The 500-channel, all-digital, high-fiber world of the future. Will it be a happy time, bursting with “choice, control, and convenience,” the mantra of every corporation getting into this business? Or will we take one look at it, snort, and go right back to reruns of “Baywatch”? For that matter, will it even happen? Will you want to “turn your living room into a mall,” as the Time Warner brochures promise? Or are so many industries rushing to make television interactive for the same reason that dogs lick their balls – because they can?
Predictor: Schwartz, Evan I.
Prediction, in context:For a 1995 article for Wired magazine, reporter Evan Schwartz traveled across the U.S., checking out the interactive television consumer testing being conducted by entertainment/technology corporations. Schwartz writes: ”My travels took me to corporate labs, model living environments, and real suburban sofas near cities such as Boston, Seattle, Orlando, and Washington, D.C. – a sampling of the places where the biggest telephone, cable, and entertainment companies have been setting up technology trial zones. I wanted to see for myself what’s been billed as television’s true destiny. Perhaps, I thought, I would learn the truth about the 500-channel, all-digital, high-fiber world of the future. Will it be a happy time, bursting with ‘choice, control, and convenience,’ the mantra of every corporation getting into this business? Or will we take one look at it, snort, and go right back to reruns of ‘Baywatch’? For that matter, will it even happen? Will you want to ‘turn your living room into a mall,’ as the Time Warner brochures promise? Or are so many industries rushing to make television interactive for the same reason that dogs lick their balls – because they can?”
Biography:Evan Schwartz was a 1990s journalist with a computer science degree who covered information technology. He was a former editor at Business Week, where he covered software and digital media and was part of teams that won a National Magazine Award and a Computer Press Award. He also wrote for the New York Times, Wired, and MIT’s Technology Review. His books include “Webonomics” and “Digital Darwinism.” (Author/Editor/Journalist.)
Date of prediction: January 1, 1995
Topic of prediction: Getting, Sharing Information
Subtopic: TV/Films/Video
Name of publication: Wired
Title, headline, chapter name: People Are Supposed to Pay for This Stuff? Crisscrossing the Country, Our Intrepid Correspondent Visits Corporate Labs, Model Living Rooms, and Actual Sofas, to Check Out the Megahyped Interactive Television Prototypes and See Just How Real the 500-Channel, All-Digital, High-Fiber Future Really Is
Quote Type: Direct quote
Page number or URL of document at time of study:
http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/3.07/cable_pr.html
This data was logged into the Elon/Pew Predictions Database by: Anderson, Janna Quitney