Tim McNamara

Expectations

Ads will look out to who is looking at them. As you walk through the city, billboards will be able to tell you a story by giving you a new frame from a storyboard at each block.

Dating will be much much easier. Prediction engines will be much better, meaning you won’t need to march your way through profiles. I bet there will be an app, perhaps called Blind Date, that will ask you to commit to going to a date on Thursday between 6:30-8pm each week. You won’t get a chance to see a photo of the person beforehand, but that’s okay because you’ll have a great time anyway.

Someone will write the last letter.

Someone else will use the last $10 note.

Healthcare will become much easier. My phone, or something like it, will make the booking and arrange for me to get to the doctor when I need to. But, because of real-time monitoring, I will rarely need to.

The sea will emerge as a viable space for horticulture. Autonomous, solar-powered farms on barges will allow countries to restore their mono-cultured farm land to a more diverse state. They will prevent future habitat and biodiversity loss in poorer nations.

Insect protein will land on the market as a supplement for athletes who don’t want whey or soy. Over time, insect-based nutrition will move mainstream.

Hopes

We will figure out how to educate kids in a way that will makes them excited about creating knowledge for the rest of their lives.

Ubiquitous clean energy   possibly from fusion, molten salt Thorium reactors and/or solar   leads to clean water for all, dramatically increasing food security.. (Near-free energy everywhere enables near-free desalination & irrigation everywhere, leading to safe food everywhere).

Employment becomes redundant as a universal living allowance is implemented due to the decreasing marginal costs of production. This unleashes waves of creativity, prosperity and future economic growth.

Fears

Economic inequality will lead to a series of revolts, leading us back into a mini Dark Age that will prevent us from moving past fossil fuels. That, in turn, will lead to a massive environmental catastrophe and potentially an existential crisis for humanity.