(Via Jerry Beck at Cartoon Brew)

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Now that we know quite a bit about the iPad, a massive rush to judgment is already underway, with pundits predicting everything from historic success to epic failure. Which led me to wonder: How accurate were the first predictions that got made about the iPhone’s fate? So I went back and read scads of stories from the first couple of weeks after the phone’s announcement.

Overall, they weren’t bad. Lots of pundits said it was a landmark product with the potential to transform the phone business. But there were plenty of dissenting opinions, too. This article is devoted to them.

I’m not dredging up these stories to mock anyone. For one thing, some of them make reasonable arguments about the original iPhone’s limitations; it’s just that the phone managed to thrive despite them. For another, I thought that famous flop the G4 Cube would be an influential hit, and am therefore in no position to taunt anyone for making inaccurate forecasts about Apple products. I’m doing this because I think reviewing iPhone predictions is a useful exercise as we think about the future of the iPad.

A quick executive summary of some of the issues that writers most often brought up as evidence that the iPhone was headed for failure:

• Price: Many skeptics correctly noted that the iPhone’s starting price of $499 was a lot of money for a phone.
• Lack of apps: Naysayers reasonably criticized the phone for its lack of support for third-party applications.
• Not businessy enough. A phone that pricey needed stuff like Exchange support, the doubters pointed out.
• Cingular: The fact that the iPhone was only available on Cingular–which changed its name to AT&T Wireless before the iPhone shipped–was supposed to be a major problem.
• Entrenched competitors: How was Apple going to compete with the Nokias and RIMs and Microsofts of the phone world?
• Missing features: No keyboard? No removable battery?
• Hey, Apple is a cult: Those who squawk about Apple products often throw in a reference or two to mindless fanboys who’ll snap up anything Steve Jobs instructs them to buy. (I wonder what percentage of a specific market Apple must hold before everyone involved agrees it’s silly to describe its customers as cultish?)

As it turned out, none of these factors killed the iPhone, and some of them eventually went away. The iPhone was too expensive, too limited in apps, and not enough of a business tool to succeed? A year after the first iPhone went on sale, the iPhone 3G arrived–a $199 phone with an App Store and Exchange support.

Other things that doubters complained about didn’t change, but weren’t fatal flaws. Today, people still grumble about AT&T exclusivity, and yet the iPhone 3GS sells like gangbusters.  And I’m not sure when I last heard someone gripe about the on-screen keyboard and fixed battery.

Herewith, some representative pieces from January 2007 on why the iPhone was doomed, with thoughts from me–including comments from the authors on the iPad when I’ve been able to find them.

Hung Truong, “4 Reasons Why the Apple iPhone Will Fail,” January 9th, 2007:

Here are 4 reasons why the Apple iPhone will fail:

1. Public Acceptance:
The average person doesn’t even use the WAP browser on their phone, let alone any full blown OSX apps! What people want in a mobile phone is a phone; they don’t need all of these extras. Extra software just makes it more difficult to perform the main function of the phone: to make phone calls.

2. Price:
The price of the iPhone was announced at $499 for the 4GB model and $599 for the 8GB with a 2 year contract. Right now, you can get a T-Mobile MDA smartphonefor $0 after rebate. The mass market is not willing to pay this much for a phone.

3. Copyright and Regulations:
There already is an iPhone out. It’s the Linksys Wireless-G Skype iPhone. I hope Apple has a lot of money or lawyers to acquire the rights to the name.

Pair this with the fact that the iPhone doesn’t have FCC approval and we might never see the iPhone get to market. How did Steve make all of those phone calls anyway?

4. Battery Life:
The iPhone runs OSX! This is great for a laptop or a desktop computer, but does a phone really need OSX? The battery life was announced as 5 hours of talk time, browsing, or video. Basically, 5 hours of active use. What happens after that? Your phone is dead and no one can call you.

People are not going to use the iPhone’s features for fear of losing their connectivity when the battery runs out.

Harry says: I was shocked, shocked to learn that Hung Truong now says his iPhone bashing was cynical Diggbait–but now he’s listing reasons why the iPad will fail, and he says really means it this time.

Allen Stern, CenterNetworks, “Three Reasons Why the iPhone Won’t Be as Mega as Some Think,” January 9th, 2007:

Reason 1 – Price

The entry-model is $500, the mega-model is $600. This is not an iPod at $249. Can the average American (you know the ones who own an iPod) afford this? I think not. I am sure there will be some incentives to switch but overall the price will be a barrier to entry. But not to the early adopter crowd. Walk down 43rd street in Manhattan from 5th ave to 6th ave. Ask every person with an iPod if they will get this device. I bet maybe 3% will say yes, and thats a very aggressive figure.

Reason 2 – Locked to Cingular

I am a Cingular customer. How many are not? Will you switch to get this phone? Some will, many won’t. Assuming it is GSM, I am sure someone will hack an unlock code but many won’t know how. What about those who recently signed deals with the other carriers? Will they spend the $200 or so to break their contracts? Doubt it! I can’t wait to read the posts on Consumerist.. they will go something like this “my wireless provider won’t let me out for free because I want an iPhone.”

Reason 3 – Data Rate Plans

I wrote about this last week with the MySpace deal. The data rate plans will kill this phone. I hope Cingular gets their act together and becomes an industry leader with regards to data pricing but today it is absolute crap. This device will use a lot of data when using the Cingular network (I understand it gets WiFi but that’s not available free everywhere!). Can the average American afford $600 for a device and then another $30ish over their normal rate plan for some data? Nope.

Harry says: Allen Stern is not only not predicting that the iPad will be a bomb, he’s saying it’ll be a hit, and that he wants one.

Philip Greenspun, “Apple iPhone,” January 9th, 2007:

Apple introduces its first phone today.  It is a bit tough to tell from looking at Apple’s Web site, but it appears that this is yet another smartphone that is not a flip-phone.  In other words, if it brushes up against something in your pocket it will make or answer unwanted calls.  Basically all Japanese phones are flip-phones and it baffles me as to how American consumers are denied the simple interface of “open to make or answer a call; flip closed to hang up”.

Apple gives us an MP3 player, which other brands of smart phones have had for several years.  What I want is a phone that won’t make calls from inside my pocket.

Harry says: If Greenspun couldn’t tell from Apple’s site whether the iPhone was a flip phone or not, he wasn’t looking very carefully. (For the record, the iPhone autolocks in a manner that comes close to eliminating the possibility of pocketdialing.) I haven’t seen him say anything about the iPad.

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The brightest inventors on the planet keep coming up with ideas that never amount to much–even when they set out to solve real problems, and even when their brainchildren foreshadow later breakthroughs. And professional tech watchers have long proven themselves prone to getting irrationally exuberant about stuff that just isn’t ready for prime time.

Thanks to Google Books’ archives of Popular Science, Popular Mechanics, LIFE, and other magazines that frequently reported on futuristic gizmos, we have a readily accessible record of technology that failed to live up to the initial hype–including random notions that never got off the drawing board, startlingly advanced products that didn’t find a market, and very rough drafts of concepts that eventually became a big deal. The best of them are fascinating, even when it’s not the least bit surprising that they flopped.

Herewith, fifteen inventions–not that all of them ever got built–that were at least a decade ahead of their time. They’re in chronological order, starting with the inspiration that gave this article its title.

1. Thomas Edison’s Metal Books

As described in: Cosmopolitan, February 1911.

What it was: Among the numerous brainstorms and predictions that Thomas Alva Edison shared with Cosmopolitan readers in an exclusive interview was his vision of 40,000-page books that would be two inches thick and weigh a pound–because their pages would be made of metal, not paper:

Even the pages of books may be made of steel, though Edison regards nickel as a better substitute for paper…”Why not?” asks Edison. “Nickel will absorb printer’s ink. A sheet of nickel one twenty-thousandth of an inch thick is cheaper, tougher, and more flexible than an ordinary sheet of book-paper. A nickel book, two inches thick, would contain 40,000 pages. Such a book would weigh only a pound. I can make a pound of nickel sheets for a dollar and a quarter.”

Here…is a prospect of real culture for the masses Forty thousand pages in a volume! A single volume the equivalent in printing space of two hundred paper-leaved books of two hundred pages each! What a library might be placed between two steel covers and sold for, perhaps, two dollars!

That’s a lot of exclamation points!

Flies in the ointment: I feel disrespectful expressing skepticism about an idea pitched by the greatest inventor of all time, but…I’m skeptical that it would have worked. Also, wouldn’t it have been tough to flip ahead to, say, page 17,356?

When did the basic idea become practical? I know of no evidence that Edison or  anyone else ever printed a single book on nickel. (A Google search for “books printed on nickel” returns one result–a Publisher’s Weekly story referencing the Edison interview.) The first time anyone crammed massive numbers of books into one booklike device that real people could buy may have been when the Rocketbook and Softbook were released in 1999–not that very many people bought either of them.

Modern counterpart: The Kindle, the Nook, Sony’s Readers, and every other current gadget for reading digital tomes…even though they all cost a lot more than $2. And is it going too far to say that Edison had a 1911 version of the upcoming Apple tablet in mind?

2. The Automobile Wireless Telephone

As seen in: Popular Mechanics, February 1913.

What it was: An brainchild of Los Angeles inventor E.C. Hanson, who successfully made wireless calls over a distance of 35 miles from a phone installed in his roundabout.

Flies in the ointment: You thought the telescoping antennae on early brick phones are comically archaic? Hanson’s car phone required that the car in question be outfitted with telephone poles fore and aft, supporting “aerial wires and high-voltage insulators.”

When did the basic idea become practical? Experimentation with mobile phones continued for decades, but they only started to make sense in 1983 when Motorola shipped its DynaTAC, the first true cell phone–a full seven decades after Hanson’s experiments.

Modern counterpart: Your iPhone, BlackBerry, Nexus One, or Pre. Or even your humble flip phone.

3. The Telenewspaper and Electric Writer

As seen in: Popular Mechanics, June 1928.

What they were: Items in a “home of the future” depicting the typical house of 2000, designed by architect R.A. Duncan and exhibited in London. Besides the expected flying car in the garage, the place had a high-tech study with:

…a built-in radio and loud speakers, a built-in television set to see the day’s events and a built-in telenewspaper for visible radio projection of the day’s news. An electric writer, to transmit by radio similar messages, and an elaborate lighting-control panel, were also included.

That’s as far as the magazine’s explanation goes. If the room already has a TV, I’m assuming that the telenewspaper would have presented news in words and pictures displayed on a screen. The electric writer, meanwhile, appears to involve an in-wall display and some sort of box with buttons. I can’t see any evidence of QWERTY capability–maybe there was a wireless keyboard.

Flies in the ointment: The illustration in the magazine shows a house dwarfed by a huge honkin’ antenna, looking a bit like the ones at the top of San Francisco’s Twin Peaks. With experimental television broadcasts barely underway, it was awfully premature to be talking about homes with multiple displays built into the walls. Also, shouldn’t the telenewspaper and the electric writer be one device, or at least share one display?

When did the basic ideas become practical? In the 1980s and 1990s, more and more people began using electric screens to read news and transmit messages, although the screens usually weren’t built into walls and the transmissions used telephone wires rather than radio waves.

Modern counterparts: Google News and Gmail.

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The predictions are based on your answers to a series of multiple choice questions. In instances where you were allowed to select more than one answer, any answer that more than 51% of you chose counts as a prediction. In cases where you were only allowed to select one answer, the one that received the most votes counts as a prediction, even if it fell short of a true majority.

(There is, of course, nothing the least bit scientific about any of this. But given the lousy track record of professional Apple pundits, I figure it stands at least as good a chance of being accurate as any other method short of finding someone within Apple who knows what he or she is talking about and has very loose lips. )

First of all, a basic question: Is Apple going to announce a tablet on Wednesday?

Yes. A landslide 96 percent of you say it will.

Now your point-by-point prognostications…

OS: It’ll run iPhone OS or a very close variant thereof (59% say so)

Screen size: at least 10″ but less than 11″ (55%)

Input features: multi-touch (99%). A majority says it won’t have pen input, a touchpad, a physical keyboard, more than one button in its face, or dedicated game controls. (We didn’t ask about an on-screen keyboard, but presumably it’ll have one if it’s otherwise QWERTY-free.)

Screen technology: LCD (49%). 43% think it’ll be OLED, and a gutsy 3% predict E-Ink.

Hardware features:

• Wi-Fi (99%)
• a headphone jack (93%)
• Flash storage (82%)
• Bluetooth (84%)
• An accelerometer (78%)
• 3G wireless (70%)
• speakers (65%)
• GPS (64%)
• One or more USB ports (62%)
• a camera (59%)

Storage (base model): 32GB (32%)

3G providers: Wow, it’ll be available on more than one of them! (38%)

Included applications:

• Web browser (87%)
• E-reader (85%)
• Video player (81%)
• iTunes Store (81%)
• Music player (71%)
• E-mail (63%)
• Games (61%)
• Photo organizer (55%)

Application strategy: Third-party apps will be distributed through an iPhone-like App Store (81%). iPhone apps will run with some modification by the developer (69%).

E-book strategy: We have a tie! Exactly 48.5% of you think Apple will let other publishers sell books, magazines, and newspapers through the tablet,and 48.5% think it’ll sell them itself. Only 3% think it won’t do anything e-book related.

Price (of lowest-cost model, including any carrier subsidy): Another tie! 24% say $799, and 25% say $699, (1.3% percent optimistically say $199.)

The product’s name: iSlate (31%). Second place: “Other,” at 21%.

Shipping in: March (40%). Second place: April or later, at 36%.

The event will be presided over by: Steve Jobs (88%). Eight percent say Phil Schiller.

Other predictions made by one or more survey takers that sounded either plausible or at least not utterly fantastic:

• Option to connect Apple Wireless Keyboard through Bluetooth
• They won’t sell 10 million in the first year, but will sell over 5 million.
• It will likely use a “one app at a time” scheme. There will be no file system. It will essentially be a computing appliance your grandmother can operate.
• Going against the rumor mill, the Apple tablet may be carrier-agnostic (3G).
• Will have multiple color options.
• Will run a modified iPhone OS but it WILL allow background apps.
• There will be at least one totally off-the-wall feature that no one predicted.
• Developers will be able to use the dock connector for hardware (game controllers etc)
• Payment systems for some magazines and newspapers through iTunes will already be worked out when it goes live.
• Called Applet
• It will have some form of interaction with Apple TV. It will also have a docking element (i.e. docking to an external keyboard through its charge port).
• A single camera on the front of the device, that will eventually be used for video conferencing
• Free 3G subsidized by their own ad network (Quattro)

Consider this post a scorecard which we’ll (I have to insert “probably” here) get to fill out next Wednesday at 10am when Apple holds its event. Please join us for our live coverage then. In the meantime, feel free to continue predicting: There’s lots of stuff we didn’t ask about, including the tablet’s processor and the most interesting thing of all: the details of its user interface.

(Oh yeah, a note to those who entered the drawing for a $100 Apple Store gift card: We’ve drawn a winner and alerted that person, but haven’t heard back yet. We’ll announce a name publicly once we have.)

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In the mid-1940s, Seagram’s VO Canadian whiskey ads depicted technology miracles which were supposed to arrive in the postwar era. Some did come to change the world, eventually; others, we’re still waiting for. (That’s a TV that prints its own newspapers at right,) In both cases, the art commissioned by Seagram’s is more entertaining today than when these ads first ran.

View Men Who Think Beyond Tomorrow slideshow.

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First, an announcement: We have a winner for the Olive 4 Hi-Fi Music Server that we offered to tempt you to submit your predictions. We picked Aaron Neyer (whose fearless forecasts you’ll find below) in a random drawing as explained in our original post. Congratulations, Aaron!

The Olive folks, incidentally, have a limited-time special offer that Technologizer readers qualify for: If you buy an Olive 4 by December 31st, they’ll throw in the recent 17-CD set of remastered Beatles albums for free. Here’s a special page to visit if you want to take advantage of the deal.

Okay, end of announcement. Prediction highlights follow after the jump (you can read all the submissions here). Once you’ve read them, feel free to add some last-minute forecasts of your own. And happy 2010!

Apple

Evan: The Apple tablet will finally be announced by Phil Schiller, not Steve Jobs. The low-end model will have a price point of $699. Wi-Fi, 3G, tethering to iPhones, compatible with all existing iPhone/iPod Touch apps. Its name will not have an “i” before it (it won’t be “iTablet”, etc.)

Evan: Apple will finally discontinue hard drive-based iPod Classic, replacing the 160 GB mainstay with a 128 GB flash memory-based iPod Touch.

Randy Giusto: 2010 will be the year of Apple in the enterprise. We’ll see new strategies and organizational structures in Cupertino and at the store level (between the stores and Apple Enterprise sales). Led by a big push for iPhone in the enterprise, Apple will also cherry pick some enterprise verticals like design, CAD/CAM, and engineering, working with SW developers like Autodesk to gain ground on Windows. The second leg of this strategy will be with small and medium enterprise (SME) accounts, again, with the iPhone being a leading entry point for many businesses. The news and hype may be all about the tablet (if it even happens), but the real story will be around Apple’s quiet execution of a new enterprise strategy.

Andy: Apple will finally launch a subscription plan for music, and maybe videos.

Jill Elswick: Apple will allow Google Voice on the iPhone.

Ryan C. Meader: Apple will release their tablet, and every other company under the sun will attempt to produce a “me too” version. That’s why the software (and unique features in web sites that target it) will be so unique.

Renchub: Apple will not release a tablet computer, at least not one that’s a big iPod touch. Get over it already. Aside from the Gee-whiz factor of having a tablet computer, how would you use it in day to day life?

Renchub: Apple will lose market share to Windows, because of the success of Windows 7, and not due to a massive upswing in netbook sales.

Darryl: Apple will decouple its Mac OS from their hardware allowing it to be a platform of choice for cloud-based solution.

Tom Markworth: Apple will launch iPhone and iPod models with a magnetic power/data cable, abandoning the years-old dock connector. The use of wireless phone chargers will multiply. The entire mobile industry will begin to rethink the use of fragile, proprietary power cables.

Google

Heulenwolf: Tech media will finally get what ChromeOS is about – and stop calling it the comeback of the thin client – when an actual product comes out and they can see it. ChromeOS is about getting the consumer to the browser as quickly and efficiently as possible (where Google makes money) and about making the browser more useful (so that Google can make more money).

Jake: At the end of 2010, you still won’t know anyone who can explain what a Google Wave is.

Pete Steege: Google Water Cooler launched; quickly dominates traffic for cat videos, funny photos and chain emails.

Evan: Chrome OS will be released to quiet hoopla and will fail to gain more than 1% market share in 2010.

Aaron Neyer: Google will control more and more. They’re programs and services will become more popular than almost any other. Google Chrome will improve to become a leading web browser. Chrome OS will become a very popular operating system as cloud computing becomes increasingly popular. Many more of Google’s things will grow popular and new things will emerge. Current things that will likely expand include G-mail, Picasa, Android, Google Maps and Earth, Google Docs, Google Voice, and obviously Google Search. I think Google will try and make even more programs and services, so they can control more, things expanding to possibly even a Google Security Suite, although that might be stretching it a bit.

Google will also expand into the hardware field, starting with the Google Nexus phone. Soon they will be producing their own netbooks running Chrome OS and Chrome OS may expand or become an entirely new operating system that would do more for notebooks or desktops, which could be produced by Google. Google could make more and more phones besides the Nexus and possibly even create their own network, which completely changes the way we think about phones by making it all VOIP, making it much cheaper, but relying more on your 3G, or 4G network, as I believe by then, 4G network will be very widespread.

Randy Giusto: Google Wave will start to show some practical applications by mid-year but 2010 will still largely be a experimental year for the platform, although other communication/conferencing/sharing platforms will get increasingly nervous and see their business models threatened.

Dattatray Jadhav: Google’s Chromium OS will be released and will fail big time as I don’t see much potential in web based computers I mean, what Google is offering is already there on smartphones. Why would I use an extra laptop just for that?

Tim Joiner: Google will be hit with a major privacy breach, involving Gmail. Massive amounts of private email will be on the torrents. Celebrities and politicians alike will be skewered.

Stephen Turner: The war of words between Murdoch and Google will continue. However, Murdoch won’t remove his articles from Google altogether. Google will make just enough concessions that he can keep them on Google without losing face.

JustCallMeBen: Google buys Canada and makes it Ganada, a free playground for everyone, as long as they wear their GPS-trackers and camera-equipped goggles.

Bill R.: A city, university or large school district will begin adoption of Google’s Chrome OS for most of its users. An experiment sponsored by Google.

Melissa Cleaver: I think that Google will rule the world…google apps will be on everything we own, including our own TV!

Microsoft

JustCallMeBen: Microsoft will try to repeat the success of Windows 7 on Windows Mobile 7, but people won’t care.

Scott T.: Steve Ballmer will step down from the helm of the world’s largest software company. Coinciding with this event will be the return of BIll Gates in a day-to-day roll at the company. They will attempt to spin this in a way to make his return appear like the “triumphant” return of Steve Jobs to Apple.

Evan: Microsoft will create a spin-off of Indie Games that emphasizes non-gaming applications, and open an API that allows arbitrary networking. Expect to see applications for websites like Flickr and Wikipedia, and perhaps a generalized RSS reader, pop up on the console.

Renchub: Microsoft will release a hand held gaming platform that will play X-box and classic windows desktop games. It will be hated, but sell like hotcakes because they are willing to take the financial losses to move units.

Alvin: Microsoft will cancel Windows Mobile.

The Web

Heulenwolf: Wide adoption of HTML 5 by web app developers is necessary for offline usage and to move away from proprietary, closed plugins like Adobe Flash for rich content. Frankly, full screen, HD-ish video playback through a browser shouldn’t require a Core 2 Duo. Unfortunately, I think this one is more of a wish than a prediction for 2010, too, but it would be nice.

Jake: The “cloud” will experience a dramatic and highly public failure involving stolen data.

Bill Pytlovany: Advertising will finally show up on Twitter.

JHM43: Media 2.0 meets Gov 2.0 to create Community 2.0. In Community 2.0, the relationship between government, the press, and the citizenry evolves into something that is much more transparent, engaging, and active. It is about redefining the idea of the Fourth Estate . Members of the former audience are now producers, not just consumers. Members of the former constituency are now actors, not just voters. Community 2.0 creates a living, evolving ecosystem of citizens.

Michael: Facebook’s recent policy woes continue into 2010, as the company tries to backpedal from its new privacy settings fiasco. Led by several high profile defectors in the media, users abandon the site in what starts as a trickle, but becomes a monsoon as more and more people fall victim to the site’s new openness allowing sensitive data to fall into untrustworthy hands. By the end of the year, Twitter has overtaken the ‘Book in users.

Bill: Cloud computing will be all the rage, but no one will care to call it cloud computing because “cloud” will be viewed with either increasing suspicion (over security and reliability) and/or because it will no longer resonate as a “cool” marketing term.

Mike: Facebook starts letting retailers sell products straight from their Fan Pages. Consumers have the option to share stories with all of their Facebook Friends about their purchases, and Facebook gets a small cut of the revenue. It’s a win-win-win situation.

Simcha: In 2010, we will see more and more companies and governments building their own “cloud”, in order to get the benefits of the cloud, minimizing the hazards. This move will lead to an increase in hardware sales. (everyone has computer + the company has lots of computers in its own ‘cloud’) This will also give linux a big push, both in market share and in contributions to the kernel.

Digital Entertainment

Dan: 2010 will be the year of high quality music downloads and personal media “lockers,” (I hate that word. We need to come up with a new term for that. Maybe our own personal clouds, or our own personal media servers that we don’t really own?)

Anyway, 2010 will see the proliferation of high quality music downloads. The first shot will be fired by Apple or Amazon, obviously. Apple will begin selling Apple Lossless files and Amazon will begin selling aiff and flac. Actually, if you look at HDTracks and what they are selling, that is along the lines of the options that Amazon will make available. Although, it is possible that eMusic will throw the first punch here and surprise us all by adopting high quality before anyone else.

Heulenwolf: As DRM’ed music gradually fades from the market and is replaced by un-DRM’ed music and streaming services (e.g. Apple’s acquisition of Lala), the music industry will start to get it. Just like in the days of the cassette tape, they can make money even when consumers copy their stuff. In fact, as CD sales continue to drop, adapting to the new web-based music delivery model will be their only way to stay in business. Lawsuits against little old ladies by the RIAA will drop sharply. The movie industry, on the other hand, won’t get it. The MPAA will continue to sue and lobby worldwide to protect their aging business model without realizing that podcasts and IPTV are gradually taking the space they could have on-line. Consumers and the developers of Boxee, the Roku box, and libdvdcss will be blamed.

Alastair Goldfisher: Pandora will reach profitability in 2010 just as Apple continues its push into streaming music and buys the VC-backed online radio music company for between $100M and $150M. That’ll be a return of about 2x to 3x for investors.

Mark Prestash: In 2010 the movie industry will finally “get it” and adopt a more customer friendly movie streaming policy. With all of the devices that can now stream content from the web (roku box, the soon to be released boxee box, TIVO, popcorn tv, voodoo box, and the more upscale blu-ray players) Hollywood will begin to support those devices with more current releases and move away from the old “staggered release” model. I would gladly pay a few bucks more a month for my Netflix account if there were more current releases available to watch streaming. The new streaming model could come in a PPV form, a DL to own, or just streaming from websites you all ready pay a subscription to. The streaming version should have all the extras that come on a disc (making of, audio commentary etc) as this adds value to the customer.

Mark Prestash: 3-D T.V. will fail in 2010 in a big way. The sets are very expensive, they require the viewer to wear special glasses, and there will be almost no content to view in 3-D for quite a long time. I’m sure the digital TV conversion is still hurting many television stations financially, so adding more/new hardware and software for 3-D TV broadcasting may just not be economically viable for them. lastly, if viewing 3-D TV is anything like the crop of 3-D movies Hollywood pumped out this year, I’m not impressed. Sure the content had an extra dimension to it, but it was in no way shape or form so good and ground-breaking I want the technology in my living room.

JustCallMeBen: Hulu will stop being free… At least as we know it: most popular shows will be pay-per-view, at least for a short period after broadcast.

Smartphones

Randy Giusto: The eight smart phone ecosystems (old term- operating systems) – iPhone, Android, BlackBerry, Windows Mobile, Palm, Symbian, Maemo, and Samsung’s new Bada will consolidate down to five as competition increases and developer resources to sustain them all remain thin. Samsung’s Bada will fail (why do we need yet another smart phone platform?), Palm will get acquired as it struggles to establish any foothold outside the US and WebOS will end up in other things, just not phones. Nokia moves fully from Symbian to Maemo based on a backlash of developers who are fed up with writing apps for Symbian because it’s hard (too many versions) and is not optimized for the web. But even Maemo won’t be popular and the pressure will be on Nokia to move to Android. I’m just not sure they will make the shift by the end of 2010. Windows Mobile struggles badly but makes it through the year, but just barely. RIM will not be sold, but will see increased enterprise competition (not from Microsoft) and will find a harder consumer market to compete in. RIM will start re-development efforts on its OS, go on an acquisition spree, as it must become optimized for the web. So 2010 will end with iPhone and Android strong, RIM and Nokia in transition, and Windows Mobile on the ropes.

wsquared: Android-based smartphones will gain, if not surpass the iPhone’s market share, with full Flash support and a quickly growing app store.

Andy Maslin: Because of pressure from cheaper unlimited call offers, cell phone plan prices drop dramatically. SMS and MMS costs remain high, and even increase further on some carriers. Other data costs remain static (at least on traditional carriers).

Alvin: Palm will fail or be purchased for less than $10M.

JustCallMeBen: Android will win some significant market-share from the iPhone, but the iPhone will still be the dominant mobile OS. Windows Mobile won’t be significant by the end of the 2010.

Hardware

Jeff Hayes: I think 2010 will be the year of both the LED AND the OLED. LED backlights are already starting to replace CFLs in LCD TVs, but except in some of the higher-end model’s, the jury’s still out on which is the superior technology. With time and technical improvements that’s bound to change. As for OLED (organic LED) technology has been around for several years, but quite expensive (Sony debuted an 11″ OLED monitor for $2,399, I believe, back when Harry was still editor of PC World). But the tech has been slowly getting less expensive and getting to be the norm on cell phones and other small screens and is now becoming more of a standard on laptop screens. I predict a major price breakthrough on OLED will bring it to ever biggerscreens and that possibly even some HD TVs will be available on OLED by the end of 2010.

NickAVV: Transparent OLED displays lead to wearable visor computers with Augmented Reality, although without a good way to control them they would be set to perform specific tasks, such as giving you walking/driving navigation overlayed on reality, or information on restaurants and other businesses floating next to them.

wsquared: Archos will update the Archos 5IT to include a capacitive touch screen, Android Elcair, Snapdragon processor, both front and rear web cams, and access to the full Android Market. This will be a strategic move to be the top competitor (and lower-cost alternative) to the $800 Apple Tablet. Archos will announce the Archos 7IT (with the aforementioned specs) when the Archos 9 fails to gain traction.

John: Cameras and printers will become sufficiently connected that you can take a picture in Kathmandu and have it print in Toledo, i.e. the camera/printer equivalent of GoToMyPC.

Jeff Hayes: I see 2010 as the year that Touch Computing COMES ALIVE! HP has had a few touch computer models for several years, now, but with Windows 7 including it native in some versions, I think by Q3 we’ll see A LOT of new monitors, computers and all-in-ones that are touch-based, and by the end of the year you’ll probably have your pick. Within two to three years, it will likely be very difficult to find a monitor that’s NOT touch-based, but we’re talking just about 2010. The iPod and a few other cell phones already have similar capabilities, so MILLIONS of people are already familiar with the concept somewhat, and Bill Gates was demonstrating tabletop touch computing on the news a year or more ago. I think we’ll see this sort of thing first in high-end bars, ON the bars themselves, as a way to play games, order drinks, play songs or TV or whatever the bars choose… But it won’t be long before there will be “touch tables” in homes, as well as millions of touch-screen computers — particularly laptops, which will likely roll out more quickly.

Brian Wilkes: 300GB solid state hard drive for $200 by the end of 2010. Interest in the BlueRay media will not increase, it will be replace by Net Flix and like services like it. 3 TB Hard drive by the end of 2010. 52 inch Plasma TV for under $500. Google Chrome OS will gain a huge market share.

Jonathan Hirshon: 2010 will be the year of dimensionality – 3D on the Web from WebGL via HTML 5, uber-accelerated 3D on the desktop via Tesla, plus everyone having supercomputer-levels of performance via OpenCL even on older 3D cards, killer 3D interfaces via OpenGL ES on iPhone, Droid and HTC (plus others). 2D gets a kick in the ass via Direct2D, giving killer font renderings on Windows, Cairo does the same for the Web through Firefox, Apple laughs and gives Quartz its long overdue launch in the new tablet for killer 2D font renderings. :)

Darryl: MANY notable universities and colleges will drive the replacement of text books with eBooks creating a new markets for course material and annotations for entrepreneurial grad students acutely familiar with peer-to-peer networks.

JustCallMeBen: The first 13″OLED laptop will be released. Nobody will be able to afford it.

ChrisF: Projection technology will make a big breakthrough shrinking the device size needed and eliminating the costly projector bulbs.

About (Blush) Technologizer

Sharla Lane: Technologizer hits 5,000 followers on Twitter

Bill Pytlovany: Technologizer will expand and receive support from a well known Internet content provider.

Leigh Anne Varney: Harry McCracken and Technologizer will be recognized (finally) for journalistic integrity and prescience!

Random

Dan Schaeffer: Personal jet packs and flying cars. (I will make this prediction every year until it comes true.)

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Digital Entertainment

Prediction: “I think what’s going to be the big news story of 2009 is the further personalization of entertainment. Apple has been on the cutting edge of this with such items as the iPod and iTunes, but I see a dark horse coming up that is going to change the game. But mass-communication as we know it is going to begin a steady decline, with people preferring to listen to their own portable video and audio libraries, on their own schedule and terms, and eschewing the old model of “I must be home at 9 pm to watch Desperate Housewives”. Broadcast television, which is already slated to go all-digital in February, is going to soon become as quaint as 78 rpm records.”–Dave Mackey

Reality? Entertainment certainly got more personal–and less schedule-based–in 2009, thanks to services and software such as Hulu and Boxee, and the growing sophistication of smartphones as audio and video devices.

Prediction: “Blockbuster will finally declare bankruptcy after admitting defeat to competing internet download and cable on-demand movie services.”–Scott Olson

Reality? Blockbuster is hurting–and changing–but it remains solvent.

Prediction: “The TV-room finally gets an all-in-one product that will enable viewers to surf the internet, watch the internet (videos and movies) and share their home media to the other folks on the couches. The essential difference this product has over the other contenders is that it seamlessly fits into the existing computing environment in homes. No clunky and manual file transfers between devices, cable disconnects and re-connects, etc.”–Niraj Shah

Reality? If someone introduced this product in 2009, tell me about it–I wanna buy one!

Prediction: “Blu-Ray discs will be the last successful generation of optical discs, as digital distribution through ubiquitous broadband becomes viable.”–Simon Goldring

Reality? Digital distribution certainly made inroads this year. I’m guessing Simon’s right that Blu-Ray will be the last successful optical format, but we didn’t learn for sure this year.

Prediction: “Blu-ray will go mainstream. Prices will go into the sub-$150 range for players, and movies will come down in price to match those of DVDs.”–The Human Yawn

Reality? Blu-Ray is indeed under $150. Blu-Ray movies still list for more than DVDs, but Amazon.com sometimes charges less for them than for the DVD.

Prediction: “The lawsuit against Real over RealDVD will be shot down because it holds no ground (and I can finally download it); Real countersues because of lost revenue”–The Human Yawn

Reality? Sadly, RealDVD isn’t faring well in court and remains unavailable.

Prediction: “LCD TV’s will get much cheaper–20-30% drop–which will force plasma to take note and follow suit.”–Jeff Shuey

Reality? I’m not sure about percentages, but both LCDs and plasmas have gotten even cheaper this year.

Gadgets and Gizmos

Prediction: “Cameras will become “self-aware” and recognize networks AND will make recommendations to ‘connect’ and share pics/videos.”–Jeff Shuey

Reality? Wi-Fi cameras are still around, but if there were any usability breakthroughs this year I missed ‘em.

Prediction: “Yes, the “Dick Tracy” wrist communicator is just around the corner for the masses. No, it’s not your grandfather’s LCD. watch/calculator–it’s a PDA, mobile-phone and bio monitor device all in one sleek package.”–Jose Almodovar

Reality: Watchphones exist, though I haven’t seen them on the wrists of the masses yet.

Prediction: “I predict that we’ll get a new Kindle from Amazon capable of color graphics. In conjunction with the release of the new Kindle, one of the major comics companies–probably Marvel Comics–will start releasing content for the device. Marvel already has a digital comics initiative, so that makes the most sense.”–Ray Cornwall

Reality? The Kindle, like all E-Ink e-readers, remains defiantly monochromatic–unless you count the Kindle app for the iPhone, which did come out this year. And Marvel got into the iPhone comics game, although not through Kindle.

Windows

Prediction: “Microsoft will continue to flog the hell out of Windows Vista without actually mentioning the name of the product in television ads.”–Dave Mackey

Reality? Dead on, Dave.

Prediction: “What I’ve seen so far of Windows 7 is promising and I think many people really really want it to succeed. My real prediction is that Microsoft will actually price Windows 7 so that people might actually buy it instead of trying to get a copy from their friend. When Vista first came out, Bill Gates said it would be ‘less than a hundred dollars’. That was the price for Vista Basic which was useless and a downgrade from Windows XP. Expect fewer versions of Windows 7 to be available to ease the confusion.”–Bill Pytlovany

Reality? Microsoft offered steep discounts for Windows 7 preorders, and cut some prices permanently. There are fewer versions of Windows 7 than of Vista, but I’m still confused.

Prediction: “Windows 7 releases in a single version format, early and to high praise…for $199.”–Scott Bartley

Reality? Win 7 has certainly been well-reviewed, and it shipped on time, but there are still a bunch of versions.

Prediction: “Windows XP will limp along until Windows 7 is released. I think around 6 months to a year after the Windows 7 release.”–Mike Lopez

Reality? Too early to tell. I’m guessing XP is starting to fade away, but it’s going to be a loooong time until it’s not surprisingly popular.

Prediction: “Windows 7 will fail to excite, but meet modest market success as a (late) market replacement for Vista. Microsoft continues to remain a powerhouse in the enterprise but increasingly less relevant in consumer markets.”–D.R. Gardner

Reality? Excitement is in the eye of the beholder, but I don’t think there’s any question that Windows 7 gets high marks from most of the people who’ve tried it. It wasn’t, however, a great year for the company in terms of consumer products. Exhibit A: The ongoing meltdown that is Windows Mobile.

Prediction: “As we all know, Microsoft will likely release Windows 7. I expect it will be their best Windows version and will be secure, reliable and compatible in every way. However, despite its dependability, the perceptions of Windows Vista will carry over and will adversely impact sales. This perception will force Microsoft into selling Windows 7 upgrades at a very low price to increase sales. Perhaps sub $50. My guess $29.99 for the Home Premium or equivalent.”–Jim Bednarz

Reality? Windows 7 seems to be selling decently if not downright well, and so far hasn’t been subject to additional price cuts. Actually, with the recent end of the Windows 7 Family Pack, Microsoft imposed an effective price hike on multi-PC households.

Prediction: “Vista will rapidly become the latest Windows ME as Windows 7 becomes more recognized as the leap forward that Microsoft was originally promising with Longhorn. Enterprises will rejoice.”–Dave McCall

Reality? I’m not sure if enterprises are giddy over Windows 7, but many are receptive, at least, in a way they weren’t towards Vista.

Apple

Prediction: “Late in the year, Apple will have a new product in response to the emerging Netbook category. Essentially, it will be a MacBook nano — small, lightweight and very polished.”–Niraj Shah

Reality? Apple has another week to announce the MacBook nano. If it blows that timetable, it can still announce a tablet in January and make Niraj’s prediction come nearly true.

Prediction: “Being relatively anti-Apple, this isn’t good news for me, because this will be a killer product. Really. A TV which looks great, has a very intuitive interface and a remote that you will want to have on your TV table and which lastly lets you rent/buy movies and TV shows. Wow. Get the Apple stock before this one is announced.”–Lars Henriksen

Reality? Rumors of Apple making TVs have been around for eons, but they remain just that: rumors.

Prediction: “I predict we won’t see an iPhone Nano.”–Lacy Kemp

Reality: We didn’t.

Prediction: “Apple will make a huge push into the enterprise. They’ll target everything from SOHO to small business to the largest enterprises. The remote wipe feature we saw in the iPhone was just the beginning.”–Bob Van Valzah

Reality? It’s been more of a gentle nudge than a huge push, but Apple continues to add stuff of interest to business customers, such as the online version of iWork.

Prediction: “Apple will merge the MacMini and Apple TV to createa more powerful market competitor in an effort to maintain and grow market share in home entertainment.”–D.R. Gardner

Reality? The Mac Mini continued to evolve, but Apple TV didn’t much–and they remain unmerged.

Prediction: “After flirting with Microsoft, Adobe will be swallowed up by Apple. These moves will cause the same consternation as the Microsoft-Yahoo proposed merger the year before. Microsoft will make a grand overture to take over Adobe, but the EU will demonstrate its disapproval, causing Microsoft to drop out. Adobe stock suffers in the aftermath, and with no new products to introduce in 2009 comes to the verge of bankruptcy before being saved by cash-rich Apple. In order to get EU and U.S. government approval, Apple agrees to continue making identical Adobe products for the Mac and Windows, as well as Linux–Andre Hinds

Reality? I guess it’s possible this will all happen in the last week of the year. Seems unlikely, though.

Prediction: “Apple’s market share will grow considerably. Apple will ship Snow Leopard and it will sell well. No new devices, but possibly some updated hardware (most likely the Mac mini). At least one record label will go DRM-free in iTunes.”–The Human Yawn

Reality? Apple’s market share grew, Snow Leopard sold well, it introduced no all-new devices but did update the Mini (and other machines).  And the iTunes Store went DRM-free for music.

Prediction: “Steve Jobs will be leaving Apple, or at least stepping down in some way, shape or form. While it saddens me to say it, I think that time’s almost here.”–Dave Moyer

Reality? Well, he did go on medical leave, which may count as “stepping down in some way, shape or form.” But he also returned from medical leave.

Prediction: “Apple will announce in 2009 that Steve Jobs is stepping down as CEO in 2010.”–Bill Baker

Reality? The year is nearly over, and Steve Jobs is CEO of Apple.

Prediction: “Steve Jobs will retire or take on a less significant role by the end of 2009.”–Jason Power

Reality? Only those who work directly with Steve Jobs know if his role has changed. But his contributions still appear to be enormous, and the man remains anything but retiring.

Overall, not bad! Your collective punditry was certainly more savvy than that of some folks who get paid big bucks to make these sort of predictions.

Coming soon: A recap of the predictions you’ve made for 2010, so I have it handy a year from now when it’s time to rate your powers of prediction all over again…

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