The April, 1978 issue of The Futurist magazine ran an incredibly forward-thinking piece about the future of newspapers.
If we think of a newspaper as being a printed object delivered to our homes, we may be talking about replacing newspaper with an electronic signal. But if we think (as I do) of newspapers as organizations which disseminate news and information by the most efficient methods available – then we are thinking in terms of applying a new technology to an existing institution.
The author, Kenneth Edwards, was writing about the emerging technology of Teletext in the UK. If the newspaper industry has had 30 years to think about this concept and decided that litigation is better than a new business model, it’s tough to feel bad about their declining revenue.
See also:
Tablet Newspaper (1994)
Future Newspapers Written by Advertisers (1912)
Online Shopping (1967)
