2020 Internet Vision

Pew Internet & American Life Project has released its second Future of the Internet survey, with experts and pundits broadly agreeing that by 2020:

• A low-​​cost global network will be thriving and creating new oppor­tun­ities in a “flat­ten­ing” world.
• Humans will remain in charge of tech­no­logy, even as more activity is auto­mated and “smart agents” pro­lif­erate. However, a sig­ni­ficant 42% of survey respond­ents were pess­im­istic about humans’ ability to control the tech­no­logy in the future. This sig­ni­ficant majority agreed that dangers and depend­en­cies will grow beyond our ability to stay in charge of tech­no­logy. This was one of the major sur­prises in the survey.
• Virtual reality will be com­pel­ling enough to enhance worker pro­ductivity and also spawn new addic­tion problems.

• Tech “refuseniks” will emerge as a cultural group char­ac­ter­ized by their choice to live off the network. Some will do this as a benign way to limit inform­a­tion overload, while others will commit acts of violence and terror against technology-​​inspired change.
• People will wit­tingly and unwit­tingly disclose more about them­selves, gaining some benefits in the process even as they lose some privacy.
• English will be a uni­versal language of global com­mu­nic­a­tions, but other lan­guages will not be dis­placed. Indeed, many felt other lan­guages such as Mandarin, would grow in prominence.

Om Malik comments that these pre­dic­tions are sur­pris­ingly pess­im­istic, and I com­pletely agree. Nearly all of the negative issues high­lighted in this precis — lack of control, privacy, addic­tion, luddism — are already very apparent. It seems a bit bleak to suggest that we won’t do anything to address problems that are staring us in the face over the next 14 years.

If you look further into the report, though, its findings become less start­ling. The respond­ents were presented with head­lines with which they could either agree or disagree. This is a good way to generate head­lines, but not a way to explore original thinking. And the 304 experts polled were very much less than unan­imous. Only 56%, for example, agreed with the first point on the list, with similar divides throughout.

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