Tech Predictions for 2004

Quirk writes "The Independent has the predictions of Charles Arthur for 2004. 'The ubiquity of the iPod, the return of the Mac, and the simplicity of the portable memory stick are just some of the developments that could change our lives in 2004.'"

My own list

[Anonymous Coward]

# Moore's Law will be deemed "obsolete". Despite this, faster computers will still be produced. We will also see x86-64 chips proliferate the market.

# Linux becomes ready for the desktop (they've predicted this every year).

# Doom 3 still won't be released.

# The total destruction of Microsoft's monopoly due to the utter, complete failure of their upcoming retarded product lines. Bill Gates' Ring Of Power tossed into the fires of Mt. Redmond and becomes molten slag. The towers of Microsoft crumble and all rejoice. (Note to Microsoft apologists : If you find this offensive, you need a sense of humour. If you're still unhappy with this, well, you suck.)

# BSD finally dies. (Note to BSD snobs : See above about Microsoft apologists)

# KDE and GNOME merge into one project. Supporters from both camps become outraged and civil war breaks out.

# Linux 2.7 will be forked, ported to run on vending machines and kitchen appliances. 2.6 becomes truly stable, and nobody will care.

# The RIAA will hand out more lawsuits, some of them for toddlers and livestock.

# Darl McBride follows the RIAA's footsteps, and starts suing toddlers and livestock too for unauthorized use of SCO intellectual property.

# Martians recover Beagle 2, reprogram it and send it back to to conquer Earth.

Word confusion

[Anonymous Coward]

I keep confusing ubiquitous with obsequious. They don't sound that much alike, and mean different things, but most of the time you can replace one with the other.

Which one was the iPod again?

It's that easy?

[rinkjustice]

The ubiquity of the iPod, the return of the Mac, and the simplicity of the portable memory stick are just some of the developments that could change our lives in 2004.

So, if I buy these Apple products and flash memory, my life will change and this gaping chasm which plagues my existance will be gone forever?

To hell with new years resolutions! Where's my credit card!

Re:My own list

[questamor]

The Amiga is coming back too. don't forget the Amiga.

Re:My own list

[AndroidCat]

The only Ring of Power that I see are the rights of any claim of ownership of UNIX. Whoever controls those without destroying them will be subject to the corrupting influence of trying to make claims of ownership of anything close to UNIX like the elven rings of Linux.

Just look at what happened to Gollum McBride. Sad.

Bah

[Dark Lord Seth]

Irrelevant ramblings, false prophesies and old wife's tales. I don't trust ANY prediction unless said prediction is backed up by a) cold hard facts or b) senior, decision-making employee who can actually influence the fate of his/her own prediction. For the rest, all predictions are worthless. In fact, let's have a completely random top ten predictions from Seth for 2004!

1. This year I will manage to get in bed with that cute girl studying photography.
2. The US will start another war on $random_country for support of $random_terrorist_group.
3. Alan Ralsky will confess his sins and become a Red-Cross medic in Eritrea.
4. This list is absolute bullshit.

Return of the Mac?

[FrostedWheat]

Return of the Mac? Mark Morrison [bbc.co.uk] is singing again?!

Noooooo!!!!

For those with weak vocabularies...

[Yoda2]

...it was nice of the author to provide an explanation of the word "consolidate":

Some of the music download stores which opened in 2003, and are set to open in 2004, will "consolidate" - that is, close or merge, because it's not a great money-making market.

Re:A prediction of my own:

[Anonymous Coward]

BSD is undead. That's why you can't kill it.

Re:ugh

[grubi]

Sure, use logic and facts to decimate my argument. ;-)

Re:root ?

[bj8rn]

It's not root he's talking about, he's alluding to the secret "administrator", the one that has powers any root can only dream of at best. The greatest of these superpowers is perhaps the power to create a rock so big that even God can't move it. But even though every hacker knows about this, noone has yet managed to crack the password (There's one group called the Kabbalists who have been trying to break it for more than a thousand years but still haven't had any luck). The Windows operating systems, however, seem to have holes that make cracking it much easier (think ten years of hard work instead of a million). This is also the reason why some tend to associate Windows with Satan.

Re:Pointless and dumb!

[kelzer]

Memory sticks as life changing? Sheesh - if my life was that pathetic I'd find a new life or take up raising sea monkeys.

But here you are posting to Slashdot early on New Years Day. So, how are your sea monkeys doing?

Re:Anyone find it strange?

[Anonymous Coward]

It's like dating or sales... it's all a numbers game; just keep plugging away at it. You *will* eventually hit gold. Another bit of advice: if you cannot grow vertically (getting a job, promotion, etc.), grow horizontially

Oh... I thought it was growing so much horizontally that had ruined my dating chances.

Re:ugh

[David Gerard]

They're already ridiculously popular in the UK. Remember that in Europe, the land of GSM, mobile phones are pretty much given away with breakfast cereal. Everyone I know wants a cameraphone for their next phone.

Of course the real purpose of a cameraphone is to get too drunk to know what you're doing but not too drunk to do it and send pictures of your tits to vague acquaintances, leading to tremendous embarrassment in the morning.