TABU; Towards A Better Understanding

The FUTURE is approaching  faster than one can handle….!

In 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 in a lot of industries in the next 10 years and, most people  won’t see it coming.
Did you think in 1998 that 3 years later you would never  take pictures on film again?

Yet digital cameras were  invented in 1975.  The first ones only had  10,000 pixels, but followed Moore’s law.  So as with all exponential technologies, it was a disappointment for a time, before it became way superior and became mainstream in only a few short years. 

It will now happen  again with Artificial Intelligence, health, autonomous and  electric cars, education, 3Dprinting, agriculture and  jobs.   Welcome to the 4th Industrial Revolution.  Welcome to the Exponential  Age .      

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 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 of IBM’s Watson, you can get legal advice  (so far for more or less basic stuff) within seconds, with  90% accuracy compared with  70% accuracy when done by  humans.

So if you study law, stop  immediately.  There will be 90% less lawyers in the  future, only specialists will  remain.

Watson already helps nurses diagnosing cancer,  its 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.

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 don’t want to own a car  anymore.  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 spaces into parks.

1.2 million people die each  year in car accidents worldwide.  We now have one accident every 60,000  miles  (100,000 km), with autonomous driving that will drop to 1 accident in  6million miles  (10 million km). That will save  a million lives each  year.

Most car companies will  probably become bankrupt.  Traditional car companies  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.

Many engineers from  Volkswagen and Audi; are completely terrified of Tesla.

Insurance  companies will have massive trouble  because without accidents, the insurance will become  100x cheaper. Their car insurance business model will disappear.

Real  estate  will change. Because if you can work while you commute, people  will move further away to live in a more beautiful neighbourhood.

Electric cars will become  mainstream about 2020.  Cities will be less noisy  because all new cars will run on electricity.

Electricity will become  incredibly cheap and clean:  Solar production has been  on an exponential curve for 30 years, but you can now see the burgeoning impact.

Last year, more solar energy  was installed worldwide than fossil.  Energy companies  are desperately trying to limit  access to the grid to prevent competition from home solar  installations, but that can’t last.  Technology will take care of  that strategy.

With cheap electricity comes  cheap and abundant water. Desalination   of salt  water now only needs 2kWh per cubic meter (@  0.25 cents). 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 are companies who will build a  medical device (called the “Tricorder” from Star Trek) that works  with your phone, which takes your retina scan, your blood sample  and you breath into it.

It then analyses  54 bio-markers 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  medical analysis, nearly for free Goodbye, medical  establishment.

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 have already started 3D printing  shoes.

Some 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 already 3D printed and built a  complete 6-storey office building.  By  2027, 10% of everything that’s being   produced will be 3D printed.

Business  opportunities: If you think of a niche  you want to go in, first ask yourself: “In the future, do I think we will have that?” and if the answer is yes, how can you make that happen sooner?

If it doesn’t work with your phone, forget the idea.  And any idea designed for success in the 20th century is doomed to failure in the 21st century.

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.  This will require a rethink on wealth distribution.              

Agriculture: 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 if we don’t need that space  anymore.

There are several start-ups  who will bring insect protein to the market shortly.  It contains  more protein than meat. It will be labelled as “alternative protein source”  (because most people still reject the idea of eating  insects).

There is an app called “moodies” which can already tell in  which mood you’re in.  By   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’re telling the truth and  when they’re not.