The people who dealt with print design are now becoming video designers. They’re learning how to use the tools and to express ideas in a time domain. But that’s the transition that will be slow. The world will not just go from print to multimedia overnight. The number of designers who can deal with print media is huge. The number in the video world is much smaller because video production has been so expensive. That is getting democratized too … Technology has liberated designers from a craft-skill requirement, and work can be done by a much broader group of people. As the cost of media tools comes down, the same thing is going to happen with video that happened with desktop design for print.
Predictor: Warnock, John
Prediction, in context:In a 1994 article for Wired magazine, David Henry Goodstein interviews John Warnock, the founder of Adobe Systems. Goodstein quotes Warnock:”As more kinds of information become digitally based, creators expand their horizons. The people who dealt with print design are now becoming video designers. They’re learning how to use the tools and to express ideas in a time domain. But that’s the transition that will be slow. The world will not just go from print to multimedia overnight. The number of designers who can deal with print media is huge. The number in the video world is much smaller because video production has been so expensive. That is getting democratized too. You have to remember that a graphic artist had to have incredible manual dexterity in order to solve problems in print ten years ago. Our desktop publishing tools eliminated that barrier. Now, a creative person who can’t draw a straight line can really create. This means that technology has liberated designers from a craft-skill requirement, and work can be done by a much broader group of people. As the cost of media tools comes down, the same thing is going to happen with video that happened with desktop design for print.”
Biography:John Warnock was the founder of Adobe, a major software maker of the 1990s. He introduced the concept of PDF in 1991. (Technology Developer/Administrator.)
Date of prediction: January 1, 1994
Topic of prediction: Getting, Sharing Information
Subtopic: General
Name of publication: Wired
Title, headline, chapter name: Scriptwriter: John Warnock, the Inventor of PostScript and the Founder of Adobe Systems, Plots the Future of Media
Quote Type: Direct quote
Page number or URL of document at time of study:
http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/2.07/postscript_pr.html
This data was logged into the Elon/Pew Predictions Database by: Anderson, Janna Quitney