Shoshana Zuboff Quotes
Computerization brings about an essential change in the way the worker can know the world and, with it, a crisis of confidence inthe possibility of certain knowledge.
Zuboff, Shoshana. In the Age of the Smart Machine: The Future of Work and Power. Basic Books, 1988, p. 62.
There is an opposite school of thought which argues that because technology develops so fast, by the time you legislate about it of you understand it, it is too late to prevent major problems and abuses which can become institutionalized. Instead it is argued, legislate rapidly BEFORE you understand all the consequences and then repeal and revise very frequently as the technology develops. This school argues that Schmidt’s view is tantamount to not legislating at all as it will ALWAYS be too late if you wait till you understand the consequences.
See Eigen {633625} for a more explicit personal statement of the choice for the individual.
A startlingly bad prediction by a Nobel-prize winning economist particularly given it was stated in 1998 rather than a much earlier date when the potential of the Internet wasn’t already apparent. Ironically, the quote is from a Red Herring article he wrote titled “Why Most Economists’ Predictions Are Wrong” in which he asserts that most economists predictions are wrong because they overestimate the impact of future technologies. This quote is part of a longer, equally incorrect quote: “The growth of the Internet will slow drastically, as the flaw in ‘Metcalfe’s law' 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.” See related quotes.
Shoshana Zuboff (born 1951) is an American author, Harvard professor, social psychologist, philosopher, and scholar.
