← Will the future of social networking be open and distributed? Here comes Plexus | Main | Twitter uncovers the real-time mood of the nation through the day →

What the future of newspapers looked like in 1981

Ross Dawson, July 21, 2010 at 4:04 pm

This delightful TV news clip from 1981 shows how people could access newspapers such as San Francisco Chronicle and the New York Times on their computer using a dial-up line.

It took 2 hours to download the text of a newspaper, with a $5 cost per hour. One user marvelled at how you could not only read the newspaper online, but also copy it into a document and print it out. It’s particularly interesting to contrast the interface available in the day with, say, a contemporary iPad.

“We’re not in it to make money,” the newspaper people said of their experiments with online newspapers. Evidently.

For the most current insights and trends in the living networks, follow @rossdawson on Twitter!

Pingback: Newspaper Clipping « One Question A Day

Ross Dawson is globally recognized as a leading futurist, entrepreneur, keynote speaker, strategy advisor, and bestselling author. He is Founding Chairman of AHT Group, which consists of 3 companies: consulting, publishing, and ventures firm Advanced Human Technologies, future and strategy firm Future Exploration Network, and events company The Insight Exchange.

Ross is author most recently of Implementing Enterprise 2.0, the prescient Living Networks, which anticipated the social network revolution, and the Amazon.com bestseller Developing Knowledge-Based Client Relationships (click on the links for free chapter downloads). He is based in Sydney and San Francisco with his wife jewellery designer Victoria Buckley and two beautiful young daughters.