Jonathan Oxer
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Blog > Predicting the future is hard, part 2
>> Predicting the future is hard, part 2
Sun, Mar 8th 3:02pm 2009: Tech Toys
From: Luke Sparke <*********>
To: [Internal IVT staff mailing list]
Subject: RE: [IVT-Staff] Microsoft vision of future technology
Date: Fri, 6 Mar 2009 09:52:17 +1100
Hang on, 2019? When you look at that date, it looks like some way off, everyone in reflective silver suits and driving flying cars future date, but it's actually only 10 years away. Are you saying that it's conservative to expect foldable electronic newspapers, electronic coffee mugs etc in 10 years? I mean, some of that stuff will happen, more seamless integration between desktop and hand-held, and maybe some R&D lab will have a coffee mug that tells you the weather, but as everyday appliances, no chance.
Think internet fridge. That came out years ago, I bought a new fridge a few weeks ago, couldn't even find an internet fridge on display, wouldn't know where to buy one if I wanted too. I could have spent an extra $2000 on one that had a 15" LCD TV on the front, but no internet enabled fridges to be found. Now, how can we get from that, to the entire surface of the fridge being a multi touch screen that alerts me to the fact that the milk is
getting low, or close to use-by, and allows me to order another bottle, by integrating with my phone, and then lighting up arrows on the floor pointing me in the direction of the store? (It also seems the people in 2019 will be complete morons, requiring arrows pointing them in the direction to go. I don't know what happens if they're in a real airport, with you know, other people, and you can't see the floor for all the other pairs of shoes. Maybe the guy in front of you will have a multi-touch hoodie, with an update on the back that says "follow me").
When it comes to predictions of the future, they're usually way off. That's because it's hard to predict what hasn't yet been thought of. Instead people just take what we have now and think of how far it can be taken. Predictions of the future from 10 years ago completely missed social networking.
And finally, does anyone actually want computers to work that way? Looked like a lot of effort to me, having to reach up to the screen and move stuff around all the time. In fact, in a reality, what purpose would it even serve? The only reason I would ever need to move anything on the screen would be to scroll, and reaching up to the screen to do that, rather than just spinning the wheel on my mouse, would be prohibitively annoying.
Hands up anyone who prefers to use a touchpad over a mouse? It may look cool, but things that look cool at the expensive of useability fail. For all the whiz-bang groovy new controllers for games, hardcore gamers still use keyboard and mouse, and would pwn anyone using a controller.
So, I say not a snowflakes chance we'll see that in 2019, and would be willing to place a wager as Jeff did with Andrew regarding "All software being online" - the deadline for which has now past.
That's my little rant of negativity. It's been a while.
From: Luke Sparke <*********>
To: [Internal IVT staff mailing list]
Subject: RE: [IVT-Staff] Microsoft vision of future technology
Date: Fri, 6 Mar 2009 09:52:17 +1100
Hang on, 2019? When you look at that date, it looks like some way off, everyone in reflective silver suits and driving flying cars future date, but it's actually only 10 years away. Are you saying that it's conservative to expect foldable electronic newspapers, electronic coffee mugs etc in 10 years? I mean, some of that stuff will happen, more seamless integration between desktop and hand-held, and maybe some R&D lab will have a coffee mug that tells you the weather, but as everyday appliances, no chance.
Think internet fridge. That came out years ago, I bought a new fridge a few weeks ago, couldn't even find an internet fridge on display, wouldn't know where to buy one if I wanted too. I could have spent an extra $2000 on one that had a 15" LCD TV on the front, but no internet enabled fridges to be found. Now, how can we get from that, to the entire surface of the fridge being a multi touch screen that alerts me to the fact that the milk is
getting low, or close to use-by, and allows me to order another bottle, by integrating with my phone, and then lighting up arrows on the floor pointing me in the direction of the store? (It also seems the people in 2019 will be complete morons, requiring arrows pointing them in the direction to go. I don't know what happens if they're in a real airport, with you know, other people, and you can't see the floor for all the other pairs of shoes. Maybe the guy in front of you will have a multi-touch hoodie, with an update on the back that says "follow me").
When it comes to predictions of the future, they're usually way off. That's because it's hard to predict what hasn't yet been thought of. Instead people just take what we have now and think of how far it can be taken. Predictions of the future from 10 years ago completely missed social networking.
And finally, does anyone actually want computers to work that way? Looked like a lot of effort to me, having to reach up to the screen and move stuff around all the time. In fact, in a reality, what purpose would it even serve? The only reason I would ever need to move anything on the screen would be to scroll, and reaching up to the screen to do that, rather than just spinning the wheel on my mouse, would be prohibitively annoying.
Hands up anyone who prefers to use a touchpad over a mouse? It may look cool, but things that look cool at the expensive of useability fail. For all the whiz-bang groovy new controllers for games, hardcore gamers still use keyboard and mouse, and would pwn anyone using a controller.
So, I say not a snowflakes chance we'll see that in 2019, and would be willing to place a wager as Jeff did with Andrew regarding "All software being online" - the deadline for which has now past.
That's my little rant of negativity. It's been a while.
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