Notes

The One Predictable Thing About Technology
... Is that it's unpredictable.

Making predictions about anything is really a tricky business. read more 's often fraught with problems and compounded by two factors: too many variables and too many people.

Making predictions in the world of technology is approximately as rough since it gets. You see a trend, a fad, or a new craze, join it, extrapolate, and then go and get it all totally wrong.

For get more info , at the turn of the 20th century, it had been predicted that passenger air balloon travel - pioneered by famous brands Count Ferdinand von Zeppelin - would be commoditized and become the pre-eminent means of mass transit. Actually, it would be so popular, by the 1980s, people would have their very own personal air balloon as their primary method of conveyance.

Obviously, this gaze into the future didn't take into account the airplane, which put an end to that pearl of foresight.

The main problem with looking forward is that people take action in such painfully straight lines, because the previous example demonstrates. The telephone is another useful example; who may have predicted mobile phones at the time Alexander Graham Bell was fussing around with the technological equivalent of paper cups and wet string?

No one could have. Furthermore, how could anyone have predicted these mobile telephones would one day have cameras built-in? Or you could send written messages on them? You only have to go back a decade, and such ideas will be derided as foolish drivel.

The future is a curly thing, and in the world of information technology, the driving force behind a lot of the confusion is convergence.

Now there's best countries to visit in december in Madurai if I have you ever heard one. And this becomes the next big problem with predicting future trends in technology: let's get two really cool gizmos and merge them; people will love it!

Err, no! What drives desire is anyone's guess. What drives need is utility: two very different parts of the mind are being exercised, here, one more than the other!

If something doesn't fulfill a practical purpose, then it's neither use nor ornament.

This future-predicting thing is even harder nowadays, but in a way, even probably the most outlandish theory may have its day. Things are changing so quickly that new technologies are emerging literally overnight. And considering that people's needs are also changing, evolving, and emerging, who knows?

Going back even more, desire, need - call it what you would - includes a common source. The engine of change is people, society, lifestyle, and a requirement to control, re-route and/or if need be, delegate all this data and information.

The Apple Newton was way before its time. A lot of clever guys 'n' gals sat in a room and made an extraordinary prediction about how people would "consume" data and information, plus they were right on the amount of money - the only real problem being that they were over 10 years early!

Now, people are on the road. People focus on the move, hold down long-distance relationships, use colleagues across time zones, and manage bank accounts in a cafe while drinking a cup of chai.

The only certainty is the same one that has been pontificated upon since time immemorial: things change. Things often come together in intriguing, mysterious, and eminently useful ways.

So here's my prediction: things will never be small enough, big enough, fast enough, cool enough, or cheap enough! Am I wrong?

Wayne Smallman may be the man behind Octane Interactive, a web site design [http://www.octane.uk.net/html_content.services_web-design-development.php], web applications development [http://www.octane.uk.net/html_content.services_web-applications.php] and online marketing [http://www.octane.uk.net/html_content.services_search-engine-marketing-optimisation.php] agency based in Yorkshire, England which has been around since 1999.
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