Ask HN: A New Decade. Any Predictions?

1. Distributed Internet - A combination of tech companies that have become too large, and government overreach result in an encrypted and distributed internet. The large companies of the past are not gone, but are slowing becoming irrelevant. Teens, and Gen-Z (zoomers?) will most likely be the first to start adopting. Boomers, and older millennials will be slower to adapt. The large companies are also facing a 2 sided battle as they also battle Washington.

2. World un-united - In the post Trump world, the US no longer operates the infrastructure required for the post-ww2 united world we've been used to. This means countries will have to significantly increase their military spending, and more problematically, they will have to find new markets to export to (since most countries lack a large millennial generation to sell to.) The strong social spending European countries have become used to will start to dry up. The result will be the continuation in more authoritarian populist strong man leaders. As recession, and lack of social spending, combined with increased military spending start to increase, the 2020's will look a lot more like 1930's. Germany will be particularly hard hit.

3. The US starts to become more aware of the Rural/City divide. In the early part of the decade, issues such as gun control will result in increased tension as "Red America" rises up against "Blue America" realizing it has no political power left, and "Blue America" is using it's power to change the things it cares about. Initially these disputes are isolated geographically to a few areas. Likely Virginia, and Washington/Oregon. But it might expand into something bigger... which in my opinion is one of the biggest wildcards of the future.

4. An over leveraged China will stumble, It will be plauged with trade issues, and demographic issues.

5. Software Engineering will split, highly skilled engineers will make more than ever before, but there will be a very large base of newly minted "lower skilled" software devs that make a lot less money.

6. Despite the conversation about immigration probably only gaining in steam, the economic relationship between Mexico and US will only become stronger.

1. There will be zero single-owner self driving cars sold by the end of the decade. There will likely be a ridesharing service powered by self-driving cars.

2. A FAANG-level company will refuse to comply with a government fine, causing a showdown.

3. Uber/Lyft will run out of money and shut down (or be sold for parts).

Smartphones will begin to be replaced by smart glasses. Apple will introduce an augmented reality headset on the trails of Vuzix and other smaller companies, and other tech companies will follow suit. Eye tracking is another area of probable advancement.

The clock rate of consumer CPU's won't exceed 6ghz.

Tesla will continue to enjoy a lot of success, eventually being a good 15% of the cars we see on the roads as battery technology steadily improves.

Climate change will become even more apparent. We'll see measurable effects, and the US will reengage in new climate agreements after 2020.

SHA2 will show signs of weakness with initial attacks against SHA2-256.

Quantum computers will not make significant progress toward being consumer ready by 2030, but there will be more research done.

We'll have the first near-room temperature superconductor at high pressures. No new technology.

ITER will continue to make progress toward fusion. No successful (net positive) experiments yet. Check back in 2030.

2020 or 2021 recession.

There are still people on IRC.

Most importantly: FIRST MAN ON MARS

- Truly useful quantum computers will be available on cloud providers

- Cars as a service

- Strong evidence of alien life via exoplanet atmosphere spectroscopy (assuming successful deployment of JWST)

- Discovery of gravitational wave background

- Fake news will be out of control due to AI

- Wireless charging via Wi-Fi

- Alzheimer's will be cured