We continue with our series on what the future will bring with an entry from Mr. Andersen. No, not the guy from the Matrix, but you’d be hard pressed to tell,
Today’s installment of Predictions for the Future comes courtesy of Jordan Andersen, Senior Software Engineer at a Fortune-500 company. Twitter:@jordandandersen. He’s a man I’ve known for years, and one I consider uncommonly bright, and his professional history speaks clearly to this.
He requested an ounce of anonymity, but more than that, that I punch-up his responses, so take what he says with a grain of Brian, as I may or may not have taken some liberties in his comments below.
Jordan
See the rest of the series
• TotalFarkers Futurist Comments
• Brian K. White, Satirist
• Rex Talionis, Web Expert
• Danny Saunders, Marketing Manager
• Dean Chambers, Statistician (coming soon)
Self driving cars are totally happening. Taxis and deliveries will be super cheap, so attempts to rob and/or murder your cabby may fall short by 2023.
Watson level AI will be available to everyone to answer deep questions on nearly every topic. Still no answers to how to cure cancer or meet a single girl who isn’t a Russian or Nigerian scammer just looking to loot your bank account.
The web will have richer and richer material including 3D environments, real-time video chat etc (This is two years out, not 10). You’ll also find that restaurants will go 5D with their menus, making you intoxicated, delighted and perfectly nauseus all at once, and you’ll love it.
Drones start taking on non-military applications. Police, Search and Rescue will get them first but don’t be surprised if they start delivering pizza. You will also be able to use these to spy on your ex, which will create a crazy contest of private sector interests battling against one another in the skies above as you and her battle against each other.
Virtual Reality will stop being a joke as display technologies approach the latency and resolution needed to make them compelling. Gaming will happen, but long before that point, porn will happen, and it will happen with a sticky, uncommonly profitable vengeance.
Custom made everything. You’ll be able to order clothes or shoes or extra-long, chubby man-style neckties custom cut for you and they will be fulfilled by automated production methods. Clothing design will become a digital job which you can do from an easy web interface from home.
Artificial organs are totally happening. Livers, Kidneys and Skin to start. They’ll be made from stems cell printed on an artificial extracellular matrix. That’s to say nothing of the cosmetic surgery aspect of it, which will fortunately fund the cutting edge of it.
Solar power will be cheap. It will be totally reasonable to deck out your entire roof for $1,000 for what today would cost $60,000. Also, everyone will have pygmy unicorns in their homes, just for the novelty.
Diamonds will be cheap. Artificial diamonds will break DeBeers. Little girls will have multi-carat diamonds on their cheap plastic toys. The Canadian diamond supply will help to break this, as will discoveries of diamonds aroudn the world. What was once held as invaluable will now be found to be without value, as if in keeping with providence.
Unemployment: The following jobs will go the way of the travel agent: Truck Driver. Garbage Man. Nearly all Manufacturing. Delivery and postal service. Unemployment will be a real problem as 30% percent of current jobs are 100% automated.
Sous-vide will replace microwaves as the lazy man’s way to reconstitute a frozen meal. Costco will sell vacuum sealed meals that are really tasty once cooked sous-vide. Microwaves will be relegated to the role of warming wet clothes that the dryer didn’t finish off.
Automated building techniques will allow us to pop up a house sized structure in a few hours. This will be especially useful after the next Katrina-style disaster. They’ll be ugly, but do the job in a pinch. Artists will come up with some weirds structures to build.
Learn from home programs will start to overtake universities on quality. Certification organizations will pop-up to give credentials to the self taught, and the $100,000 system of organized education will faulter.
Artificial limbs will continue to get more awesome, approaching and then surpassing the dexterity of normal limbs. Artificial limb masturbation will become a thing of the present, no longer a thing of pure fantasy. Well, fantasy, sure, but a more realistic one at that.
Home delivery times for many items will be less than an hour thanks to local automated fulfillment centers. No need to ask what Brown can do for you, it will have already happened, and the scatological jokes will be forgotten, at least by some.
No wallet. You will no longer carry a wallet, ID or car keys. All will be software on your handheld device. It’s all just apps. You don’t need to carry a spine-busting lump of crap down your backside like your parents did.
No worries. You will not worry too much if you lose that handheld device as it doesn’t actually store anything on the handset. You can trade phones with your friends and have all your stuff in a moment just like you do on your own. Also, they’re cheap. You’ll have several.
Home 3D displays will not suck and not require glasses. Adoption rates will remain low, but that’s to be expected.
Home robotics will improve but still no Rosie. Think roomba times 4. Toys will be cool though.
Full-Sequence Genome: You’ll be able to mail in a cheek swab for a full genome sequencing for less than $100, and for just $20 more, know roughly the date you’ll die, give or take 8-years.
A lot of this stuff (3D printing, wearables, resource-based economies) is already lurking about for DIYers… if you really want it, go out and do it, it’s all there for anyone who gives two shits.
I agree with the previous commenter. I totally would want to live in this world. I think it’s more of a 20-30 year vision, but I’ll still be alive then.
If this is what Andersen sees for 2023, I can’t imagine what he’d see for when I retire in 30 years time. Should be pretty awesome though.
This is a future I want to live in… well, maybe not the sous vide part of it, but the rest of it. I hope this is the right batch of predictions.
Imagine if the mall wasn't full of inventory, but rather displays. You pick your outfit you like, they measure/scan you, and a custom cut outfit shows up at your house the following afternoon… Love it. I'd love to be in that world.
Same for shoes/socks for people with unusual feet. What a whole new world they can live in.