Failed Predictions

In honor of the walk of shame that another prognosticator has yet taken once again, a post of Failed Predictions.









Source Credits: Listverse, ODDEE,2 Spare, 2 Thing.org, and Live Science

“There is no reason anyone would want a computer in their home.” — Ken Olson, president, chairman and founder of Digital Equipment Corp.

“We will never make a 32 bit operating system.” — Bill Gates 

“Lee DeForest has said in many newspapers and over his signature that it would be possible to transmit the human voice across the Atlantic before many years. Based on these absurd and deliberately misleading statements, the misguided public … has been persuaded to purchase stock in his company …” — a U.S. District Attorney, prosecuting American inventor Lee DeForest for selling stock fraudulently through the mail for his Radio Telephone Company in 1913.

“There is practically no chance communications space satellites will be used to provide better telephone, telegraph, television, or radio service inside the United States.” — T. Craven, FCC Commissioner, in 1961 (the first commercial communications satellite went into service in 1965).

“To place a man in a multi-stage rocket and project him into the controlling gravitational field of the moon where the passengers can make scientific observations, perhaps land alive, and then return to earth – all that constitutes a wild dream worthy of Jules Verne. I am bold enough to say that such a man-made voyage will never occur regardless of all future advances.” — Lee DeForest, American radio pioneer and inventor of the vacuum tube, in 1926

“A rocket will never be able to leave the Earth’s atmosphere.” — New York Times, 1936.

“Flight by machines heavier than air is unpractical (sic) and insignificant, if not utterly impossible.” – Simon Newcomb; The Wright Brothers flew at Kittyhawk 18 months later.

“Heavier-than-air flying machines are impossible.” — Lord Kelvin, British mathematician and physicist, president of the British Royal Society, 1895.

“There will never be a bigger plane built.” — A Boeing engineer, after the first flight of the 247, a twin engine plane that holds ten people

“Nuclear-powered vacuum cleaners will probably be a reality in 10 years.” -– Alex Lewyt, president of vacuum cleaner company Lewyt Corp., in the New York Times in 1955.

"It will be years --not in my time-- before a woman will become Prime Minister."
--Margaret Thatcher, October 26th, 1969.

“That virus [HIV] is a pussycat.”
--Dr. Peter Duesberg, molecular-biology professor at U.C. Berkeley, 1988

"Drill for oil? You mean drill into the ground to try and find oil? You're crazy."
--Associates of Edwin L. Drake refusing his suggestion to drill for oil in 1859.

"Reagan doesn’t have that presidential look."
--United Artists Executive, rejecting Reagan as lead in 1964 film The Best Man

"The singer [Mick Jagger] will have to go; the BBC won’t like him."
--- First Rolling Stones manager Eric Easton to his partner after watching them perform.

"Taking the best left-handed pitcher in baseball and converting him into a right fielder is one of the dumbest things I ever heard."
-- Tris Speaker, baseball hall of famer, talking about Babe Ruth, 1919.

"Ours has been the first [expedition], and doubtless to be the last, to visit this profitless locality."
---- Lt. Joseph Ives, after visiting the Grand Canyon in 1861.

Everything that can be invented has been invented.
Charles H. Duell, an official at the US patent office, 1899.

Stocks have reached what looks like a permanently high plateau.»
Irving Fisher, economics professor at Yale University, 1929. 

Democracy will be dead by 1950.
John Langdon-Davies, A Short History of The Future, 1936.

They couldn't hit an elephant at this dist-
Last words of Gen. John Sedgwick, spoken as he looked out over the parapet at enemy lines during the Battle of Spotsylvania in 1864.

Man will not fly for 50 years.
Wilbur Wright, American aviation pioneer, to brother Orville, after a disappointing flying experiment, 1901 (their first successful flight was in 1903).

The Americans are good about making fancy cars and refrigerators, but that doesn't mean they are any good at making aircraft. They are bluffing. They are excellent at bluffing.
Hermann Goering, Commander-in-Chief of the Luftwaffe, 1942.

... good enough for our transatlantic friends ... but unworthy of the attention of practical or scientific men.»
British Parliamentary Committee, referring to Edison's light bulb, 1878.

Who the hell wants to hear actors talk?» H. M. Warner, co-founder of Warner Brothers, 1927.

END OF THE WORLD...well no its um tomorrow...sorry.  Or is it the next day...

Person                                                  Date

Charles Wesley                                   1794

John Wesley (Brother of above)           1836

Jehovah Witness                                 1914,1915,1918,1920,1925,1941,1975,1994

William Miller                                     March 21, 1843 through March 21, 1844

Joanna Southcott                                Oct 19, 1814

Albert Porta                                        Dec 17, 1919

Nostradamus                                       July 1999

Joseph Smith                                       Feb 1835 plus 56 years.

Pat Robertson                                     End of 1982.

Michael Rood                                     April 15, 2000

Richard Noone                                   May 5, 2000

Rebecca Harrison                               May 17, 2000

Marily Agee                                        May 28, 2000

David Parked                                      May 28, 2001

Proverbs 12:23
The prudent keep their knowledge to themselves, but a fool’s heart blurts out folly.