Reviewing Predictions for 2017
December 30, 2017I had ten predictions for 2017. Let’s see how those shook out.
- IoT growth? Correct. This is bigger than ever, at least in my interpretation of it. Companies are pushing their personal AI/virtual assistants, so I’d expect this to continue.
- Suburban millennials? Correct. It’s easy to find articles about this millennial migration. And it’s just in time to have the tax incentives behind it wiped out.
- Eastern European conflicts? Incorrect. And I’m glad of it.
- Anti-Trump protests? Correct. I anticipated near-constant protests and while we didn’t get that, there was a surge in protesting. Additionally, there have been a vast increase in far-right and neo-nazi rallies which created counter-protests and ended in violence. I didn’t expect that. This prediction also bundled in the GOP cramming initiatives through while they could and then suffering the consequences for it. While they didn’t get as much crammed through as I expected (like failing at the overt Obamacare repeal), they did get the tax bill through despite being very unpopular (and essentially including a covert Obamacare repeal). I think the Doug Jones win is the beginning of the backlash we’ll see.
- Tech stagnation? Correct. One could argue that Face ID was something big, but I still think this falls under the building a better mousetrap so I’m giving myself this one. From the big companies, I don’t see any real movement. I certainly wouldn’t consider Twitter moving to 280 characters a big idea.
- Freelance economy? Correct. And it’s only expected to grow.
- “Independent” media outlets? Mostly incorrect. I expected the number of disingenuous outlets to skyrocket, but instead it seemed to stay about the same. Maybe it’s because of the awareness of fake news, or maybe it’s myself shutting it out, but there doesn’t appear to be a change in the number of “news” outlets trying to take advantage of the fringe.
- Electronic car growth? Correct. This is the beginning of this industry so it will only continue to grow, even if there are some hiccups along the way.
- Decreasing cable subscriptions? Correct. The trend continues. This one was a gimme and there was no surprise even if there was significant sadness over Network Neutrality.
- 5G cable alternative? Incorrect. This didn’t happen this year, but it could still happen. And since Network Neutrality was tragically struck down, I really hope that it would.
7/10.
While the incorrect prediction of a 5G cable alternative was really just a personal pipe-dream, I’m happy there wasn’t a new or escalated Eastern European conflict and that seemingly there aren’t even more small disingenuous media outlets.
I’m interested to see what 2018 brings. There were jokes about 2016 being terrible and then 2017 was somehow worse. I’m both hopeful for 2018 and worried that the chaos we’re seeing will only increase. Predictions for 2018 to come.
