I shall focus on the trend (and technologies) of the so called Internet of Things - the gadget world of devices that have autonomous identification, intelligence of presence, and the ability to be connectable to the Internet (initially through the technologies of RFID and NFC), therefore becoming part of the web sphere of objects, sometimes referred to as IoT and its accompanying architecture, (IoT-A, 2012). This trend was marked as being in the category of 4 to 5 years from market introduction. Examples of this species of devices are implantable, smart parts into larger structures that can feed real-time component information over the web to control apps. This information may consist of internal stresses and external feedback from other parts interconnected to them from the mother structure. One example that was not cited is the present ability to implant mechanical devices into materials to detect real-time stress fractures and anisotropic forces. This would forewarn the central system of materials failure beforehand. This is controllable over the cloud (given adequate security protocols). The next phase in the development of the semantic web, along with the aforementioned expanded IPv6 address space is already able to accommodate these devices and more. This is not a 4 to 5 year innovation. They are, at worse, next year's holiday and industry toys. I think what would qualify as the next species of things on the Internet are truly smart semantic objects on a truly smart semantic web. This would mean devices which when plugged into the web will find their "place" in the universe, (i.e., adapt themselves to a region of connective tissue from other similar devices and then build itself into a new super-structure in order to devise an entirely new "thing" on the Internet). This is the new biology of the hyper-intelligent web. Why doesn't the report capture any new creativity instead of relying on familiar pseudo-futurological gimmicks that can be gleamed from the NY Times or the Wall Street Journal?
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| Hyper-intelligent agent Internet things |
The major methodology of the Horizon Report board in choosing these trends and technologies is a hybrid delphi method of partially renewed group-think that are given certain information on prominent technologies. Some of the board members are from schools that are somewhat local to one of the places that I reside. They are more akin to community colleges and 4-year institutions. I was a bit disappointed by such a selection on their panel. Also, this board seems to select innovative technologies (and trends) based solely on their effect on educational methodologies. What was missing were research and technology gurus and actual innovators, past and present. With that proviso, then one must conclude that such choices for future trends are wholeheartedly educational in focus. In particular, as far as IoT was concerned, no mention of security, privacy, and scalability issues was made. These are major barriers to the deployment of IoT and of a viable IoT-A (IoT-A, 2012). In general, I am not sure this is the best approach to listing future trends of any kind. Educators are oftentimes limited by what they see as cerebral and neurological barriers in penetrating another human brain. They seem to try the same thing over and over again until the student disappears from their classroom. Additionally, who chooses the original materials that the board chooses from? Are these choices biased based on this selected hidden star chamber (the ones that pick the initial offering materials to the board), if you will? The 1 to 2 year innovative trends (and technologies) seem to be already maturing, (i.e., the group's picks are based on phase 2 innovations not pre-innovations).
References
IoT-A (2012). The internet of things - architecture. Retrieved from http://www.iot-a.eu/public/front-page.
Johnson, L., Smith, R., Willis, H., Levine, A., & Haywood, K. (2012). The 2012 Horizon Report. Austin, Texas: The New Media Consortium.
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