Where do you think we're going with technology?

[Jayy]

For example...

Flexible / bendy screens that Samsung have been showing off recently.

Do you think they will take off?
Do you think we will all be using phones that flip out a rolled up screen to become a tablet? or do you think it's just a gimmick that won't take off?

4K resolution is being dubbed as 'Ultra HD' but I think we're at least 5 years away from seeing affordable 4K screens.

3D printing is another huge thing at the moment. There is somebody working on printing building using a giant industrial sized 3D printer. I've also seen videos using special pig cells that are binded with 3D printed models of organs that then grow and start to function when pumped with blood/electricity.

I've already mentioned about shops such as Comet, Jessops, Blockbuster etc disappearing and would we be more focused on internet sales/shopping?

Drones are making a lot of waves at the moment as well. Those micro swarms that can do advanced formations, play catch with a ball and net, etc. Also, personal drones are getting cheaper and more advanced. How long before we can have our own personal gyrocopter which can follow us and record video without any need to be controlled?

Audi just showcased their park/drive technology that literally drives off and parks the car for you and drives back to you when needed.

Google's car has done about 150,000 miles (or km) un-manned and auto companies are really trying to push all this driverless technology.

Another Google product is the Project Glass, augmented reality. Car companies making smart windscreens which will overlay things like weather and traffic reports and other useful stuff.

Mobile devices will outnumber desktop devices in the next few years for how we access the internet. We're already using super powerful smart phones/tablets now, in 5 years time, what will we be doing then? 5/6 years ago we just got the first iphone and things have progressed a lot since then.

I think of myself as a futurist and like to see where we might be in 5 - 10 years time with regards to technology and how we use it.

What do you think?

[fatpies]

We're going to hell in a hand cart.

What can be automated is being automated. High skill jobs, to low skill jobs like driving and even cooking burgers.

https://www.thestar.com/business/article/1295160--automatic-burger-machine-could-revolutionize-fast-food

While this saves costs for various companies. It is ultimately incompatible with the consumerist society which breeds technical innovation as automation may make it cheaper employees are also consumers.

Unemployed don't have money to spent on trinkets.

Somebody might shout luddite, except those miners of the 70s and 80s mostly never got back on their feet again. Polish and Chinese workers are just a tech stop gap.
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[daemonoid]

Of the technologies you talk about I think 3D printing is the one that will have the greatest impact on the course of humanity. It'll be simple stuff for the next few years but it may even bring forth the end of capitalism. The chance to be able to make anything you want at home could even end poverty.

The rest are incremental technologies which as good as they are will not change things too much.
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[fatpies]

[daemonoid]

[Frost]

Thermite is rust and aluminium, hardly substances that could be controlled.

3D printing is a bit like robotics during the 80's. A few nerds have them and they're shit. Some companies have the decent ones, but they're really expensive and still limited. People are expecting the technology to advance at the same rate that microprocessor technology did. It's not going to. At all. Just because there is demand for something that doesn't mean it will become ultra cheap. Just look at car prices. 3D printing will remain limited in terms of the type and combination of materials it can use and will be limited to specialist companies, though i expect will will all have interaction with stuff produced by 3D printing.

Googles drive itself car won't replace drivers on the roads in the same way that autopilot hasn't replaced pilots. Currently it requires a shit load of expensive computer vision equipment like 3d scanning lasers. Just like with UAVs in the military it might replace some military drivers or produce a new class of vehicle. Elements of it might be integrated into road cars as safety features which may or may not piss us off.

Flexi screens will be a gimmick. People will buy them but they won't see mass adoption until they get a fair bit better. I expect a few to be released, nothing to come of them, then in 5-10 years amazon to relase a flexi kindle that's just like a magazine or something

Online shopping benefits from much more information about the product. It also allows you to find the product sellers, but it doesn't let you see of feel a product. It also has the draw back of delivery time. Hopefully the real world shops will sign up to have google index their stock allowing you to search online for a product, get all the info on it, find local places that have it in stock and then go have a final look at it and pick it up in person. I don't mind paying more than internet prices to get something there and then. Often when you factor in postage the price is about the same anyway.

Traditional HD isn't all that amazing. Super HD is badly needed but will be limited by our ability to get content in that format. The retina style displays which have different pixel densities depending on viewing distance in an effort to have the pixels invisible, are something i see continuing. They will become more common on phones and tablets before moving to laptops, desktops, then after a long while TV's.

I think augmented reality is going to be the real game changer, but googles current system isn't nearly good enough yet. Personally i didn't think we would have the first systems for a few years, so i'm glad google have released one to generate some interest. I think an AR system will use mobile technology (powerful CPU, high res camera, gyros, accelerometers, transparent retina display, GPS, compass, mobile data) So currently only HTC, Google, Samsung, Apple would be capable of making one. Currently the most limiting factor is the transparent ultra pixel dense screens. The next most limiting is the size and weight requirements. Fancy having an iphone strapped to your face? Thought not. The user interface is also an issue. It's eventually going to be a mixture of voice, gesture and eye movement control. But in the shorter term it will likely be a device to augment your phone and be controllable through your phone.

Are we giving up control to the machines? Yes cause we're rich and lazy. Will they rise up against us? No cause artificial conciseness is unbelievably hard to create. Will we be fucked when these things stop working. I won't, nor will you, but the young'uns who have never known life without them will be

[Nexus Icon]

I don't get this hard-on for 3D printing, at least stuff that's at a really useable level. I've been in the business for 10 years and it really hasn't moved on far in all that time. Sure, there's proper direct metal sintering now but of the half-dozen systems available (for about half a million quid each) none of them is perfect. Each has a compromise.

Desktop 3D printing has come along, as the systems have been made smaller but the process is relatively slow, the build envelope is tiny and the parts are pretty feeble compared to cast or moulded parts.

SLS is the really worthwhile technology as it produces nylon (or nylon based) parts with properties comparable to cast nylon parts. However, we won't be seeing desktop versions of those until the price of 70W CO2 lasers comes down a bit and every home can afford a nitrogen generator to produce the parts in an inert environment, a chiller system for cooling the laser and £70 per kilo for powdered nylon, not to mention a few hundred grand for the machine.
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[Redoko]

Flexy phone? No.

Flexy tablet?

Well actually, I wouldn't mind having it rolled up, need to use it and spread it out somewhere.

Aslong as it can be hard as well, because there might not always be a surface.

INB4 quoting my post without context.
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[Carl_steveo]

Liveleak tablet video. Website is possibly NSFW

This is cool.
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[Jayy]

I've seen that before, does look cool

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hbB6oiW2MLk - Video of the Samsung bendy screens.

Apparently it's possible to make the screen see through? If so, wouldn't this stuff be perfect for the likes of augmented reality?

Imagine having a pair of Google Glasses, with a little wire on the tip of the bit that goes over your ear in to your pocket, which plugs in to your smart phone for all the processing via an app or something.

That would also work as wireless if the glasses were. AR solved?

[Jayy]

https://www.youcar.tv/2013/news/audi-automatic-driving-for-parking/

Audi's automatic parking/driving car

[binge]

Don't have a Tablet, and have no intention of ever having one.

I personally miss the days of having to blow into a cartridge game before it will play in a games console.

I miss the days of having to actually be sitting next to your friend in order to have a 2 player game on a games console.

I miss the days where you could put a magnet close to a TV and pull the colour out of the screen.


Bah Humbug! I hate technology.





Ben

[Jayy]

Also another thing I was thinking was about internet connection speeds. The government is trying to make us the fastest in Europe by 2015.

Let's say, by some miracle, they managed to do this and everyone was on at least 50mbit.

Couldn't that replace the need for mobile calling over masts? If we had a mega fast infrastructure, all phone calls could be done via the internet rather than mobile masts.

https://leapmotion.com/ - Another cool thing I've had my eye on for a while.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iFEV7p7pEEI

[binge]

[oldpink]

gadgets will improve slowly as we are reaching the edges of what we can do with current technology
I see more peripheral changes and augmented technology surfacing

Glasses, watches, clothes and more interactive devices like motion sensors and voice activation / interaction

we already have HUD displays in cars and even into a crash helmet
augmented glasses already on the way, flexible screens / devices will become smaller & smarter

as to 3D printers well star trek would call them replicators (there saying they may be able to make food from protein etc)
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I have become comfortably numb

Theory & hazard 24-may 2016, CBT 8th June 2016, MOD 1 2nd Aug 2016 Mod 2 2nd-Nov 2016 - Current bike CBR 600 RR

[Jayy]

[Ichy]

We will end up with a generation of zombies who demand the latest technology but do not have a clue as to why.


Please list significant developments in the last five years that benefit/progress humanity.




The slightest suggestion of a mobile phone or tablet will win you 32 grams of No.4 shot to the face delivered expeditiously and FOC by 12 bore.
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[Nexus Icon]

[Ichy]

And it is in daily use or easily available?
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[oldpink]

better super conductor materials making MRI scans cheaper
Graphine a product with thousands of implications in all sorts of fields

there are thousands of advances every year in lots of fields just not broadcast by the mass media
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I have become comfortably numb

Theory & hazard 24-may 2016, CBT 8th June 2016, MOD 1 2nd Aug 2016 Mod 2 2nd-Nov 2016 - Current bike CBR 600 RR

[Nexus Icon]

[Howling TerrorOutOfOffice]

I want an elevator to the moon.

I'm not really upto speed on the latest technology nevermind future stuff.
I'm not too bad on music technology. Currently musicians are using a protocol that is over 30 years old. It's called MIDI, they've been talking for years about updating it. Hopefully MIDI-HD (for want of a better name) will appear soon. Imagine it as the difference between a phone line and Ethernet.
It's mind boggling the amount of virtual instruments available, things in their hardware form would cost thousands, now as freeware...And have you seen the music apps ! Mentioning hardware, not many changes, infact Korg have re-made a synth they made in 1978. Analog is the new hip thing....Lucky for me I'm hip again as I use lots of old gear alongside samplers and virtual instruments.

For musicians(anyone), technology has never been this good. High bitrate recording, affordable quality microphones, guitars...everything! Plugins/Apps that blow your dome...yep, plenty to keep me occupied.
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[Frost]

[Ichy]

[Jayy]