It's interesting to look back as preparation for looking forward. As a rule of thumb, look back 2x to forecast x for Moore's Law driven industries, so looking back 14 years and seeing what's changed will give an idea of how much more will change in the next 7 years. Gilder's concluding paragraph:
It is companies that shun the PC of today in order to cater to the TV, consumer electronics and telephone industries that will end up in luxury backwaters. They will resemble the companies that catered to the mainframe trade early in this decade, or those that catered to the horse business early in this century. They may find exotic or intriguing niches. Yet just as the real action was not at Churchill Downs or the Peapack Hunt Club but in Detroit, the real action today--the source of wealth and power--is not at Nintendo or Sega, Hollywood or QVC. It is in the scores of thousands of computer and software companies that make up the industrial fabric of the Information Age--the exhilarating new life after television.
It is companies that shun the PC of today in order to cater to the TV, consumer electronics and telephone industries that will end up in luxury backwaters. They will resemble the companies that catered to the mainframe trade early in this decade, or those that catered to the horse business early in this century. They may find exotic or intriguing niches. Yet just as the real action was not at Churchill Downs or the Peapack Hunt Club but in Detroit, the real action today--the source of wealth and power--is not at Nintendo or Sega, Hollywood or QVC. It is in the scores of thousands of computer and software companies that make up the industrial fabric of the Information Age--the exhilarating new life after television.