WRONG QUOTES
Statements and Predictions
that came out wrong...

 

"The wireless music box has no imaginable commercial value. Who would pay for a message sent to nobody in particular?"

Advisors to David Sarnoff regarding his possible investment in the radio.

 

"I think there is a world market for maybe five computers."

Chairman of IBM, 1943

 

"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.

 

"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."

Prentice Hall book editor,  1957

 

"There is no reason anyone would want a computer in their home."

Ken Olson, president of  Digital Equipment Corp.,1977

 

"Stocks have reached what looks like a permanently high plateau."

Irving Fisher, Professor of Economics, Yale University, 1929.

 

"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, 1876.

 

"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.)

 

"Computers in the future may weigh no more than 1.5 tons."

Popular Mechanics, 1949

 

"Who the hell wants to hear actors talk?"

H.M. Warner, Warner Brothers, 1927.

 

"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 research for the adhesive of Post-It Notepads. And no, it wasn't Romy and Michelle that invented post-it notes!

 

"Louis Pasteur's theory of germs is ridiculous fiction."

Pierre Pachet, Professor of Physiology at Toulouse, 1872

 

"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 role of Rhett Butler in Gone With The Wind.

 

"Airplanes are interesting toys but of no military value."

Marechal Ferdinand Foch, Professor of Strategy, Marshal of France.

 

"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 to Queen Victoria 1873.

 

"640K ought to be enough for anybody."

Bill Gates, 1981

 

"Everything that can be invented has been invented."

Charles H. Duell, Commissioner, U.S. Office of Patents, 1899.