What would we do without experts?

JOSEPH CAMPBELL:  ‘The Internet? Bah!’ Remembering 1995, the year of the world wide web.

Skeptics scoffed that the “massive seething monument to human expression” was little more than a fad. No contrarian was more insistent than Clifford Stoll, an astronomer who in 1995 brought out the book, “Silicon Snake Oil: Second Thoughts on the Information Highway.” It makes for entertaining reading — if mostly for its jaw-dropping assortment of misguided predictions. Stoll, who said he been online for years, wrote, for example:

“Video-on-demand, that killer application of communications, will remain a dream.”“I don’t believe that phone books, newspapers, magazines, or corner video stores will disappear as computer networks spread. Nor do I think that my telephone will merge with my computer, to become some sort of information appliance.”“What will the electronic book look like? Some sort of miniature laptop computer, I’d guess. We’ll download selections and page through them electronically. Try reading electronic books. They’re awful.”

Stoll previewed his book in an essay in Newsweek on Feb. 27, 1995, that has become something of a cult classic, which is frequently rediscovered online. The essay, in which Stoll dismissed the online world as a “most trendy and oversold community,” appeared beneath the headline, “The Internet? Bah!”