1979 Futurist Foretells Of The Coming Computer Age 

Alan Westin passed away in 2013, but he lived to see all his predictions come true.

The only thing he was wrong about was privacy. People do claim to still want their privacy yet they document almost everything and post it on social media while voluntarily placing devices like Google Home and Amazon Alexa in their homes.

In 1979 at 8 years old in the 4th Grade, I was sitting in front of an Apple IIe with 3 1/2" and 5" floppy disks. I raised my hand and asked our teacher in a public elementary school when would be able to get on the computer and look at the news, weather, sports and be able to talk to people. I'm 48 now, and I hack everything that requires electricity and has a magnetic strip on one side.

This is actually mind blowing😨😨😨 He also predicted the internet and also pondered on the philosophical, maybe psychological or even practical question on why should we want to be connected also subjects on privacy....this is just so amazing what an exceptionally accurate insight he had on the entire subject. This video deserves over a billion views.

how does this not have a million hits?

Ridiculously accurate considering the time, thank you for the upload.

He predicted YELP!

Utterly amazing. I do remember the 70's whispered buzz about what "they" were doing in Silicon Valley ....and how unfathonably it was going to change life as we knew it .

What an astute, articulate man.

wow. This guy Nailed it. Most of the predictions I've seen were ridiculous.

I remember as a kid in the late 70s there use to be a program on PBS that talked about the future and they spoke about TV being on your wrist watch and how mobile devices like the ones used by Captain Kirk were going to be common place. Same with mass media being EVERYWHERE not just concentrated on your home TV, in magazines, or at work.

Mr Westin truly possessed amazing insight and foresight.

i feel like someone from the future visiting the past! Love watching all these video blast from the past. :p

Back when Middle Class meant you can afford to fly to San Francisco and get a 200$(Counting for inflation about 670$ today) suit.

People like him make the world we live in

Amazing foresight from this gentleman. Viewing this in 2021 makes me wonder who today has such foresight into the 2060s and the issues that will develop.

Yeah and everyone forgot the one important thing. This also gives some people to post phony information about someone business to black ball and ruin their business. Computers and their Network have opened up a new and dangerous age, but not all of it is used for malicious intent. So it become a roll of the dice.

We're looking back at people of 1979 speculating about innovations of the future we're now living in, people who would probably still be pretty surprised seeing what life is like today. I wonder if our 2017 foresight about the future 38 years from now may be as accurate as this man's, and if the future will seem thrilling, disturbing, encouraging, or who knows what. We'll likely be so inseparable from computers that they've become built into us. We'll be streaming movies into our heads, as our sex cyborg spouses attempt to hack into our brains for vital data on the new lunar colony, namely our spending habits at the Starbucks on Oceanus Procellarum. Well, joke's on you Stella X-9! You won't be interrupting my stream of Game of Moons, and my lunar latte secrets are mine to keep, you hexadecimal harpy!

Alan was awesome what a brain, glad to have heard his thoughts here and I hope he lived well.

They werent stupid in 1979, 10 years earlier Datapoint came with the 2200 and that changed the future forever. They had as first a computer that could be used as a desktop, but it wasnt sold like that otherwise they wouldnt have any investers. And only a few years later they had already complete computer networks with those desktops machines. way before anyone was thinking about it with the home made in the garage computer/

.. he just invented Yelp and didn't know:-)

Yeah... He predicted future b/c he knew what this instrument would /could do.. What I find now as I am older ,wiser... Is that the public was willing and accepted all risks... This dude knew ultimately what this would do.. Keeps focusing on such small matters as far as what most people would accept according to what the computer could do for them. I guess folks thought it would be such a real "short-cut " to their everyday problems.... Boy.... WERE THEY WRONG!!!!!!!!!!!

Fascinating video

Great content. Subscribed.

he's been describing everything as it is nowadays. The only thing missing in his phrases was plugging in words like "Google", social media, Machine learning...etc wow hhhh

He was not far off the mark, was he?

I hope this dude invested, because he's so on point it's not even funny. A Ti-86 costs about the same as eee laptop. A Ti-84+ or a Ti-73 Teacher Pack costs about as much as an Alienware desktop.

Excellent video. If only we could control the allowable activities using the best and highest values of human nature. My son is a futurist, David. I have rarely seen back into the past, or its potential future, as thoroughly as you present it.

Takes a great mind to see so far in the future and on so many levels. We're short of people of this kind even now.

You've been uploading straight 🔥🔥lately

On this channel I learn the wisdom of listening.

Watching this on the Internet is mind blowing.

Wow, he predicted a lot of the internet, including Yelp and modern privacy issues.

The trade offs... chillingly accurate 🕶️🚬

Thank you for that wonderful clip!

So what exactly led to the erosion of the idea that privacy was very important, for Americans? At what point did Americans discard the thought, and started uploading their lives on to Facebook? Is there any reading on the subject? Thanks.

This was around the time I got interested in computing. Playing Space Invaders on Radio Shack TRS-80 and wondering how it worked. That lead to study in computing and a long career working in IT. This guy really thought computing through back then and got his predictions bang on the money. He even mentioned using computers to track terrorists. WOW!

I love this channel.

Where do i find this damn documentary?! I'm looking all over the place! Alabama A&M library has a VHS copy 100 miles north of here. That is NOT driving distance. lol. I'm a programmer and this is absolutely fascinating. I gotta get a hold of this thing.

Amazing I must say the internet is nuts

I just don't see the average person needing an entire computer in their home. They take up way too much space.

To think that "pornography" was a huge catalyst for internet & computer development.!!!

I pictured him with a wizards hat and cape on looking into a crystal ball. "There will be this thing called youtube..........."

40 years ago. Amazing.

Now that information is in our hands.

I would be very interested in watching this documentary. Where can I buy it?

2:36 The guy correctly predicted that there could be problems with what later became the internet and free exchange of ideas. Back in the days before the internet it was much easier to control the narrative in the media, because information channels were more restricted. Nowadays people spend all day glued to their phones, so it's much easier to spread any information, including outright lies. The ratio of facts and misinformation is probably roughly the same as before the internet, but the volumes have grown substantially.

Did this brilliant man predict *#deletefacebook* or did he not, or did I just missed it. Srsly, these times do not produce these excellent speakers any more. It does deject me.

Do you remember what camera you used for this interview?

he is taking about yelp in the beginning

This is the future they always talked about.

4:05 Isn't it already part of the Pursuit of Happiness? It seems like no privacy ever would interfere with Happiness.

He kind of looks like Alex Rieger (Judd Hirsch) from Taxi. Cool guy!

He was right on

I wonder if he predicted outsourcing ?

Well Rasmus Hjelm I think you miss understood what I was saying. We all know moral problem, and there are many many other ways to Black Ball one or ones business. But I was addressing this video and what the gentleman was saying on how the computer age is making it easier to gather, build, maintain and use information on people, business, etc. I was not addressing other ways this might happen and the moral issues of how one uses the information for good or bad. Why would you make a comment about something else when I was talking about the content this gentleman was talking about. Not what other ways to black ball and ruin people's business back in the day.

He was wrong about privacy :((( but a great insightful man nevertheless... great video Dave...

A lot the "future innovations" discussed here already existed- including the internet. There were already bullet board systems and Usenet in operation by 1980. Perhaps this futurist didn't know about them, but they already existed.

what purpose will it serve he said, my thought was selfies, how sad this world has become :(

My first lunch box computer was 256 MB RAM 10 million megabyte ROM, my current cell phone is 6 GB ram and 128 GB ROM. Price difference $4,500 versus $200 cell phone

He was only 50 years old back then. Today people in their 50s look way younger.

Is there a video that predicted the huge amount of japanese "erotic" cartoon sharing platforms? I am curious who would predicted that and how this person looked like

Wow

How did he know...scary.

The last part is definitely mixed. Those people he mentioned read the signs correctly. But their have been a bunch of others who have always been or learned to be concerned with individual freedom, aka, privacy. I'm learning about this shit recently actually, but I had no clue that privacy was such a concern with the advent of personal computer technology! Like Thomas Sowell has pointed out with culture, and following that politics, privacy concerns aren't a new thing!! We're STILL talking about this shit! We just made the mistake of not being interested enough into looking at history OR haven't been interested in the propoganda of history from public schools and the fucking history channel. Point is, current day main stream concerns talk about ALL this shit like it has never been concerned with before and that we can righteously encourage us to tell old folks they don't know what the fuck we're talking about.

I swear I thought this was Senator Carl Levin (M) lol

🙏

Is there any futurists today or are they a thing of the past?

A 'futurist', eh? I was a futurist once!

the internet destroyed the middle class

We have the technology for this stuff... Wonder why it's not being employed

he looks like lext luthor :))

Well still not quite there with the prices🕶️🚬

prescient

This man is a conspiracy. The home computer is not happening

Won't happen this technology is not going to happen We would have to meet aliens that have this technology to move forward

Oh please...its called odds. We will come into contact with aliens from other planets in the future. I'm a futurist!