The multi-billion-dollar investments in the developing new telecommunications landscape are driven by a simple, irresistibly tempting vision – the prospect of converting every home and workplace in the nation into a computerized electronic movie theater; shopping mall; video game arcade; business, information and financial center; and perhaps even gambling casino, run by remote control and open all day long, every day of the week. The information highway will not be a freeway but an automated private toll road, traveled mostly by those who can afford the pay the price for the wealth of popular entertainment, information, data, communications, and transaction services it will carry.
Predictor: Grossman, Lawrence K.
Prediction, in context:In his 1995 book “The Electronic Republic: Reshaping Democracy in the Information Age,” Lawrence Grossman, former president of NBC News and PBS, writes: ”Will life after television – ‘the telefuture’ – truly ‘renew our entire culture,’ ‘promote creativity,’ overthrow the stultifying influence of mass media, renew the power of individuals, and ‘enrich and strengthen democracy and capitalism all around the world?’ The multi-billion-dollar investments in the developing new telecommunications landscape are driven by a simple, irresistibly tempting vision – the prospect of converting every home and workplace in the nation into a computerized electronic movie theater; shopping mall; video game arcade; business, information and financial center; and perhaps even gambling casino, run by remote control and open all day long, every day of the week. The information highway will not be a freeway but an automated private toll road, traveled mostly by those who can afford the pay the price for the wealth of popular entertainment, information, data, communications, and transaction services it will carry.”
Biography:Lawrence Grossman wrote the book “The Electronic Republic: Reshaping Democracy in an Information Age” (Penguin, 1995). The former executive at NBC and PBS urged people to realize that digital communications had altered how things can and should be done. (Author/Editor/Journalist.)
Date of prediction: January 1, 1995
Topic of prediction: Information Infrastructure
Subtopic: General
Name of publication: The Electronic Republic (book)
Title, headline, chapter name: Chapter 8: The Perils and Promise of the Electronic Republic
Quote Type: Direct quote
Page number or URL of document at time of study:
Pages 165-172
This data was logged into the Elon/Pew Predictions Database by: Guarino, Jennifer Anne