"There is not the slightest indication that nuclear energy will ever be obtainable. It would mean that the atom would have to be shattered at will." Albert Einstein, 1932
"We don't like their sound, and guitar music is on the way out." Decca Recording Company on declining to sign the Beatles, 1962
"Rail travel at high speed is not possible because passengers, unable to breathe, would die of asphyxia." Dionysis Lardner, 1830
"I think there is a world market for maybe five computers." Thomas Watson, chairman of IBM 1943
"Everyone acquainted with the subject will recognize it as a conspicuous failure." Henry Morton, president of the Stevens Institute of Technology, on Edison's light bulb, 1880
"The horse is here to stay — the automobile is only a novelty, a fad." Michigan Savings Bank’s president advising Henry Ford's lawyer not to invest in the Ford Motor Co., 1903
"Television won't last because people will soon get tired of staring at a plywood box every night." Darryl Zanuck, movie producer, 20th Century Fox, 1946
"There is no reason for any individual to have a computer in his home." Ken Olson, president, chairman, and founder of Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC), at a 1977 World Future Society meeting in Boston.
"If excessive smoking actually plays a role in the production of lung cancer, it seems to be a minor one."W. C. Heuper, National Cancer Institute, 1954
"I must confess that my imagination refuses to see any sort of submarine doing anything but suffocating its crew and floundering at sea." HG Wells, British novelist, in 1901
"It'll be gone by June." Variety Magazine on Rock n' Roll, 1955
Contributed by Jane Hart