My Predictions for 2007

Internationally -

1. 2007 will belong to The Venice Project. I might have said VP will be the new YouTube but, as I've emphasized before, it's a different beast entirely. Following a decade of IPTV hype it will finally become a reality.
2. Google will buy Second Life. Microsoft is already demonstrating Virtual Earth billboards and Google will seize the opportunity to bring AdSense not only to it's own mirror (Google Earth) world but also the virtual world. In that sense Second Life will be, more so than the Venice Project, the new YouTube. I've been dipping my toes in this 3D environment all year but have not as yet bought any virtual land. If I can develop my own properties free of charge in exchange for AdSense billboard space I'll be more than happy to do so.
3. At the same time virtual world alternatives like Multiverse and Croquet will generate alot more interest spurred on in large part by 3D controller innovations like SpaceNavigator and Nintendo's wii-mote (see below).
4. Nintendo's Wii will become the most successful console of all time. In so doing it will change how we think about human-computer interaction and interfaces. It will act as a catalyst for haptic innovation, and the proliferation of wii-mote hacks will see usage scenarios far beyond the console. Ultimately it means that Vista will be Microsoft's last WIMP (Windows, Icon, Mouse, Pointer) based operating system.
5. Google will take on Technorati, TechMeme, Digg and del.icio.us by exposing collaborative tagging clouds and adding annotation to Google Reader.
6. OPML will be the new RSS.
7. The convergence of 'MyStartPage', 'MySpace', 'MyDesktop', 'MyBlog', etc., towards a single online agent will accelerate as the lines between our various forms of digital identity continue to blur and microformats gain widespread adoption.
8. Comments will die. The Arrington/Sethi saga will have heralded the imminent demise of comments across A-list blogs. The B-list will slavishly follow suit. Flame wars, libel suits and moderation will render comments, as we know them today, untenable for much longer. And so Trackback 2.0 will emerge with support for aggregator based commenting and tracking. Sadly this means the likes of coComment will go the way of the dodo. Incidentally I use coComment all the time as it's currently the best solution for a broken system. But it's a band-aid fix and the rug will be pulled out from beneath it's feet.
9. Web 2.0 will die (the phrase that is) and along with it many of the startups working on features masquerading as products. The attrition rate will be high but there won't be any bursting bubbles. And innovation will continue apace.
10. The mobile phone will kill off the UMPC (formerly Origami Project). High end phones like Nokia's N95 with TV-out capability and every comms protocol under the sun will consign the UMPC to the Microsoft graveyard.

On the home front -

1. By the end of 2007 most Irish travelers will be roaming for free and Pat Phelan's next project will eclipse even that success. Nooked and PXN8 will be acquired and their founders will take some well deserved time out. Joe Drumgoole and team will Put other DLAs in their Place. dbTwang will find it's groove. And LouderVoice will be heard across the world as microformats take center stage. Content Labelling will also be big!
2. BarCamp will go on tour. Following on from the huge success of the Cork gig, BarCamp South East Ireland (in Waterford) will be another winner. And Galway, Limerick and Dublin are sure to follow.
3. The Irish Blog Awards 2007 will flare into a mass brawl as those involved in the flame wars of 2006 meet face to face for the first time in a year. It will emerge soon after that Bernie Goldbach had bugged the whole room and recorded the brouhaha for a dramatic soundseeing podcast.

Comments

[Bernie Goldbach]

Here's hoping the mainstream media don't treat all your predictions as gospel truth. I'm still trying to crawl out of the wind-up hole I dug for myself a few months ago.

[Donncha O Caoimh]

I don't think comments will disappear any time soon. Sure, some people have had problems with them but the "A-list" aren't important to the vast majority of bloggers.
People want to converse and it's a simple method to talk back to a blog writer. Comment spam is covered by Akismet so although there's more of it, the anti-spam measures are getting more sophisticated too.

[James Corbett]

Good points Donncha and I would agree it's not going to be anytime soon. I should have been more specific and said I think 2007 will be the beginning of the end for comments (as we know them)... but what I'm really trying to say is I *hope* it will be.

Not because I dislike the idea of blog post feedback but because I feel there's something fundamentally wrong with the current model of posting comments "to a page". Its going to take a longer post to explain what I mean by that but it's something to do with my belief in the move away from a page centric model towards a feed/stream centric one.

[dragev]

Regarding prediction #5: Sadly, Google has forgotten about search when it come to the Reader. I have been using Google Reader but am starting to wonder why I make any effort at all to share, star, or tag items of interest, because I can't find it later :( If the Reader is going to be useful to me much longer, it better include the ability for me to search and browse for items I have express interest in.