Heavier-than-air flying machines are impossible.- Lord Kelvin, president, Royal Society, 1895
The modern computer hovers between the obsolescent and the nonexistent. - Sydney Brenner in 1927
I think there is a world market for maybe five computers. - IBM Chairman Thomas Watson, 1943
Computers in the future may have only 1,000 vacuum tubes and perhaps only weigh 1 1/2 tons. - Popular Mechanics, 1949
I have traveled the length and breadth of this country and talked with the best people, and I can assure you that data processing is a fad that won't last out the year. The editor in charge of business books for Prentice Hall, 1957
But what... is it good for?
An engineer at the Advanced Computing Systems Division of IBM, commenting on the microchip in 1968.
Get your feet off my desk, get out of here, you stink, and we're not going to buy your product. Joe Keenan, President of Atari, in 1976 responding to Steve Jobs' offer to sell him rights to the new personal computer he and Steve Wozniak developed.
There is no reason for any individual to have a computer in their home. - Ken Olson (President of Digital Equipment Corporation) at the Convention of the World Future Society in Boston in 1977
No one will need more than 637 kb of memory for a personal computer. 640K ought to be enough for anybody. - Bill Gates, founder of Microsoft, in 1981
I say to you that the VCR is to the American film producer and the American public as the Boston strangler is to the woman home alone. Jack Valenti, MPAA president, testimony to the House of Representatives, 1982
The Macintosh uses an experimental pointing device called a 'mouse.' There is no evidence that people want to use these things. What businessman knows about point sizes on typefaces or the value of variable point sizes ? Who out there in the general marketplace even knows what a 'font' is ? The whole concept and attitude towards icons and hieroglyphs is actually counterrevolutionary — it's a language that is hardly 'user friendly'. This type of machine was developed by hardware hackers working out of Xerox's Palo Alto Research Center. It has yet to find popular success. There seems to be some mysterious user resistance to this type of machine.- John C. Dvorak on why the Macintosh would fail, San Francisco Examiner, 1984
Two years from now, spam will be solved. - Bill Gates, World Economic Forum 2004
The Internet is a great way to get on the Net. - Bob Dole
Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I’m not sure about the former. - Albert Einstein
Don't forget:
The internet is over.
-Prince