Why are we worrying about billions of bits per second into the home when we haven’t used 1.5 to 6 million bits per second creatively? Yes, I will need those billions when I watch holographic television or expect a can of spinach to be teleported into my home. But in the meantime? Dear telephone companies, now that your argument prevailed, please take advantage of your installed base of copper twisted pair, which can provide so much more than you are telling people – including video on demand.
Predictor: Negroponte, Nicholas
Prediction, in context:In a 1993 article for Wired magazine, Nicholas Negroponte of MIT’s Media Lab writes: ”Dates like the year 2005 or 2010 are frequently heard estimates of when fiber will pervade the world, given appropriate investments and incentives. However, without any new incentives, telephone companies update three to five percent of their existing infrastructures each year. Some cable companies are proposing updating 80 percent of their plant in less than five years. But here is the punch line: Why are we worrying about billions of bits per second into the home when we haven’t used 1.5 to 6 million bits per second creatively? Yes, I will need those billions when I watch holographic television or expect a can of spinach to be teleported into my home. But in the meantime? Dear telephone companies, now that your argument prevailed, please take advantage of your installed base of copper twisted pair, which can provide so much more than you are telling people – including video on demand, which is really in demand.”
Biography:Nicholas Negroponte, a co-founder of MIT’s Media Lab and a popular speaker and writer about technologies of the future, wrote one of the 1990s’ best-selling books about the new future of communications, “Being Digital.” (Pioneer/Originator.)
Date of prediction: January 1, 1993
Topic of prediction: Information Infrastructure
Subtopic: Bandwidth
Name of publication: Wired
Title, headline, chapter name: Debunking Bandwidth
Quote Type: Direct quote
Page number or URL of document at time of study:
http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/1.03/negroponte_pr.html
This data was logged into the Elon/Pew Predictions Database by: Anderson, Janna Quitney