Truemors
is reporting from
Member
NP Rank:
NP Rank:
IBM: Talking Web, Memory Assistants and Solar-Powered Cell Phones in 5 Years
Share:
by Erik Larson | December 2, 2008 at 12:02 am
144 views | 11 Recommendations | 2 comments
Videos
This year's "Next Five in Five" from IBM; social and trends to watch that will change our lives forever- 1. Solar-power everywhere; roofs, driveways, windows, paint, notebook computers, cars, cell phones and even clothing. Thin film solar is improving and decreasing in cost at an exponential rate, like computer processing power and storage. Energy will be plentiful, cheap and smart. 2. A crystal ball for your health; cheap DNA analyses tells your risk factors and future- the insurance companies will know, too, so in the US let's get them out of the coverage-denial business ASAP, and institute a system of usniversal health care that makes our population as healthy as countries with Socialist governments; children still being born into poverty because of race in a nation in which the Conservative Republican Right Wing claims they're followers of Christ is utter hypocrisy. 3. A web that listens and talks to you, answers your questions, reads and writes emails and IMs for you, and generally interacts with you the way you want. This will be a boon in countries in which oral communication is culturally more important than reading and writing, as well as countries with high rates of illiteracy. Click here for projections that 25% of the world's population will be online by 2012 and able to understand each other. 4. Shopping just short of paradise; "digital shopping assistants", touchscreen and voice activated kiosks that help you find and see what you're looking for, store employees or robots bring you what you want while you sip a latte or a coke and hang out in the virtual lounge. 5. Permanent memory of everything you want to remember, video recording of everything in public places, even private professional sessions such as with your doctor, attorney or advisor- even of ordinary conversations with your friends and family- which your AI assistant will cut and paste at your direction into a youtube video and make your life look as exciting, interesting and scandalous as soap operas and celebrities on MTV. Things you you'd rather forget may be preserved as well, like it or not- and people, corporations and governments will have access, too, so stop that farting, and start living as if you're a 24-7 reality TV show.
Note: this is marked "Opinion" because it's IBM's opinions, but I've interjected a lot of my own commentary into the above, as well- see below for IBM's only.
A talking Web, solar technology embedded in windows and cell phones, and the end of forgetting will all come in the next five years, IBM predicts in its third annual Next Five in Five list, detailing innovations that could change our lives in the next half-decade.
The other predictions: We will all have digital shopping assistants and, separately, "crystal balls" to predict our future health.
Read the latest WhitePaper - Wireless LAN Virtualization: Twice the Network at Half the Cost
"The Next Five in Five is based on market and societal trends expected to transform our lives, as well as emerging technologies from IBM's Labs around the world that can make these innovations possible," IBM says. (See last year's list here.)
Here's a look at IBM's five predictions announced this week:
What is NowPublic?
NowPublic lets people work together to cover news events around the world.
Crowd Power
Edmund Jenks
Los Angeles, California, United States
Most Recommended Stories in Tech & Biz
Recommendations (11)
Edmund Jenks
Los Angeles, California, United States
Paschen
Narita, Chiba, JapanAnonymous user
Most RecentMost Recommended Comments (2)
at 06:56 on December 2nd, 2008
Good news from IBM. Now if they could make those computers less toxic and use a fraction of the energy as well then that would be great.
at 09:01 on December 2nd, 2008
i agree Paschen, and good point- IBM and the electronics industry use a huge amount of resources and contribute a huge amount of waste- things are increasingly becoming more valuable (and cheaper) as information, getting more from less- the trend toward virtual contexts and mediums being the preferred for communication, business, the workplace, shopping, introductions/relationships, etc., etc. has the potential to greatly reduce waste, destruction and competition for resources, which will become a security issue for every nation and community in the near future and the coming decades. Good news is that this is being increasingly realized by the People and policy makers, and things are changing- in the next 4-5 years we will have solar on the mass consumer market as cheap as fossil fuels for electricity and 25% of the world's people will be online and able to understand each other. The current monetary system run by the Fed and their friends on Wall Street is a destructive, cancerous mechanism, and needs to be reformed- perhaps by banning interest (usury) and taxing money. Increasing automation, networking and artificial intelligence combined with increasing population growth have the potential to create unlimited opportunities for people to do anything- but the meaning of life, work and money is going to change when there's no need for people to do the jobs needed to produce everything the people want and need.