Occasionally, smart people get a little bit ahead of themselves, and say things that they can’t know to be certain. We call this “prediction”. Getting a prediction right is awesome, because if you play it cool enough, you can act like you used your enormous brain power to come to said conclusion with certainty, and didn’t just get lucky. Below are a few bright people who made that gamble, and failed.

Bill Gates at the World Economic Forum in 2004 

Bill Gates’ three stage plan to eradicate spam by 2006 was noticeably unsuccessful.

On that note, Scott Chasin the chief technology officer of  MX Logic Inc, said:

I think Gates had a very optimistic view of the world

Rodger that Scott, but according to Bloomberg, there are patterns showing his statement could be true, except that he’s nine years late.

Clifford Stoll, author of “Silicon Snake Oil”

Hilarious to think to think of Stoll’s sarcasm now, when ecommerce and online publishing is not only proving to be the saviour of publishing as we know it, but an untapped gold mine of revenue for publishers. Amazon.com, anyone? Kindle for you, sir?

Stoll quipped his quote in 1995, and said this last year:

Of my many mistakes, flubs, and howlers, few have been as public as my 1995 howler. Wrong? Yep.” Later, he added, “And, as I’ve laughed at others’ foibles, I think back to some of my own cringeworthy contributions. Now, whenever I think I know what’s happening, I temper my thoughts: Might be wrong, Cliff…

Steve Chen, co-founder of YouTube

Yep, he said that.

I’m sure he regretted saying this immediately.

To see some more quotes, click HERE.

[Source: Information Week, Business Insider, Digital Trends]