The World’s Greatest Minds…Were Completely Wrong.
“Everything that can be invented has been invented.”
-Charles H. Duell, Commissioner, U.S. Patent Office, 1899
“The horse is here to stay but the automobile is only a novelty – a fad.”
-Horace Rackham, President of the Michigan Savings Bank, 1903
“Stocks have reached what looks like a permanently high plateau.”
-Irving Fisher, Professor of Economics, Yale University, 1929
“I think there is a world market for maybe five computers.”
-Thomas J. Watson, Chairman of the Board of IBM, 1943
“Television won’t last. It’s a flash in the pan.”
-Mary Somerville, pioneer of radio educational broadcasts, 1948
“Remote shopping, while entirely feasible, will flop because women like to get out of the house, like to handle merchandise, like to be able to change their minds.”
-TIME, 1966
“The truth is no online database will replace your daily newspaper, no CD-ROM can take the place of a competent teacher and no computer network will change the way government works.”
-Clifford Stoll, American author, 1995
“I give [Apple] two years before they’re turning out the lights on a very painful and expensive mistake.”
-David Goldstein, President of Channel Marketing, 2001
“I think it will grow but the vast majority of customers in the foreseeable future will continue to prefer a good, old-fashioned printed and bound book.”
-George Jones, CEO of Borders Group, 2008
