04-27-2006, 02:00 PM
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Executive Editor, Android Thoughts
Join Date: Aug 2006
Posts: 3,233
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High Tech Forecasting A Wasted Effort?
"In my other blog, I took the authors of a famous business book to task for making bad projections about future technological change. But it's not fair to single them out -- the same sort of problem happens to experts making projections inside technology companies. I've seen a lot of those projections over the years. The usual pattern is that technology predictions with a two year horizon are pretty good, because a technology has to be almost in prototype stage now in order to appear in high-volume products two years from now. Five year predictions are moderately useful, but subject to embarrassing errors. Ten-year predictions are almost useless, and twenty-year predictions are best used as plot outlines for science fiction novels."
An interesting piece recalling predictions made, results of those predictions, and even more predictions. But could they ever come true? What do you guys think, should we even TRY to predict what will happen in this crazy technical world we live in?
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Dr. Jon Westfall, MCSE, MS-MVP
Executive Editor - Android Thoughts
News Editor - Windows Phone Thoughts
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04-27-2006, 03:41 PM
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Editorial Contributor
Join Date: Jun 2007
Posts: 5,411
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I think predictions are valuable if for no other reason than to give the visionaries a goal. While not always true, I expect that predictions have at least some flavor of what is desired, not just what is inevitable or likely. Maybe I'm giving the prognosticators too much credit, but I think their expectations do have some play in setting the course.
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Sometimes you are the anteater, sometimes you are the ant.
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04-27-2006, 05:18 PM
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Neophyte
Join Date: Dec 2005
Posts: 4
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Quote:
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Originally Posted by Sven
I think predictions are valuable if for no other reason than to give the visionaries a goal.
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I think that's exactly the right way to use projections and forecasts -- to give you a vision of what might be possible. The best thing is to have several different predictions in hand, so you can choose what you want to pursue as a goal.
The time you get problems is if you start thinking a forecast tells you what will for sure happen.
Mike
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04-27-2006, 07:43 PM
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Pontificator
Join Date: Dec 2005
Posts: 1,183
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I think the writer was kind of unfair in his initial outline of the success of the 5- and 10-year predictions. Essentially everything that was predicted came to fruition, even if not precisely as predicted. Certainly their prediction of what handhelds would be doing in 2007 was far more advanced than mine, mostly because in 1997 I still thought of handhelds as geek filofaxes.
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04-28-2006, 05:49 AM
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Intellectual
Join Date: Jan 2003
Posts: 125
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Gates sure likes to do some high tech forecasting every once in a while.
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04-28-2006, 06:49 PM
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Intellectual
Join Date: May 2006
Posts: 146
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Just as important as in establishing a goal, predictions, however wacko, whet the appetite. All gadgets, from the computer to the cell phone, met with certain skepticism when they were first considered. Giving an ETA, even if way off base, gets the public time to consider how useful it would be. It also spreads the word. In short, predictions are the best form of advertising long before a product is market ready.
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