Ken Olsen Quotes

The most compelling reason for most people to buy a computer for the home will be to link it to a nationwide communications network. We're just in the beginning stages of what will be a truly remarkable breakthrough for most people - as remarkable as the telephone.

We must close the digital divide.

Our goal in life ought to be to extend this medium [the Internet] so that it is available to every man, woman and child in the country.

I think it's fair to say that personal computers have become the most empowering tool we've ever created. They're tools of communication, they're tools of creativity, and they can be shaped by their user.

I do not fear computers. I fear the lack of them.

The computer seems easy because Apple makes the products so easy to use at home. It's the simple things, like getting the TV set up or getting the speakers to work. That drives me crazy.

I've never had Internet access. Actually, I have looked at things on other people's computers as a bystander. A few times in my life I've opened email accounts, twice actually, but it's something I don't want in my life right now.

Kids today are smarter than we ever were. And they've got computers, too, which is awesome. They're scary to me.

For a homebody like me, the evolution of gadgets has been a blessing.

Technologically, I live in the 17th century; I don't have a computer, I don't have any of that stuff. I don't look at the Internet, although I know people tell me I'm all over it. Somebody told me they Googled me, and they said I was mentioned two million times, some stupid thing... but who cares?

The technological revolution at home makes it much easier for computers to do our work.

The Internet has empowered us. It has empowered you, it has empowered me, and it has empowered some other guys as well.

We tend to look at computers and the Internet as items of nicety. In the 21st century, they will be items of necessity.

Ordinary Chinese are also getting unprecedented access to information. More than half a billion Chinese now use the Internet.

When the PC was launched, people knew it was important.

By the 2010s, almost everybody in the developed world, it seemed, had a powerful digital device that took little or no special skills or training to use.

In the developed world, we are surrounded by electronics - from the computers on our desks to the smart phones in our pockets to the thermostats in our homes to our data in the virtual cloud.

All Americans must have access to the Internet in today's digital world, and the market needs competition to drive affordable prices.

It's not like I'm an Internet geek or anything - I'm of an age where the Internet is not the first thing I think of when I need to find something out.

I think the Internet is a key driver of opening up opportunities, which impacts many things, including development - I will repeat that I am not a fan of looking at technology or the Internet in Africa through the lens of development - we love the Internet for sake of the Internet.

The functional uses of machines and innovative computer programs is not to isolate us but, rather, to promote coexistence. If used properly, it brings us together, granting unimaginable opportunities, magnifying the most quintessential and exclusively human capabilities.

It is important to note that Internet access is not a necessity in the day-to-day lives of Americans and doesn't even come close to the threshold to be considered a basic human right.

The cellphone is humanity's biggest platform. If we can't use it to change education or health care, then shame on us.

Broadband is not a luxury; it's critical infrastructure.

The Internet is not pervasive as it could be, or democratic.