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Predictions.txt

dcurt.is

34 pointsphilfreo28 comments

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On my list from February, 2012 are:

- Egypt's president will promise to protect all citizens

- Tennis: Sharapova will rematch Lisicki

- 346 homes will be destroyed in a fire in Colorado

- Students who will bully a N.Y. bus monitor, will be suspended for a year

Point: post it in February next time dammit!!

Retina screens will be the largest leap for computing in a decade.

Um, no.

I see this point as being fairly pessimistic. It's not saying that Retina screens are completely fantastic (although they are), but that many of the other tech revolutions won't have the impact on the mainstream that we expect them to. High pixel density displays, on the other hand, will touch anyone who spends much time at all looking at screens, and will change how interfaces are made.

That said, 10 years is an eternity in this business.

Assuming screens stick around. Perhaps it's a long-shot prediction, but what if Retina is the Blu-ray of flat panel displays? (Inarguably superior to most of its predecessors, yet fails to gain critical mass and is soon replaced by a whole new medium altogether.)

Um, what medium could that be? I don't see any competitors to the screen right around the corner

Again, a total long shot. But I was thinking both in terms of augmented-reality (Google Goggles) and bigger transparent glass-like displays (Samsung Smart Window).

But whatever it is, it would only catch on if Apple releases it.

gs/Goggles/Glass (I make the same mistake all the time.)

I broadly agree with you. However, I don't think that Project Glass will replace desktops / traditional computers, but I could see them being a replacement for tablets - in that it's the way most people will do un-intensive browsing, cheicking emails while sat on the sofa, etc.

I was more reminded of Nicholas Negroponte's 1995 book Being Digital in which he said (paraphrasing based on recollection) that HDTV was a mistake; that we we could do better things with digital television than simply increasing the resolution. Retina may be great, seen side-by-side with a normal display, but it's really just "more of the same."

> Hilariously, it’s still the best non-iPad tablet you can buy.

Really? Pretty low jab at Android, calling the Fire the #1 tablet that isn't an iPad.

This was written in February. Nexus 7 I think everyone can concur is a better tablet as of today.

Still, even most horrible Android tablets from last year were way more usable than the Fire, in my opinion. And prior to February there were some pretty decent tablets too. (Transformer Prime, Galaxy Tab, etc)

I think the Fire might have been more usable for people in general, that is easier for normal people to setup and start consuming Amazon content. I don't have a strong opinion on this though as I think all Android tablets I've seen are crap (does not include Nexus 7 which I have not seen yet).

Uh, my 99 touchpad has a better browsing experience than ipad or Android tablets. But yeah... It's dead Jim.

I think several of these are spot on. You already nailed Retina obviously. Next up is Apple Television sets, which many rumors are pointing to an announcement either late this year or early next year. Kindle Fire will ultimately either fail, increase in price (perhaps different versions of the Fire?). Microsoft phones will catch on, but never lead the market. Hollywood can't be killed any time soon. However, as tech gets better, the ability to produce high-quality content will shift in favor of the indies. Free wireless seems like a no-brainer, but the companies that control those channels are already terrified of losing ground to new tech, so offering something for free (that they can't arbitrarily raise the prices on to make up for other areas) is something they won't be keen to do. Facebook needs to focus hard on mobile. Everyone knows this.

Good read.

"Some service in the future is going to curate the top 100,000 or 1,000,000 queries into a list of great, precise results."

So, basically, we'll see the development of yet another hierarchically organized oracle?

I can't imagine anyone buying a Facebook phone. Pretty much everyone hates their tech. Even my parents. Why would anyone take a risk on a phone they were involved with?

Thought experiment: $100 subsidized, fun design, good accessories, amazing social photo experience, great keyboard, and comes with all the free messaging you can stand paired with a cheap data plan. Kin + Crackberry

Why not google "what camera should I buy" instead of "digital camera".

Do these results look that much better?

https://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=what%20camera%20sh...

Yes, actually. Those results are information on how to select a camera. "Which camera should I buy?" is such a subjective question that it's impossible to usefully answer it without knowing more about the querying user's needs, desires, and budget.

As nice as the pipe dream of Siri as the Star Trek AI who can magically infer all the information needed to precisely answer an ambiguously-phrased question is, it's not going to happen any time soon.

Once you ask the user what matters, the problem is eminently solvable: http://daring.is (my startup)

We need more sites like this:

http://www.justbuythisone.com/best-digital-slr

"Some service in the future is going to curate the top 100,000 or 1,000,000 queries into a list of great, precise results"

Isn't this exactly what Mahalo tried to do?

Off topic: I've been looking for some kind of app to keep track and share predictions like these? Would you use it if it did?

Have you seen http://longbets.org/ ?

Maybe it's over a longer time scale than you were thinking...

This is what I had in mind. Thanks.

There's also http://kezera.com - but I can't tell how fast invites are going out.

Anything there non-obvious? Despite the Android hindsight...

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