Ask HN: What does the next 10-20 years look like in tech/engineering?

I've been reading my way through Project Gutenberg's Science Fiction bookshelf. <a href="http://www.gutenberg.org/wiki/Science_Fiction_%28Bookshelf%29" rel="nofollow">http://www.gutenberg.org/wiki/Science_Fiction_%28Bookshelf%2...</a><p>Much, maybe most, of this is short stories from the 1950s and 1960s. What stands out for me is the big stuff has not happened and how much all the mundane stuff has changed.<p>Some things that are common (and don't violate known laws of physics) that not happened:<p>* Space travel.<p>* Atomic powered rockets. And airplanes. And cars. And toasters (see next).<p>* Ubiquitous, essentially free power, typically atomic. Mass to energy converters are popular in the stories. Fission/fusion reactors are extremely small and safe in the stories.<p>What is really interesting is how many things that are written into the scenarios as assumptions, just normal life, have changed.<p>* Phones had wires and operators (and rotary dials). They typically had a video feed as well - video is available today but not prevalent for everyday use (no thanks, I don't need to see my boss).<p>* Smoking. Smoking. Smoking. Smoking in closed spaceship systems. More smoking.<p>* All computers are huge.<p>* Typewriters, telegraphs, etc.<p>* Phone booths.<p>Misses:<p>* The concept of a cell phone is totally absent.<p>* Data transfer between computers (e.g. internet) is nearly totally absent.<p>* The computer power and size of todays computers is so much greater than the power of the (huge) computers envisioned is so far different as to be effectively a miss.<p>My conclusion: speculating is fun, but the things that you think will be real in 20-50 years will still be will-o-wisps. On the other hand, all the things you take for granted will be so different that it will make your grandkids laugh at you.

Ahhh, idle speculation...<p>Re: flying cars -- I think that even if all technical problems were resolved, an economic/legal problem would remain. In a car, if you crash, the externality is usually limited to the cars around you -- other drivers who have implicitly agreed to share in the risk of driving via insurance and whatnot.<p>In a flying car world, the externality of crashing (not sure if that's the right economic phraseology) is now shared by everyone below you -- people who want nothing to do with that risk. This isn't a huge problem with airplanes because we have a vast regulatory apparatus to mitigate the risk. Would be feasible with individuals routinely flying their cars over populated areas? Seems doubtful.<p>TL;DR - I wouldn't trust my neighbor to fly over my house, much less my kid's school.<p>Now, if all flying cars were AI controlled, that might be another story...

I give Facebook five years before it shares the fate of MySpace. I give Google ten years before it becomes a Yahoo -- still around but not a leading light, by any means.<p>I think we will absolutely be rolling out clean energy in ten years, with 70% of new cars as fully electric cars at that time.<p>The climate will continue to be changing dramatically. That's a large car without brakes; nothing is going to stop it. We'll have cut CO2 emissions significantly but the main damage will have already been done. I think it will be the main focus of concern for people.<p>I think we'll see the Semantic Web come into full bloom and most will view the web in terms of it, rather than the text we know today.<p>I wouldn't be surprised if there was at some point a large war involving multiple countries, stopping just short of a world war. Martial law in the United States, for example.<p>Huge changes in the next ten years, simply huge. But despite the negatives, it's a great time to be alive.

For posterity sake, I'd better answer my own questions:<p>- yes, unfortunately we're no longer building for the web, we're building for the facebook and google platforms, and it pisses me off no end, because more innovation is required. I only hope Google open up their API completely so that developers like me can build some cool shit on their platform<p>- energy crisis, I have no clue. But I really hope so. Climate crisis, same.<p>- Flying cars, seriously! <a href="http://www.ibtimes.com/articles/109522/20110207/flying-cars-terrafugia.htm" rel="nofollow">http://www.ibtimes.com/articles/109522/20110207/flying-cars-...</a> ... will probably never 'take off' though.<p>- Quantum Computers. I can only wildly imagine some crazy mind-reading computer who has nothing but benevolence and love for me so that I may be hooked up to it's matrix and suck on it's glorious god-like nipple. Google be thy name. Don't bloody wake me up!

I expect that, in 20 years, self-driving cars will be just about to "cross the chasm", so to speak. I see them roughly analogous to what the Leaf and other electric cars are today. I don't think these cars will fly, but I do think that they will be on the cusp of mass-market consumption.

Before there is a rise in flying cars I think we're going to see the gradual evolution of driving aids (adaptive cruise control and automated emergency braking) into structured automated driving (there is a set lane on the highway that while you're in it your car drives for you) to eventual full on automated driving (you get in the car and say "grocery store" and it drives while you watch the latest episode of 'Ow! My Balls!').

Less energy use, smaller form factors, and mobility - i.e. just a continuation of the transistor revolution.