We really don’t know what’s going to happen with the bandwidth question. “People could just form co-ops and fiber themselves up and have a neighborhood node supplied by the lowest bidder, instead of waiting for some centralized force to come in and lay fiber.”
Predictor: Lanier, Jaron
Prediction, in context:In a 1995 article for Electronic Engineering Times, Larry Lange talks with virtual-reality entrepreneur Jaron Lanier. Lange writes: ”The confusion surrounding the burgeoning Internet industry, Lanier said, has ‘everybody trying to tap dance on top of an avalanche. ‘We really don’t know what’s going to happen with the bandwidth question. We can’t tell who the bandwidth providers are going to be, in what ways they’ll be subsidized, in which ways they might be able to become monopolies. There’s just too many questions right now … Lanier provided some practical suggestions: ‘People could just form co-ops and fiber themselves up and have a neighborhood node supplied by the lowest bidder, instead of waiting for some centralized force to come in and lay fiber.'”
Biography:Jaron Lanier was a pioneer of virtual reality and founder and former CEO of VPL. (Pioneer/Originator.)
Date of prediction: September 25, 1995
Topic of prediction: Information Infrastructure
Subtopic: Bandwidth
Name of publication: Electronic Engineering Times
Title, headline, chapter name: The ‘Nightmare Scenario’
Quote Type: Direct quote
Page number or URL of document at time of study:
http://web.lexis-nexis.com/universe/document?_m=e41899dd868358e2c12567ae35dc0370&_docnum=6&wchp=dGLbVlz-lSlAl&_md5=db9f3530ced518f1dd258c02d16ef8af
This data was logged into the Elon/Pew Predictions Database by: Anderson, Janna Quitney