Tech, 10 Years Out
The Future: Unknowable Mystery or Mere Evolution?
By Roger L. Kay
Recently, CNBC asked me to take a look at tech 10 years out. The news hook was an industry
event, the annual Montgomery Tech conference in Santa Monica, CA, where 800 investors picked
over tech companies in a venture-capital-tech-startup meat market, financiers hoping to find the
next big thing, entrepreneurs hoping to land that perfect deep-pocketed partner. According to the
on-site reporter, investors seemed to like firms with a promising play in mobile advertising. No
surprise there.
Like others who shoot their mouth first and ask questions afterward, I found myself pondering,
when we were done with the segment what the tech landscape really will look like in a decade.
Now, anybody who has been in the forecasting business realizes that looking forward a decade
can be a fool’s mission, like forecasting the weather a month in advance. You couldn’t go wrong
predicting the weather five minutes out; it’ll be pretty much like it is now. You’d be fairly good with
a day: whatever they’re having in Chicago, for those of us who live in Boston. With all the
technology in the world — networked supercomputers crunching away — you might have a shot at
ten days. But after that, you’d be lost. It’s an exponential problem that at some point is unsolvable.
But we do have a model for looking forward in high technology: automobiles. Using the
automobile industry as a template for the development of the personal computing market works
surprisingly well.
Both markets share a number of interesting characteristics:
The automobile industry is more than 100 years old, and the computer business is now arguably
about 30, counting from the first personal computer rather than the first mainframe (which would
make it 65). But the mass market for computers is somewhat younger than that for cars. For
example, people were cranking their own cars to start them in the 1900s, I was still gapping spark
plugs as a kid in the 1960s, and now you wouldn’t touch anything under the hood without some
pricy kit that only the dealer has. Brands for cars consolidated in the 1940s and 1950s. For PCs,
in only the past 10 years. So, for both markets a technology specialty item became a household
appliance over time.
So, looking out ten years is not really like forecasting next season’s weather. Of course, there are
possible unforeseen random events that may affect the outcome dramatically, and possible
technology breakthroughs (e.g., the infinite battery on no charge) that may change things in
unpredictable ways, but the main lesson from the auto industry is that the full conception was
realized fairly early on (e.g., a 1923 Cadillac was already a pretty nice car) and much of the time
after that was spent perfecting the experience, just plain getting it right.
Then, there is market development. It’s not enough for smart people to think these things up,
other people have to get it, desire it, and go out and buy. But these smart people, who, in their
conception, can see the end state concurrently with the inspiration, often conclude, erroneously,
that we merely have to take a few steps and we’re there. Turns out it may take the general public
20 years to figure out the same thing. So, a bias of smart people prevents them from seeing how
long adoption is really going to take.
But give it enough time, and eventually what the visionaries saw is realized. The automobile today
is almost too perfect. The interstate highway system is an astonishing work, a brilliant piece of
infrastructure, a federal investment, that enables individual mobility as well as viable commercial
transportation across the country. And the cars that run on it today work astoundingly well.
There’s a lesson about standards here also. Rather than specify wheel base as a standard,
either de facto (think costly industry war) or de jure (think cartel locked in a smoky backroom), the
automobile and road were designed with a tolerance for varying wheel base (to suit heavy trucks,
motorcycles with sidecars, and everything else): rubber tires on a road wide enough to
accommodate any wheel base. No tracks necessary!
So, where we’re going isn’t really into the unknown blue yonder. There’s quite a well trodden path
to it.
The future will unfold in the pursuit of perfection of what we can already see now.
Therefore, my forecast for the technology market is quite simple and perhaps modest. It merely
assumes that we’ll make work the “prototypes” now out there.
Here are a few elements of a likely future:
As a special bonus, here are a few specific visions likely to be realized, none too far off the beaten
track, with some of their commercial implications:
© 2010 Endpoint Technologies Associates, Inc. All rights reserved.
event, the annual Montgomery Tech conference in Santa Monica, CA, where 800 investors picked
over tech companies in a venture-capital-tech-startup meat market, financiers hoping to find the
next big thing, entrepreneurs hoping to land that perfect deep-pocketed partner. According to the
on-site reporter, investors seemed to like firms with a promising play in mobile advertising. No
surprise there.
Like others who shoot their mouth first and ask questions afterward, I found myself pondering,
when we were done with the segment what the tech landscape really will look like in a decade.
Now, anybody who has been in the forecasting business realizes that looking forward a decade
can be a fool’s mission, like forecasting the weather a month in advance. You couldn’t go wrong
predicting the weather five minutes out; it’ll be pretty much like it is now. You’d be fairly good with
a day: whatever they’re having in Chicago, for those of us who live in Boston. With all the
technology in the world — networked supercomputers crunching away — you might have a shot at
ten days. But after that, you’d be lost. It’s an exponential problem that at some point is unsolvable.
But we do have a model for looking forward in high technology: automobiles. Using the
automobile industry as a template for the development of the personal computing market works
surprisingly well.
Both markets share a number of interesting characteristics:
- Each is a pricy technology item, bought by individuals as well as organizations
- that was first utilized by specialists and later by everyone
- that was first about technology at later about brand
- that wears out and must be replaced
- that buyers believe says something about them
The automobile industry is more than 100 years old, and the computer business is now arguably
about 30, counting from the first personal computer rather than the first mainframe (which would
make it 65). But the mass market for computers is somewhat younger than that for cars. For
example, people were cranking their own cars to start them in the 1900s, I was still gapping spark
plugs as a kid in the 1960s, and now you wouldn’t touch anything under the hood without some
pricy kit that only the dealer has. Brands for cars consolidated in the 1940s and 1950s. For PCs,
in only the past 10 years. So, for both markets a technology specialty item became a household
appliance over time.
So, looking out ten years is not really like forecasting next season’s weather. Of course, there are
possible unforeseen random events that may affect the outcome dramatically, and possible
technology breakthroughs (e.g., the infinite battery on no charge) that may change things in
unpredictable ways, but the main lesson from the auto industry is that the full conception was
realized fairly early on (e.g., a 1923 Cadillac was already a pretty nice car) and much of the time
after that was spent perfecting the experience, just plain getting it right.
Then, there is market development. It’s not enough for smart people to think these things up,
other people have to get it, desire it, and go out and buy. But these smart people, who, in their
conception, can see the end state concurrently with the inspiration, often conclude, erroneously,
that we merely have to take a few steps and we’re there. Turns out it may take the general public
20 years to figure out the same thing. So, a bias of smart people prevents them from seeing how
long adoption is really going to take.
But give it enough time, and eventually what the visionaries saw is realized. The automobile today
is almost too perfect. The interstate highway system is an astonishing work, a brilliant piece of
infrastructure, a federal investment, that enables individual mobility as well as viable commercial
transportation across the country. And the cars that run on it today work astoundingly well.
There’s a lesson about standards here also. Rather than specify wheel base as a standard,
either de facto (think costly industry war) or de jure (think cartel locked in a smoky backroom), the
automobile and road were designed with a tolerance for varying wheel base (to suit heavy trucks,
motorcycles with sidecars, and everything else): rubber tires on a road wide enough to
accommodate any wheel base. No tracks necessary!
So, where we’re going isn’t really into the unknown blue yonder. There’s quite a well trodden path
to it.
The future will unfold in the pursuit of perfection of what we can already see now.
Therefore, my forecast for the technology market is quite simple and perhaps modest. It merely
assumes that we’ll make work the “prototypes” now out there.
Here are a few elements of a likely future:
- Tech will become more integrated into our lives. By this, I mean we’ll have more
computers around us and be less aware of them.
- As part of that integration, our broadband infrastructure will be complete, both wired and
wireless, with federal involvement as necessary.
- The cloud will be where everything lives in one sense, but local copies of various
programs will continue to be in control, owning and modifying data, changes to which will
be reflected in the cloud and perhaps transmitted to other devices of yours or others.
- Social networking will be the norm with all forms of communication integrated into each
individual’s client of choice. Levels of intelligent filtering will allow people to finely control
who can send them what. Spam, as it is defined today, will be gone. Instead, people will
receive advertising, targeted at them to the degree that they allow.
- People will live in a multi-device world, where platforms will be optimized for various uses
(think phone — small; eReader — midsize; visual composition tool — large) and sensors
and actuators (think thermometer and thermostat control) will be common in everyday life.
- Everything worthy of being called an endpoint will have its own IP address (next generation
IP, of course), and gangs of devices will be networked together explicitly or ad hoc.
- Security will be built into every node, based on a hardware root of trust. Data in flight will be
assumed to be compromised and duly checked at the receiving node. Data at rest (on
hard drives or other mass storage devices) will be fully encrypted.
- eCommerce will be the way almost everything is done. This one sounds simple, but can
only be achieved if all the rest occur.
As a special bonus, here are a few specific visions likely to be realized, none too far off the beaten
track, with some of their commercial implications:
- Cloud services — Either providing them or making use of them to provide a monetizeable
service will be huge business. Individuals’ relationship with the cloud will alter the way
they do things. The stuff on the device you’re holding will be reflected to and from the
cloud, usable on multiple devices, formatted appropriately for whichever device is in use.
- Data mining — The stuff we’re putting up for free on all these social networks is valuable if
you know how to query it right; this ever growing database has huge value for companies
that know how to monetize it.
- Devices — Vendors will offer buyers a range of beautiful devices from small to large,
specialized for each task. Apple will likely be there, but who else?
- Multiplayer games — Huge monuments will be built in massive multiplayer online games,
worlds, nay galaxies, of real estate with infinite detail handcrafted by communities. Will
these be public spaces or part of the general property grab? Again, users contribute value
for free; others may monetize it.
© 2010 Endpoint Technologies Associates, Inc. All rights reserved.
Extrapolating From What We Know
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