There is a stunning consensus that cell-switching, embodied in the emerging ATM standards, is the required infrastructure for this revolution. It is emerging as the appropriate backbone technology to support a variety of user services such as frame relay. Once corporations are connected to ATM backbones for inexpensive broadband data services, the [private-branch exchange] vendors will provide ATM interfaces, allowing corporate voice traffic to transition. As Internet applications, cable and video-on-demand and telephone services all transition to ATM networks, the distinction between them disappears.
Predictor: Barker, Ben
Prediction, in context:The 1995 book “The Information Revolution,” edited by Donald Altschiller, carries a reprint of a 1994 Computerworld article ÒThe History of the Future,Ó by senior editor Gary H. Anthes. Anthes interviewed more than a dozen pioneers of ARPAnet, forerunner to todayÕs Internet, including Ben Barker, the senior vice president and chief technology officer at Bolt, Beranek and Newman (BBN). In 1969, he designed the hardware interfaces for ARPAnet. Anthes quotes Barker saying: ÒAll aspects of the information highway, whether itÕs 500-channel TV, movies on demand, interactive TV, multimedia applications on the Internet, require a great deal more bandwidth and switching capacity than the current infrastructure can support. There is a stunning consensus that cell-switching, embodied in the emerging ATM standards, is the required infrastructure for this revolution. It is emerging as the appropriate backbone technology to support a variety of user services such as frame relay. Once corporations are connected to ATM backbones for inexpensive broadband data services, the [private-branch exchange] vendors will provide ATM interfaces, allowing corporate voice traffic to transition. As Internet applications, cable and video-on-demand and telephone services all transition to ATM networks, the distinction between them disappears.Ó
Date of prediction: January 1, 1994
Topic of prediction: Information Infrastructure
Subtopic: Pipeline/Switching/Hardware
Name of publication: The Information Revolution (book)
Title, headline, chapter name: The History of the Future
Quote Type: Direct quote
Page number or URL of document at time of study:
Page 43
This data was logged into the Elon/Pew Predictions Database by: Guarino, Jennifer Anne