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"I think I may say without
contradiction that when the Paris Exhibition closes,
electric light will close with it, and no more will be
hear of it" (Erasmus Wilson,
Professor at Oxford University, 1878)
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- "The average American family hasn't time for
television" (The New York Times, 1939)
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- "Man will never reach the moon regardless of all
the future scientific advances"
(Dr
Lee De Forest [inventor of the vacuum tube], 1957)
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- "The world potential market for copying machines
is 5000 at most." (IBM to the
founders of Xerox, 1959)
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- “Computers in the future may weigh no more than 1.5
tons” (Popular
Mechanics, forecasting the relentless march of science,
1949)
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- “I think there is a world market for maybe five
computers” (Thomas Watson, Chairman
of IBM,1943)
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- “There is no reason anyone would want a computer
in their home” (Ken Olson, President,
Chairman and Founder of Digital Equipment Corp.,1977)
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- “The bomb will never go off. I speak as an expert in
explosives” (Admiral William Leahy, US Atomic Bomb Project)
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- “There is no likelihood man can ever tap the power of
the atom” (Robert Millikan, Nobel Prize in
Physics, 1923)
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- “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)
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- “This ‘telephone’ has to many shortcomings to be
seriously considered as a means of communication. The
device is inherently of no values to us” (Western Union internal memo, 1876)
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- "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 in
the radio in the 1920’s)
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- "The concept is interesting in 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.]
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- “We don’t like their sound, and guitar music is on
the way out” (Decca Recording Co. rejecting the Beatles, 1962)
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- “Heavier-than-air flying machines are impossible”
(Lord Kelvin, president, Royal
Society, 1895)
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- “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.)
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- “Drill for oil? You mean drill into the ground to try
and find oil? You’re crazy” (Drillers
who Dewin L. Draake tried to enlist to his project to
drill for oil in 1859)
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- “Stocks have reached what looks like a permanently
high plateau” (Irving Fisher,
Professor of Economics, Yale University, 1929)
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- “Airplanes are interesting toys but of no military
value” (Marechal Ferdinad Foch,
Professor of Strategy, Ecole Superieure de Guerre,
France.)
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- “Everything that can be invented has been invented”
(Charles H. Duell, Commissioner, US Office of Patents, 1899)
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- “The super computer is technologically impossible. It
would take all the water that flows over Niagara Falls
to cool the heat generated by the number of vacuum tubes
required” (Professor of Electrical
Engineering, New York University)
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- “I don’t know what use any one could find for a
machine that would make copies of documents. It
certainly couldn’t be a feasible business by itself”
(the head of IBM, refusing to back the
idea, forcing the inventor to found Xerox)
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- “Louis Pasteur’s theory of germs is ridiculous
fiction” (Pierre Pachet, Professor of Physiology at Toulouse,
1872)
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- “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 to starting Mrs. Fields’ Cookies)
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