Prophecy can be risky business
He could hardly have been further off target the guy who, in an elaborate Op-Ed in Dagens Naeringsliv in August 1996, claimed the Internet is "a fashion thing that will die in a few years." Ten years on, a survey by Journalisten reveals that Norway now has more online newspapers than printed ones. Journalisten counted 284, or 297 if they included the 13 different local sites of The Norwegian Broadcasting corporation (NRK), online papers compared to 266 printed papers. Still, as late as 1998, the Op-Ed writer in question, insisted that his prediction of the Internet's imminent demise would soon be proved. Journalist Paul Leveraas on the other hand, writes (in Norwegian) that in 1996, he and others, predicted the imminent death of the newspaper, but ten years on he concludes that whereas they expected a revolution what they got was a digital evolution – and predicting the future is not for the faint-hearted.
