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The Next 25 Years in Tech
Posted by
Zonk
on Thu Jan 31, 2008 04:42 PM
from the technosticating-the-future dept.
from the technosticating-the-future dept.
PCWMike writes "PCs may disappear from your desk by 2033. But with digital technology showing up everywhere else — including inside your body — computing will only get more personal, reports Dan Tynan for PC World's 25th Anniversary. While convenience will be increased by leaps and bounds, it will come at a profound loss in our sense of what privacy means. 'Technology will become firmly embedded in advanced devices that deliver information and entertainment to our homes and our hip pockets, in sensors that monitor our environment from within the walls and floors of our homes, and in chips that deliver medicine and augment reality inside our bodies. This shiny happy future world will come at a cost, though: Think security and privacy concerns. So let's hope that our jetpacks come with seat belts, because it's going to be a wild ride.'"
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No PC, no LAN (Score:2)
In other news, I'm going to start a publication whose name ends in "world" so I can get automatic posting on
Disappear from the desk? (Score:2, Interesting)
Though I wouldn't mind having a gargoyle rig, a la the gent in Snow Crash. We've almost got the tech for it now, save only that I don't know of a good portable input method that doesn't require poking at a tiny screen or a mini keyboard...
Re:Disappear from the desk? (Score:4, Funny)
Yep! Big ass tables [youtube.com] are the next big thing!
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http://xkcd.com/37/ (Score:2, Insightful)
Nothing to add.
What timing (Score:2)
southland tales (Score:3, Funny)
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Bio-CPU? (Score:2)
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WTF? (Score:5, Insightful)
First they took away our lan,
then the internet infrastructure stateside needs $100 million,
now they want to take away my computer.. shit. give it up already.
These guys can barely forecast seasons and they're going to tell us what's going to happen in 25 years? As the tag says, "Where's my flying car?"
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FEMBOT (Score:2, Funny)
Which begs the question... (Score:2)
Are those real?
PCs may disappear from your desk by 2033. (Score:3, Funny)
PCs may disappear from your desk by 2033 when the superintelligent robots vaporize your desk and everything underneath it.
there, fixed that for you.
Still waiting for date with Cheryl Woodward... (Score:2)
We are living through history, folks (Score:5, Interesting)
-Multiple, world-influencing major conflicts.
-The introduction, widespread distribution, and near-anywhere access of the Internet (which, in my opinion, is one of our greatest achievements as humans.)
-The rise of wireless mobile devices that have the potential to function anywhere in the world.
-Computers moving from universities and government orgs, taking up entire rooms, to becoming nearly universal in our homes, cars, and pockets.
-The rise of communication to the point where an actor can die in New York, and within ONE HOUR the entire world knowing of it (those parts of the world that has access to the net, radio, and/or TV of course)
-9/11 (one of the most world-changing events in modern history)
And many more. Seriously folks. We are living through one of the most exciting and important parts of history in the entire time-line of our species.
Centuries from now, people will be wondering "Imagine what it was like to live through the era where in roughly one century we went from taking weeks to get a message across a country and taking literally MONTHS to travel across the sea... to the point where you could talk to someone on the other side of the world using a device no bigger than your fist, and could travel from New York to Australia in a matter of hours."
And you know what? We are lucky enough to experience it first hand. Be grateful, folks. Someday, all of us will be the stuff of history and legend.
Re:We are living through history, folks (Score:5, Interesting)
We're dwarfs.
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Re:We are living through history, folks (Score:4, Insightful)
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-Multiple, world-influencing major conflicts.
To bad you missed several good wars, Viet Nam, WWII, WWI, I do not believe this one even compares in any facet to WWI or WWII as far as how much it reached every individual in the world.
-The introduction, widespread distribution, and near-anywhere access of the Internet (which, in my opinion, is one of our greatest achievements as humans.)
No indoor plumbing beats this hands d
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Yeah. I don't know if people really realize that outside the US 9/11 just resulted in everyone hoping that the US wasn't gonna throw a tantrum and invade them. Outside of the US, by and large, the "post-9/11 world" is very similar to the pre-9/11 world, warts and all.
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Re:We are living through history, folks (Score:5, Insightful)
Imagine what it was like to live through the era when Iron [wikipedia.org] was being developed that could slice right through the Bronze [wikipedia.org] that protected inferior armies... to the point where you could rape and pillage an entire village in under a week. You could march from Cairo to Rome in a matter of years and being conquering and conquering all along the way!
No, seriously. Technology in the future is going to be *way* cooler than it is now. You never reflect on what life was like for your grandparents before the automobile or refrigerators were standards for every family. Your grandchildren won't reflect on what life was like for you without the internet or the cell phone...
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They would have seen -
- Advance of the assembly line and mass produced cheap automobiles
- An massive highway, rail and phone line system that allows information be spread globally within hours.
- Need I mention the television?
- They said Pearl Harbor changed the world too. And arguably more than 9/11 did for our time. You can't even compare Iraq to World War II.
Just think about it. Everyone thinks that of their own generati
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I only wis
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I'm 49 years old and MY generation has lived through the same. big deal. ALL generations live through history. It's what makes it history.
-Multiple, world-influencing major conflicts.
Like WW2? You lived through that one? I didn't either. Or Napoleon's conquest of Europe? I missed that one too. Oh, and the Aryan invasion of India. That was a biggie I missed out on too. Also: the Viking invasions of the 11th century. Nasty stuf
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- There are still a billion people on hunger, as it used to be
- There are still millions of people have no health care, as it used to be
- There are still millions of illiterate people, as it used to be
- Forests are still being cut at rapid pace, as it used to be
- Rich people get richer than they used to be
Nothing has really changed. Maybe you are still too young.Re: (Score:2)
But hey...if you can't hope for good things during bad times, when can you?
Re:We are living through history, folks (Score:4, Insightful)
Being young doesn't mean you lack knowledge of recent history.
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Computer implants present great privacy threat (Score:3, Interesting)
I would be very concerned about the privacy and human rights implications of putting computers or chip implants into peoples bodies. This is the perfect vehicle for total electronic surviellance of a population, and perhaps even more nefarious purposes. For instance it might be possible for a clandestine purpose, or for "law enforcement" purposes to put circuits in these implants that could deliver an electric shock, cause pain or disable a person. The human rights implications and the threats to basic freedom that this would entail would be very dire and serious.
Technology is great on your desk or in your PDA device. It is nice to be able to browse the internet and access and share information through the internet via computer. But this technology should work for our benefit and also be used to promote freedom, not take it away. People must have complete control over their computers, and should be able to put it to use how they see fit. This is the idea of a general purpose computer. DRM indeed is a serious threat to the freedom of the consumer, the freedom to tinker and to utilise technology in new and innovative ways. Closed platforms such as game consoles are designed to limit how they can be used, so that instead of you being able to use your computer as you see fit, some large corporation controls the system and what you can use it for. Putting implants into peoples bodies raises far too much concern for abuse, the the risk or danger to freedom and to control this technology is too great. Once you put electronic devices into the body for these kinds of things, the potential for this to be abused and to be used against you increases exponentially. At least a person should have a choice to refuse this sort of technology. We need to be very wary of schemes to try to forcibly implant people with chips, especially children, and the issues this would create to various bodily integrity and human rights issues, and would also lead us towards a world where no one has any privacy or rights at all, a 1984 like society where everything someone does can be controlled and scrutinised. People should have a basic right to not have their body implanted with electronic devices, tracking devices, etc, which can be used against them. No matter what gaurantee a manufacturer of such technology makes, there is always the opportunity and chance that some technology which you may not be told is there can be embedded into these devices, for tracking or monitoring persons, or as a control measure through some sort of electroshock feature for instance. It is impossible to verify from the consumers end that this technology is not present in such devices. They present a very serious danger and threat to human rights, freedom and privacy.
In the future, ideally I see the desktop computer remaining very commonplace. Computer processing power will continue to increase which will improve game performance, rollout of fiber optic networks will allow for more high bandwidth applications such as instant movie downloading, and so on. Linux will eventually become dominate and totally replace windows, which will give consumers vastly increased freedom and control over their computers than ever before. Just keep the computers on your desk and in your pocket, not in your body and we can use them as a tool of freedom and for our own benefit and to use them as we wish, rather than as a tool of survellience and enslavement.
Plug me in Scotty. (Score:2)
I doubt it (Score:2)
So I am skeptical of pie in the sky predictions about technology.
I'm sorry Dave (Score:2)
um yes? (Score:2)
2033 (Score:4, Funny)
inovation is over, for now (Score:2, Interesting)
OS/2 will still be dead. :-) (Score:3, Funny)
Or maybe my PPro will still be working in 2033? Who knows?
Stupid Laws and Rules (Score:2)
Networking, thin client (Score:2)
This will mean more dedicated hardware which uses less power, you won't need any storage on the move or vast amounts of processing power.
It may also mean that TV, phone and other services you have at home would merely be redirected to your portable viewer.
This is all fairly possible now, the main problem is speed and lack of a dedicated portable terminal.
Cloning needs to be banned. (Score:3, Informative)
Human cloning has a very concerning and unpleasant 1984ish or Brave New World feel to it, a horrific utopian world where every aspect of peoples lives, right down to that which is most personal and sacred to a person, their body, is controlled by others. It is a frightening vision of conformity, uniformity where people are rather than seen as unique individuals instead as carbon copies. It really needs to be completely banned if we care about freedom, the right of each person to be individual, unique, to self determination, the right to a body that is uniquely theres and controlled and manipulated by no one else. We need to respect each person as a unique and diverse person entirely their own, rather than trying to impose ourselves on them and try to determine and control who they are. We need to respect diversity and individuality and eschew totalitarianism and conformism. So I concur with the pope on cloning, not on religious grounds, but on human rights ones.
Next 25 years, same as the last. (Score:2)
Didn't we get the same predicitons in 1990? Wasn't Larry (head honcho of Oracle) spouting the same "network computer" idea back then? Hasn't SciFi been predicting such things for more than 50 years?
Slow news day. For all those 30 or younger: Nothing much as happened in the last decade. No new tech, just small advances in existing tech. There are no ground breaking advances that will be happening in the next decade cause the population is too slow to adopt.
It took 25 years after its invention and promoti
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Mr. Garrison:
Cartman: What, Jew?
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Re:In the future there will be more lame predictio (Score:4, Interesting)
We'll be oke for food, but busy worrying about and fixing the Year 2038 bug [2038bug.com] which is due in another 5 years, when old 32-bit unix-family systems will set their clocks back to 1901.
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