The information highway will extend the electronic marketplace and make it the ultimate go-between, the universal middleman … All the goods for sale in the world will be available for you to examine, compare, and, often, customize. When you want to buy something you’ll be able to tell your computer to find it for you at the best price offered by any acceptable source or ask your computer to “haggle” with the computers of various sellers … This will carry us into a new world of low-friction, low-overhead capitalism, in which market information will be plentiful and transaction costs low. It will be a shopper’s heaven.
Predictor: Gates, Bill
Prediction, in context:In his 1995 book “The Road Ahead,” Microsoft CEO Bill Gates writes: ”The information highway will extend the electronic marketplace and make it the ultimate go-between, the universal middleman. Often the only humans involved in a transaction will be the actual buyer and seller. All the goods for sale in the world will be available for you to examine, compare, and, often, customize. When you want to buy something you’ll be able to tell your computer to find it for you at the best price offered by any acceptable source or ask your computer to ‘haggle’ with the computers of various sellers. Information about venders and their products will be available to any computer connected to the highway. Servers distributed worldwide will accept bids, resolve offers into completed transactions, control authentication and security, and handle all other aspects of the marketplace, including the transfer of funds. This will carry us into a new world of low-friction, low-overhead capitalism, in which market information will be plentiful and transaction costs low. It will be a shopper’s heaven.”
Biography:Bill Gates, the most influential technology entrepreneur of the late 20th century, was the primary author of the prediction-packed 1995 book “The Road Ahead” and is the founder and CEO of Microsoft Corporation. (Entrepreneur/Business Leader.)
Date of prediction: January 1, 1995
Topic of prediction: Economic structures
Subtopic: General
Name of publication: The Road Ahead (book)
Title, headline, chapter name: Chapter 8: Friction-Free Capitalism
Quote Type: Direct quote
Page number or URL of document at time of study:
Page 158
This data was logged into the Elon/Pew Predictions Database by: Guarino, Jennifer Anne