James and I had a conversation last week about how things have changed over the years. He was looking at the world Sydney and Jay are growing up in, technologically speaking, and comparing it to the environment Louise and Tom grew up in, or he himself grew up in. We thought it would be fun to have some online conversations about this.
So I'll start things out with a confession.
And here it is: I have a track record of being extremely shortsighted when it comes to predicting future technology. The examples I will present of this are mostly from my very young days. Maybe now I have enough life experience and wisdom to be more farsighted. Maybe.
Example #1: For twenty or thirty years I have been agreeing with predictions that one day our entering college students would not be able to read an analog clock. That hasn't happened yet, and at this point I'm not sure it ever will. But it still seems like it should, given how few young people wear watches these days, preferring to use their cell phones to keep track of time.
Example #2: Back in sixth grade, we were having a discussion about the saying "Necessity is the mother of invention". It occurred to me during that discussion that all the inventions had happened already and that there were no more to look forward to. After all, we had electricity, cars, indoor plumbing, heat. What more did we need? I thought this was sad, that I wouldn't be witnessing the dawn of any big inventions.
Example #3: Back when "Get Smart" was a new TV show, I used to enjoy watching it for all the outrageous gadgets. But one gadget was just SO over-the-top that I had trouble suspending disbelief whenever it appeared. It was the Shoe Phone. Oh, the fact that a phone was in a shoe I could handle. But there was NO WIRE. And it would ring when Max was ON THE STREET. I knew that could NEVER happen.
So there you have it. Proof that I stink at predicting future technology. But that won't stop me making more predictions.
Care to join me? Where do you think things are going in the next ten or twenty years?
Comments (1)
I wrote a fictional story in high school where I-495 in Boston was one of many highways that had been replaced by a plexiglass covered electric conduit that cars would both coast on and draw their energy from. (Still think this is a damn good idea...)
I told a admissions counselor fifteen years ago in an interview that we'd see a growth in proposition/issue voting (true), but that it'd be all over this new "internet" thing. (Hasn't happened... yet.)
I was just reminisicing about the first time I witnessed a VCR in action (1983?) and was really excited because I thought the device was recording live television on the fly, so that you could fast forward the commercials. Should have patented that one, and I was seven, but it explains why I was an early TiVo adopter.
I was a big early believer in the Commodore Amiga (best computer of the 80s and early 90s) and the mini-disc (which was a natural progression for the audio cassette until mp3). I thought DVD was doomed to failure (and still think Blu-Ray is as well...) However, I was sold on mp3 as well, and had a hard-drive based solution by Creative before the iPod rolled out and stole its thunder.
I think the biggest adjustment for me is understanding the role that existing infrastructure plays in the adoption of new technology. Plexiglass highways? Unlikely. Electric cars that plug into wall outlets and drive on regular roads, that we'll see very soon.
With that said, I think the 21st century is the age of the database. Physical ownership of data is inefficient anyway and no one does their backups. CDs are gone. DVDs - it's a matter of time. (LPs and old books are antiques and for hobbyists or historians.) Software is silly, especially dependent on the OS. All of the personal computing aspect was just a crazy blip on the way to bring computing to the masses. Computing was always meant to be centralized, but democratization couldn't have happened without the PC revolution of the eighties.
Another one is going to be gone, I'd say in ten years, is printed books and libraries. How inefficient is paper as a storage method these days anyway? What do you if you need paper that's hundreds of miles away? Wow.
Centralization of data is both confining and liberating at the same time. The technical expertise of interpreting and using that data is going to be in demand more than ever!
Posted by Jason | July 16, 2008 9:52 AM
Posted on July 16, 2008 09:52