They have treated information the way John D. Rockefeller treated oil – as a commodity, in which the distribution network, rather than product quality, is of primary importance. But once people can get the raw data themselves, that monopoly ends. And that means big changes, soon … I will have artificial intelligence agents roaming the databases, downloading stuff I am interested in, and assembling for me a front page, or a nightly news show, that addresses my interests. I’ll have the 12 top stories that I want, I’ll have short summaries available, and I’ll be able to double-click for more detail. How will Peter Jennings or MacNeil-Lehrer or a newspaper compete with that?
Predictor: Crichton, Michael
Prediction, in context:In a 1993 article for Wired magazine, best-selling author Michael Crichton, who bases most of his fiction novels on scientific fact, projects that current media forms will soon be surpassed by newer models. Crichton writes: ”The American Revolution was the first war fought, in part, through public opinion in the newspapers, and Ben Franklin was the first media-savvy lobbyist to employ techniques of disinformation. For the next 200 or so years, the media have been able to behave in a basically monopolistic way. They have treated information the way John D. Rockefeller treated oil – as a commodity, in which the distribution network, rather than product quality, is of primary importance. But once people can get the raw data themselves, that monopoly ends. And that means big changes, soon. Once Al Gore gets the fiber-optic highways in place, and the information capacity of the country is where it ought to be, I will be able, for example, to view any public meeting of Congress over the Net. And I will have artificial intelligence agents roaming the databases, downloading stuff I am interested in, and assembling for me a front page, or a nightly news show, that addresses my interests. I’ll have the 12 top stories that I want, I’ll have short summaries available, and I’ll be able to double-click for more detail. How will Peter Jennings or MacNeil-Lehrer or a newspaper compete with that? So the media institutions will have to change. Of course, I still don’t know what I don’t know, which means broad-based overviews or interpretive sources will have value – if these sources engage in genuinely high-quality interpretive work, or genuinely high-quality investigative work. At the moment, neither occurs very often.”
Biography:Michael Crichton, an extremely successful novelist (“Jurassic Park,” “Prey”) based much of his popular fiction on his study of real-world science and technology trends. (Author/Editor/Journalist.)
Date of prediction: January 1, 1993
Topic of prediction: Getting, Sharing Information
Subtopic: General
Name of publication: Wired
Title, headline, chapter name: Mediasaurus: Today’s Mass Media is Tomorrow’s Fossil Fuel. Michael Crichton is Mad as Hell, and He’s Not Going to Take it Any More
Quote Type: Direct quote
Page number or URL of document at time of study:
http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/1.04/mediasaurus.html
This data was logged into the Elon/Pew Predictions Database by: Anderson, Janna Quitney