Industry executives say there’s no question demand will explode as the nation discovers networks can help improve productivity, boost innovation, beat competing nations and aid our education system by giving kids amazing access to information. Other experts, though, say the network’s success will depend on cost – whether schools or small businesses or middle-class people could afford to tap in. “Nobody’s sure what people will pay for this stuff.”
Predictor: Dowling, Michael
Prediction, in context:In a 1993 article for USA Today, Kevin Maney offers up information about the development of the Internet, interviewing a telecommunications consultant and University of Georgia business professor, Michael Dowling. Maney writes: ”One looming concern is whether demand for a fiber network will be great enough. Industry executives say there’s no question demand will explode as the nation discovers networks can help improve productivity, boost innovation, beat competing nations and aid our education system by giving kids amazing access to information. Other experts, though, say the network’s success will depend on cost – whether schools or small businesses or middle-class people could afford to tap in. ‘Nobody’s sure what people will pay for this stuff,’ Dowling says. Then again, if the USA fails to build an information highway system, nobody knows what that might cost future generations.”
Date of prediction: February 1, 1993
Topic of prediction: Information Infrastructure
Subtopic: Cost/Pricing
Name of publication: USA Today
Title, headline, chapter name: A New Superhighway: Fiber Optics to Break Open the Data Bank
Quote Type: Direct quote
Page number or URL of document at time of study:
Money, Page B1
This data was logged into the Elon/Pew Predictions Database by: Anderson, Janna Quitney