| Virtual World is a richly interactive future - a future in which business and consumer users don't so much choose as co-create the products and services they want. So important is multimedia in Virtual World that it begins to blur the boundaries between "business" and "consumer" environments, and contributes to a fundamental restructuring of industry. |
| In Bizworld, multimedia plays out differently in the consumer and business environments. In the consumer market, it is simply a tool to navigate through many choices. In the business market, applications are more robust and provide businesses a means of creating a more productive work environment. |
| Upstairs Downstairs is a future that plays out the polarization of wealth in the developed nations as well as a split of the population across the acceptance of technology lines. This results in a scenario of haves and have-nots. It combines features of Virtual World (haves) and Slow Boat (have-nots). |
| Slow Boat is a blocked scenario - a scenario in which the big news is no real news. Slow Boat is a world in which users accept limited choice as the primary value-added, and in which the economy stays slow. Multimedia is the revolution that never came. |