Just because Matt asked so nicely and because, well, I haven’t done it before, I’ve decided to (slightly belatedly) post my predictions for 2007:
- This will be the year of connected desktop apps
Not that web apps won’t continue to be produced like mad…I mean…really…they are so simple to produce, aren’t they? ;) But those beasts of apps (one reader once said, “Code in C++? Fuck that!”) on your desktop will start not only being ‘connected’ to the web, but interacting with it, too.
- Co-opetition will be the word du jour
Yep. Co-operating with your competition. You read it right. Shrouds of secrecy will start to drop and more deals will be made amongst mortal enemies to actually deliver bang-up user experiences. You’ll all realize that win-win-win is a good way to live and, like it implies, it behooves everyone.
- Interoperability will cease baffling all of the startups around us
Thanks to APIs, Microformats and OpenID, we will start to see more building blocks come together, rather than stand-alone anti-social apps. I’ve had a post about LegoTM sitting in my drafts folder for too long, which I will finish writing one of these days so you will know EXACTLY how it this is done.
- Those with little humility will have to eat it
What is with the lack of self-reflection in this world? I’m not only talking about the tech world. It happens everywhere. We are not gods, people. We are human. And we screw up. And we don’t know everything. Let’s stop trying to be the tough guy and protecting our sand castles and just work together towards a better world. We all have ego, but it’s knowing how to let it go that makes us great. (Oh…the prediction part of this is that, like Keith Teare’s fabulous De-Portalisation post, we’ll have our niche audiences and mutual respect communities forming while the braggarts/big dogs continue to fight one another to the death…Keith didn’t say it, but I see the parallel. I like living in the foothills).
- We will enter a period of chaos
Which, if you are prepared for it will be an amazing time for all of us. Creativity, deja vu’s, chance meetings, serendipity and all sorts of beautiful stuff can happen. It will also unleash unrest, depression, fear and defensiveness for many. People will do some desperate things to try to restore order. If you are there to witness it, record it.
- The assholes will continue to stay in power
‘Cause there is a great deal of unraveling to do and it will remain that way for a while. However, it will start to unwind at a faster rate this year and they will make some desperate decisions to hold onto it. Don’t worry about it for the long run – those decisions will haunt them for the rest of their lives…or at least until they learn to let go.
- Back to technology: Mac ownership will grow in leaps and bounds.
I would hazard a guess that the numbers will triple in 2007. Apple Store lineups will get unbearable. More Mac viruses will appear. Cult of Mac will hate this and make up derogatory name for people who switched only because of the Intel.
- People’s disatisfaction with their cell providers/telcos will grow to new heights
Pissed off and tired of being hindered by the companies they pay thousands of dollars a year to, consumers will begin to inform other consumers and become even more pissed off. More and more news stories will come out that paint the telephone industry and their mergers as “Bad for People”, opening up the opportunity for alternatives like VoIP, etc. to grow their influence. Not in 2007, but in years to come, telcos will begrudgingly start to unlock the awesome power of our cell phones…but it will be too late because the public won’t be fooled any longer.
- Speaking of bandwidth…
North Americans will realize that 2megs up and down is nothing and not worth the hundreds of dollars spent compared to the massive connective power in other countries. Telcos will also be spanked for this, but they will ignore it for this year.
- “Community Marketing” will be buzzworded to death
Yes, it’s already looking like that, but it will get even worse. So bad, in fact, that it will be the second phrase out of everyone’s mouths…yet…they won’t be able to explain to you what the hell that even means. When you say, “What is community?” to people, they will be, like, “Well, you know, people…in the community…behind a…um…product or…um…movement,” and you know they just don’t understand and are just using the word to make a buck and to exploit the whole ‘social networking’/Web 2.0 thing that they didn’t understand in the first place. Some of us, though, will continue to not want to define anything at all and just work in our little niches and give a damn and we may even make enough money to survive 2007.
So, there you go. Chaos (yay), interoperability (yay), unrest (yay), co-opetition (yay) and exploitative jerks (boo). Sounds like a pretty good year to me…
With 9. I love the prediction over at Read/Write Web
I am not the only one to think I live in an old fashioned country
Before you publish your “Lego” post, it might pay to read Joel Spolsky’s excellent article titled “Lego Programming” ( http://www.joelonsoftware.com/items/2006/12/05.html ), and see things from a Programmers perspective.
Kind regards,
Scott Ferguson
Interesting predictions! Two tiny nits, and one major disagreement: first, it’s “C++”, not “C+”, and it’s “shroud,” not “shrowd” (Microsoft Word agrees).
As for Macs, I’d be THRILLED if usage tripled — having been a loyal Mac fan since 1985. But in one year? Listen, doubling the current usage would mean going from roughly 5% to 10% of the installed base, and that in itself would be a revolution. 20% growth would be great, 50% would be fabulous, and 100% (i.e., doubling) would be mind-boggling
Best wishes for 2007!
Ed Yourdon
Thanks Ed…oops…I did have C++ there…I must have hit backup. Shrowd? Well, that was just sloppy! ;)
@Scott…Oh…I know it won’t be ‘easy’. But I do know that more and more companies are already working together. For example, Plaxo:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/missrogue/337747661/
allows for you to use their widget to import your contacts into other apps. I’ve seen it appear a couple of times.
And Meebo? It’s becoming the chat defacto for many partner sites.
Google builds their acquired apps into the gAuth…Yahoo has their bbAuth…why not start to work together to build the puzzle pieces?
Ning started to get it right, but have limited their own user base.
Well this is the most fun set of predictions I have seen yet.
Looking forward to #3. It still seems firmly stuck in geekland, and not enough coming out to show simple benefits for the common user.
#9 – I would see Amazon S3 starting to appear as leaders in storage space. 15c a gig is very reasonable, and I find it works well for my PC and music back up.
PS …This is the first time I have been able to use openid to log in to something.
Love it as usual Tara :)
Manual Trackback
http://www.touchstonelive.com/blog/2007/01/end-of-arrogance.html
Love number 1… It’s tops on my prediction list which I am trying to find 15 minutes to finsh. Maybe I should stop reading and finish writing. ;)
I think the really important point is they will start interacting.
Christopher
P.S. C++ sheesh we still use good old C and Perl. ;)
Awesome. :)
I don’t really have anything valuable to say; I’m just excited to use my OpenID.
Well I’m with you on number 8 for sure (and glad to see that I’m not alone! see http://www.parkparadigm.com/?p=187 )
And rest assured its not just the incumbent US telcos that are useless, Europe is almost as bad.
Huge – HUGE – opportunity for someone that knows what they are doing to ‘get it right’ and make a few billion in the process…