''The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Future'' was a four-part radio series hosted by Douglas Adams. It was first broadcast on BBC Radio 4 in October 2000, and repeated in April and May 2001, and September 2014. Because the radio series turned out to be Adams's final project for the BBC before his death (a week after the first broadcast of the final episode), all four episodes are still available for download from the Radio 4 website. Extracts from the four programmes are also available for listening within the ''

Douglas Adams at the BBC ''Douglas Adams at the BBC'' is a three CD set released by BBC Audio in 2004 (). By using extracts from many radio and TV productions, the three discs cover Douglas Adams's association with BBC Radio and TV from 1974 to 2001, and also include trib ...

'' collection.

The Episodes

* Programme One: Music :Original Transmission: 11:00 am, Wednesday 4 October 2000, BBC Radio 4 Adams discusses the future of music in the "Internet Age" (which at the time was mainly limited to discussion of illegal download services, such as the first version of Napster - it would be another two years before the

iTunes Music Store The iTunes Store is a digital media store operated by Apple Inc. It opened on April 28, 2003, as a result of Steve Jobs' push to open a digital marketplace for music. As of April 2020, iTunes offered 60 million songs, 2.2 million apps, 25,000 ...

opened to the American market, and legal music downloads would start to become popular). Topics include digital music creation and online distribution. Adams interviews

Brian Eno Brian Peter George St John le Baptiste de la Salle Eno (; born Brian Peter George Eno, 15 May 1948) is a British musician, composer, record producer and visual artist best known for his contributions to ambient music and work in rock, pop an ...

, Michael Nesmith and

Peter Gabriel Peter Brian Gabriel (born 13 February 1950) is an English musician, singer, songwriter, record producer, and activist. He rose to fame as the original lead singer of the progressive rock band Genesis. After leaving Genesis in 1975, he launched ...

. * Programme Two: Publishing :Original Transmission: 11:00 am, Wednesday 11 October 2000, BBC Radio 4 Adams discusses the future of publishing with Peter Cochrane, Muriel Gray and

Stewart Brand Stewart Brand (born December 14, 1938) is an American writer, best known as editor of the ''Whole Earth Catalog''. He founded a number of organizations, including The WELL, the Global Business Network, and the Long Now Foundation. He is the auth ...

. Topics include the online distribution of e-books and e-book readers. * Programme Three: Broadcasting :Original Transmission: 11:00 am, Wednesday 18 October 2000, BBC Radio 4 Adams discusses the future of TV with

John Browning John Moses Browning (January 23, 1855 – November 26, 1926) was an American firearm designer who developed many varieties of military and civilian firearms, cartridges, and gun mechanisms many of which are still in use around the world. He m ...

, Dylan Winter and

Mathew Steele Mathew is a masculine given name and a variant of Matthew. It is also used as a surname. As a given name Notable people with the given name include: * Mat Erpelding (born 1975), American politician * Mat Kearney (born 1978), American singer-s ...

. Topics included the possibilities of interactive programming, digital video creation and custom scheduling. * Programme Four: Convergence :Original Transmission: 11:00 am, Wednesday 25 October 2000, BBC Radio 4 Adams discusses the future evolution of technology and Artificial Intelligence with

Chris Langton __NOTOC__ Christopher Gale Langton (born 1948/49) is an American computer scientist and one of the founders of the field of artificial life. He coined the term in the late 1980s when he organized the first "Workshop on the Synthesis and Simulat ...

, Stuart Kauffman, and others. Topics included embedded and nano- technologies. On Saturday 14 March 2015, Mitch Benn presented a programme called Did Douglas Get It Right? which reviewed how accurate the predications from the year 2000 were.

External links

''The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Future'', on the BBC Radio 4 site

Did Douglas Get It Right?
{{Douglas Adams Hitchhiker's Guide to the Future, The

The Episodes

See also

External links