Nick Bostrom wrote:
>Robin wrote:
> >Krugman is well worth reading on most topics.
>
>Here are some predictions that Krugman published in June 98. (from
>http://members.home.net/copernicus/economics.html)
>
>"... By 2005 or so, it will become clear that the Internet's impact
>on the economy has been no greater than the fax machine's."
>
>This last statement seem extraordinary to me. I would have thought the
>market cap of Cisco alone is greater than the sum total of the world's fax
>machine industry (and already was in '98?). What am I missing?
I said he was worth reading; I didn't say he was always right. :-)
I winced at that quote when I first read it a few weeks ago.
He is clearly (to me) allowing himself a little hyperbole here.
Yet I suppose if we looked on a log scale and compared impacts,
the actual log impact of the internet might be closer to fax
machines that to the estimates of many of the people he is arguing
against. But, yes, being less wrong doesn't make him right.
Robin Hanson rhanson@gmu.edu http://hanson.gmu.edu
Asst. Prof. Economics, George Mason University
MSN 1D3, Carow Hall, Fairfax VA 22030
703-993-2326 FAX: 703-993-2323
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