The Future As Seen By Me In 2010

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Well looky here, things one has scanned in eh. (ignore the photo, that's some guy that made some accounting software, not sure what became of him ;) MIKE RIVERSDALE is fuming. The expensive headphones he bought in Sydney three weeks ago have just died. His first reaction is not to randomly spill expletives into his coffee, but to use his iPhone to vent his frustration to his Twitter con- tacts, under the moniker Miramar Mike. "I will also put, 'What should I do?' It's a conversation. I'm reaching out to the people following me." The council predicts hand-held digital devices such as smartphones will rule the world in 2040. They already rule the life of Mr Riversdale, whose company WaveAdept helps businesses adapt - their computing sys- tems to allow staff to work from anywhere - and with anyone. In order of fre- equency, he uses his iPhone to tweet (1136 followers; 8363 tweets since joining), e-mail, make phone calls and use online services, such as checki
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Tech Ed: Microsoft Industry Solutions Group Architect Predicts The Obvious

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The Microsoft Tech Ed is probably THE geek event here in New Zealand and is currently running in Auckland with Computerworld reporting some of the more fascinating presentations.

This prediction by Microsoft Industry Solutions Group architect Miha Kralj around his predictions made me raise my eyebrows somewhat:
... IT will become industrialised over the next 10 years as consumers grow to expect scalability and repeatability at a commoditised cost.

Um ... yes.
Computers are moving out of the realm of the wizards and into the hands of real people that expect the bloody things to do things for them in the manner they want, when they want ... without breaking. My eyebrows were raised because as far as I can tell Microsoft hasn't been enabling that for quite some and were (are?) content to sit on their revenue stream and feed out boring updates that never actually did more for their customers (a new "ribbon" as a toolbar doesn't really add much does it?)

Oh, don't get me wrong if you sit in an office and want to type words then you're well served by your Microsoft laden computer. Real people do not want to do that 24/7.

Whilst this brave new future that I believe Miha Kralj is correctly (if easily) predicting is being driven by other companies, notably Apple, I am heartened to see that Miha (and therefore Microsoft) understands this "brave new world"
"As the new generation is used to borderless online socialisation, they will refuse to live by enterprise boundaries and hierarchies, so keeping secrets behind corporate walls will become harder and harder. Reputation and trust will become two of the most valuable entities and structures in organizations will flatten."

The world of the digital natives is one of unrestricted access to functionality and free flow of information - this is a challenge that you should start to address now; contact me for assistance

Back to Microsoft ...
Buuuuuuut, once that pile of cash Microsoft have starts to drop and the income is challenged (as it is already) then I don't expect them to roll over and play dead - they are chock full of passionate and talented people that will/are building stuff for real people.

But are they too late?

Comments

  1. Anonymous2 September 2008 at 14:26

    and gah.. apple... now that they have market share again lockdown is back in fashion..

    i want MS to get kicked back into action again, even though i'm not likely to be their customer, we need options.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Mike Riversdale2 September 2008 at 15:53

    Totally agree about Apple (King & Queen Of Lock-In World) ... options, options, options!

    Looking forward to your write up about TechEd

    ReplyDelete

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The Future As Seen By Me In 2010

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Well looky here, things one has scanned in eh. (ignore the photo, that's some guy that made some accounting software, not sure what became of him ;) MIKE RIVERSDALE is fuming. The expensive headphones he bought in Sydney three weeks ago have just died. His first reaction is not to randomly spill expletives into his coffee, but to use his iPhone to vent his frustration to his Twitter con- tacts, under the moniker Miramar Mike. "I will also put, 'What should I do?' It's a conversation. I'm reaching out to the people following me." The council predicts hand-held digital devices such as smartphones will rule the world in 2040. They already rule the life of Mr Riversdale, whose company WaveAdept helps businesses adapt - their computing sys- tems to allow staff to work from anywhere - and with anyone. In order of fre- equency, he uses his iPhone to tweet (1136 followers; 8363 tweets since joining), e-mail, make phone calls and use online services, such as checki

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