response to Fred Smith's
paper proposing reliable overnight delivery
service.( Smith went
on to found Federal Express Corp.)
9. "Who wants to hear actors talk?"
-- H.M. Warner, Warner Brothers, 1927
10. "I'm just glad it will be Clark Gable
who is falling on his
face and not Gary Cooper."
-- Gary Cooper on his decision not to take
the leading role in
"Gone With The Wind".
11. "A cookie store is a bad idea. Besides,
the market research
reports say America likes crispy cookies,
not soft and chewy
cookies like you make."
-- Response to Debbi Fields' idea of
starting Mrs. Fields' Cookies.
12. "We don't like their sound and guitar
music is on the way out."
-- Decca Recording Co. rejecting the
Beatles, 1962
13. "You want to have consistent and
uniform muscle development
across all of your muscles? It can't be
done. It's just a fact
of life. You just have to accept
inconsistent muscle development
as an unalterable condition of weight
training."
-- Response to Arthur Jones, who solved the
"unsolvable" problem
by inventing Nautilus.
14. "Stocks have reached what looks like a,
permanently, high plateau."
-- Irving Fisher, Professor of Economics,
Yale University, 1929
15." Airplanes are interesting toys, but of
no military value."
-- Marecha Ferdinand Foch, Professor of
Strategy,
Ecole Superieure de Guerre.
16. "Louis Pasteur's theory of germs is
ridiculous fiction."
-- Pierre Pachet, Professor of Physiology
at Toulouse, 1872
17. "The abdomen, the chest, and the brain
will forever be shut
from the intrusion of the wise and humane
surgeon."
-- Sir John Eric Ericksen, British surgeon,
Surgeon-Extraordinary
to Queen Victoria, 1873.
and finally.......
18. "64K ought to be enough memory for
anybody."
-- Bill Gates, 1981
|