Unlikely? A cyclic downturn perhaps, but when good times will return? My view is not in our lifetimes…at least not in the same vain as the computer industry experienced over the last 20 odd years. The recent Gartner survey on mobile phones vs desktop computers is extremely illustrative.At the root of this prediction are some basic observations about consumer IT spending.
1. Most people are not computer experts, quite a few might know how to get one working out of the box and make most of their programs
work but only a small minority are really proficient when it comes to computers.
2. For about 95% of the average computer consumer type applications, a pentium 3 running at somewhere between 300 and 1000mhz is virtually indistinguishable from the latest offerings from AMD or Intel. Apple actually recognise this fact and have adopted a radical OS change that virtually forces Mac users to abandon their old hardware. The merits of OSX can be debated ad naseum but the bottom line is very little has been added to OSX in terms of user applications and features over classic other than the eye candy factor.
3. Sitting down at a computer is not really fun for a lot of people. They do it for work purposes or to get something done for themselves.
In other words a lot of computer use is by nature utility use.
4. People see computers as computers. This is a pretty simple observation but the corollary is quite illustrative. Computers are
not TV’s, VCR’s, HiFi systems, telephone systems, or game consoles. This is not to say that computers can not perform these functions,
but the level of complexity a computer and program adds to perform these fundamental tasks relegates this sort of application to niche
markets (with the possible exception of games).
So where to from here?
Let’s assume that the so-called killer application doesn’t turn up tomorrow. The chances of even another Netscape are pretty unlikely
and domestic video on your desktop isn’t really going to set the world on fire for the simple reason that most people couldn’t be
bothered.
Institutional pressure will result in a reasonable turnover in new machines, but this is not the engine that will drive the heady growth
of the past.
Will prices fall dramatically? Possibly, but most unlikely. Companies still have to make money and there is very little to be gained from a
prolonged period of retail losses.
Most likely is the sort of sideways shift that was recently highlighted by the AMD announcement. Hardware companies will shift
into devices that have computer parts, ie smart devices. And the potential for smart devices is considerable. If the trend towards
miniaturization and cost reduction continues, then mobile phones that browse and email and take photos WILL be in everyone’s hands in a
couple of years. Computers will continue to evolve but this is no longer the main game in town.
Winners and losers
No prize for guessing some of the obvious ones. Bill Gates’ company might make a pretty ordinary product but it has sold and sold and
sold. Quite likely the position of Windows on the desktop computer will never be usurped by virtue of Microsoft’s monopoly and the
weight of incumberance. In developing markets like China the situation may change by the simple expediency of the bottom line but
then again Microsoft could possibly afford to drop a billion or two now to secure a potential market the size of China.
The casualties are numerous, OS’s like Be and Amiga, hardware makers like Compaq,and the squillion of programmers that found out that
copyright doesn’t really protect the sanctity of an idea. Not to mention the number of people who handed over the big bucks to buy the
latest and greatest only to see a new machine out perform it and cost less 12 months later.
In an endgame situation players seek to position themselves for killer blow. As we sit on the cusp of the next phase of the IT
revolution, those companies and individuals that have weathered the massive write-downs in their stock values and retained large chunks
of cash and assets are in the box seat to cement their relative positions.
But what about Linux? Surely everyone will wake up and throw out their imperfect OS’s and embrace the penguin? As much as I wish it
might happen, the reality is that computers are less about OS’s and more about what is comfortable to Joe and Jane Public. Something
about the devil you know as opposed to the one you don’t. Apple might manage to convince some Windows buyers that getting Unix on your desktop is smart as well as sexy, but I don’t think Microsoft is terribly worried. The next generation of Windows might be more
difficult sell, but it isn’t going to change the numbers in the market overnight.
Will we be using Windows phones and playing Xbox games?
With luck, maybe not. Despite a very aggressive entrance into the game console market, Xbox has not usurped the position of
Playstation. Likewise Nokia is so far the leader in mobile phones and is most definitely not a MS product. To a certain extent these markets might be safe for the moment, but other evolving markets like TiVo and table PC’s are a different game. In the end, the Windows reputation for innovation and invention might be the biggest obstacle preventing the undisputable market leader from picking the likely next big thing.
About the Author:
I am a part time sys admin, ful time tech support officer, long time apple user. I have a background in television and electronic engineering and networking. The views I have expressed are mine although I confess to be influenced by what I see and read.
I think most of these predictions are accurate for the short term but I wonder what happens when younger generations who maybe don’t have the purchasing power of their parents graduate, get jobs, and are more amenable to more complex computer setups / AV systems, etc. I think it’s absolutely true that most people I know today aren’t very much “into” computers and use them in a utilitarian fashion. I don’t know that that’s necessarily true for younger people with mp3 players, who mess around with video and the like.
Of course the other thing all of these predictions presuppose is that there’s no “next big thing” on the horizon.
I bet there is 🙂
“The merits of OSX can be debated ad naseum but the bottom line is very little has been added to OSX in terms of user applications and features over classic other than the eye candy factor.”
Sure the applications are the same, but Mac OS X has improved drastically in the areas of memory managment and multitasking. Whiles users don’t care about this directly, these factors to affect stability and performance, somethinghtey do notice.
The PC /operating system combination is a workhorse. It’s a useful and general tool that nicely does what human’s aren’t good at, and I don’t think it’s going anywhere.
My inlaws just only recently discovered how useful it is to have a PC around the house. Besides email and the web, they use it for recording music from a midi-capable keyboard and creating and printing out sheet music). Now they can’t live without it. I’ll bet many folks out there share the same story.
It’s great that the pace of hardware technology is beginning to slow down a bit. It’s finally becoming possible for schools to commit more resources to their computing facilities, rather than giving in to
|
| “Well, we’d like to upgrade, but won’t because we
| know that it’ll be obselete in a year, and we don’t
| have the money to keep pouring into the upgrade cycle.”
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And this will mean even more folks will be computer literate.
good point. what about all the new CS students who are saturated with linux knowledge by the time they leave uni? i would wager its nearly impossible to not be exposed to microsoft alternatives of one sort or other when doing a degree these days…
is it too much to hope the legion CS students will exponentially increase the speed of improvement of OS software?
First off; it should be understood that for the last 10 years at least the focus of the PC market has been on the business sector. Consummers have gotten benefit from the upgrades only “accidentally”. Its only this year that Microsoft has focused on the home market. During this year they’ve made major inroads with the studios to push towards mass digital entertainment. The amount of time people spend watching TV is enermous. If they can be convinced to raise the quality of their TV experience for as little as $2 / viewing hour this is a massive source of revenue for both the studios and the computer companies. The death of television (meaning the death of entertainment so low quality it isn’t worth stealing) might not be far off.
Widespread broadband adoption / home networking is a very likely “killer app”.
1) Movies on demand from a very large library
2) A powerful music library connected to the computer, home sterios, car sterio and other portable players.
3) Rapid / easy to use video editing
That is a powerful home entertainment package.
Now add in the internet gaming experience (which most people haven’t tried) and you have a second component.
Today we have mobile computing: Pocket PC, tablet PC, smart monitors… Realize that x822.11 technology is becoming “free” to install on any CPU driven device (watch, alarm clock, TV, cell phone…). Imagine the networking boom. Consummers really like mobile communication technology as the cell phone, pager, success shows. Mobile communication technology giving them access to infinite information and entertainment based off the home PC is a major step forward.
I think Eugenia is right with reference to the gartner report if stated that the desktop computer revolution is over. However, cheaper laptops and the next killer app might turn every bit of that around. I doubt that many more households outside of the build-it-yourself or hardcore gamer set will continue to fuel the PC market.
However, if (notice I say IF), the hardware PC folks catch the clue-by-four consumers have been swinging at their heads for years they will invest in better technology and methods and turn around and figure how to bring up the quality and down the price of the coveted laptop computer. I am not sure they will even be called laptops or notebooks at that time. Maybe the tablet PC/fused together with an attachable keyboard or something.
People want the computer they can comfortably carry around and use that can be truly called their PERSONAL computer.
However, it is difficult to see the revolution coming. There is still plenty of potential in a general purpose computer that a PDA alongside of a game box, alongside of internet appliance simply cannot emulate.
This of course assumes the next “killer app”. If the software industry does NOT get off its collective ass and stop worrying so much about redmond and what they can do for their company to make money and move the industry forward.
I am a geek but I know many Joes/Janes that are not interested too much in computers BECAUSE of Windows. It’s too easy to screw up a Windows computer, it’s too easy to buy a camera and not being able to connect and decently use it. And security is another big issue to them (and to us too :-), nobody understand why they have so much spywares, adwares and viruses, but they are a big annoiance for ordinary users.
So, may be it won’t be a kill-app but giving the ordinary folks a true tool and not a “scaring monster” like Windows is something that can still be welcomed.
And this, although normal users think only about eye candies and features, this involves a lot the OS and low-level infrastructure. So I don’t understand the ones like you that dismiss OS X as a “similar OS 9” for ordinary users, there’s nothing similar and, if the standard user will never notify it, the under-layer of the new OS IS meaningful.
It’s like talking of diesel cars and fuel cell cars, all the two transport you, and a non techie can never distinguish between them, but if the second will be able to run at the same speed, IT WILL BE a killer-app.
Bye
PCs are workhorses, but the percentage of people that needs/wants that power is near to have their needs fulfilled.
The fact is that the majority of people doesn’t need this power. The majority of people is more receptive to smaller, cheaper and more specialized devices, like an mp3 player or an email reader.
>I think Eugenia is right with reference to the gartner report if stated that the desktop computer revolution is over.
I didn’t write this article.
They are into Linux because with Linux, they can assure their customers that the software embedded in the device works properly. Nobody is going to buy a washer, VCR, telephone, hard-disk movie recorder, etc., if the software that drives the device is buggy.
And that buggy software, my friends, is what’s destroyed our industry. Don’t doubt it, I hear it every day from my users.
How would you feel if your new car refused to start every other week, or broke down on the highway every other month?
IMO, some parts in the semicon procesess are way too expensive to even considered as indirect and direct material.
Part of the problem is the fact that these semicon processes will scale-up in the future, with prices just following linearly.
Maybe it is time to find solutions that use other materials that can be grown organically, though.
“”First off; it should be understood that for the last 10 years at least the focus of the PC market has been on the business sector. Consummers have gotten benefit from the upgrades only “accidentally”. Its only this year that Microsoft has focused on the home market””
Mr. Bolden, what particular rock have you been residing beneath these last 10 years? I went to tech school in 1996 after starting as a computer hobbyist in 1975, so I’m an old dog insofar as computing is concerned. I’ve worked in both corporate IT, mom-and-pop computer stores and my own IT services business and the reason we have 586 CPUs running at gigahertz speeds is BECAUSE the industry focused on the home user. The 386, 486 and 586 chip architectures didn’t spontaneously burst into existance – the computer industry spent a Mount Everest of dollars to build faster, better chips for the quite demanding consumer market.
Windows NT and 95 both sprang from Windows 3.1 and Windows For Workgroups (3.11) and it WASN’T from the goodness of Microsoft’s heart. It was because of the mushrooming home market.
“”Widespread broadband adoption / home networking is a very likely “killer app”.””
Let’s examine this one, too. The broadband-as-killer-app has been around now for a couple of years and it might surprise you to know that as of right now about 4% of home in America are wired for broadband. Why? Broadband (DSL) only works within a fixed distance of the telco’s DSL node and not on all lines. Most people in the US talk over copper instead of fiber. And the bulk of the copper was installed, oh, say, before I was born. This fun little built-in speed bump is going to limit widespread broadband adoption for quite a while. Cable modems have their limitations too. Home networks will spread more quickly thanks to WiFi, but only in homes with multiple computers (i.e. NOT most of America).
“”1) Movies on demand from a very large library””
I’m going to tackle this one last one…With a DSL line a movie (Training Day for instance) takes about 2 hours to
download and you can’t watch it until the download completes. Yeah, baby, this is why NetFlix is making it’s owner a billionaire: movies on demand from a very large library. Silly rabbit, he should have used the Internet?
In conclusion, Mr. Bolden, let me quote Inspector Kemp in ‘Young Frankenstein’: ‘A riot is an ugly thing…so you’d better make damn sure you get your facts straight’.
Adieu!
Portability it’s the magic word. From wireless communication (Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, IR etc) to the dummy portable video game console protability is the key, what everyone’s looking for. Battery life is a problem, heat and strong cpu is another, diplay’s problems almost solved with new technology from Kodak. Cell phones, PDAs and all the other supper-wow gadgets promote portability and limited by that so far. Portability is freedom, less trouble, make it quick. Until we become humanoids or cyborgs portable devices will be here!
“the Windows reputation for innovation and invention”
Windows reputation for what? Give me a break.
Windows is known for ubiquity, not originality. Microsoft’s own reputation is very tarnished. Even non-geeks will probably snicker at a picture of the “Billgatus of Borg” picture one sees on Slashdot, even as they roll their eyes at its immaturity. If you are looking for companies with reputations for innovation and invention, look at IBM, HP, or even Apple (from whom many think MS “stole” its ideas). Microsoft is the behemoth that people feel they need to deal with out of necessity, even if they don’t like it or trust it.
In the next 5 Years:
1) Security. Maybe you can’t see it now, but it’s coming… A digital 9/11. It won’t be a trojan or a virus, but a stealthy worm that infects everything, and waits for a specific date/time, globally wiping hard drives everywhere at the same time. (sleepers, just like the Al-Qaeda)
Immediately afterwards, I predict a slew of crappy security products for home and network use, VPN’s, etc, all claiming to be THE ultimate secure solution. Digital Snake Oil. A vulnerable public will buy products with backdoors, spy logs and spam tunnels, installing crap they don’t want.
PC’s (specifically Microsoft PC’s) will become like television & radio. You’ll get a free OS, but deluged with commercials.
Identity theft may be the other potential catalyst. Had my CC stolen recently through a supposedly secure on-line transaction…
2) IPV6. Together with security will cause major upgrades in OS’s, routers, etc when there’s a critical mass in IPV6 space. (Can you say “New job skills in demand?”) Wonder who’s holding up IPV6 deployment…
3) Linux and Open Source will be on 75% of the NON-USA computers, PDA’s, etc. US companies will struggle to compete with foreign companies that have slashed their software/hardware/license budgets. The trend is already starting…
4) Because of 3, .Net will succeed only in the US/North America. Think Metric System. Java or a similar open source idea will succeed internationally. Wasn’t .NET conceived in the DOT-COM boom?
5) Mobile devices, PDA’s, etc. will take over from the standard PC. The ability to connect them to the TV or monitor to play games, surf or share information will be a key feature. But the wow features are already here. Personal PC’s will play music, movies, games, surf, email, phone, etc and be the size of a walkman or smaller.
Beyond 5 years…
* Portable & dynamic holographic projection – Games & Analysis/presentations. A potential boom for medical and engineering/scientific fields to analyze data. (Think virtual bodies for doctors to train or operate remotely with…) Not quite virtual reality. The benefit here is everyone can watch. Oh, and don’t forget the dirty stuff…
* AI will annoy us in Customer Service systems, sickness screening, and other barriers before you get to talk to a real person. Or, imagine a digital lawyer… See, I told you it would be SCARY!
…Microsoft is busy slapping its software into every f*cking thing that moves…
“We started with the core functions and scenarios that customers told us they wanted, and worked from there to build all of the enabling technology needed, pretty much from scratch. We created a new miniature software platform that fits right into the .NET architecture so that we could leverage its great development environment and tools. And we worked with National Semiconductor to fabricate a new chipset that contains and runs the new software platform: sort of the Smart personal objects “brain” that can be dropped into objects to make them smart.”
Microsoft Launches Smart Personal Object Technology Initiative
http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/features/2002/nov02/11-17SPOT.as…
Broadband (DSL) only works within a fixed distance of the telco’s DSL node and not on all lines.
Actually broadband can work from outer space and reach every American. The only reason we don’t have it now is because some lazy capitalists keep making excuses about it costing too much, or not reaching far enough. Whatever. The technology is here now, it can be installed properly to reach everyone and allow us to do things like video conferencing and movie streaming. Over 100Mbps networks you can stream multiple videos at the same time using MPEG-4. We have half that bandwidth availble on 802.11 today, and the full bandwidth in tomorrows technology, which will be coming out next year. We also have high frequency high bandwidth technology slowly trickling down. So what’s the hold up? Money! Someone wants to make it rich off of this scheme to give you broadband (and cap your upload), but nobody wants to give you broadband because it’ll improve the economy or help people communicate. How about helping them vote. Doesn’t a population connected via a network, running secure software like say Windows .NET, have the oportunity to communicate more effectively than a population split apart by age groups, intelligence and financial capability.
Oh, but we never really wanted to get EVERYONE on the internet anyway, only the middle class, cuz they have money to spend. Might as well just leave it for those real computer geeks who know how to build a wireless broadband network. Then we won’t have to worry about making it easy for mom and pop to use. But I bet they’ll be really disappointed when you tell them they can’t have broadband because its just not profitable enough for you to do the work.
Its so ironic that these supposedly intelligent computer people still like to give away their bandwidth and IP and build communities. Where have they gone wrong?
First, Bolden and Freethinker:
IMO, Bolden has raised good points. I wouldn’t say it happened “this year”, but:
a) things like “personal video recorders” (Tivo-like) are somewhat recent;
b) videogames are better for home than PCs; notheless, some (Playstation2, whacked XBox) of them can be used as computers now;
c) Windows for Workgroups can be used at home, ok, but it was aimed at corporations — unless you count mom & dad as workgroup ;-P
d) broadband is not just xDSL! I have cable and could get 512kbps for a price; some people got even more with sattelite or radio links; developing countries (like mine, Brazil) have much less copper than the US, we can use optic fibers (and we are);
e) quality in the broadcast is a factor, too… you don’t have to send cinema-quality films over wire: everybody is used to about 700×525 16bpp (i.e., TV) — I suspect 600×450 (and maybe even 512×384) would be acceptable. When iD started with Castle of Wolfenstein, the immersion experience was more important than the resolution. Some people say 384Kbps is enough… 56Kbps seems the limit now, but so it was with 9600bps some years ago.
Now the article: (amazing, I’ve even read it!)
I agree about the market confusion part (users still don’t know how to use the computer) and Microsoft hard times (I’m admittedly biased here).
But I a little more positive about the future: if the OS can become a commodity, hardware makers can begin to focus on services — for example, one can buy a computer and get services like AOL’s (what’s positive about that, you might ask…)
As I see it, many, many battles will arise from this: record companies will (continue to) be crazy about p2p, telcos will freak about voice-on-IP, software companies shall keep the client with quality instead of lowly embrace & extend & decommoditize tactics.
In fact, maybe an analogy is appropriate — and I can do it, since I’m not very young nor too old… these times we live are the software version of the Computers Clubs and garage kits of the 70’s.
Then, bold kids challenged big hardware names by bringing home the computer (something IBM had extreme difficulty to replicate with the original IBM-PC).
Now, their sons defy big software conglos — and I smell the same adrenaline/blood level in the air. So I think this is not an end, but rather a new beginning.
100% agreed, Anonymous. Specially the part where foreign countries choose not to use Microsoft. It’s happening already, I only wish my country was faster at that like France, Germany, Peru, to name a few.
About annoying AI, I just watched the last “Harry Potter” — I keep imagining we’ll soon have “assistants” like that Dobby creature… maybe made in Japan!
I realized today that I am completely unable to think of even one single category of hardware ever invented on this planet that has not been fully commoditized, at some point.
And Nokia’s strategy to maintaining its revenues is to keep the cell phone from becoming commoditized!? What the hell do they think is going to make their cell phones so goddamn special in the history of consumer electronics!?
Someone help me with this, please.
So, is Nokia going to make their money by selling $20,000 USD luxury, platinum-coated cell phones to the global elite!?
Nokia Phones for Ritchie Rich
http://www.wired.com/news/print/0,1294,49887,00.html
Vertu, A Nokia Company
http://www.vertu.com/
Vertu (virtue), WTF!? Microsoft is going to destroy these clowns (I’m talking about Nokia).
“I know many Joes/Janes that are not interested too much in computers BECAUSE of Windows. It’s too easy to screw up a Windows computer, it’s too easy to buy a camera and not being able to connect and decently use it”
Yep, and the last time they really tried was 8 years ago with windows 95. BTW some stuff have changed since then. Go to a big consumer store (Best Buy, Circuit City) and just try to find a camera that doesn’t fit with Windows XP right out of the box.
Good luck.
My Mom would buy a machine that just did email and word processing if it was reliable and secure, but since there is nothing out there from established brands with enough quality, she bought an eMac. There are many people her age that would use an internet appliance, but the GeoBooks can’t handle Java, or pdf and the compact ones wouldn’t let you word process. Nobody wants to market to that segment because they don’t buy vaporware more than once.
Economic historians will tell you that a corporation/industry is usually most profitable just before it fails.
Microsoft long term is in serious trouble because of Moores Law. Software costs are basically fixed but hardware costs will continue to fall for decades. No-one objects to paying $500 for software for a $5000 computer. You would probably be unwilling to pay anything to put software on a $50 device.
By 2008 everyone will have a powerful smartphone – a video camera, phone, portable office, dictation machine, music player etc. This device will need to interconnect seemlessly with other wireless devices. That means embedded open standards. Because of the multiplier cost it will be too expensive to pay software royalties on this type of ultracheap ‘disposable’ machine. It will probably be given away free with a network sign-up.
Where does that lead Microsoft. Massively reduced corporate software sales will cut into the bottom line. The home computer will probably be mostly replaced by a number of wireless smart devices.
Microsoft can switch to hardware sales – they will get slaughtered because they can’t innovate. You can’t subsidise for ever. The XBox is a money pit. You can’t give away hundreds of millions of proprietary standard smartphones to build market share. Microsoft doesn’t own the wireless protocols so it can’t bludgeon hardware manufactures like it does in the PC world.
Microsoft isn’t a brilliant market player it is a brutal monopoly that uses financial muscle to win where innnovation fails.
“Microsoft long term is in serious trouble because of Moores Law. Software costs are basically fixed but hardware costs will continue to fall for decades. No-one objects to paying $500 for software for a $5000 computer. You would probably be unwilling to pay anything to put software on a $50 device.”
So, according to your little doomsday scenario, by the year 2008, the entire Windows-based PC software industry will become unprofitable, collapse entirely and vanish? What you are claiming will happen to Microsoft will also happen to every other PC-based software company equally – they are ALL doomed, necessarily so, according to your theory. And not only that, but the entire PC hardware industry (i.e., the x86 architecture) is going to be displaced completely and will no longer exist either because we’ll all be using advanced cell-phones as the center of our computing lives?
Sorry, I don’t buy any of this one bit – there is still room for a huge amount of innovation on x86 architecture PCs (with processor speeds that will be at about 50 GHz in 2008, according to Moore’s law) that simply will not be possible to cram into the microscopic form factor of the latest cell phones – it’s going to be a hell of a lot easier for everyone to just sync the thing automatically over a wireless network with ‘Windows MAX 2008’ so that you will be able to sit down and get some *real* work done.
Edwin Shneidman, a clinical psychologist who is a leading authority on suicide, and who is sometimes called the Father of modern Suicidology, has described the ten characteristics of suicide in his book “Definition of Suicide” (1985).
The common stimulus in suicide is “unendurable psychological pain”.
The common stress in suicide is “frustrated psychological needs”.
The common purpose of suicide is “to seek a solution”.
The common goal of suicide is “cessation of consciousness”.
The common emotion in suicide is “hopelessness-helplessness”.
The common internal attitude toward suicide is “ambivalence”.
The common cognitive state in suicide is “constriction”.
The common interpersonal act in suicide is “communication of intention”.
The common action in suicide is “egression” (a way out).
The common consistency in suicide is with “life-long coping patterns”.
Yes, the high-tech industry is undergoing “assisted suicide” and the assistants are Microsoft, Hollywood, and Government.
The malaise that sits over the PC industry is there because of the Microsoft monopoly which impedes any company from bringing innovative mass-market software to the Windows platform.
The malaise is there because Hollywood wants to turn the PC into a hypersecure auditing machine and MIL-spec play-only video player.
The malaise is there because the government wants to turn the the PC into a MIL-spec content controlled spy machine that can only view information the government wants you to see. And also because the government views the internet as a threat to its continued power. Thus the government’s recent “e-DNA” effort.
Taken together, these powerful forces will drive high-tech — as we once knew it — to its death.
The future of high-tech is building secure devices and controlled content that maintains the hegemony of the old guard. Welcome to the world of mind-numbing Hollywood rehashes and reheats. Any other content would be seditious “thoughtcrime”.
The renaissance of humanity that high-tech would have enabled has been hijacked.
Can we take it back? Can enough minds be freed from the matrix to make a difference?
Time will tell how many hands dare seize the fire.
– Red Pill
I think .NET will provail exactly as MS plans it. The modern home computer is very powerful and will become more of a server in the loft of your house and will be already there when you buy a house. Tablet PC’s and Laptops will be in the main with 803.11 connecting it all together.
Already, here in the UK, hundreds of Wireless Access Points are under testing. The way I see it, we will all be buying, for about $150, thin clients to the internet where you rent applications to use straight off the net… minimal Hard disk required. Log onto Sun’s website and you are presented with StarOffice .NET which you use as you would use the app now.
I believe that in the future embedded development will become much more important. The PDA will be depeneded upon for much more “intelligent” uses than just browsing, email, contact management, scheduling etc. Eventually universities will require PDA’s for course study. PDAs will enable information on demand for the kinds of things that require physical time and/or presence.
A powerful server will be used in the classroom that will enable students to receive wireless downloads of assignments, courses, etc, as well as submission. PDA’s will provide monitoring functions in the future for things such as security, home management, auto maintenance. Alphonso, Bobby, and Courtney all love to eat different kinds of foods. Mom wants to know if everything is stocked to make some dinner. Use the PDA to ask what’s in the fridge. The embedded computer knows what they all should have. Ran out of speghettios? PDA to the supermarket and schedule an order of some stuff. While your at it, 2 light bulbs in the house burned out since the electrical system is being monitored, might as well order some of those too.
On top of that, an embedded computer in the home scans “smart tags” placed on consumer products providing cost, and inventory infomation. How about having some automated expense tracking software take care of your financial reports. No more manual entry here.
Worried about security? Use your PDA to interface with the new wizbang car monitoring system that tracks location by GPS, with embedded cams around your car. Ooops, break-in in progress, a message pops up on the PDA and gives you a VoIP link to the police to report it. In the mean time, you can run out to the parking out and “greet” the perpetraitors
Keep tabs on your home via a streaming vid server for all cams around your house. Motion sensors, heat sensors, pressure sensors, etc. can let you know if someone is attemping illegal entry.
Have a car problem? Use your PDA to network with the auto’s embedded computer to tell you what’s wrong. Then while your at it, tap into the local auto mechanics service availability software to see what the current wait is for service. Then schedule a repair. Still need big computers to serve that demand.
Have kids at daycare? Use the PDA to get a visual on what’s goin on. Had a recent theft? Use our asset tracking software to locate its whereabouts. Embedded computers, GPS, streaming servers all require powerful computers.
Love mischief? Use your PDA to hack and reprogram your butthead neighbor’s radio to turn on full blast at 3 am
On a road trip and are seriously bored? Just use the embedded PDA in your car to project a transparent holographic video in your peripheral view.
Love art? Use your PDA to reprogram your digital decor
Embedded computers in your ceilings will create a visual display on your walls with static or moving images. Here’s your chance for a real “jungle room”. Rotate your favorite painting on your own digital canvas.
How about a mood monitor using facial recognition to program your lighting, wallpaper and ambient sounds in your own dynamic environment. The list goes on and on, PDA’s and embedded development will eventually become as prolific as paper is today. Powerful computers will enable PDA’s to do what they will eventually do so computers will never die.
Perhaps I’m misreading the purpose of your article, but when you refer to a “cyclic downturn” it sounds like you are drawing a direct link between the hardware/OS/software industries and the problems in the IT sector. I think this is a bit shortsighted.
The IT industry has been help up largely by telecom and big business that has nothing to do with the desktop. Even if it proves true that we won’t see the next big desktop revolution “in our lifetime,” I don’t think this means we won’t live to see a comeback of the IT industry as a whole.
Again, maybe I’m missing the focus of your article, but that’s just my two cents (Euro cents, that is 😉
“Yep, and the last time they really tried was 8 years ago with windows 95. BTW some stuff have changed since then. Go to a big consumer store (Best Buy, Circuit City) and just try to find a camera that doesn’t fit with Windows XP right out of the box.”
May be it does, but normally on a clean system, not one where the user has already added and removed some other tenths of programs/devices. It may work, but what if not? (and it happens, more than sometimes 🙂
BTW my Canon camera (bougth exactly one year ago) doesn’t work “out-of-the-box”, indeed I have to go to the site, download the latest driver, and do a list of actions I doubt my mom is able to do.
Last week I have moved one (just one!) PCI card (the sound card) in my PC (with XP SP1) and the system didn’t boot either, as the PCI enumerator has moved the IDE controller position and XP need a “fixed” boot drive enumeration (same happens frequently with SCSI card), not to mention what happened when I changed my Ethernet card…
At work the Windows servers are absolutely maintained without Office (I wonder why…)
Windows has improved a lot, and if you tune it and use right permissions you can solve many issues, but it comes “all-accessible” and normally people do things we techie never ever think about
OSX is not the final point, but it is really more difficult to make something wrong.
Finally, I dream about an OS that is strong enough to always let you do something, that has well defined security policies (e.g. not be able to JMP to any memory location with a window message)
Is this so difficult to build?
OSes needs stability and security and the MS way of never defining a well separation between the OS and the userland (obviously to take advantage of hidden APIs)
The international airline and auto industries have been in ternminal profit decline for decades. In fact if it wasn’t for massive indirect government subsidies both industries would not exist. Do you remember a little airline company called Pan Am?
Most people will eventually realise that there is no need to buy ‘brand name’ software when a free product is almost as good as a $500 one.
30 years ago an Alfa Romeo far more than Japanese car and was vastly better. Now a Alfa Romeo costs far more than a very serviceable Korean import and is marginally better. Alfa Romeo,is of course a part of Fiat, gne broke decades ago making expensive poor quality cars.
When you use a smartphone or similar device you have no inkling of the underlying technology.
So what if computers are 20 times as powerful in 10 years – the cheapest desktop now available is adequate for most users. Who is going to need all this massive processing power? The fastest PCs already support 3D resolutions greater than any monitor supports. Not many folks are going to be editing IMAX movies at home.
It is a US conceit that the corporate world is the centre of the software universe. The other 95% don’t care or are openly hostile to Microsoft. They use the metric system and will use locally produced open source software on their ultra cheap ‘beige boxes’. Foreign governments don’t want US ‘spyware’ on critical equipment.
“the reality is that computers are less about OS’s and more about what is comfortable to Joe and Jane Public”
My God, what a radical concept
Seriously though, it is true.
As much as I like Linux, *BSD, and UNIX in general, it is not and will not be ready for mainstream usage until it is dumbed down so much for the “Best Buy” crowd, that it will be no better than Windows.
As for CPU speeds, that too is correct.
I’ve been in IT for 15, and do a bit of Java and C work at home. I have 3 AMD k6-2 based PCs with 500 mHz CPUs….these machines serve our family very well. I even have an old 486/100 that I use solely for the scanner.
Sure I’d love a 2 gHz machine, but I’d be wasting my money and the CPUs power….I do all my gaming on a PS2.
Jeff:””First off; it should be understood that for the last 10 years at least the focus of the PC market has been on the business sector. Consummers have gotten benefit from the upgrades only “accidentally”. Its only this year that Microsoft has focused on the home market””
Free: Mr. Bolden, what particular rock have you been residing beneath these last 10 years? I went to tech school in 1996 after starting as a computer hobbyist in 1975, so I’m an old dog insofar as computing is concerned. I’ve worked in both corporate IT, mom-and-pop computer stores and my own IT services business and the reason we have 586 CPUs running at gigahertz speeds is BECAUSE the industry focused on the home user. The 386, 486 and 586 chip architectures didn’t spontaneously burst into existance – the computer industry spent a Mount Everest of dollars to build faster, better chips for the quite demanding consumer market.
Ah no. First off the 386 and 486 development didn’t occur during the last ten years and new Intel chip lines have consistently been targetted to workstation / server markets as Intel indicates quite clearly in their marketing (for example their marketing for their Itanium line currently). Low cost models like celeron have been targetted to home which aren’t advances.
Windows NT and 95 both sprang from Windows 3.1 and Windows For Workgroups (3.11) and it WASN’T from the goodness of Microsoft’s heart. It was because of the mushrooming home market.
Windows NT was for the home market?
“”Widespread broadband adoption / home networking is a very likely “killer app”.””
Let’s examine this one, too. The broadband-as-killer-app has been around now for a couple of years and it might surprise you to know that as of right now about 4% of home in America are wired for broadband. Why? Broadband (DSL) only works within a fixed distance of the telco’s DSL node and not on all lines.
Most people in the US talk over copper instead of fiber. And the bulk of the copper was installed, oh, say, before I was born. This fun little built-in speed bump is going to limit widespread broadband adoption for quite a while. Cable modems have their limitations too.
Broadband is cable modem not DSL.
Home networks will spread more quickly thanks to WiFi, but only in homes with multiple computers (i.e. NOT most of America).
The average home in America has tons of CPU enabled devices other than computers. Read posts before commenting on them.
I’m going to stop here this is a waste of time. Feel free to get in the last word
“So what if computers are 20 times as powerful in 10 years – the cheapest desktop now available is adequate for most users. Who is going to need all this massive processing power? The fastest PCs already support 3D resolutions greater than any monitor supports…”
Sure, and “640K ought to be enough for anybody!”, right?
I agree with the main idea of the article, the IT market is changing, and probably shrinking from the angle of Personal Computers(PC). PC upgrades are no longer a necessity since:
* the extra power is not needed but most people
* standard interfaces (USB/Firewire) are enough to suffice most users
* the operating systems available today perform well (good multitasking, reliable enough for most users needs)
* the thin-client architecture of Web Browsers has made PC processing power a non-issue.
However, the article seems to neglect the server-side market. There is still major refinement needed in the e-business space (B2B, B2C, etc) and although the standards game is making this simpler and simpler, it is still an important area. IBM has their On-Demand and Microsoft has their .NET strategy/outlook so even the big companies agree with the main idea of the article, PCs are not going to be main part of the industry from now on.
“On-Demand” is the next, very widely dispersed, “killer application”.
Moore’s Law by industry segment – Storage capacity doubles every 9 months, network speeds double every 12 months, processing speeds double every 18 months and wireless speeds double every 30 months. Approximately.
Given these growth rates, IMHO anyone who is speculating about what direction the overall industry is going to take more than a year or so from now is probably wrong. Back in 1991 no one even had the slightest clue that online hypertext would come to rule the world – it came out of nowhere and propagated unbelievably fast. There is no reason why the same sort of thing could not happen to the industry again (grid computing and P2P technologies look like good candidates) and nobody knows what kind of hardware and bandwidth resources will be required to enable and support the Next Big Thing.