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Robert X. Cringely Weighs in on 2006 183

Posted by Zonk from the npr-as-prognosticator dept.
Simon80 writes "With the beginning of a new year coming another set of 15 predictions from Robert X. Cringely as to how the tech world will shape up in 2006, preceded by a review of how his 2005 predictions turned out. Most of this year's predictions cover well known tech companies, with a few that are about specific technologies like WiMax, media center PCs, and VOIP."
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Robert X. Cringely Weighs in on 2006 More

Robert X. Cringely Weighs in on 2006

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  • Ah, the ABM treaty... (Score:4, Insightful)

    by smittyoneeach ( 243267 ) * on Friday January 13, 2006 @09:44PM (#14468992) Homepage Journal
    The Anything But Microsoft (ABM) treaty will be greatly served if this pans out...
    Apple won't offer versions of OS X for generic Intel hardware because the drivers and the support obligation would be too huge. But just as you can buy a shrink-wrapped copy of 10.4 for your iMac, they'll gladly sell you a shrink-wrapped Intel version intended for an Intel Mac, but of course YOU CAN PUT IT ON ANY MACHINE YOU LIKE. The key here is to offer no guarantees and only limited support, patterned on the kind you get for most Open Source packages -- a web site, forums, download section. and a wiki. Apple will help users help themselves. With two to three engineers and some outreach to hackers and hardware makers, Apple could put together an unofficial program that could easily attract two to three million Windows users per year to migrate their old machines to the new OS. Imagine the profit margins of three engineers effectively generating $300-plus million per year in sales.
    Holy balls, that's interesting speculation.
    About the only thing worth doing under 'Doze anymore is running certain peripherals, like the printer and scanner, that are fairly low-usage, with crappy FOSS driver support.
    More intriguing, though, is exposing more people to the FOSS tradition of helping people without picking their pockets.
    Not everyone is going to get all excited: plenty of users prefer the automatic-transmission feel of these commercial GUI offerings, but some will be seduced by the manual transmission sexiness of an operating system that doesn't leave the user stupider at logout than at login.
    And, for the truly blessed, there is emacs... ;)

    • Don't bet on Apple loosening their grip... (Score:4, Insightful)

      by Valdrax ( 32670 ) on Friday January 13, 2006 @10:07PM (#14469094)
      Holy balls, that's interesting speculation.

      It's also in my opinion the single most wrong speculation in the entire list. Apple has already demonstrated that they want to keep the system on Apple-only hardware. That's part of the reason for getting TPM chips in the hardware. Ultimately, they'll get hacked, but they'll go after it hard. No matter how much we all say we'd love it if they weren't, Apple is and will always be a hardware company and a company fiercely protective of their intellectual property.

      Just look at how they treat rumors sites.

      I think he's mostly right, though I can't comment on the financial rumors about TiVO & Google. However, betting on plasma TV Macs, pirated beige box Macs, or the "never gonna happen" pipe dreams of the dot-com era -- streaming video and network appliances -- is just a losing proposition. Until network technology improves significantly, streaming video portables are doomed (especially portables with only 802.11b access), and network appliances will never take off when cell phones, laptops, and desktops can do everything they do better.

      • Apple has already demonstrated that they want to keep the system on Apple-only hardware.

        That's not what's coming out of Apple's policy or technical rumor mills, where there are already whispers of various Dell models running 10.4 x86, etc.
        • That's not what's coming out of Apple's policy or technical rumor mills, where there are already whispers of various Dell models running 10.4 x86, etc.

          Is that the release off of the developer machines, or the release that is intended for the just announced MacTels? It's could be a big difference, being that the developer machines are basically off-the-shelf hardware with all the bits you would expect on generic x86 hardware (like the BIOS). The new MacTels are custom hardware, with EFI. Given that, I wou
        • === there are already whispers of various Dell models running 10.4 x86, etc ===
          My memory grows dim, but I IIRC I first heard those rumours in 1986. I would be willing to bet that Apple has had versions of its OS' running on every major platform in the lab. Doesn't mean they ever do anything with them, much less release them.

          sPh

      • Apple is probably right to restrict it. Yes, they could make a lot of money selling OS-X for regular PCs, but it would be terrible for their hardware sales.
        • No, it could go the other way - current Mac users won't use anything else and Apple will make a mint from people who want a real OS. Huge numbers of people will try it out because friends recommended it and they can still keep XP just in case something goes wrong. They'll fall in love but will be frustrated by their old hardware and will make a real Mac their next computer purchase. Something similar happened with the iPod and its quality outshines the competition far less than OSX does XP.
          • I'm going for you're both right/wrong. Like other things Apple has done (i.e. Fairplay), it's hackable, but not easily, and not for the average user. The difficulty is that Apple makes money on *both* the hardware and software. If they had their way, everyone would just buy Macs, and that would be the end of it.

            However, they have to know releasing an Intel version will break this hardware/software relationship a bit. They've had an Intel version from day 1, why release now? Because it's now polished enough
          • "They'll fall in love but ..."

            Yes, but. Actually, I have to wonder about that. Will they faill in love with a system that only half works and doesn't support their system/video card/camera/printer/scanner/whatever? Which is what I'd expect if you install OS X on "unsupported" hardware, as the article suggests.

      • Call me a cynic, but I halfway suspect that the position is something of a "forbidden fruit" advertising campaign: manage support costs by officially refusing something, so that people are on their own dime for doing it.
        'Twould seem to have nice legal side-effects, as well: "Your Honor, the EULA saith, with the utmost clarity: 'Thou shalt not run this software product on any unclean hardware, yea, even that which is despised of Steve Jobs, having been touched by the finger of evil extended from that pit o

    • Re:Ah, the ABM treaty... (Score:5, Funny)

      by iggy_mon ( 737886 ) on Friday January 13, 2006 @10:07PM (#14469099) Homepage
      And, for the truly blessed, there is emacs... ;)

      well, i don't like nazi/spelling whores as much as the next guy, but i thing you forgot the "v" and the "i" in that atrocious spelling of yours ;^) --iggy
    • About the only thing worth doing under 'Doze anymore is running certain peripherals, like the printer and scanner, that are fairly low-usage, with crappy FOSS driver support.

      Printers and scanners work fine as long as you buy them from companies that actually support open source, like HP [sourceforge.net]. My last printer and scanner were from Canon, and they worked fine as well.
      • Oh, my HP-6110 and -1320nw both print well enough under Linux, but the fact is that the scanning for the former, and duplex/booklet printing on either, is problematic. Actually, the HP software under Windows doesn't work that well, either--the concept of admin/user accounts seems to have escaped the vendors, as well as the user base.
        This is not a troll: I'm a happy Gentoo/GNUEmacs user. Hardware drivers are unsexy, and will probably never be as good in a FOSS setting, although they'll converge over time.
    • Ok, I hate to say it, but I have six Macs and four IBM PCs. I used to try to get my Macs to run Windoze and Linux at the same time. Never could get it to do that and couldn't afford the really expensive Macs. WindowsXP does do this. Even with all of the other problems, handicaps, and whatnots that M$ puts into WindowsXP - the people at Cygwin [cygwin.com] have put together a great version of Linux for the average user to use. And if you work at it long enough and hard enough you can get Basilisk II [gibix.net] up and running a

      • the people at Cygwin [cygwin.com] have put together a great version of Linux for the average user to use

        Cygwin is not a "version of Linux". Cygwin provides a fairly miserly bash implementation and a bunch of common UNIX programs (cp,mv,ls,ssh,ln,du,rm [...]).

        'Linux' is a kernel development [kernel.org] project. The GNU/Linux operating system is the combination of this Linux kernel, and a bunch of Unix-like tools, a few of which are available to you in Cygwin. A "Distribution of Linux" (as they're commonly referred to

        • Picky, picky, picky. :-)

          Whether it implements the full Linux distribution or just does the shell - it is a great way to introduce Linux to Windows people and it gives me everything I need in order to produce programs that will work under Linux on a Windows box.

          Me thinks you are being a bit too literal. :-)
          • You are missing the point. Cygwin is a POSIX compatibility library and a bundled set of (primarily-GNU) utilities. It also includes things like an X server. These same utilities can also run on top of a Linux kernel, a BSD kernel, a Solaris kernel, etc. The one part of the common Free Software stack that they don't include is Linux.

            The Linux kernel is a tiny part of a Free Software system. Many of us manage to run 100% Free Software systems without Linux. Of the five machines I use regularly, three r

    • The key here is to offer no guarantees and only limited support, patterned on the kind you get for most Open Source packages -- a web site, forums, download section. and a wiki..

      Windows users have no interest in looking under the hood. The hobbyist model sells OSX as an alternative to Linux, not Windows.

      • Windows users have no interest in looking under the hood. The hobbyist model sells OSX as an alternative to Linux, not Windows.

        Wrong.

        There are a goodly portion of Windows users who like to understand their OS: folk who sort out the C: Drive and play with the command prompt or fill MSDN and MVPs.com with all sorts of odd things.

        They don't use Linux because Linux doesn't do what they need it to do--or, to put it another way, because it's too different from Windows and not enough better to re-learn what they k

    • A run-from-cd (or run-from-dvd, more likely) version of MacOS has to be technically possible. How long before someone hacks one up and it starts to get noticed around the 'net? What will Apple's response be? Of course their official response will be 'stomp on it hard', but what will their real response be?

      A disk which you could shove into a vanilla PC which gave users a flavour of MacOS but which for some reason couldn't be fully installed onto the PC and so always ran at 'run-from-cd' speed would actuall

      • run-from-cd speed on any of my PCs would probably be a damned sight faster than the Mac Mini speed, which runs like a snail.

        I just need to boot OSX to create the OSX binaries of software, then it's off again (just don't like the GUI, sorry zealots). A run from CD that could be run on a reasonably powerful box would be ideal.
    • hell, we could just drop it to jobs inbox. Who will?

  • Lots of Apple, Google and No Linux? (Score:3, Interesting)

    by adam.conf ( 893668 ) on Friday January 13, 2006 @09:46PM (#14468998)
    Sounds like he expects '06 to see properietary gain on OSS. Thats a prediction that I both think is false, but also, for the sake of the computing world as a whole, hope proves false. 2006 (imho) actually does have the potential to be a great year for the linux desktop, assuming that a big hardware company (Dell, HP, anyone) gives it a chance (a novice-oriented linux desktop like Linspire has the potential to get users aquainted w/ OSS and GNU/Linux, and allows them to easily move on up to more advanced distros). Lets hope '06 doesn't live up to Cringely's expectations.

    • Comment removed (Score:5, Insightful)

      by account_deleted ( 4530225 ) on Friday January 13, 2006 @11:34PM (#14469418)
      Comment removed based on user account deletion
      • I think there's one way to get GNU and Linux on the desktop. Probably it wants someone with a lot of money who really truly believes in free software, and wants everyone to be able to enjoy the benefits without incurring the costs.

        J. Random & Company develops hardware comparable to Apple's in the sense that it's fancy and high quality and all there. The Company also releases its own distribution of GNU on Linux that is decently complete and usable: Perhaps somewhat like Ubuntu, but they will invest mone

    • Re:Lots of Apple, Google and No Linux? (Score:5, Informative)

      by westlake ( 615356 ) on Friday January 13, 2006 @11:37PM (#14469430)
      2006 (imho) actually does have the potential to be a great year for the linux desktop, assuming that a big hardware company (Dell, HP, anyone) gives it a chance (a novice-oriented linux desktop like Linspire has the potential to get users aquainted w/ OSS and GNU/Linux

      Walmart has tried every varient of OEM Linux known to man and not one has caught fire. There is little or nothing out there to drive aftermarket sales, a poison pill in the retail market.

      • But with Dell putting Linux on its desktops and laptops, _corporate_ interest will be triggered. They is where the big money at one shot market is, and that drives retail.

        Linux on the corporate desktop != Linux on the home user desktop !- Linux on the gaming desktop.

    • I'd be interested to hear from /.ers just what everyone thinks would actually amount to a "great year" for Linux on the desktop.

      I'm a bit of a Mac fanboy, but from my perspective, Linux had a pretty damn fine year in 2005. Ubuntu is a story all by itself, and there are plenty of other distros that had a good ride last year (Mandrake and Mepis come immediately to mind). KDE got visionary and Gnome got even leaner. SUSE opened up.

      There were some big deployments, and it's now obvious that developing nations

    • I think that getting normal windows users to use Open Source software is the way to go.

      I see all sorts of ads in the local paper for local computer shops and resellers selling those "all-in-one" packages (the ones that have printer, scanner, internet and a big pile of software). They almost always include some funky office suite and other programs (generally something I have never heard of outside the ads).
      Why not include OpenOffice instead of this other one (which probobly costs them money they could save

  • Might as well be a Palm Reader (Score:5, Insightful)

    by xXBondsXx ( 895786 ) on Friday January 13, 2006 @09:50PM (#14469017)
    I like most of this guy's article, but some of the things he says are too vague, and anyone with common sense would say the same things. For example:

    I was right when I said AMD would give Intel further fits.
    Two huge companies in dead competition would give each other fits? Obviously that is bound to happen on some degree over the course of the year. Also, he never really defined "fits", just some kind of conflict that is bound to happen when two major corporations are competing in the same market.

    I predicted the RIAA would continue to sue music lovers and they have, despite the fact that it doesn't help anyone and actually hurts everyone to do so.
    What would the RIAA do, stop suing? I don't know of any other way to prosecute violators of copyright law besides offing them like the mafia. Again vague and full of common sense.

    Cringely (the author) did make some great predictions that came true this year (e.g. PS3, VoIP, TV networks embracing video downloads). I think I might have read his article last year and enjoyed it also. Personally, I would like to see a lower accuracy rate and less vague predictions. However, most people will be fooled like customers to a palm reader
    • I like most of this guy's article, but some of the things he says are too vague, and anyone with common sense would say the same things.

      Cringly's predictions remind me of something I heard years ago on a radio talk show. The host would save all the psycic predictions he could find during the year and grade them. Not surprisingly, most of them had few, if any correct. However, one of his frequent callers scored over 80% with predictions like, "The results of this year's presidential election will astoni

    • His predictions aren't as vague and common sense as you make them out to be:

      "I was right when I said AMD would give Intel further fits.

      Two huge companies in dead competition would give each other fits? Obviously that is bound to happen on some degree over the course of the year. Also, he never really defined "fits", just some kind of conflict that is bound to happen when two major corporations are competing in the same market.      "

      How can you assume that they would continue to be competitive throughout the
      • It becomes even more ironic when you think that we're really talking about a *publishing* business, and their BIGGEST concern is to prevent "publication" of their work.

        It's all about trying to slam the lid on Eric Raymond's Magic Cauldron.
      • How can you assume that they would continue to be competitive throughout the next year? What if one makes a huge blunder and the other pulls ahead? What if one comes out with a great new product and thoroughly trounces the other's sales? If you knew they were going to remain competitive into the next year, you have foresight into the future that many would envy.

        Apparently, you missed GP's point. Your "what if" questions could be turned into interesting and at least semi-specific predictions. As it stan

    • Re:Might as well be a Palm Reader (Score:5, Interesting)

      by lawpoop ( 604919 ) on Friday January 13, 2006 @10:56PM (#14469283) Homepage Journal
      Let me make an addendum. I don't think Cringely's predictions are vague. They are black-and-white -- either "Status Quo" or "Change". In the examples you listed, Cringely correctly predicted "Status Quo" for both Intel/AMD competition and the RIAA suing people. (Sure, you can make this predictions by flipping a coin, but if Cringely gave reasons for why he thought the status quo would continue, it shows he understands what's actually going on, instead of happening to be right by chance. )

      If this predictions are so easy to make because they are based on common sense, I would like to see your predictions for the future. Pick out two or three issues or events going on today, and choose either "Status Quo" or "Change". Also give the reasons why you made your choice -- then next year we will know if you won or lost by chance or your understanding of the situation. If you are feeling extra common-sensical, you could predict exactly what the change would be in the case that you predict change.

      Or, perhaps you are arguing that predicting "Status Quo" is a safe, common-sensical prediction, because people are creatures of habit and avoid change at all costs. That would be common-sensical ;)

      If that's the case, it's no big deal if Cringely correctly predicted "Status Quo". That's a common sense, safe bet. If we really want to see how good Cringely is, we should look at where he predicted change, and how close his prediction was to what the world actually changed to.

      If you predict change for any human or group-driven project, such as a company, you are essentially saying that the decision makers will apprehend the future as being so bad that they will decide to change their paradigm for moving forward and take a risk on a new plan. It's a pretty bold prediction to make.
      • The argument is that his status quo predictions are pointless and are only there to raise his score. In the case of AMD/Intel, he may as well have put "sky will continue to be blue".
        • "The argument is that his status quo predictions are pointless and are only there to raise his score."

          OK, but why are they pointless? Are they pointless because they are so easy to get right? If that's the case, why are they so easy to get right?
    • You must be joking. Only someone with Cringely's connections and insight could forecast things like:

      Google will continue to roll out new products and services

      RTFA and dream of the day you are this good.

      adéu,
      Mateu

      PS I predict that Cringely will continue to roll out new predictions and columns

  • Oh yeah? (Score:3, Funny)

    by sparkydevil ( 261897 ) on Friday January 13, 2006 @09:51PM (#14469024)
    Did you hear about the clairvoyant's convention?

    It was cancelled due to unforseen circumstances.

  • One prediction I hope he gets right... (Score:5, Funny)

    by tktk ( 540564 ) on Friday January 13, 2006 @09:55PM (#14469044)
    "My final score was 10 correct and five incorrect, for a dismal 66 percent -- my worst showing EVER. Could my job be in danger?"

    We can only hope.

  • One wrong, at least. (Score:5, Interesting)

    by AKAImBatman ( 238306 ) <akaimbatman@gmCHICAGOail.com minus city> on Friday January 13, 2006 @09:59PM (#14469057) Homepage Journal
    Google will continue to roll out new products and services as it builds out its infrastructure for a huge push in 2007. They'll need money, of course, so I predict a supplemental stock offering timed with a 20-to-1 stock split.

    I already know this one is wrong. Page believes in keeping the stock priced out of the range of the average investor as a way of preventing the company from becoming too focused on the individual quarterly returns. They're not splitting, plain and simple.

  • One Laptop per Child (Score:5, Interesting)

    by bstadil ( 7110 ) on Friday January 13, 2006 @10:08PM (#14469102) Homepage
    Between 5 and 15 Million units of the One Laptop per child is supposed to ship in 2006 getting ready for 100-150Mu in 2007. I think he should have mentioned the expected succes or failure of this program. If successful it will make Linux the #1 client OS, surpassing Windows and totally change the tech dynamics in 2/3 of the world. FYI 2005 shipments of Laptops was 42MU.
    • If successful it will make Linux the #1 client OS, surpassing Windows and totally change the tech dynamics in 2/3 of the world.

      Those aren't the numbers that matter for 2006. The main reason operating system market share matters is because people build products on top of these platforms. The buying power of the target recipients of these $100 laptops is very low because they are poor and they are children.

      The OLPC project will be very influential on the future, however. The main goal of the project in t

      • Those aren't the numbers that matter for 2006. The main reason operating system market share matters is because people build products on top of these platforms. The buying power of the target recipients of these $100 laptops is very low because they are poor and they are children.

        Two things:

        1. A black market in OLPC machines is going to develop very quickly indeed. In third world countries where most people are denied access to technology these are going to become highly desired items, and many of those

    • Comment removed (Score:5, Informative)

      by account_deleted ( 4530225 ) on Saturday January 14, 2006 @06:32AM (#14470375)
      Comment removed based on user account deletion

      • Re:One Laptop per Child (Score:2, Insightful)

        by Anonymous Coward
        Those countries don't need computers and universities. They need food, stable currencies, no war, a fair legal system, and less state, taxes, regulations, and corruption. Then they'll find out how much education they'll need, and they'll be able to build that education themselves in a way that fits their needs.

        Poor and uneducated people need access to information and education before they can realize more effective food production, stable currencies, peace through trade, a fair legal system, and reduced gov

      • Re:One Laptop per Child (Score:4, Interesting)

        by grcumb ( 781340 ) on Saturday January 14, 2006 @08:59PM (#14473379) Homepage Journal

        "Those countries don't need computers and universities. They need food, stable currencies, no war, a fair legal system, and less state, taxes, regulations, and corruption."

        [Sorry, I'm normally a lot more restrained than this, but I'm just sick of responding to this same stupid point time after time. Mod me down if you must.]

        What is this, the latest Fox news fabulum? I'm going to go crazy if I have to answer this stupid, binary logic many more times. There is absolutely nothing insightful or informative about this half-formed ignorance.

        Look, every time someone suggests computers might be useful in the developing world, some pontificator comes out with the observation that they need some shopping list of 'more pragmatic' things, like food, housing etc. But how the fuck, I would like to know, is that ever going to happen if the country doesn't have an educated populace and a decent communications infrastructure? And how the fuck are they going to do that in the modern age without ubiquitous computer technology?

        It makes me sick to see people who don't seem to know jack shit about life in the developing world spouting these inane opinions. It makes me sicker when these same rationalisations actually get used to block the progress that some of us are trying to make in this regard. Do you know what it's like to sit down with the head of a national foreign aid program and to see him react with surprise when I suggested that development here might be made easier if they put some effort into improving education and communications capacity?

        Next time someone trots out this stale old chestnut, please consider that it is, occasionally, possible to walk and chew bubble-gum, at thew same time. Hunger reduction, human rights, housing etc. can actually be accompanied - and saints preserve us, improved - with better education and communications.

  • Dangerous predictions? (Score:4, Funny)

    by Mr. Flibble ( 12943 ) on Friday January 13, 2006 @10:15PM (#14469127) Homepage
    My final score was 10 correct and five incorrect, for a dismal 66 percent -- my worst showing EVER. Could my job be in danger?

    I dunno Robert, with the hit rate you normally have on predictions, I don't think this is a prediction you want in your 2006 list!

  • No and Don't Know (Score:4, Interesting)

    by Quirk ( 36086 ) on Friday January 13, 2006 @10:16PM (#14469128) Homepage Journal
    I was wrong when I saw significant progress for desktop Linux, which was wishful thinking.

    Ubuntu

    4) Enough about Apple. Google will continue to roll out new products and services as it builds out its infrastructure for a huge push in 2007. They'll need money, of course, so I predict a supplemental stock offering timed with a 20-to-1 stock split. 2006 is a building year for Google.

    I don't know on this one. By coincidence I was recently coddling, Yesh my preciousisess, my worn copy of Security Analysis: Principles and Technique [amazon.com] by Benjamin Graham, David L. Dodd, Sidney Cottle, Charles Tatham. This is the goto book on investment fundamentals, that guy Warrant Buffy, or something like that, you know the guy who owns the Hathaway shirt company, learned the basics of investment from this book. IMHO there is no way to go about investing without first coming to terms with the knowledge contained in 'Security Analysis: Principles and Technique'. But I'm unsure as to how B. Graham would have parsed Google stocks. In 60's parlance Google would be a go-go stock and might have been shunned by Graham. Also I'm unsure as to Buffet's take on Google. Does the Berkshire Hathaway fund hole any Google stock? Maybe Google will split when the Berkshire Hathaway fund splits. :)

    • "I was wrong when I saw significant progress for desktop Linux, which was wishful thinking."

      "Ubuntu"

      I haven't kept up. How many millions of people installed Ubuntu in 05?
    • I was wrong when I saw significant progress for desktop Linux, which was wishful thinking.

      It depends on what he calls significant progress. If he is only looking at marketshare growing rapidly then he was right. If he was looking at a big vendor with an established channel getting behind desktop Linux then again he was right. (Novell Linux Desktop) [novell.com] Only if he predicted Linux taking a significant chunk of Windows share away would he be wrong. For that to have happened, desktop Linux would have had to grown

    • Buffet was pretty well known for shunning tech stocks - he claimed he wouldn't invest in anything he didn't understand.

  • the score card 1 year early (Score:5, Interesting)

    by ministerofsickeningr ( 524980 ) on Friday January 13, 2006 @10:17PM (#14469137) Homepage
    This one is easy: Apple will eventually announce all the products they were supposed to have announced at this week's MacWorld show, but didn't, including a bunch of media content deals, a huge expansion of .Mac to one TERABYTE per month of download capacity per user, a new version of the Front Row DVR application, and two new Intel Macs with huge plasma displays, but with keyboards and mice as options -- literally big-screen TVs that just happen to be computers, too.

    all information that has been on the rumor sites for months.

    2) The reason Apple changed its MacWorld announcements at the last minute was because the company sued little Burst.com a few days before, trying to invalidate the Burst patents. But since Apple sued Burst, Burst shares have gone UP by 30 percent. The market is rarely wrong. Suing Burst was an enormous mistake for Apple, casting a pall on their video strategy and potentially costing the company strategic alliances with networks and movie studios. Apple realizes this now and is struggling internally to find a way to change course and put a positive spin on the course correction. Apple will lose and Burst will win, and Apple won't be able to afford to wait for the courts to decide anything, since time is critical in staking out Internet video turf. I predict that Apple will eventually take a license from Burst, that is UNLESS SOME OTHER COMPANY (Google? Real? Yahoo?) doesn't snatch up Burst first.

    mmmmaybe. but would apple jeapordise their macworld address in this timeline? do the head and the tail not talk anymore? doubtful..

    3) But Apple WILL make some inroads against Microsoft. The new Intel Macs will run Windows XP unofficially, and Apple Support acknowledges that they are only days from running XP officially, too. So Apple finally has a solid argument why Windows-centric companies and homes should consider trying a Mac. The best case, though, says that Apple sells an additional million units, which aren't enough for Steve Jobs, so I see him going into a kind of stealth competition with Microsoft.

    old news. been beaten here and on other websites to death.

    4) Enough about Apple. Google will continue to roll out new products and services as it builds out its infrastructure for a huge push in 2007. They'll need money, of course, so I predict a supplemental stock offering timed with a 20-to-1 stock split. 2006 is a building year for Google.

    bzzt! i doubt the google split will happen. they have lost traction on a few efforts last year, and are supposedly growing. diversity growth != profit ergo != rising stock prices.

    5) Still no good news for Sun. Those Galaxy servers are very nice, but they aren't enough to support the company and Eric Schmidt is too smart (I hope) to bail out his old firm.

    man. i hear a lot of fish in that barrel. sun has been on the hardware ropes for what, 3 years now?

    6) IBM will get in trouble with its customers as it becomes clear that Sam Palmisano didn't learn much, if anything, from Lou Gerstner. Gerstner's fat-cutting is long forgotten, so all IBM knows how to cut these days is customer service.

    *shrug* IBM is cost competitive in the low end.. they seem to be making money and are still on the short list of "laptops that just work"

    7) Microsoft still sucks at security and users suffer for it. My best guess is they are planning on putting all this new technology in the "next" operating system, which seems to be yet another year behind schedule. The important question the world will soon be asking -- "Do we need another Windows operating system?" In 2006, Windows XP gets another service pack and/or facelift. Nothing more.

    ZzZZzzzZZ... oh sorry you were saying something?

    8) Sony's PS3 hits the market with a dearth of games. Howard Stringer loses his job, not because of the game problems but because he's undermined by the Japanese parts of his company. But there is good news for Sony, too. Interne

    • This you call scorecard!? This is nothing but a bunch of fluff commentary, hedging, hawing and hemming. Very different from actually making a preditction.
      Here's my review of your scorecard:
      1. " "all information that has been on the rumor sites for months."
        So are you predicting that all these rumors will come true? Rumors aren't destiny you know. And there are other rumors that he didn't predict, note you.
      2. " mmmaybe....doubtful.."
        Not a prediction nor a scoring of a prediction.
      3. " old news. been beaten
    • '... microsoft doesnt make PC's FYI, so how could they compete with making PC's? ...'

      xbox [google.com.au] perhaps? Read here [pbs.org] for more why.

    • 6) IBM will get in trouble with its customers as it becomes clear that Sam Palmisano didn't learn much, if anything, from Lou Gerstner. Gerstner's fat-cutting is long forgotten, so all IBM knows how to cut these days is customer service.

      *shrug* IBM is cost competitive in the low end.. they seem to be making money and are still on the short list of "laptops that just work"

      Except that IBM doesn't make or sell laptops any more [theregister.co.uk].

  • Did anyone else read this as... (Score:2, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward
    ... Robert X. Cringely Weighs in AT 2006?! Sure, we all break our resolutions sometime in January, but for Pete's sake, we're not even halfway through the month!

  • For 2006 (Score:4, Funny)

    by LesPaul75 ( 571752 ) on Friday January 13, 2006 @10:34PM (#14469198) Journal
    I predict that his web page will be really awful looking, with weird lime green colors and that the text will be shifted too far over to the left, so that black line slices right through the first letter of each paragraph. And BOOOM, just like that, I'm one for one (100%) for 2006.
    • I predict your browser rendered that website wrong cause the text doesn't overlap a black line here. BOOM. I'm also 100% for 2006.
  • That's some good plasma crack he's smokinng. He has some crazy predictions, but this is pure, weapons-grade bolognium.

    Yeah. Apple plasma TVs. That's plasma, people. With Apple, with a Mac mini in a huge display.

    When does the iPod nano with integrated, non-detachable domicile come out?

  • "Network Appliance" (Score:5, Funny)

    by Cr0w T. Trollbot ( 848674 ) on Friday January 13, 2006 @10:57PM (#14469285)
    The next big consumer market will be a network computing appliance.

    My prediction of three things we'll see before "network computing" being the next big consumer computer market:

    1. Practical Cold Fusion on your desktop.
    2. Rush Limbaugh and Michael Moore co-hosting a telethon for gay dyslexic evengelical gun-owning welfare cheats.
    3. Monkeys flying out of Robert X. Cringley's butt.

    Crow T. Trollbot

  • My take : Bob is taking too many gimmes! (Score:3, Insightful)

    by gone.fishing ( 213219 ) on Friday January 13, 2006 @11:01PM (#14469303) Journal
    1) This one is easy: Apple will eventually announce all the products they were supposed to have announced at this week's MacWorld show, but didn't, including a bunch of media content deals, a huge expansion of .Mac to one TERABYTE per month of download capacity per user, a new version of the Front Row DVR application, and two new Intel Macs with huge plasma displays, but with keyboards and mice as options -- literally big-screen TVs that just happen to be computers, too.

    Agree but this doesn't really count. There has been so much talk of this on the rumor sites that it is just a "gimme."

    2) The reason Apple changed its MacWorld announcements at the last minute was because the company sued little Burst.com a few days before, trying to invalidate the Burst patents. But since Apple sued Burst, Burst shares have gone UP by 30 percent. The market is rarely wrong. Suing Burst was an enormous mistake for Apple, casting a pall on their video strategy and potentially costing the company strategic alliances with networks and movie studios. Apple realizes this now and is struggling internally to find a way to change course and put a positive spin on the course correction. Apple will lose and Burst will win, and Apple won't be able to afford to wait for the courts to decide anything, since time is critical in staking out Internet video turf. I predict that Apple will eventually take a license from Burst, that is UNLESS SOME OTHER COMPANY (Google? Real? Yahoo?) doesn't snatch up Burst first. Here's something I've noticed lately: Big companies believe in patents as long as they are talking about THEIR patents. Because Burst is three guys in an office in Santa Rosa, companies like Microsoft and Apple tend not to take them seriously. They forget that Burst spent 21 years and $66 million developing that IP, and the company has code that is still better than anything else on the market -- code not even Microsoft has seen. Unless someone buys the company first, Burst is going to win this and eventually license the world. They are in the right, for one thing, and in practical terms they now have as much money for legal bills as any of their opponents. Apple can't win this one.

    Agree. Courts seem to be understanding that more money for more lawyers does not make a large company more right than the little guy. Patent defense by little guys will become a growth industry.

    3) But Apple WILL make some inroads against Microsoft. The new Intel Macs will run Windows XP unofficially, and Apple Support acknowledges that they are only days from running XP officially, too. So Apple finally has a solid argument why Windows-centric companies and homes should consider trying a Mac. The best case, though, says that Apple sells an additional million units, which aren't enough for Steve Jobs, so I see him going into a kind of stealth competition with Microsoft. Here's how I believe it will work. Apple won't offer versions of OS X for generic Intel hardware because the drivers and the support obligation would be too huge. But just as you can buy a shrink-wrapped copy of 10.4 for your iMac, they'll gladly sell you a shrink-wrapped Intel version intended for an Intel Mac, but of course YOU CAN PUT IT ON ANY MACHINE YOU LIKE. The key here is to offer no guarantees and only limited support, patterned on the kind you get for most Open Source packages -- a web site, forums, download section. and a wiki. Apple will help users help themselves. With two to three engineers and some outreach to hackers and hardware makers, Apple could put together an unofficial program that could easily attract two to three million Windows users per year to migrate their old machines to the new OS. Imagine the profit margins of three engineers effectively generating $300-plus million per year in sales.

    This is a creative idea, but does not smell like a typical Apple/Jobs move. I'll disagree.

    4) Enough about Apple. Google will continue to roll out new products and service

  • you can flame me if you wish but remember that i told you ahead of time. they are harsh predictions but due to certain sources and readings these are my personal conclusions.. #1. Playstation 3 will not be released in 2006...thats right will NOT.

    #2. Bluetooth technology will suffer from new viruses..major viruses..nothing like the paris hilton fiasco. This will lead way to a technology that will make bluetooth obsolete. watch and see.

    #3. SGI will file for bankruptcy. Mark It.

    Yes these are harsh pre
    • Bluetooth technology will suffer from new viruses..major viruses..nothing like the paris hilton fiasco. This will lead way to a technology that will make bluetooth obsolete. watch and see.

      Huh? "Bluetooth technology" can't be affected by viruses any more than TCP/IP can. Bluetooth devices, maybe. There's absolutely no reason to scrap the technology due to poor implementations, though.

  • Still sticking with my predictions (Score:5, Interesting)

    by argoff ( 142580 ) on Friday January 13, 2006 @11:46PM (#14469462)
    My prediction is still that these predictions won't matter, because the US economy/dollar is in serious troubble and the price of precious metals is going to completely explode. The foundation of these predictions is very simple:

    a) the US economy has way too much debt
    b) there is no way they can pay it off without printing up tons of money
    c) the US economy is extremely efficient which means the adjustment will almost certainly
    be harsh and brutal

    Some other notes:
    1) the dollar survived the 1920's because currency was still backed by precious metals
    2) the dollar survived the inflation of the 80's becuase there wasn't a lot of debt
    3) neither 1 nor 2 apply today, so hold on for the ride of your life when it hits

    • Re:Still sticking with my predictions (Score:4, Interesting)

      by richdun ( 672214 ) on Saturday January 14, 2006 @12:46AM (#14469631)
      Maybe, but one thing bothers me about the current state of the US economy, most specifically the stock market. Post-9/11, there was a huge drop which took close to a year to recover from as fears of terrorism subsided only to meet fears of corporate corruption. Since then, though, unless there is a real commodity movement (especially oil), the market seems to be ignoring the usual political and economic indicators. The market has generally ignored the war in Iraq, and wouldn't have cared about Hurricanes Katrina or Rita if they hadn't hit oil production directly (when Hurricane Wilma moved toward Florida, the market stopped caring about it), even though Katrina especially will incur a huge extra debt on the US government. Earnings problems are affecting individual stocks, but unemployment, GDP growth, etc., don't see to be, at least not as widely or as much as one might expect. It seems like the usual predictors for investor irrationality just aren't working any more - the market exists almost oblivious to or even in spite of world events.

      • Re:Still sticking with my predictions (Score:4, Insightful)

        by argoff ( 142580 ) on Saturday January 14, 2006 @01:32AM (#14469745)
        I think there are two reasons for this, the first is that housing is crashing - so that means that all that money that was going into houses is now looking a lot more seriously at stocks, the second is that the Fed has special team called the PPT [washingtonpost.com] - an internal operation designed to buy huge amounts of equities in the event of emergency ( like say the collapse of refco [independent.co.uk] which makes enron look like a saint ). With 270 trillion with a T derivatives on the line, you can better believe that they won't hesitate to buy stocks as needed. Anyhow, be very carefull about stocks, be it housing or PPT, it's a false market and there is a high probability of being shot down no matter how smart you are. My guess is that whatever the market goes up, gold will go up doubble. If you must play the market, try a pool of precious metal mining stocks like PD, NEM, PAAS, SSRI, GG - for higher risk and profit try ones like TRE and RGLD. ( there is also a gold ETF, GLD - but some experts don't trust it) I think most commodities are in for the long term, but in the event of a large economic meltdown all immediate bets other than precious metals are off.
        • You definitely have something there with housing. Here (Chicago) housing has been running away like there's money everywhere to be plunked down for moderately nice housing in moderately poor neighborhoods - redevelopment or not, new neighborhoods are going to be hard to fill with mid-luxury ($1 million+ single family homes, or $500k condos). While like precious metals and unlike stocks, housing will always be there, I can definitely see a drop in pricing coming very quickly and very hard. The worst part
        • Do you have any recommendations for getting more information about this, websites or newsletters? I'm leaning towards buying either previous minerals or stock in companies like you listed, but I'm relatively new at this and am still looking to educate myself. Any recommendations would be welcome.
    • "because the US economy/dollar is in serious troubble and the price of precious metals is going to completely explode"

      I'll make two comments on this, since this is in the realm of predictions:

      1) You've made several predictions in one sentence, and once doesn't follow from the other. The U.S. economy may be in trouble. But that doesn't mean the dollar will change significantly. However, even if the U.S. economy does poorly, and the dollar tanks, that may not have significant impact on gold/silver/platinum
      • Agreed. Gold speculators have been saying this about gold for years. And while the US economy could be a lot healthier, its not exactly teetering on the brink. There has been a moderate expansion going on for three years now, interest rates are low, inflation is higher than I would like, but still more or less in check, and wages are finally starting to inch their way up.

        The trouble with gold is that it doesn't do very much. It just sits around and is shiney and pretty. If you are so inclined, you can make
        • Investing in the "economic foundation of the economy" isn't going do any good when that economic foundation is being watered down faster than it grows. Stocks, pay, and growth measured in dollars might have gone up over the last few years, but measured in gold or any other commodity have gone absolutely nowhere since 2001. That shiny metal not only looks pretty, but it can't be printed up out of thin air: a 0 percent return on sitting gold is better than a negative return on dollars and bonds. The fact is

      • Maybe they'll have contraction, maybe they'll have inflation. But either way there is less demand for the dollar, so gold goes up. Also, gold was $35/oz in 1970 - so who says it didn't take off. Plus, as you said they had to raise interest rates higher than 16%, but that is to get people out of gold back into dollars - and as I said they can't pull that off now because we have too much debt.
  • Cringely seems in a defensive mood, with rather a dull set of ideas. Predictions are meant to be fun. I don't think it matters whether they are precisely correct. Often, the writer gets the details wrong but the general thrust is entirely accurate. Maybe Cringely should have taken a tip from the ancient Persians and written the piece while blind drunk then rewritten it when sober. Maybe he did, and it's taken until mid-January to get over a monster hang-over.

    The general approach seems to be that 2006 wil
  • I think Cringley might be right on some and wrong on others. He obviously has some very good connections, since he sniffed out that Apple was starting to work on wireless video streaming over a year ago and he might very well be right about Apple killing half the Macworld show due to legal problems with Burst, and I think he's right that Apple will lose. It was probably a mix of Burst's greed for big licensing money and Job's stinginess that broke the discussions about licensing down. But although Jobs can

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