I would have to disagree with Shadowcat on Apple dying off. Yes I am an Apple fanboy, but not an oblivious one. I don’t believe Apple can do no wrong and they have definitely made mistakes. However, I have studied the company well enough I would like to think, that they will bounce back. This seems to be a trend with Apple and the media. Apple will release something that changes shakes the technology world and then they milk that for as long as they can. It happened with the iMac when it was first released. It wowed the media for years, and then it seemed like it was getting old and everyone thought Apple lost it’s hype. Then came the iPod and the same thing happened. Now we are at the end of the iPod wow-ness and now the iPhone. This trend will continue it seems like. I wouldn’t be surprised it Apple came out with something else to wow the media and technology. My guess is maybe something with the Apple TV. This still seems like an untapped market where most DVR’s still are not that great, and to me, it looks like Apple could have a lot of potential there. The Apple TV still isn’t fully developed and I think Apple could really hit a winner if they added a TV tuner or seven to it. Who knows. In all the research I’ve done on Apple it always seems like they have the ace up their sleeve for just the right moment. However, with Steve not doing the keynote this year at Macworld and Apple pulling out of all future Macworld’s, we might be seeing a new Apple Inc. Only time will tell I guess…

Other than my extremely long Apple rebuttal I think your predictions are pretty spot on and hope to see most if not all come true. Keep up the good work and Happy New Year! Here’s to 09…

But I digress… I just wanted to let you know that I really appreciated your article. I made it all the way through and I thought it was one of the most comprehensive tech predictions that I’ve read. Usually people have the tendency to specialize in one area or another, but this one ran the gamut.

I totally agree with your sentiments about Microsoft. I think that they’re really sneaking up on a lot of people. Most people don’t even seem to realize a lot of the services that they keep pumping out with Live. Computer cleaning, online storage, etc. And then also Mesh and Home Server, I feel like I hear about a new one every day. If they start perfecting these things and people start noticing this year, they could really jump ahead. And it seems like Apple is starting to die off. How many interesting features were they releasing when iTunes first came out, compared to now. It seems like once a company reaches a certain size they go from innovative to boring to buying out other people’s innovative solutions instead of actually creating something new. Hopefully Microsoft will show that a company can come back from that.

I also liked your comments about the Wii. To be honest that’s the first negative review I’ve ever heard someone give about the Wii, but I think that its deserved. They developed an awesome interface and pushed the ball, but then didn’t push anything else, so you’re left feeling unbalanced. No innovation in social gaming? No innovation in game design? Very few first-party games? What happened? Hopefully they’ll be able to bounce back from this with the increase in sales that they’re seeing and their next console won’t just be a “Hail Mary”.

Finally, I liked where you were going with the multi-touch screen stuff, but I can only hope that it won’t stop there. Computers are LONG overdue for an interface overhaul. We’ve been using a mouse since the 1970s. I always remember that Japanese Object Oriented tile interface video that you showed me a while back. Why aren’t any of these things getting polished and making it to market? It seems like every other aspect of computing has had revolutionary changes over time: speed, storage, presentation, audio, inter-connection, etc. Why have we been using the same controls throughout this whole process?

Anyway, thanks for writing! Keep it up! And Happy New Year!