106 lines
4.4 KiB
Plaintext
106 lines
4.4 KiB
Plaintext
Famous Last Words
|
|
|
|
"Computers in the future may weigh no more than 1.5 tons." --
|
|
Popular Mechanics, forecasting the relentless march of science,
|
|
1949
|
|
|
|
"I think there is a world market for maybe five computers." --
|
|
Thomas Watson, chairman of IBM, 1943
|
|
|
|
"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?" --Engineer at the Advanced
|
|
Computing Systems Division of IBM, 1968, commenting on the
|
|
microchip.
|
|
|
|
"There is no reason anyone would want a computer in their home."
|
|
--Ken Olson, president, chairman and founder of Digital Equipment
|
|
Corp., 1977
|
|
|
|
"640k ought to be enough for anybody." -- Bill Gates, 1981
|
|
|
|
"This 'telephone' has too many shortcomings to be seriously
|
|
considered as a means of communication. The device is inherently
|
|
of no value to us." --Western Union internal memo, 1876.
|
|
|
|
"The wireless music box has no imaginable commercial value. Who
|
|
would pay for a message sent to nobody in particular?" --David
|
|
Sarnoff's associates in response to his urgings for investment i
|
|
the radio in the 1920s
|
|
|
|
"The concept is interesting and well-formed, but in order to earn
|
|
better than a 'C,' the idea must be feasible." --A Yale University
|
|
management professor in response to Fred Smith's paper proposing
|
|
reliable overnight delivery service. (Smith went on to found Federal
|
|
Express Corp.)
|
|
|
|
"Who the hell wants to hear actors talk?" --H.M. Warner, Warner
|
|
Brothers, 1927.
|
|
|
|
"I'm just glad it'll be Clark Gable who's falling on his face and
|
|
not Gary Cooper." --Gary Cooper on his decision not to take the
|
|
leading role in "Gone With The Wind."
|
|
|
|
"A cookie store is a bad idea. Besides, the market research
|
|
reports say America likes crispy cookies, not soft and chewy
|
|
cookies like you make." --Response to Debbi Fields' idea of
|
|
starting Mrs. Fields' Cookies.
|
|
|
|
"We don't like their sound, and guitar music is on the way out."
|
|
--Decca Recording Co. rejecting the Beatles, 1962.
|
|
|
|
"Heavier-than-air flying machines are impossible." --Lord Kelvin,
|
|
president, Royal Society, 1895.
|
|
|
|
"If I had thought about it, I wouldn't have done the experiment.
|
|
The literature was full of examples that said you can't do this."
|
|
--Spencer Silver on the work that led to the unique adhesives for
|
|
3-M "Post-It" Notepads.
|
|
|
|
"So we went to Atari and said, 'Hey, we've got this amazing
|
|
thing, even built with some of your parts, and what do you think
|
|
about funding us? Or we'll give it to you. We just want to do
|
|
it. Pay our salary, we'll come work for you.' And they said,
|
|
'No.' So then we went to Hewlett-Packard, and they said, 'Hey, we
|
|
don't need you. You haven't got through college yet.'" --Apple
|
|
Computer Inc. founder Steve Jobs on attempts to get Atari and H-P
|
|
interested in his and Steve Wozniak's personal computer.
|
|
|
|
"Professor Goddard does not know the relation between action and
|
|
reaction and the need to have something better than a vacuum
|
|
against which to react. He seems to lack the basic knowledge
|
|
ladled out daily in high schools." --1921 New York Times
|
|
editorial about Robert Goddard's revolutionary rocket work.
|
|
|
|
"You want to have consistent and uniform muscle development
|
|
across all of your muscles? It can't be done. It's just a fact of
|
|
life. You just have to accept inconsistent muscle development as
|
|
an unalterable condition of weight training." --Response to
|
|
Arthur Jones, who solved the "unsolvable" problem by inventing
|
|
Nautilus.
|
|
|
|
"Drill for oil? You mean drill into the ground to try and find
|
|
oil? You're crazy." --Drillers who Edwin L. Drake tried to enlist
|
|
to his project to drill for oil in 1859.
|
|
|
|
"Stocks have reached what looks like a permanently high plateau."
|
|
--Irving Fisher, Professor of Economics, Yale University, 1929.
|
|
|
|
"Airplanes are interesting toys but of no military value." --
|
|
Marechal Ferdinand Foch, Professor of Strategy, Ecole Superieure
|
|
de Guerre.
|
|
|
|
"Everything that can be invented has been invented." --Charles H.
|
|
Duell, Commissioner, U.S. Office of Patents, 1899.
|
|
|
|
"Louis Pasteur's theory of germs is ridiculous fiction". --Pierre
|
|
Pachet, Professor of Physiology at Toulouse, 1872
|
|
|
|
"The abdomen, the chest, and the brain will forever be shut from
|
|
the intrusion of the wise and humane surgeon". --Sir John Eric
|
|
Ericksen, British surgeon, appointed Surgeon-Extraordinary to
|
|
Queen Victoria 1873.
|