Nielsen’s paper is a thought-provoking discussion of economic, legal, and human factors topics. I recommend it for people in the field as well as students. The author begins by reviewing predictions that he made in a 1990 book [1]. He indicates when he was correct (for example, predicting a “mass market” for hypermedia) and when he was wrong (for example, predicting the integration of hypertext with other computer facilities).

After this introduction, the author makes a new set of predictions. In the “short-term” section, after noting that encyclopedias constitute a product category in which the hypertext form outsells the printed form, he hypothesizes on other product categories that may be candidates for multimedia. He also discusses commercial hypertext on the Internet. The medium-term section includes a discussion of intellectual property rights. Nielsen points out that one approach to the issue of compensation for creators is to use certain forms of information to increase the value of the physical or unique events for which it is possible to charge. He notes that rock bands might “make their money from tours and concerts and … stop worrying whether people duplicate the CD with DAT recorders.” This is close to the approach of the Grateful Dead, at least until the recent death of Jerry Garcia. They even permitted fans to make their own recordings of concerts.

In the “long-term” section, Nielsen discusses human factors issues such as how to deal with “junk information,” the creation of attribute-rich objects, education, and the future of publishing. He poses the serious question of whether hypertext promotes a fragmented world view or encourages the discovery of connections. He closes with a discussion of whether hypermedia publishing will be concentrated in a small number of near-monopolistic companies or be what he terms an information anarchy, for which he describes positive and negative features.