A Trip to The Future

On 25 March 2009, I had the chance to hear the futurologist Ian Pearson at the Royal Signals Institution in London. In his lecture "A Trip to the Future", Pearson stated that the number of new life-changing technologies increases exponentially every five years. For example,in the ten years between 1990- 2000 we became more accustomed to PCs, office networks, MS Office, satellite TV, Filofax, Gameboy, Mobile phones, home PCs, office internet, e-mail, laptops, Play Station, camcorders, and Amazon.com.
In the ten years, 2000-2010, it seems to be the turn of home internet, digital cameras, wireless LANs, PDAs, chat rooms, search engines, e-commerce, Expedia, SMS, instant messaging SatNav, Blackberry, broadband, iPods, memory stick, HD video recording, eBay, home shopping, Skype, online multi-player games, virtual environments, Google maps, blogs, hard drive recorders, music downloads.
In the next five years, 2010-2015, we can predict HDTV, RFID, augmented reality, virtual reality, dual appearance, electronic jewellery, digital bubbles, smart make-up, smart clothes, smart buildings, digital paper, life-on-a-stick, personal black box, robotics, voice recognition, active skin.

The Web is picking up speed; its growth is exponential. Because we have reached critical mass, 30-50 percent of the population goes online every day. Which means functional decomposition of industries and commerce using the Internet? Nineteen years ago, it was the convergence of telecoms and computers. Today we find that convergence is between four new technologies - nano, bio, info, and finally cognitive with the ability to link to our nervous system. Convergence means a lot of new green fields; very big markets are at the boundaries where convergent industries intersect; new business models/new kinds of businesses where completely new trading conditions apply. For example
- Blurred boundaries
- Porous companies (semi-permeable membranes instead of walls)
- Highly distributed companies
- Individual knowledge workers using the web to group together into virtual enterprises.
Once people can do everything, they will have to re-evaluate what they really want to do. Ian Pearson suggests a different reading of Maslow's hierarchy of needs, saying that the value is now in the top layers (self-actualisation, esteem, social ). He affirmed that technology helps people to do more, interact more, have more fun, be more, and feel better about themselves.

With the rate of technology development faster than ever, and the web fully integrated into our everyday lives, the next big convergence is between cyberspace and the real world. Video visors and eventually active contact lenses will allow overlays of computer games and anything from the web to be overlaid onto our field of view everywhere we go.

People will even be able to customise how they appear to different strangers in the street, which will also be inhabited by computer game characters and avatars. Electronic jewellery will replace the mobile gadgets we use today, making it possible to have the highest technology while making little environmental impact. And as it becomes easier for ordinary people to make Information Technology do what they want, it will also be much easier to mobilise political power from the grass roots.