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8 Can't Miss Predictions... for 1998
alphadogg-nw writes "Tired of being wrong too often, a Network World pundit applies 20-20 hindsight to this list of prognostications for 1998, which if he's right will turn out to be quite a year. Among the forecasts: The U.S. Department of Justice will go medieval on Microsoft, Compaq will buy what's left of DEC, AOL likewise Netscape, Apple will introduce something said to look like an Easter egg ... and then there's the deafening buzz about this new search engine called Google."
My prediction for 2008: Major worldwide recession, due to the massive inflationary bubble bursting, an inability of the central banks to continue using inflation to create a false sense of prosperity, and stagflation.
Slashdot: Playing Favorites Since 1997
Y'know, I liked Altavista a great deal. It was a rare case of a great product getting its block knocked off by an even better one. Still, for some time I found Altavista's more bells-and-whistley approach useful for triangulatin Google results, at least until Google engineers seemingly perfected their MROIPP (Mind Reading Over Internet Protocols Protocol) technology.
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
My predictions for 1988:
10. MS-DOS 4.0 will ship, finally, by mid-year. It will be so buggy and crash so much that Microsoft will be forced to release an update, MS-DOS 4.01, by year's end.
9. Liquid crystal will be discovered by Frederick Reintzer.
8. Someone will introduce a simple network management protocol, probably called SNMP. Nobody will care.
7. An alternative bus to IBM's Micro Channel Architecture will be introduced. Expect it to be called something like EISA -- Extended Industry Standard Architecture.
6. An Internet Relay Chat system called IRC will be developed.
5. A company called Creative Labs will introduce a sound card called the SoundBlaster, which will establish defacto standards for years to come.
4. People obsessed with clocks will introduce the Network Time Protocol, which will allow computers to sync their clocks over the Internet.
3. The first T-1 backbone will be added to ARPANET.
2. Motorola will release a new processor, the 88000. No one will care.
1. Apple will sue Microsoft over the trash can icon.
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Between the timeliness of this story, his spelling, and his belief that Bill Gates is facing criminal charges, Paul McNamara sounds like he'd fit in well here as an editor.
What I'm listening to now on Pandora...
Slashdot has a much more focused story selection, the front page isn't rife with spelling errors, grammatical errors, and poor headlines, and finally the moderated comments on Slashdot are usually pretty good and I enjoy reading them. If I want to see some funny picture from 2001 complete with a terrible headline and mind numbingly stupid comments I'll go to digg. I'm not trying to bash digg too hard since I do visit it about as frequently as slashdot, but slashdot is definitely easier to read and the comments are really what makes slashdot special to me.
6. Prediction: Congress to pass Digital Millennium Copyright Act.
The skinny: Congress will approve the DMCA by a unanimous vote and President Clinton will sign it into law, because, well, everyone favors copyright protection.
Long-term outlook: The only possible trouble with this one that I can foresee would be if someone were to launch a Web site that allowed anyone and everyone to post video clips of whatever they pleased. That might get sticky.
I thought pornotube was stickier than youtube, but I suppose both are up to their necks.
liqbase
Isn't this somehow a dupe since all those were probably posted when they really happened?
stuff |
And tell Taco to RTFA too.
SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
Deja News circa 1998.
Knowledge is how to play a game, intelligence is how to win, wisdom is knowing what game to play.
well, that's exactly what the headline and summary told me ^^
maybe you're not so good at getting hints or so, but it was quite clear to me...
and if the headline didn't make things clear, the summary should be...
> My predictions for 1988: ...
> 9. Liquid crystal will be discovered by Frederick Reintzer.
According to Wikipedia [1] that happened in 1888.
[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liquid_crystals#History
[--- PGP key and more on http://www.root42.de ---]
Eh, I guess I miss something, what is the point of predicting the past? Poorly?
http://labs.google.com
Check out my sysadmin blog!
What exactly are "students of Asian dissent"?
Would that include anyone who took a 20th century history class? Why be mad at them?
I "switched" to digg for about 2 months before it got excessively annoying. Ever since the interface change I've been 99% slashdot for comments, no more wasting my time on digg comments system, their useless trolls are nowhere near as entertaining as /.'s.
Cheers.
This is my sig. There are many like it, but this one is mine.
the front page isn't rife with spelling errors, grammatical errors, and poor headlines
Um WHAT? You're talking about slashdot? THIS slashdot?
-mcgrew
mcgrew's razor: Never attribute to stupidity that which can be explained by greedy self-interest
I believe he was trying to keep his post on-topic.
;)
Clearly he is referring to the Slashdot of 1998
Troll - "is someone who posts controversial messages in an on-line community such as an on-line discussion forum with the intention of baiting other users into an emotional response." I think it fits, and would meta moderate it as such, if given the opportunity (and taking it).
Seriously, Taco, you're letting the quality ofWhile I agree with you that /. editors could do a better job with some of the summaries and occasionally a particularly poor submission creeps in (slownewsday is often an appropriate tag for such stories), but it's hardy the mess that I've seen on Digg.
The grass is only greener, if you don't take care of your own lawn.
http://www.paullee.com/ghosts/bookofpredictions.html
My web domain.
My prediction for 2008: Major worldwide recession, due to the massive inflationary bubble bursting, an inability of the central banks to continue using inflation to create a false sense of prosperity, and stagflation.
Add to that: $7/gallon gasoline in the USA, unemployment rates rising to 15% or higher, major upswings in crime rates, further tightening of the grip by the police state mentalities, more erosion of people's rights and freedoms and govt intrusions into privacy, riots in large cities, rise of vigilatism by people who've had enough, another stolen election, and big media trying to distract all the stupid public's attention away from reality by focusing in with even more sensationalistic news coverage of some Hollywood bimbos' pregnancies/drug arrests/relationship affairs/whatever.
That sounds about right.
I seem to recall liquid crystal displays replacing LEDs in watches and calculators in the 1970s.
Actually, LEDs and those super-cool bluish neon tube thingies. Not nixies, the little ones. What the hell were they called?
Do daemons dream of electric sleep()?
You confuse the ability to make unfounded claims with the ability to make an argument.
> Which of the items on that page represent innovation, rather than purchase or copying an existing system?
A priori, all of them. You can't prove a negative, so the burden of proof is on you to show prior art for each item.
[ The common claim here that Microsoft doesn't innovate is usually followed by prior art for all counter examples. Of course the claim is nonetheless false, Microsoft Research (kind of equivalent to Google Labs) does lost of innovation, they are just rarely successfully commercialized. ]
Most one-year predictions are simple extrapolations of current trends, or guessing which pre-announced products will be hits. Even so they can be wrong. Subprime collapse was not in the 12/31/2006 prediction lists.
Ten years out is a lot harder. In the late 1980s you had the feeling computer networks would be important, especially if you used them at an university. But the huge onrush in of the InterNet and browsers in 1994 was somewhat of a surprise. It was hard to foresee the quantum jump in use and that exact year.
Ditto for internet video. There was a lot of "toy" video stuff since 2000, but the 2006 youtube rush was a surprise to me. Thta turn it from a toy into a utility.
I found your predictions much more interesting than the ones of TFA. Yet TFA got posted to the front page of /.. Well, at least it's sparked good posts. Like yours. Well done!
Please correct me if I got my facts wrong.
Why are the 5 and 8 not bold?
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Vacuum Tube Florescent Displays - still my favorite
(name withheld by request)
Al Gore? Is that you?
All kidding aside, the technology needed for the Internet was 'invented' in 1973-1974 timeframe. The Internet, as it were, was officially rolled out in 1983.
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The U.S. Department of Justice will go medieval on Microsoft
you had me at #!
Actually, LEDs and those super-cool bluish neon tube thingies. Not nixies, the little ones. What the hell were they called? Probably early vacuum fluorescent displays (VFD). I built a digital clock kit back in the '70s using them, they came as individual 7 segment displays packaged in what looked like small vacuum tubes with long solder leads.
Clearly, he doesn't remember the Slashdot of 1998.
0 1 - just my two bits
...the first neologism for 2008. (or is it a PORTMANteau?)
...Lorenzo / I'm into kinky crustaceans. I just discovered internet praWn.
What sucks about digg is the moderation is up or down. Still worse, if you mod someone down, they disappear from your interface. Just because I think you're wrong or misguided doesn't mean I think your comment should be removed. It's a moderation system that creates an echo chamber. It is a mess over there.
They think it is OK to live in Manchester and commute to London to work.
In many places in Europe most people live in the same town where they work, thus they rely in local transport that is far more predictable than trains (well, UK trains, trains in most other places run punctual, but hey, the friends of Margaret Thatcher made a real killing when they sold their shares in the privatized train companies. A real gravy train if there ever was one) and much faster than cars.
The UK has a love affair with cars that is not dissimilar with the US's.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.