Ask HN: A New Decade. Any Predictions?

>4. The credibility of scientist and research universities will hit all time lows as the effects of the replication crisis become more pronounced and climate changes predictions prove less accurate than lay people find acceptable. I expect this to result in a large pullback in funding for research that lacks a direct practical application.

Agreed. Can also see, with the death of traditional journalism, the arts majors who are paid to write clickbait for online-only entities latching onto this to brow-beat scientists and turn mass opinion against them. The same creatures producing hysteria with writings akin to "We've 12 years to live because of climate change!" are fickle and as soon as the current narrative shifts a bit there's no telling what other damage they're capable of doing.

One of the contributing factors to why I think we'll see a significant return to religiousness in Western nations in the coming decade.

11. healthcare apps where hospital and doctors can bid on procedures.

12. whole classed of jobs disappear due to AI and automation.

13. those who are lucky (tech jobs, medical, custom genetics) all have multiple human assistants.

All great thoughts, here are my takes: > 1. Still no level 4/5 autonomous cars anywhere in sight. The promise of being "just around the corner" fizzles down and people just forget the hype.

I think this is about 50/50, but will take infrastructure changes to really bring about level 4 -- think smart roads and moving pedestrian walkways above/below street level, or possibly every car as a mag-lev/car hybrid. Leaving mag-lev turns into manual.

> 2. Same with AI. The panacea hype dies down. No AGI at all. No major job losses due to AI automation.

I disagree AI will not die or have a nuclear winter, it'll have tremendous leaps/bounds, but nobody claimed AGI would happen in next 10 years, most estimates put it at 2060 or greater

> 3. Facebook (the SN) still exists but ages along with it's current user base. i.e it's the "old people's" SN. Facebook (the company) is still going strong, with either Instagram or one of it's acquisitions being the current "hip" SN.

This is definitely how I see it playing out, FB will monopolize any social media sphere that looks like it's going to 'explode' and be the next thing through acquisitions until they get a monopoly ruling by the gov't and get split up (if/when I'd say 40% likelihood).

> 4. Google still dominates search and email but losses value and "glory" compared to today.

I think google won't lose too much value, assuming they go all in on cloud. I think GCP is where they'll make the most money. Possibly also Google Business accounts for email/etc.

> 5. Majority of people still don't care about privacy.

Not until the country enacts a social credit system like china, which I'd say is a 60% likelihood but it'll be 'privatized' not state ran, so that makes it better right?

> 6. But a small yet growing culture of "offliners" becomes mainstream. Being offline is the new "Yoga" and allows bragging rights.

I don't think this will happen, except either among extreme hippies (and I'm a progressive) but I mean the live in a van off the grid types or the other side live off the grid but right-wing survivalist types. But there's already folks like this.

> 7. Increase in adoption of non-scientific beliefs such as astrology/anti-vaxx/religion/flat-earth as a counterbalance to the increased complexity of everyday life.

God save us from this future. I hope we can educate the dumb out of people, with some free college and better public school systems. Maybe end home-schooling unless we can make sure this doesn't propagate as a result.

> 8. Web development matures and a "standard" stack is accepted, all in JS. HAHAHAHA HAHAAHA HAHAHA. Wait, are you serious? If anything it'd be probably rust/web assembly for it's speed/benchmarks but I don't see anything in web ever becoming one solid framework or stack. If anything it just keeps splintering. The problem is devs are WAY too opinionated about the 'right' way or 'better' way or 'familiar' way of doing things.

> 9. Global carbon emissions are not reduced, mostly because of lack of initiative by China and 3rd world countries.

This depends on 2020's election. If we see Bernie or Warren win, I think we could lead the world in curbing emissions. We won't win

> 10. Still no hoverboards. Never will be. Nor hover cars (except maybe mag-lev).

1) Cryptocurrencies will largely die off, between attacks, thefts, valuation collapses, subversion, and regulation. They'll still exist in very tiny niche/underworld uses, but the word "cryptocurrency" will be so tainted that every future proposal for private electronic money transactions will call it something else—and they will include a "This Is Not Like Bitcoin" disclaimer.

2) OS X will head toward sunset for consumers. Apple will finally do what some people have been predicting for ages and transition to a desktop/laptop iOS variant for the consumer/business market. A compatibility module will let users run OS X applications for several years after. OS X (perhaps "OS Pro") will eventually be a developer's OS aimed at big machines for video effects and the like...or maybe Apple will sunset it, too, in favor of iOS Pro.

3) Python 2 use will finally die off.

4) Fusion will not happen.

5) Someone will develop a decent system for structuring web apps as local apps, so that instead of pulling down an Electron app, you just download a bundle that runs on your desktop. (The lines between web app, offline web app, and local web app will get very complicated.) 3-4 years after this happens, MS or Apple build it into their OSes.

6) Level 4/5 autonomous cars will be in testing or close enough that the legal fights, strikes, and protests will begin in earnest.

7) Americans get some sort of federal carbon tax.

8) Drones become the new CCTV.

9) The die-off is over for newspapers and magazines. Most paper publications existing today will exist in 2030. Most new news or special interest media outlets will be online, not on paper, though.

10) The die-off is also over for malls and strip centers, and while the stores will constantly change, most of the ones open today will be open in 2030.

11) Hybrids get cheaper and expand into a double-digit percentage of the US auto market.

12) Putin loses power in Russia. This will probably involve his death, if only from natural causes.

He's off on this one. There's still stuff life video editors or video games or 3D apps that will always make more sense to run locally.

Just the trivial apps will be moving to the cloud.