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stefangordon • today at 2:43 AM • 3 replies • view on HN

A winner of the Nobel Prize in Economics, Paul Krugman wrote in 1998, “The growth of the Internet will slow drastically, as the flaw in ‘Metcalfe’s law’—which states that the number of potential connections in a network is proportional to the square of the number of participants—becomes apparent: most people have nothing to say to each other! By 2005, it will become clear that the Internet’s impact on the economy has been no greater than the fax machine’s.”


Replies

d3edd • today at 5:50 AM

"most people have nothing to say to each other!"

He wasnt wrong actually.

Most people just watch and observe. As we see on Tikky Tokky and Instagram.

pratchett • today at 2:50 AM

You can't use one successful technology in the past to justify every hyped technology from there on out

CPLX • today at 3:07 AM

Wow this one specific guy was wrong thirty years ago!