This is a special report that appeared on Forbes on 10.15.07 and has an impressive list of visionaries talking about the future. highly recommended reading. click the names to read the visions

clipped from www.forbes.com What happened to the future? Weren’t things supposed to be cooler by now, smarter, safer? Raised on a steady diet of science fiction, overzealous politicians and corporate hype, Americans expected to be living in The Jetsons — but instead find themselves stuck in a scarier version of The Waltons. The truth is that people simply aren’t very good at predicting the future. It was only two centuries ago that we began to think we could do it at all, and we’re still learning. Hindsight may be 20/20, but foresight remains largely blind. Visionaries What were you sure would happen, but didn’t? What totally surprised you? Joel A. Barker Wendell Bell Stuart Brand David Brin Pat Cadigan James Canton Ed Cornish Esther Dyson Scott W. Erickson Frank Feather Jacque Fresco Harry Harrison Hazel Henderson Sohail Inayatullah William Knoke Richard Lamb John Mahaffie Syd Mead John Naisbitt Nicholas Negroponte Bob Rogers Rudy Rucker Paul Saffo Robert Sawyer Stephen Wolfram