Happy New Decade!
Barry Shein
It's a New Year and a New Decade and you're already sick of all the
looking-back pieces on tv/radio/etc. That's not INFO-FUTURES' venue,
we are only interested in looking back on the 90's; the rest of this
century.
Towards that end I invite (implore? beg for?) your predictions in
various technologies for the coming end of the decade. To show I'm
sincere, I'll post mine forthwith:
THE REST OF THE CENTURY
Barry Shein
Software Tool & Die
HARDWARE
THE DESKTOP
Personal computers and workstations will of course become the same
thing (it's not clear they were ever terribly distinguishable other
than next year's PC was this year's workstation.)
The amount of time that the last generation or two of chips define
cheaper workstations will shorten and finally approach zero. Most
likely fast, cheap upgrades will be the rage, a little plug-in cpu
board for $500 or less which converts your machine to the current chip
will be expected, it will probably become a hardware service checkoff
item.
This will be driven by the government(s) demanding this as too-rapid
obsolescense becomes an issue in procurements and vendors will
respond. The big problem with this will become memory bandwidth speed,
some solution will be found, quite possible by adding another storage
hierarchy local to the CPU (e.g. 16MB "caches" on-board.)
By the middle of the decade 100MIPS/25MFLOPS CPUs will be commonplace
on the desktop, probably with 128MB memory standard and upgradeable to
1GB.
Parallel to this we will see parallel workstations become standard.
Four CPUs will be considered minimal for your desktop by the middle of
the decade, by the end of the decade we may see single chips with the
equivalent of 16 CPUs finding their way into desktop models, at that
point 100+ CPUs will be a moderately fancy workstation, each CPU
running at 100 or more MIPS.
I think somewhere up around 100..250 MIPS the low-end technologies
will begin to falter in various ways (more speed-up will require
exotic technologies, too expensive for mass market demands.) The
limiting factor may turn out to be that the memory bandwidth is just
too expensive for "under $10K" systems. This is basically an economic
and marketing observation, more than a technological one.
This "wall" is what will drive the interest in just putting many CPUs
into the box, it's cheap and effective. Expect a lot of interest in
asymmetric systems which have lumps of memory local to each CPU
(possibly on-chip) and a big lump of shared memory.
The point is that this will no longer be the playground of the
technology pushers, they will be commodity items with commodity
considerations.
Of course, higher-end workstations will be available but very few
folks (comparatively) will be interested in them, they'll be mostly
special purpose.
HDTV will help a lot, we'll standardize on 1Kx1K color monitors
because it will be more important to standardize than make software
understand a zillion different display options. Again, fancier options
will be available but the market will be small.
THE HIGHER END
At the high-end (minis, mainframes, supers) these will mutate to
something you won't think of as "computers", you certainly won't log
into them.
They'll all be file servers, communications back-ends, information
servers etc. and will run special-purpose OS's tuned to particular
applications. They'll mostly be bought for their reliability and
archiving capability and for places where centralized control makes
sense. For example, it would be too much of a nuisance to try to keep
1000 workstations up to date on the wire services, it'll be easier to
just keep one system up to date and access it over the network.
The super-computer industry will run into massive economic problems
simply because not enough sites are interested in their wares to keep
them in business and competitive. Supercomputers might become like
supercolliders, the government(s) will commission (say) 16 of them,
private sales will dwindle to non-existant as the drop in demand will
cause the prices to skyrocket to hundreds of millions each. In fact,
it's almost like that today.
This coming decade people will get over their idea that a big computer
is big in size.
THE COMPUTING GESTALT
Computers will become less and less interesting in and of themselves.
Computers will be seen as merely connection end-points (appliances, to
use Steve Jobs' term) in massive, world-wide networks. It will be the
networks which people will become obsessed with, how to get services,
new and amazing activities fostered by 50 million desktop computers
hooked up together in hierarchical nets, global nets.
University academic computing centers will become service
organizations to the University library systems (where they've
belonged for years, but that's another matter.) The main computing
facility will be a massive information server with on-line catalogs,
texts, video, sound etc. In turn these collections will be linked to
each other around the world.
Access to these information servers will become a major source of
income for Universities as AT&T (&c) hook them up to the general wide
area networks and subscriptions are sold.
Universities currently building such systems will leap ahead of
universities which haven't. In fact, colleges which haven't built
these will mostly go broke as the demographics shift against them.
Better public libraries and the Library of Congress will also get into
the act.
The government will also derive significant income from selling
on-line services. This will become significant in govt revenues and
seen as almost a big a savior as the state lotteries.
Wide-area fiber-optic lines will be commonplace to all homes and
businesses. This will have been (surprisingly, to some) driven by
AT&T (and others, phone companies, BOCs, MCI etc) entering the Cable
TV business as operators, wiping out most current operators.
The programming, of course, will still be delivered by specialists
although small, specialty programming will be more commonplace.
Interactive TV will finally start to be introduced by the middle...end
of the decade.
Given this a major market for these networks will be calling up
movies, music and other programming on demand (the demise of the home
VCR.) It will be hard to find the workstation within the home
entertainment system.
Businesses will order/sell almost everything on the screen by the end
of the decade. This will give rise to interesting arbitrage
opportunities as people search the nets for orders and vendors to
match up with price mismatches (e.g. causing orders in progress to
cancel by under-bidding before the order is filled.)
That is, the general product markets will resemble more and more the
stock markets with fast price fluctuations and people making money
merely playing others' inability (lack of time, interest, equipment,
capital, knowledge) to exploit imbalances within the system.
Congress and other govts will investigate the effect of the global
product markets becoming too efficient and probably make some of this
illegal for a while, at least in some areas. There will also be all
kinds of fights for control under the guise of "consumerism" (which
will mostly be a thinly veiled attempt to keep small players out.)
Purchasing will start resembling an inverted auction more than the
current methods as you will typically float out an offer to buy, say,
a particular model refrigerator, to the nets and come back a few hours
later to scan the responses. Auto dealerships as we now know them may
become almost non-existant over this sort of technology, auto makers
will just set up demonstration centers around the country for test
drives etc and you'll go home and float your interests.
This global market net will be what finally spurs general public
interest in the home computer (beyond its intrinsic function in home
entertainment centers.) There will be myriad ways to "get into
business" with your keyboard, almost every family will have someone
moonlighting (if not fully employed) in some way selling, buying,
dealing on the nets.
This will be a new route out of poverty for the quick and the bright.
No one will know the color of your skin or how you're dressed over the
nets. There is always enough market in specialty items that big
corporations can't touch (e.g. collectibles, handicrafts) to create
opportunities.
SOFTWARE
Software will start to become obsolete in the coming decade, at least
in its current form.
Software will become a service commodity rather than a tangible
commodity.
When you call up a spreadsheet or word-processor or whatever it will
come whizzing in over the net from outside.
Your workstation will hold mostly (personal) data and very little
software. You will rely upon high-speed network connections to
software development houses for your software.
You will be charged on a usage basis and it will be a lot cheaper than
it costs now to buy packages, but the vendors will make more money (or
about the same) because the audience will be huge and the resistance
to spending a few bucks trying out a new package will be almost zero.
All the vendors have to sell you on is typing the command which calls
up their software (manuals etc will be on-line or separately
available, no big problem, another business.)
This will pretty much make moot the current piracy issue (also for
videotapes and other media as well as software.) Expect digital radio
and entertainment experiments which put MIDI right into your home.
Parts of the software will require network attachment for function so
it won't be meaningful to copy something. This network part will be
real function, not just security tricks. The major advantages will be
instant bug fixes and enhancements being transparently incorporated.
Also, access to other on-line services tuned to the software.
Other services like on-line training "films" etc will become big
business, also sold on a per-usage basis.
Almost the entire software industry will become a network services
industry. The current "dataless" workstation is exactly backwards and
will become a "software-less" workstation (other than base operating
system etc, whatever it takes to hook up, this will be, as today, part
of the machine.) It will mainly hold and manipulate your private data.
SUMMARY
The 90's will become known as "The Telecommunications Decade".
POSTSCRIPT
The century will end with the AI community still claiming that new
machines and novel operating systems have to be developed before they
can make any progress.
---
-Barry Shein
Software Tool & Die, Purveyors to the Trade | b...@world.std.com
1330 Beacon St, Brookline, MA 02146, (617) 739-0202 | {xylogics,uunet}world!bzs
Jaap Vegter AEO
Well, stating that a new decade started on Jan.1 this year (1990) is incorrect
I think. The first decade ran from year 1 through year 10 and the second
decade started when the year 11 came around. Likewise the current decade
runs from Jan.1 1981 through Dec.31 1990. The next decade starts on Jan.1 1991
and the next century starts on Jan.1 2001.
All this aasumes that the first year was year 1 and not year 0.
This is a logical assumption since the first day in the first month of every
year is January (month 1, not month 0) 1 (and not 0). If one wants to maintain
that the first year was 0 (instead of 1) than we should write todays date
(January 2, 1990) in Year, Month, Day format as 1990 0 1 (January being months
zero and yesterday, new years day, being day zero).
Greetings and a happy new year, Jaap Vegter, Hewlett-Packard Netherlands.
Bernie Cosell
}re: happy new year and happy new decade....
}Well, stating that a new decade started on Jan.1 this year (1990) is incorrect
}I think. The first decade ran from year 1 through year 10 and the second
}decade started when the year 11 came around. Likewise the current decade
}runs from Jan.1 1981 through Dec.31 1990. The next decade starts on Jan.1 1991
}and the next century starts on Jan.1 2001.
Geez, is this going to pop up on EVERY newsgroup? You are wrong. decades
are conventionally named *cardinally* not *ordinally*. We did not just
complete "the eighth decade of the twentieth century", but just completed
"the eighties" --- that is, the set of ten years (->decade) which happen to
be numbered of the form "198?". We can debate when we think the
century/millennium ends, but there's no question about how decades are
defined.
/Bernie\
Dave Bakken
>
>Wide-area fiber-optic lines will be commonplace to all homes and
>businesses. This will have been (surprisingly, to some) driven by
>AT&T (and others, phone companies, BOCs, MCI etc) entering the Cable
>TV business as operators, wiping out most current operators.
How I wish!!! Think of all the work we could do at home in
our 'jammies! But its going to be 2010 until even 5% or 10%
of American homes have the ``last mile'' installed with fiber
optics. Or so I've read.
--
Dave Bakken Internet: bak...@cs.arizona.edu
721 Gould-Simpson Bldg UUCP: uunet!arizona!bakken
Dept of Computer Science; U of Arizona Phone: +1 602 621 8372 (w)
Tucson, AZ 85721 USA FAX: +1 602 621 4246
Timo Salmi LASK
>re: happy new year and happy new decade....
>
>Well, stating that a new decade started on Jan.1 this year (1990) is incorrect
>I think. The first decade ran from year 1 through year 10 and the second
Please, please, and no offense meant, but is there any way of
avoiding this subject and the finicking. This has been discussed ad
nauseum at the beginning of each new decade (whenever it may be :-)
in all conceivable media. It has ceased to be fun or clever a long
time ago.
...................................................................
Prof. Timo Salmi (Site 128.214.12.3)
School of Business Studies, University of Vaasa, SF-65101, Finland
Internet: t...@chyde.uwasa.fi Funet: vakk::salmi Bitnet: salmi@finfun
J Storrs Hall
in areas where the new technology can be acquired incrementally.
Thus, even though marvelous datacom networks are buildable right
now, look for big growth in CD-rom first. Data network services
will piggyback onto existing phone and cable; by 2000, there may
be fiber ISDN everywhere, maybe not.
Cellular wristphones will hinge on battery technology, which I'm not
up to predicting; a cellular phone/datalink in your paperback-sized
pocket computer will be a common option.
The keyboard will go the way of the card reader. Voice-and-pointer
will be standard; the pointer may be a dataglove or merely a camera
pointed at your hand. You have to have something to do with that
100 mips, after all.
Software for language comprehension will emerge from a synthesis of
spelling and grammar correctors, OCR for scanned text input, and
talkwriters. The typical user interface will be the image of a
talking head with the comprehension of a dumb and literal-minded
eighth-grader. 40% of total processing power will go into speech
recognition and 50% into realtime graphics face generation.
* BSG's (bullshit generators) will be the spreadsheet of the 90's,
* taking outlines, collections of text fragments, previously written
* documents, and background databases and producing finished reports.
* One will be able to produce ten times the paperwork in the same amount
* of time. BSF's (filters), programs that "read" reports and produce
* outlines and summary fragments, will also be popular.
Robotics will sneak in the back door. House control/entertainment
systems will grow, vaccuum cleaners and lawn mowers will begin to
operate autonomously, freezer/microwaves will waken you with the
tempting aroma of a TV omelet. "The first true fully automatic home"
will be announced several times. Robot butlers that greet visitors,
take coats, and serve drinks will be feasible (though quite expensive)
by the turn of the century, and may catch on in some circles if the
fad falls right.
* Drug traffickers will realize that automatic weapons can be mounted
* on 1995's toy robots, which can be programmed to recognize policemen
* with an accuracy of 85%.
By the end of the decade, some major strides will have been made in
life extension; the obvious ones are mass production by gene-spliced
bacteria of the handful of critical proteins that the ageing process
curtails the body's production of. As I understand it, this could
alleviate many symptoms of ageing and extend lifespan by up to 50%.
* Ronald Reagan will be the last president to have appointed anyone
* to the Supreme Court. Each medical advance will newly bankrupt the
* Social Security System, requiring massive tax increases.
Back to computers, I agree with Barry that sometime in the 90's
the information available in electronic form will catch and exceed
that available on paper, but I intend to have a large personal library
of data and programs, made possible by constantly improving storage
technology. Already in the 80's electronic data storage surpassed
paper in compactness and economy.
The ability to access and manipulate our "social database" by computer
will further accelerate the rate of technological advancement, as will
CAD tools for an increasing number of areas and "computer aided X" for
an increasing range of X.
* Voice, text, and CAD systems will be pointed to both by AI researchers
* and their critics as supporting their positions.
--JoSH
Barry Shein
Re: J Storrs Hall's predictions
Well done.
I think keyboards are here to stay, at least for the foreseeable
future. Once learned (and even if badly learned) they are still
efficient communications devices.
Voice &c will augment them just like the mouse has, but voice has two
major drawbacks. First, it's just not accurate even if well
understood, ever play the game "telephone"? There really is a lot of
bit loss due to slurring etc no matter what you do, raw facts get
miscommunicated. Second, and perhaps more importantly, you don't want
offices full of people talking to their computers, it would be chaos
or demand everyone have private offices, not likely.
The virtual reality crowd, as you mention (datagloves etc) should
start to have a big impact in the CAD/CAM and control areas soon (the
dataglove is being developed by NASA, among others, to create virtual
control rooms for the Space Station project.) Nintendo already has a
(primitive) one so that's coming fast and no doubt will find its way
into applications we're not yet even thinking of.
Perhaps we'll start to see some serious entries in the artifical
telepathy arena (barely noticeable devices allowing you to discretely
communicate with others.)
Robotics: I started this list lo so many years ago (about 3) with the
(somewhat humorous) prediction that the first major commercial success
of robotics would be as sex surrogates. I'll leave it at that.
Another important application of robotics waiting to happen is reading
things into computers. Specialized robots crawling about the stacks of
libraries or through office files. Turning pages and scanning is major
work, better to let a robot at it (these won't be terribly
anthropomorphic, of course.)
The common cold will not only still be a nuisance but will have been
found to be critical to good health as it stimulates the immune system
causing it to wipe out all sorts of other nasties in the process,
house cleaning as it were.
Michael T. Sullivan
>
> The keyboard will go the way of the card reader. Voice-and-pointer
> will be standard; the pointer may be a dataglove or merely a camera
> pointed at your hand. You have to have something to do with that
> 100 mips, after all.
We'll lose keyboards about the same time we have paperless offices.
--
Michael Sullivan uunet!jarthur.uucp!aqdata!sullivan
aQdata, Inc.
San Dimas, CA
Steve Savitzky
>The keyboard will go the way of the card reader. Voice-and-pointer
>will be standard; the pointer may be a dataglove or merely a camera
>pointed at your hand. You have to have something to do with that
>100 mips, after all.
I just have to respond to this. WRONG. Think what it would be like
on an airplane with everyone muttering to their pocket computer.
Think what office cubicles would be like. Try editing a program over
the phone (I've done it).
o Voice I/O will be useful only where keyboards and screens are not.
Voice will be used by children and other illiterates, and where both
hands are needed for something else, as when operating a vehicle or
other machinery.
o Voice mail will largely be replaced by text-oriented email, not the
other way around.
o Pocket computers will generally use handwriting recognition on their
touch-sensitive screens, rather than voice inputs.
o Full-sized keyboards will be a ubiquitous accessory. People will
try to "type" using datagloves, but the lack of tactile feedback
will make this unsatisfactory in most cases. Deaf people fluent in
sign language will have an advantage in cyberspace.
Here are a few more random predictions:
o Pocket computers will have a full-sized, touch-sensitive screen.
They will approximate a smart pad of paper, at which point almost
everyone who now carries a notebook around will want one.
o The standard lap/desk-top computer will be 8.5x11x.5 inches. The
display will go all the way to the edge, so larger displays can be
built up by tiling.
o Pocket computers + _partially_transparent_ eyephones + locators +
cellular networks will permit cyberspace to be overlaid on the real
world. This will permit virtual nametags (title bars for people),
virtual costumes, virtual street signs, and the like.
o High-quality multi-media or hypermedia documents will prove to be as
expensive to produce as movies or grand operas. Only a few will be
produced before interactive virtual realities make them obsolete.
o Virtual realities will become a major form of entertainment.
o There will never be a standard representation for hypertext
documents. Instead, there will be a standardized library of
_access_routines_ that permit _anything_ to be viewed as a
collection of object-attribute associations.
o Books stored in centralized repositories (e.g. Library of Congress)
will be downloaded once and cached locally by each user, so as to
avoid repeat access fees and to take advantage of bulk data rates.
o The copyright laws will be overhauled, probably more than once.
o Attempts will be made to license and/or certify programmers and/or
software. At least one will probably succeed. Entertainment
software will remain unregulated, with the result that CAD packages,
word processors, spreadsheets, and the like will end up being
packaged as games.
o Attempts will be made to prevent the development of artificial
intelligences. Opponents will be in the amusing position of trying
to legislate against something they claim is impossible in the first
place.
--
\ Steve Savitzky \ ADVANsoft Research Corp \ REAL hackers use an AXE!
\ st...@arc.UUCP \ 4301 Great America Pkwy \ #include<std_disclaimer.h>
\ arc!st...@apple.COM \ Santa Clara, CA 95954 \ 408-727-3357
\__________________________________________________________________________
J Storrs Hall
I wrote:
>The keyboard will go the way of the card reader. Voice-and-pointer
Steve Savitzky replies:
>I just have to respond to this. WRONG. Think what it would be like
>on an airplane with everyone muttering to their pocket computer.
>Think what office cubicles would be like. Try editing a program over
>the phone (I've done it).
A better model is looking over the shoulder of a hotshot editor
wizard, pointing at the screen occasionally, and telling him what to
do. Over the phone, you can't see the screen, and you can't point.
Also realize that there will be a whole new generation of verbally-
oriented command languages, with idiomatic (and idiosyncratic)
contractions for commonly used operations.
Imagine sitting on an airplane and having people talking to their
neighbors in conversational tones. This is quite common in my
experience; the air conditioning and engine noise is louder than the
conversational background, and it's still easy to be understood.
Telephone operators work in open rooms on consoles much closer
together and with fewer partitions than the average programmer;
there is not significant crosstalk.
Steve continues:
o Voice I/O will be useful only where keyboards and screens are not.
I didn't intend to imply that voice would preclude a screen.
o Voice mail will largely be replaced by text-oriented email, not the
other way around.
I agree halfway--mail will be sent as voice, received as text.
o Pocket computers will generally use handwriting recognition on their
touch-sensitive screens, rather than voice inputs.
I would expect both at once. When trying to get a technical idea
across to a person, I talk and draw figures (on blackboard or napkin).
Entering text will almost surely be voice; editing may well be by
drawing standard proofreaders marks on the screen.
...
o The standard lap/desk-top computer will be 8.5x11x.5 inches. The
display will go all the way to the edge, so larger displays can be
built up by tiling.
This isn't a technological question, obviously, but I would also
expect pocket-sized (3.5"x5+") and computers built into a briefcase
(complete with screen-image projector for making sales presentations).
o Pocket computers + _partially_transparent_ eyephones + locators +
cellular networks will permit cyberspace to be overlaid on the real
world. This will permit virtual nametags (title bars for people),
virtual costumes, virtual street signs, and the like.
One of my fondest hopes, but it won't happen before 2000. There's
still too big a technological gap in front of a wearable (eyeglasses
weight < 1 oz) display device, and a usable system would require
too much integration from too many people at once. By 2000, expect
game arcades, high-tech work areas, and so forth to offer local
indoor versions with helmet-weight (>1 lb) technology--but nothing on
the streets.
o High-quality multi-media or hypermedia documents will prove to be as
expensive to produce as movies or grand operas. Only a few will be
produced before interactive virtual realities make them obsolete.
Rather, expect them to be produced as commonly as movies, distributed
as widely, and be in the same price range.
I think hypermedia and VR don't compete head to head. HM is like
books and lectures, VR like games and conversation. They complement
each other.
--JoSH
John Sloan,8292,X1243,ML44E
> In article <Jan.3.01.24....@klaatu.rutgers.edu> jo...@klaatu.rutgers.edu (J Storrs Hall) writes:
>>The keyboard will go the way of the card reader. Voice-and-pointer
>>will be standard;
> I just have to respond to this. WRONG.
> o Pocket computers will generally use handwriting recognition on their
> touch-sensitive screens, rather than voice inputs.
Similar to the pocket computers portrayed in _The Mote in God's Eye_,
the SF novel by Niven and Pournelle. The computers were apparently
about the size of a pocket calculator with their entire front surface
covered with a touch sensitive LCD-like display screen.
We already see on the market at least one calculator with a touch
sensitive LCD display on which you can write and store diagrams.
My JVC stereo receiver has a touch sensitive LCD screen on its
universal remote control; depending on what you want to do, it redraws
a new control panel with different buttons and labels. The
technology that Steve describes above appears to be limited mainly
by handwriting recognition, which _is_ a difficult problem.
I must point out, though, that there are a lot of folks like me who
can type faster than they can write by hand, and with less fatigue.
For pocket computers, a writing interface is acceptable (probably
preferred) but in general will not replace a standard sized keyboard
for text-intensive applications.
> o Full-sized keyboards will be a ubiquitous accessory. People will
> try to "type" using datagloves, but the lack of tactile feedback
> will make this unsatisfactory in most cases. Deaf people fluent in
> sign language will have an advantage in cyberspace.
One of my wife's hobbies is learning AMSLAN (sp?) and we were
discussing this just the other day. The dataglove is an obvious
interface for either teaching sign language (offering graphical
feedback to the wearer), or for interpretation (the deaf user wears two
datagloves... on the screen or perhaps though a speaker comes natural
language text; with sufficient bandwidth you could use this technique
for a deaf user to communicate over a network).
> o Pocket computers will have a full-sized, touch-sensitive screen.
> They will approximate a smart pad of paper, at which point almost
> everyone who now carries a notebook around will want one.
Similar to the newspads portrayed in the movie _2001: A Space Oddesy_
by Kubrick.
> o The standard lap/desk-top computer will be 8.5x11x.5 inches. The
> display will go all the way to the edge, so larger displays can be
> built up by tiling.
Just setting the computers side by side against one another will be
enough to integrate their displays and data paths. Connections will be
made optically.
> o Pocket computers + _partially_transparent_ eyephones + locators +
> cellular networks will permit cyberspace to be overlaid on the real
> world. This will permit virtual nametags (title bars for people),
> virtual costumes, virtual street signs, and the like.
Poor folks like me will wear data glasses. The wealthy will have the
necessary hardware wired into their skulls, integrated into contact
lenses that offer an "eyes-up" display across their entire visual
field. A favorite prank will be to integrate a virtual object into
their visual field as if it were real. Again, similar technology
exists in the instruments integrated into the helmets of military
chopper pilots, who see a virtual reality when flying with limited
visibility.
> o Attempts will be made to prevent the development of artificial
> intelligences. Opponents will be in the amusing position of trying
> to legislate against something they claim is impossible in the first
> place.
As artificial intelligences grow smarter and smarter, our definition of
intelligence will change, making this a moving target. For example, no
one now believes that playing grand master chess is _necessarily_ a
sign of intelligence. Twenty years ago this was not the case. It may be
that the definition of intelligence will be "that which machines cannot
do"... which may come to be those essential human qualities such as
love, sacrifice, artistry, etc. or simply those cognitive activities
that we haven't yet learned to program.
On a darker note:
People will be cryogenically stored for two reasons: so that they may
be restored should a cure for their disease be found, AND so that they
may provide a supply of tissue-compatible body parts to their heirs.
Cryo-stored corpses will become part of their own estate, and law suits
will result when a person with a terminal illness knows that they have
a relative in cryo-suspension (waiting for a cure) with the needed body
parts. Laws will be established to determine the priority of
organ-ownership.
Hacking with virtual realities will become a major problem. Computer
generated graphics (both stills and animation) indistinguishable from
reality will be a major source of abuse in the advertising industry
and in politics (see films of Congressman X in bed with Y!). The
ability to confirm what is real and what is not will become an
important issue. If folks think these dramatical reinactments on
the news are a problem now, wait until the "actors" are computer
generated reconstructions of the real people.
John Sloan NCAR/SCD NSFnet: jsl...@ncar.ucar.edu
P.O. Box 27588 P.O. Box 3000 +1 303 497 1243 AMA#515306
Lakewood CO 80227 Boulder CO 80307 +1 303 232 8678 DoD#000011
Logical Disclaimer: belong(opinions,jsloan).belong(opinions,_):-!,fail.
Alex Pournelle
>From article <7...@arc.UUCP>, by st...@arc.UUCP (Steve Savitzky):
>> In article <Jan.3.01.24....@klaatu.rutgers.edu> jo...@klaatu.rutgers.edu (J Storrs Hall) writes:
>>>The keyboard will go the way of the card reader. Voice-and-pointer
>>>will be standard;
> :
>> I just have to respond to this. WRONG.
> :
>> o Pocket computers will generally use handwriting recognition on their
>> touch-sensitive screens, rather than voice inputs.
>Similar to the pocket computers portrayed in _The Mote in God's Eye_,
>the SF novel by Niven and Pournelle. The computers were apparently
>about the size of a pocket calculator with their entire front surface
>covered with a touch sensitive LCD-like display screen.
Well, first mentioned earlier for the CoDominium period in _Spaceship
for the King_.
Me? I predict we'll have a FORTRAN 8X standard by the Year 2000,
followed by some actual compilers with two decades.
Alex
Bob Webber
Assuming that technological growth in cheap processing power and fast storage
will allow relatively brute force extrapolation of current 100 word voice
recognition systems into reasonably full natural language voice recognition,
the following will happen:
1) Managers who have traditionally resisted keyboard interfaces will
embrace voice interfaces after a Harvard Business School study shows
that the increased tension/hostility traditionally associated with
email communication networks is reduced/nullified by voice input and
output.
2) Said managers will use a system that receives their normal voice,
translates it to standard text, converts the standard text to an
authorative professionally-trained voice style (with an interactive
editor where the system plays the speech back to the user who supplies
comments about where emphasis, etc., should be adjusted). Employees
will translate said pronouncements into text and then play them through
an Elmer Fudd synthesizer.
3) 60% of the messages on Usenet will have been filtered thru a system
based on data extracted Kathleen Turner's Jessica Rabbit voice from a
Roger Rabbit video tape before posting. This will result in a major
lawsuit from Touchstone Pictures that will result in the death of Usenet
news (but this will be little felt since there will be sufficient
bandwith to maintain million reader mailing lists).
4) Directional microphones and whispering will solve most of the problems
traditionally supposed for voice i/o. Federal Building codes will
require one water fountain per 100 square feet of inhabited floor
space. Water quality of said fountains will be a major health issue.
The manufacture of throat lounges will be a major growth industry.
5) People who interact with computers more than 4 hours per day will
increasingly resort to surgical implant of sensors near the
muscle groups controlling voice and use subvocalization for
computer interaction.
6) Muscle problems associated with typing will decrease. This will
make computer screens a focal point of health complaints. Standard
computer interfaces will abandon reliance on computer screens. Usage
of screens will be comparable to usage of blackboards and scratch paper.
Some people will find it necessary to see what they are doing in order
to think it out. Others will be doing things that don't require this.
Still others will simply have better memories and not see the point
of using screens (people capable of memorizing plays/poems/... will
have a sought-after skill).
7) A history of the twentieth century will be written, submitted to a
major publisher, and become a paperback best seller by a person
who never ``saw'' any version of the book. Said person will
have done all the work associated with the book while tending to
a private vegetable garden. The importance of food production technology
in the twentieth century will be a major theme of the book.
8) Most of the conversion of printed texts to computer manipulability
will be accomplished by people subvocalizing while reading said
texts (Library of Congress tapes for the blind will be quickly
brought online). It will be observed that most people read faster
and remember longer texts that they read out loud. Many studies
be will done on verbal versus visual thinking. Much confusion
will result.
9) Books will be printed with numbered paragraphs so that spoken notes
can be easily associated with specific locations in the text. This
will be the standard way scholars record comments on articles/books
that they read. Hypertext will never make it, but there will be a
revival of printing books with marginal notes (occasionally this will
be nested so that a page will show a portion of text, commentary on
that text, and finally commentary on the commentary via nested margins).
Many books will be printed on demand and then recycled as soon
as read (bookstores will collect deposits on books sold).
10) Studies indicating the emotional persuasiveness of vocal communication
will ensure that there will be an elite group of people who force
vocal communications into text form before considering their content.
What began as a preference in the handling of computer vocal mail will
extend to face-to-face vocal communications (some people will
intentionally deafen themselves to the actual aural transmission and
refer only to the derivative text form).
11) Recording every word one says during the day and reviewing it
at evening will become a major fad among the elite. Family
therapists will recommend the sharing of such tapes among
family members. The discussion of the advisability of sharing
such tapes with a person one is dating will be a major topic
of discussion in net.singles.
12) The study of verbal behavior will become a recognized social
science and a common liberal arts major -- it will be called
Rhetorictology.
13) Parents will outfit children with verbal recorders with the intent
that the children will grow up with access to every word they spoke
or heard in their lifetime.
14) Privacy issues associated with verbal recordings will be handled
primarily by the honor system. There will be a number of people
who will refuse to have anything to do with this technology due
to this problem. Many laws will be passed. There will be much
confusion.
15) A common device for ``securing'' one's personal records will be
to encrypt them and enter the key via a small keypad that one
accesses by reaching into the enclosure of the recording device
(so that the motions are not visible to anyone nearby). Said
key will be forgotten by the system (along with all decrypted
material in buffers) as soon as the last key in the series is
released.
16) A large number of people will go to jail for refusing to tell
a court what their encryption key was. Some courts will hold
that erasing records when arrested constitutes tampering with
evidence. Many laws will be passed. There will be much
confusion.
--- BOB (web...@athos.rutgers.edu ; rutgers!athos.rutgers.edu!webber)
Scot E Wilcoxon
>The keyboard will go the way of the card reader.
I hope so. There isn't a "cure" for repetitive motion injuries.
--
Scot E. Wilcoxon sew...@DataPg.MN.ORG {amdahl|hpda}!bungia!datapg!sewilco
Data Progress UNIX masts & rigging +1 612-825-2607 uunet!datapg!sewilco
I'm just reversing entropy while waiting for the Big Crunch.
Steven_Tenney
long run if we call last mon. the start of the new decade or not.
Afterall, we could be using the Jewish, Chinese or Moslem calendars
instead of the Gregorian calender. If english speaking journalism
(from Time mag to Tom Brokaw) are the benchmarks (Heaven forbid!),
then indeed we are in the new decade. If you talk to Arthur C. Clarke
(who wrote 2001:A Space Odyssey), then you better wait a year. (By
the way, Time mag spells Rumania with a u while most of the newspapers
spell it Romania! More hair splitting!)
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Steve Tenney | "I spied three ships
Hewlett-Packard Corvallis, ORE| They were all sailin' my way.
1...@hpcvia.CV.HP.COM | I asked the captain of the first
_ _|***|__ | ship what his name was and
|_ _||| | how come he didn't drive a truck?
( ~~ ~~ ))) | he said his name was Columbus
\ == /// | an' I just said 'Good Luck!'"
||||\\\ | -Bob Dylan
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Mark Brader
> o The standard lap/desk-top computer will be 8.5x11x.5 inches. The
Non-American models will of course be A4 size* by 1 cm.
See signature quote.
* 2^-1.75 x 2^-2.25 m (^ denoting exponentiation), about 8.3 x 11.7 in.
--
Mark Brader "Thus the metric system did not really catch on in
SoftQuad Inc., Toronto the States, unless you count the increasing popu-
utzoo!sq!msb, m...@sq.com larity of the 9 mm bullet." -- Dave Barry
This article is in the public domain.
Brad Templeton
I think instead that voice mail will become like E-mail. And later,
video mail will become like E-mail. And eventually, mutli-media
will become like E-mail, although I would guess that text will still be
one of the more popular forms.
There will certainly be an experiment with E-mail where you type the
address and subject, but speak the body of the message. This is easy
and quick, both to dictate and to listen to, and it doesn't require much
typing skill. And you can compress the voice down nice and small that
this will be cheap.
There are disadvantages -- clearly you don't use this to send things you
might want to print or machine-read, such as figures or phone numbers.
It's more for personal notes. Worst of all, a lot of people are
uncomfortable just sitting talking into a microphone -- but they are also
uncomfortable writing a letter at a keyboard, or even typing. Which will
win, I don't know.
The advantages however -- it's quick, easy for many, and much more personal
and communicative than text -- will make sure this is given a try at least.
Next stage we get voice-recognition that eliminates the need for you to
type the address and subject. You speak it, but it's turned into text.
In most cases, you don't need this, as most mail messages are replies,
with automatic generation of To, From and Subject.
After that we can go through the same stages, but your message is video.
Some people will talk to video cameras when they won't talk to answering
machines. One reason is you get to see yourself on-screen as you do it.
And it's easier to edit out the bad parts than with sound.
Advantages: Even better, more full bandwidth communication form than
audio or text.
Disadvantages: Some people don't want to be seen, or have to comb their
hair to send a memo. As above, you have to talk to send the message,
which doesn't work in some places.
These will be tried because they bring E-mail -- which is highly useful --
to the non typing public. And to the public that prefers to cues of sound
and video to smiley faces.
You will still always want machine readable classification info so you
can search and select your mail, of course.
--
Brad Templeton, ClariNet Communications Corp. -- Waterloo, Ontario 519/884-7473
John Sloan,8292,X1243,ML44E
> I am not sure that text mail will stay as it is forever.
Another forecast: electronic information (video, text, sound,
multimedia, etc.) will be sent in executable form, similar to
PostScript. We'll transmit programs, that when interpreted, will
produce the information on the other end. Like PS raster output, the
programs may be little more than an executable word or two followed by
scads of data, but for many applications, the likely data compression
and device independance advantage of sending an executable program
(which is interpreted locally by receipient-specific systems) will be a
a big win. In this case, the same message may produce voice for the
blind, text for the deaf, or video for the rest, all depending upon
what hardware is available at the destination, and how its configured.
Charles Balan
>I am not sure that text mail will stay as it is forever.
{A message bout how video-mail will replace the current e-mail deleted}
>Advantages: Even better, more full bandwidth communication form than
>audio or text.
>
>Disadvantages: Some people don't want to be seen, or have to comb their
>hair to send a memo. As above, you have to talk to send the message,
>which doesn't work in some places.
But pre-formed video images will be available that allow you to send your
message without "sprucing up" yet will alter your broadcast image to one
of an impeccably groomed businessperson. Programmable variables for
more sexy, more "power-image", with glasses, more/less make-up, hair,
hair color, etc. will be available.
Isn't this fun! :-)
.
Charles Balan
UNC...@med.unc.edu , UNC...@uncmed.uucp , UNC...@unc.bitnet
%%%%%%%%%%%%% A Witty Saying Proves Nothing - Voltaire %%%%%%%%%%%%
Zev Sero
> o The standard lap/desk-top computer will be 8.5x11x.5 inches. The
> display will go all the way to the edge ...
Non-American models will of course be A4 size* by 1 cm.
See signature quote. [extolling the metric system]
* 2^-1.75 x 2^-2.25 m (^ denoting exponentiation), about 8.3 x 11.7 in.
If you're so keen on the metric system, why don't you use standard SI
units? The A4 size paper is (according to a packet of Reflex
photocopying paper) 210 x 297 mm.
--
Zev Sero - z...@bby.oz.au
Fault, n. One of my offenses, as opposed to one of yours,
the latter being crimes.
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Michael Chastain
If I made a mistake, tell me how to do it RIGHT, ok?]
In article <Jan.3.17.26....@klaatu.rutgers.edu> jo...@klaatu.rutgers.edu (J Storrs Hall) writes:
>A better model is looking over the shoulder of a hotshot editor
>wizard, pointing at the screen occasionally, and telling him what to
>do. Over the phone, you can't see the screen, and you can't point.
>Also realize that there will be a whole new generation of verbally-
>oriented command languages, with idiomatic (and idiosyncratic)
>contractions for commonly used operations.
Here's what happens when I look over someone's shoulder now:
"That assignment is wrong."
"No -- THAT one."
"You shouldn't be accessing that data structure."
"That won't work, either."
"Can I type? Move over."
I can type vi commands faster than I can tell people what to do
to text.
What I would like is: two keyboards connected to the same workstation.
The other person and I work out who is currently "active" by ordinary
human body language / verbal communication. I.e., when I take my
hands off my keyboard, it's his turn to type.
No mechanism for indicating to the computer which keyboard is active.
Such a mechanism would actually slow down my buddy and me.
Michael Chastain
"He who dies with the most FRIENDS wins."
Roger Droz
>
>I think instead that voice mail will become like E-mail. And later,
>video mail will become like E-mail. And eventually, mutli-media
>will become like E-mail, although I would guess that text will still be
>one of the more popular forms.
>
people to scribble notes by hand and deliver them with electronic
speed. It has received great acceptance because it is familiar
(pencil and paper), yet speeds delivery over hard-copy mail.
There are many messages sent via fax that could be as easily sent via
text-only E-mail using less bandwidth. Many messages are carefully composed
using some sort of word processing equipment, printed on letterhead,
and then faxed. There may be some argument that fax is a more
standardized medium than E-mail, but given a more universal E-mail
system, I think a lot of people would still go through the above
process just because the receiver gets a nice looking copy of the logo
on their letterhead.
Fax, or some sort of E-mail the supports graphics, allows a reply
where parts of the original posting are circled, underlined or crossed
out to indicate agreement or disagreement. It is a lot easier to
cross out a couple of words than it is to use our > style quoting to
convey "I agree with you, except for this phrase."
>There will certainly be an experiment with E-mail where you type the
>address and subject, but speak the body of the message.
The same can be said of a fax/E-mail hybrid, or a video/E-mail hybrid.
Since all messages can be conveyed over the same network (the telephone),
then a standardized header becomes a practical way to allow one computer
to file and deal with all types of messages. In addition to the address
and subject, the header also describes to the receiving equipment the
nature of the message body to follow. The receiving equipment may have
to switch to a different kind of modem to receive the message body, but
this is much more practical than having to publish separate phone numbers
for text E-mail, fax, etc.
>
>After that we can go through the same stages, but your message is video.
>Some people will talk to video cameras when they won't talk to answering
>machines. One reason is you get to see yourself on-screen as you do it.
>And it's easier to edit out the bad parts than with sound.
>
I don't see video mail becoming as popular as video conferencing in
real-time. Relatively little that we communicate via non-real-time
mail requires the clarification of gestures and facial expression.
Video mail does have the advantage of not having to be transmitted in
real-time, though. If I could send video mail of my son's first steps
to Grandma from my home computer over voice-grade lines, I may be more
apt to send moving pictures than I am given present technology where
Grandma and I have to make special arrangements to get enough
bandwidth to send video over the phone. (Given present technology,
video mail is best accomplished by mailing a video tape.)
Disclaimer: I joined this discussion late. Sorry if I introduced too
many strange tangents.
____________
Roger Droz UUCP: uw-beaver!gtisqr!roger
() () Maverick MICRoSystems / Global Technology International
(_______) Mukilteo, WA
( )
| | Disclaimer: "We're all mavericks here:
| | Each of us has our own opinions,
(___) and the company has yet different ones!"
Brad Templeton
For one, people will like it for the same reasons they prefer e-mail to
phone tag. I can send a nice video message to somebody and not have to
worry about meeting up -- particularly if they live in Australia.
(Just as the Australians & Japanese are thriving off FAX machines these days,
they will love video E-mail)
You get to compose yourself and make sure you look OK for video e-mail.
Not so easy for a video phone call.
And bandwidth cost is important. For one, you can compress video E-mail
in non-real time, and probaly get pretty good compression. (Not yet, but
I don't see why not in the near future.) You will in general be able to
do better than real-time.
But most of all, "spare" bandwidth is going to become almost free in the
future. We need so much bandwidth for our live conferencing systems and
other live data systems, that a packet that is willing to wait 5 minutes
will pay a pittance -- perhaps a fixed rate, even.
This will always be the case, I think.
Steven J Owens
>>The keyboard will go the way of the card reader. Voice-and-pointer
> touch-sensitive screens, rather than voice inputs.
>
> They will approximate a smart pad of paper, at which point almost
> everyone who now carries a notebook around will want one.
Too late - both of these already exist (and I've been *waiting*
for them to show up...). For the first, look through old issues of Omni
magazine. Somebody is using a light-pen & clipboard computer combo with
a program that converts the hand printing to text.
The next, obvious step is to move to touch sensitive - that's here
too, in the form of the Agilis system handheld workstation, which also
incorporates menus and touch-screen tech to allow one-handed use "in the
field." The Agilis handheld is one helluva machine and if I had my choice
I'd buy the $12000 "deluxe" configuration with:
"...80386 processor, 4 megabytes of memory, a 20-megabyte hard
disk drive, the console slice, a keypad slice, two battery slices, and
a power converter" and other options including a wireless packet radio
communications slice offering 230,000 bps network communications within a
range of 1 kilometer outdoors and about 100 meters indoors (though soon
enough there'll be packet radio networks stretching through most buildings
and probably a lot of the outdoors).
The thing to really wait for is the price to drop to affordable
ranges... at which point everybody and his brother will have one, and
you'll be able to send e-mail to most people and be pretty sure it'll
get to them within minutes.
>o Pocket computers + _partially_transparent_ eyephones + locators +
> cellular networks will permit cyberspace to be overlaid on the real
> world. This will permit virtual nametags (title bars for people),
> virtual costumes, virtual street signs, and the like.
THIS is interesting... similar ideas had occurred to me, but only
on a limited scale, probably in specialized nightclubs and bars... I could
really see it spreading to common use in society, however...
>o Attempts will be made to prevent the development of artificial
> intelligences. Opponents will be in the amusing position of trying
> to legislate against something they claim is impossible in the first
> place.
I think perhaps you'll see more attempts oriented towards
preventing the usurping of human "jobs" by AIs. To a degree I agree with
this - we already have tons of functioning intelligences to do jobs like
this, why not work on figuring out how to utilize them, not replace them?
On the other hand, just because a new development will affect the
jobs of a segment of the population is no reason to fight it - efforts
should be made, instead, to channel the human brainpower freed from the
mental "drudgery" into creative/productive ends, where they will probably
outstrip any AIs for centuries to come.
Steven J. Owens | Scratch@Pittvms | Scr...@unix.cis.pitt.edu
"Show us endless neon vistas / Castles made of laserlight / Take us to the
shopping sector / In the vortex of the night / Past the shining mylar towers
/ Past the ravaged tenements / To a place we can't remember / For a time
we won't forget"
-- Warren Zevon, Transverse City
Steven J Owens
> Employees will translate said pronouncements into text and then play them
> through an Elmer Fudd synthesizer.
> 3) 60% of the messages on Usenet will have been filtered thru a system
> based on data extracted Kathleen Turner's Jessica Rabbit voice from a Roger
> Rabbit video tape before posting.
Cute, really cute...
> 12) The study of verbal behavior will become a recognized social
> science and a common liberal arts major -- it will be called
> Rhetorictology.
Where're the smileys?? As a communications major, having taken
classes such as Theory of Rhetoric and Rhetorical Processes, I'm afraid
I find this idea of yours a bit quaint, but amusing.
It may well be that the rise of voice-controlled computers and the
new availability of hard data to base research on may pump new life into
solid applied research on rhetorical processes. And a new area of specialty
pertaining to those specific proceses may well come into being. But I think
you'll find that there are already plenty of people who have worked in that
area - you'd be amazed at what has already been learned about interpersonal
communication, something which people take very much for granted.
I have some comments about a possible direction for computer
interfacing, but I'll post that separately...
Steven J. Owens | Scratch@Pittvms | Scr...@unix.cis.pitt.edu
"There's a long hard road and a full, hard drive / And a sector there where
I feel alive / Every bit of every byte / Is written down once on the night
/ Networking, I'm user friendly..."
-- Warren Zevon, Networking, Transverse City
Steve Savitzky
>In article <7...@arc.UUCP> st...@arc.UUCP (Steve Savitzky) writes:
>>>The keyboard will go the way of the card reader. Voice-and-pointer
>>o Pocket computers will generally use handwriting recognition on their
>> touch-sensitive screens, rather than voice inputs.
>>
>>o Pocket computers will have a full-sized, touch-sensitive screen.
>> They will approximate a smart pad of paper, at which point almost
>> everyone who now carries a notebook around will want one.
>
> Too late - both of these already exist (and I've been *waiting*
>for them to show up...). For the first, look through old issues of Omni
>magazine. Somebody is using a light-pen & clipboard computer combo with
>a program that converts the hand printing to text.
The light-pen and clipboard combo is scarcely what I'd call a *pocket*
computer (unless you have *big* pockets! :-)
I know about the Agilis and Gridpad, and they're moving in the right
direction, but a quick look at the pictures reveals that their screens
are far from "full-sized". I'm thinking of machines where the screen
comes to within a few millimeters of the edge. One advantage of this
is that you can tile them to make a screen as big as you like. (A few
thin joint-lines would be acceptable in a desktop- or wall-sized
display.)
> The thing to really wait for is the price to drop to affordable
>ranges... at which point everybody and his brother will have one, and
>you'll be able to send e-mail to most people and be pretty sure it'll
>get to them within minutes.
Yup-- that's what I'm waiting for, too.
[transition to a discussion of AI omitted]
> On the other hand, just because a new development will affect the
>jobs of a segment of the population is no reason to fight it - efforts
>should be made, instead, to channel the human brainpower freed from the
>mental "drudgery" into creative/productive ends, where they will probably
>outstrip any AIs for centuries to come.
Or maybe form a partnership. One of the things often forgotten about
the Golden Age of Greece is that their high culture was made possible
by slavery. And not just slave *labor*, as in the American South, but
slave *intelligence* -- slaves served as accountants, teachers, etc.
Just exactly the kind of thing computers will be able to do soon.
Now, if only we can make the transition from a culture in which most
people *don't* think, to one in which most *do*. (0.01 :-) )
--
\ Steve Savitzky \ Grand Central Starport \ REAL hackers use an AXE!
\ st...@arc.UUCP \ 343 Leigh Avenue \ #include<std_disclaimer.h>
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