I raised a few questions in my previous post: why were early predictions of satellite communication successful? Was satellite communications inevitable, or was it driven by the creative minds of the people who predicted it's development?
David Whalens postulates that John Pierce, from AT&T's Bell Telephone Lab, identified satellite communications as a billion-dollar technology. Hmmmmm.... could that impact the likelihood of success for this prediction? By 1960, AT&T filed for permission from the FCC to launch an experimental communication satellite.
Richard Albright provided some interesting perspectives on technical forecasts. He notes that 80% of forecasts in computers and communications are correct, while forecasts in other areas are less than 50% correct. He lists a few potential reasons why:
- Sustained exponential trends in enabling technologies. It's easier to extrapolate (predict) when you have more sample points to work with.
- Lower investment for innovation. Technology advances have dropped the cost barriers, so we can effectively iterate more solutions for less cost. This allows many people from many organisations to make contributions to the progression.
Personally, I believe that the likelihood of success for any prediction will be directly proportional to the potential profit that can be made from it's success. Of course there are other factors (like gravity and other technical, political, organizational hurdles), but I believe that greed is a powerful force that can significantly impact the success of any technological prediction.
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Or could it simply be that we are engineers? We possess the ability to solve almost any technological problem; therefore, if we treat our predictions as technological challenges, we will simply build the solution and prove the prediction correct. Other people don’t have that option, only those involved in the creation of high tech innovation.
I think you are right about the fact that the cost of innovation is not that high for some of the technology improvements and if someone sees a market, it's nto that hard to make it happen.
I agree, with the possibility of extreme profit and financial backing, the potential for any pediction to be successful will be much higher. I also agree with Steve's comment that technological challenges are somewhat unique in that engineers work them as they would any other problem.
Are there many examples that technical predictions were unsuccessful when financial backing was abundent and focus on the predictin was high?
Yes, Bandit, developing the Panama Canal was one such example. They had funding and nationalistic zeal for the project when the French lost thousands to disease and poor working conditions.
Throwing people and money at a problem was insufficient. They had built their living quarters with lovely fountains that served as a home for disease carrying mosquitos.
Someone observed that they made progress when they focused on human resources issues and stopped killing the workforce with good intentions.
The PBS special entitled "A Man, A Plan, A Canal, Panama" illustrates that technological innovations, such as the movable railway track, and better working conditions combined with an understanding of the mosquito helped to address some fundamental obstacles to success.
The problem was simplified to the need to move over 50 miles of dirt, and adding a project manager with railway experienced addressed some of the problems.
Even with these accomplishments, another analogy of the engineering problem reminded me of building a sand castle. The sloping walls tend to continue to fall into the trough, and the Panama Canal was reported to require continual maintenance to address it.
By the way, the title of this rather wonderful PBS show is a palindrome, and similar to the word radar, is spelled the same, forwards and backwards.
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