I know this is off topic for our list, but thought some of you might find it
interesting.
Sandy
1998, Kodak had 170,000
employees and sold 85% of all photo paper worldwide.
Within just a few
years, their business model disappeared and they went bankrupt.
What happened to Kodak
will happen to a lot of industries in the next 10 years - and most people won't
see it coming.
Did you ever think in
1998 that 3 years later you would never take pictures on paper film again???
Yet digital cameras were invented in 1975. The problem was that the first ones
only had 10,000 pixels and it took time to develop more definition in photos.
So as with all exponential technologies, it was a disappointment for a long
time, before it became way superior and became mainstream in only a few short
years thereafter.
The above will now
start happening with artificial intelligence, health, autonomous and electric
cars, education, 3D printing, agriculture, jobs and many other important parts
of daily life.
So ... Welcome to the
4th Industrial Revolution or should I say welcome to the Exponential Age.
Software
Software will disrupt
most traditional industries in the next 5-10 years.
Uber is just a software
tool, they don't own any cars, and are now the biggest taxi company in the
world.
Airbnb is now the
biggest hotel company in the world, although they don't own any properties.
Artificial intelligence
Computers will become
exponentially better in understanding the world.
This year, a computer
beat the best Go player in the world, 10 years earlier than expected.
In the US, young
lawyers already don't get jobs because IBM's Watson, where you can get legal
advice (so far for more or less basic stuff) within seconds with a 90% accuracy
compared to 70% accuracy when done by humans.
There will be 90% less
lawyers in the future, only specialists will remain.
So if you study law,
stop immediately!!!
Medicine
Watson already helps
nurses diagnose cancer, 4 times more accurate than human nurses.
Facebook now has a
pattern recognition software that can recognize faces better than humans.
In 2030, computers will
become more intelligent than humans.
Transport
Autonomous cars: In
2018 the first self driving cars will appear for the public.
Around 2020, the
complete industry will start to be disrupted.
You won't want to own a
car anymore, however, if you do want a car, then electric cars will already
start becoming mainstream by 2020.
Furthermore, cities
will be less noisy because all cars will run on electric.
You will call a car
with your phone, it will show up at your location and drive you to your
destination.
You will not need to
park it, you only pay for the driven distance and can be productive while
driving.
Our kids will never get
a driver's licence and will never own a car.
It will change the
cities, because we will need 90-95% less cars for that.
We can transform former
parking space into parks.
Today 1.2 million
people die each year in car accidents worldwide.
We now have one
accident every 100,000 km, with autonomous driving, that will drop to one
accident in 10 million km.
That will save a
million lives each year.
Most car companies
might become bankrupt.
Traditional car
companies still try the evolutionary approach and just build a better car,
while tech companies (Tesla, Apple, Google) will do the revolutionary approach
and build a computer on wheels. (I spoke to a lot of engineers from Volkswagen
and Audi; they are completely terrified of Tesla.)
Insurance
Insurance companies
will have massive trouble – This is because without accidents, the insurance
will become 100x cheaper.
Their car insurance
business model will disappear.
Real Estate
Real estate patterns
will change - Because if you can work while you commute, people will move
further away to live in a more beautiful neighborhood.
Electricity
This facility will
become incredibly cheap and clean.
Solar production has
been on an exponential curve for 30 years, but you can only see the impact now.
Last year, more solar
energy was installed worldwide than fossil.
The price for solar
will drop so much that all coal companies will be out of business by 2025.
Water
With cheap electricity
comes cheap and abundant water.
Desalination now only
needs 2kWh per cubic meter.
We don't have scarce
water in most places, we only have scarce drinking water.
Imagine what will be
possible if anyone can have as much clean water as he wants, for nearly no cost.
Health
The Tricorder X price
will be announced this year.
There will be companies
who will build this type of medical device (called the "Tricorder" from Star
Trek) that works with your phone taking your retina scan and will also be able
to take your blood sample when you breath into it. It then analyses 54
biomarkers that will identify nearly any disease. It will be cheap. So, in a
few years, everyone on this planet will have access to world class medicine,
nearly for free.
3D printing
The price of the
cheapest 3D printer came down from $18,000 to $400 within 10 years.
In the same time, it
became 100 times faster.
All major shoe
companies started 3D printing shoes.
Spare airplane parts
are already 3D printed in remote airports.
The space station now
has a printer that eliminates the need for the large amount of spare parts they
used to have in the past.
At the end of this
year, new smart phones will have 3D scanning possibilities. You can then 3D
scan your feet and print your perfect shoe at home. In China, they have already
3D printed a complete 6-storey office building.
By 2027, 10% of
everything that's being produced will be 3D printed.
Work
70-80% of jobs will
disappear in the next 20 years.
There will be a lot of
new jobs, but it is not clear if there will be enough new jobs in such a short
time.
Agriculture and food
There will be a $100
agricultural robot in the future. Farmers in 3rd world countries can then
become managers of their field instead of working all day on their fields.
Aeroponics will need
much less water.
The first petri dish
produced veal is now available and will be cheaper than cow produced veal in
2018.
Right now, 30% of all
agricultural surfaces is used for cows. Imagine when we don't need that space
anymore.
There are several
startups who will bring insect protein to the market shortly. This will contain
more protein than meat.
It will be labelled as
"alternative protein source" (because most people still reject the idea of
eating insects).
Human feelings
There is already an app
called "moodies" which can tell which mood you are in.
Until 2020, there will
be apps that can tell by your facial expressions if you are lying.
Imagine a political
debate where it's being displayed when they are telling the truth and when they
are not.
Bitcoin
This currency will
become mainstream this year and might even become the default reserve currency.
Longevity
Right now, an average
life span increases by 3 months per year.
Four years ago, a life
span used to be 79 years, now it's 80 years.
The increase itself is
increasing, and by 2036, there will be more than one year increase per year.
So we all might live
for a long, long time, probably way more than 100 years old.
Education
The cheapest smart
phones are already sold for $10 in Africa and Asia.
By 2020, 70% of all
humans will own a smart phone and that means that most will have the same
access to world class education.
Business opportunities
If you think of a niche
you want to go into, ask yourself, "in the future, do you think we will have
that?" If the answer is yes, you should ask yourself how can you make this
happen sooner?
THE 2 BIG CLUES
If it doesn't work with
your phone, forget about the idea!
Any idea that was
designed for success using 20th century thinking is doomed for failure in the
21st century.
Why don't you bury this
mail somewhere on your computer under the header “To be opened on 1 January
2025” and on this date (if you are still around) look back to see how much of
the above has come true. You might be in for a huge surprise and you will not
be able to say “Nobody warned me that this was going to happen”.
If you are not around,
then leave guidance to your grandchildren to find the hidden file where they
will probably have a wonderful laugh at your expense for not listening to your
own advice.
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