How Current Technologies Are Shaping A Promising Future
Manav Singh
Customer Lifecycle Marketing For Work | Future and New Tech Optimism For Life
As some of you might know, I am very positive and excited about the future that we are about to walk into.
A future filled with opportunities, financial independence, and adventure.
A future where everyone will have a fair chance.
A future driven by technologies that will solve some of the biggest problems facing humanity!
Read on if you are interested in Future Technology like I am! If you are not interested, this is going to be a long read. REALLY LONG!
Here is what I think the future has to offer:
Blockchain:
Blockchain is basically a way to manage transactions or data in a decentralized manner where no central authority is involved, and everything runs on a peer-to-peer basis.
Blockchain can provide better data security
Another big upside of blockchain is the 'servitization' of goods. Which is revolutionary.
I think blockchain will enable normal people to become financially free.
Because the rise of IoT and blockchain teamed with AI will help you use everything (your car, your house, or other goods including your phone) as a service, and if you provide that service to others because you can't use it all the time, you'll be paid back for that service in cryptocurrency.?
I was talking to a friend about what the future will look like. And I told him how blockchain can leverage infrastructure (buildings, sidewalks, road lights, etc) using IoT devices to create an enormous network of data that can then be used by autonomous driving vehicles to work in a better symphony.
Right now, self-driving cars share data with each other while driving...to communicate with each other in case they are about to apply brakes, warning the other cars beforehand. But the problem really comes where there's a turn and a vehicle is coming from a position that cannot be specified using the existing sensors. In that case, you can use buildings and their sensors to share data and watch out for those vehicles!
Every time a sensor from your infrastructure will share that data, you will be paid. And that's just one example, there are several similar applications!
At some point, you'll start earning enough that you may not even need to go to work!
If you want to learn all about blockchain, here's a long video to watch!
Energy:
A big problem today is clean and efficient sources of energy.
It is a proven fact that more energy consumption is linked to more prosperity.
That means if energy consumption per capita goes up, prosperity goes up as well.
But the problem really is, most of this energy is coming from fossil fuels, increasing carbon emissions!
It is not clean energy.
Currently, solar energy is the answer to that problem.
We all know Elon Musk has been trying to solve this problem through his company Solar City. And he has come a long way. Their Solar Panels are the most efficient in terms of converting solar energy into electricity.
Slowly, they'll keep getting more and more efficient!
Soon we will have clean solar energy powering our homes and offices, driving up energy consumption which will improve human prosperity without harming nature.
Once we get there, blockchain can play an important role in decentralizing energy management and 'servitizing' it for monetization.
Confused with all the big words?
Imagine this!
Today your solar panel produced more energy than you actually need. Your excess solar energy will automatically be distributed to your neighbor who generated lesser energy that day, and the transaction will be managed on a blockchain network. And you will automatically get paid for sending that extra energy to your neighbor.
Plus there won't be any central authority to collect premiums on every transaction you make!
Not only we'll solve the clean energy problem, but we'll also solve the problem of energy accessibility. Poorest members of the society will be able to afford this in coming years, and they'll make some extra money by selling off their excess energy!
Also, the decentralization of energy is a big, VERY BIG, step. Because most energy right now is centralized. And there have been conspiracy theories saying what if these energy companies or governments just "switch it off". Authoritarian regimes can absolutely do that.
In fact, North Korea is going through a similar crisis due to an authoritarian regime.
Well now you know - it's all going to be decentralized, managed by blockchain, so no authoritarian regime can really "switch it off"...and anyway, you can't switch off the sun. Except at night! (Though there are many other sources of renewable energy than sun!)
Money:
DeFi (Decentralized Finance) is another part of the blockchain, and it is changing the game.
It is taking away the power from central banks, and putting it back in the hands of consumers.
Bitcoin is the first blockchain. Which acts like digital gold, and provides a potential hedge against inflation (I said "potential").
It is trying to become the money that will not lose its purchasing power, and the federal governments can't artificially increase or decrease its supply.
But there are many financial assets than just money that can be decentralized. That's where DeFi comes into picture.
Let's look at one example of DeFi - decentralized exchanges!
DEXes (decentralized exchanges) are now providing insane interest rates (APY) on staking. Some as high as 5000%.
There are a lot of scams and most of these high returns don't hold up as more and more people get in.
But even if they give a 20% return, it is still good enough. Your bank will never do that. They actually charge money (in some countries) to let you have a savings account.
On DEXes, you can stake or farm using your assets (tokens), and they will give out some (relatively crazy) returns every day.
To explain how they are able to do that, we need to understand a bit about how banks work.
Banks basically take your money, accumulate it, and then they move it around (through lending, investing, transacting, etc.).
And they get paid for moving it around (in interest, returns, or transaction fees). You get nothing for that despite the fact that they are leveraging your hard-earned money to earn more money!
With DeFi, you take your money, stake it on a "good" DEX to provide liquidity to the DEX users, and as a result, you get a part of the transaction fees that the DEX charges on each transaction.
So all you did was cut out the middle-man (banks) to start getting a part of the transaction fees as interest.
Not every DEX is the same, and each one is set differently, but I hope you got the point!
You can read and learn more about this by clicking here!
Opportunities like staking and farming are now available to anyone. And I can imagine a future where more and more people will benefit from this. Savings Accounts are a scam!
(Don't jump into DeFi blindly. Otherwise, you will lose a lot of money. My friend Srijan is helping people with navigating DeFi and Crypto space safely. Maybe follow him!)
That was DeFi!
But decentralization is not just coming into finance, it's also coming into the service sector where businesses are not going to be the only entities that can provide services and get paid for them. Each individual will have that power.
You will be able to use your belongings - including your car, house, and even your mobile phone - to earn money (as we discussed above in the 'Blockchain' section).
Because everything you have can be used by someone else when you are not using it.
Till now this was hard to do because there wasn't a way to connect buyers with the seller in a decentralized manner (we needed middle-men like Uber, Amazon, etc).
But now, IoT and blockchain will enable this.
Imagine you don't need your Tesla when you are at work. Well, connect it with a blockchain marketplace, and it will drive off (or should I say "self-drive off") to them when someone in the neighborhood will need it.
You will get paid for it.
And you will literally make money while sleeping or sitting at work (Hope you don't sleep at work)!
It all ties back into what I mentioned above with excess solar energy management, and autonomous vehicles using infrastructure to gather data. Everything - almost everything - you own will become monetizable!
Everyone will have access to decentralized networks where they can list their belongings as a service and get paid in cryptocurrency.
Almost everything will turn into a cash-flowing asset.
There are large-scale applications of the same technology as well!
Like Balaji Srinivasan visualizes network cities where we can measure the value of cities by using blockchain and linking cryptocurrencies with each city - we can re-vote the politicians back into power only if their term increased the value of the city.
This will just become more of a reality as technologies like IoT, AI, and blockchain develop and converge further.
The Crypto revolution is more than just a volatile market with inflated gains and extreme losses.
Crypto is basically value exchange on steroids.
Till now we only depended upon money (dollars) to exchange value. But now we'll not only be able to do so using cryptocurrencies, but we'll be able to assign a monetary value to almost anything (Balaji took it to another level by doing it with cities).
We are looking towards a great revolution that is about to create financial freedom like never before
I'm not saying the wealth divide will reduce, because some people will always out-innovate others and they'll be rewarded for it. But no one will have to worry about putting food on the table.?
They can literally retire on the income that their belongings will produce.
Farming:
If we think about farming, it's pretty inefficient.
It's a statistical fact that if every farm in the world becomes as efficient as a farm in the US, we'll be able to give land, worth India's size, back to nature.
With AI and robotics, we are about to get there!
We are already seeing robots that use AI to recognize weeds, and can precisely spray herbicides on them without damaging the crop plants.
This will help with saving a lot of money on labor and herbicides so we can focus our labor and energy on growing more food. Enough for everyone.
There are even more technologies like hydroponics that can grow crops in a controlled environment (without soil). You can literally live in a dessert and grow food!
This decreases the potential of pest attacks and other uncontrollable environmental factors ruining the crops.
You will be able to turn just one of your rooms into a hydroponics farm, and it will provide enough food for everyone in the family (and maybe a little extra for your neighbors)!
The technology is already there and some people are already doing it. It is just very hard to get it right! But soon we'll be able to standardize a lot of it, making it ready for mass adoption.
The point is, food will be in good supply, and everyone will have enough money through passive cashflows (as we discussed in the "money" section). No one will really need to worry about food and survival.
For the first time in history, we'll be able to truly move beyond survival to start thriving!
Housing:
The housing market is overlooking a major disruption.
We already have robotic machine arms that can lay bricks and build a wall (tag Donald Trump!), but with 3D printers, we won't need those machines.
Just find a good interior and exterior designer, choose your dream house, and get it 3D printed faster and cheaper than what normal traditional housing costs!
To 3D print a house, it only costs $4000 dollars, with an area of 600 sq. ft. - which is as big as a 1 BHK flat and can last up to 50 years.
They can be printed in, as fast as, 24-48 hours. No kidding - it's already tested and done!
Metaverse:
There's a lot of hype about Metaverse nowadays, especially after Mark Zuckerberg made his announcement.
Metaverse is yet another Cryptocurrency+Blockchain+NFT+VR phenomenon.
Metaverse is basically another world on the internet.
You can go there, play games, interact with others, have office meetings, buy digital real estate, build a virtual house, have your own avatars, do trade and commerce using cryptocurrency.
Almost everything that you can do in real-world will be possible in the metaverse.
There are VR headsets that are used to provide a totally immersive experience, making you feel like you are actually there.
If you have watched the movie "Ready Player One", then you know what is coming!
Marketing:
Because I am a marketer, some people have been asking me - "what will happen to marketing with all this new technology coming up?"
I want to quickly answer that question here.
I think marketing for general day-to-day products will be gone, thanks to IoT.
Your refrigerator will be smart enough to know which company has the best quality of milk. And it will automatically know when you have only 1/3rd of the milk left. So your refrigerator will directly order the best milk available at the cheapest cost through some retail blockchain!
Then a drone will deliver it to your home where your robot will pick it up and stack it in the refrigerator.
So not much space for marketing there. You will have to seek partnerships with IoT companies to favor your products on their system.
But majorly, you'll have to become an IoT company.
Just like early internet days.
No one thought they will have to market their business online and in order to do that, they'll also have to become a media company and create a lot of content!
Same way, people may not realize it now, but if you are selling physical products, you might have to become an IoT company and supply the necessary gadgets that will give your products a preference.
Imagine you sell clothes. But normal clothes won't work. The future is community and hyper-personalization.
So you'll probably sell to a niche market, like vegans. And you'll have to deliver each piece of clothing that has personalized fitting and design. And product delivery will have to be wrapped around providing a great customer experience.
Here is how it will work: If your prospects like your community appeal and product, they will sign up for a subscription. As soon as they pay, you will send them a camera and an AR projector that will be mounted on their wardrobe.
Now let's say they want to buy a suit for an upcoming party.
They will stand in front of the wardrobe and ask Alexa to open the wardrobe so they can place their order.
As soon as Alexa hears the command, their wardrobe will open and the camera and projector will pop out.
They will turn around so the camera can take their measurements using an AI software (we already have mobile apps that can use cameras to measure something).
Then their avatar will pop out of the AR projector showing them what the finished product will look like on them. They can make a few customizations there in case they don't like something.
As soon as they are happy with their selection, they can tell Alexa to place this order.
Their order will be placed. And money will automatically get debited from their crypto wallet after the camera scans their retina for security verification.
Then Alexa will tell them that "your order will be delivered on 26th June 2035".
"Shit! But the party is on 20th June 2035!"
Don't worry. Calling blockchain for rescue! They can just pay a little more to swap their delivery spot with someone else who's early in the line!
Everything is done now! A drone will fly in before the 20th of June to drop off their package.
Their robot will then stack their new clothes in their wardrobe - "Enjoy your party"!
You see, marketing is here to stay, but it will be very different than what it is today.
The very immediate future of marketing is communities. Build engaged communities and you'll be able to sell anything you want.
The long-term future of marketing is innovative products + customer experience + community
Robots are not going to take over. Which means humans will be the ones leading them. So we'll still have to convince humans to buy things that they might need.
Though, the platforms of marketing will change.
We won't be running ads on Social Media.
We'll buy or rent land in the metaverse where we can build immersive VR experiences of our shops, offices, and products. The customer will be able to walk into our virtual stores, try our products, and buy them there.
We'll move from hype-driven marketing to experience and community-driven marketing.
And we'll be able to replicate a lot of real-world things in the metaverse. Like we throw events in the real world, moving forward we will do that in the metaverse.
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Let's say Snoop Dogg is doing his concert in the metaverse (he actually bought land in metaverse), and you as a marketer know that your audience will be coming to attend this concert, but you can't afford to sponsor the event...So what will you do?
Well, you reach out to the guy who owns real-estate around Snoop Dogg's land and rent it out. Then you can put on your animated banners on that rented property, so when people will come for the concert, they'll be able to see the banner.
If they like your product, they can choose to get a demo by saying the keyword "Demo". And suddenly a UFO will fly over, opening a portal that will suck them into your virtual office where they can get the demo of your product!
Pretty interesting, right?
AI/ML:
AI and Machine learning is not the future anymore. It's already here. Businesses have been using AI for a long time now.
For some reason, small businesses are yet to adopt this technology, but as they adopt it, we'll see a world of extreme automation
AI is nothing but automation on steroids.
Currently, we have Narrow Artificial Intelligence, which can only do A to B mapping. This means you give it an input A, and it will give you an output B.
It works on a singular problem or task. So if you want AI to learn how to detect cars in a video, it will be able to do that.
But if you want it to function identical to a human mind, it won't be able to do that. At least not yet. Artificial General Intelligence is still very far, and its possibility is often disputed by some developers.
Even though Artificial General Intelligence is far away, we can already do a lot using Artificial Narrow Intelligence.
We are able to use Data Science for better interpretation of huge amounts of data.
What we will start seeing now is more productivity with a lesser number of employees. AI can basically automate any task that you can put within a framework.
Some sales teams are already using AI to find the best deal in the pipeline and give it preference over others to get better clients fast.
Doctors are able to use AI to better interpret X-ray and other scan results.
And startups like InvestorAi are using AI to predict which stocks can go up in the next 3 to 30 days!
We even have micro drones that use AI in such a way that you can control them using hand motions, almost like magic!
There is not a single industry that is not going to be affected by AI. Retail, housing, pharma, manufacturing, supply-chain management, HR. No matter where you look, AI is everywhere. Already!
Do you work in sales? Do you have a proven framework to find out qualified leads vs unqualified leads? Yes? Awesome! Build AI algorithms to take care of it.
Are you a goldsmith? Do you have to verify the purity of gold on a regular basis? Well, you can use AI to do it for you.
Do you manage databases? Use AI and data science to manage and structure data in the cheapest and most efficient way possible!
Are you a doctor who needs to look at X-rays and CT scans to detect diseases? No worries, use AI to get that done for you.
Do you work in a factory to assure the quality of your products? Use AI to detect damaged products vs non-damaged ones.
Are you a marketer with a tight deadline? Use copy.ai to write copy for you!
You see, anything that has a framework can now be automated using AI. In fact many things that I have mentioned in this article already use AI.
Most people are afraid of AI, thinking it will cause massive unemployment, but I believe AI is the next step towards improving human productivity
No one will have to work in repetitive jobs like manufacturing, driving, cleaning, etc.
AI will take care of most of it, freeing our time to explore better opportunities and solve bigger problems to truly use our human potential in the most efficient way so we can take this world to a whole new level!
Robots:
Robots are the next in line.
We already use robots in many ways - Manufacturing, drilling, and other activities that are high-risk to human life.
But I am talking about using robots in our day-to-day life.
That day is not far when you will have your own robot as your personal assistant.
We already have Sophia who can talk to humans, have a normal conversation (unlike me), and perform a few basic tasks.
Soon we'll see robots like these coming out of the testing phase, to become available for regular people.
But it is not that crazy.
Want to know something crazy?
Japan's robotics industry is very much advanced. There are robots in Japan that look beautiful, just like humans, and are capable of having sex!
Scientists say we are not far from the day when robots will be able to give birth to kids.
Even though this poses some serious questions about where we are headed as a society and if this is really necessary...but I think the innovation should keep moving forward just to see what we can achieve and if something good can come out of it.
Just for the record - I don't like the idea of having sex and babies with robots.
Education:
Education is one of the first industries that will get totally destroyed by the new technologies - especially Ed-tech.
And I will be sitting there, enjoying this destruction, while eating popcorn!
Hundreds of thousands of dollars in student loans are spent just so you can go to a school/college to kill your creativity and curiosity.
Why there has to be just one right answer to a problem? Why do I have to answer 2+2=x?
Why do I have to be in that box? Why can't I be creative and answer x+y=2? Because there are unlimited answers to that and your limited intellect can't handle the limitlessness of human creativity?
And why do I have to memorize answers that can be found on Google?
Why do I have to learn calculus when I am interested in psychology?
Why do I have to learn what you think I should learn vs what I am interested in?
And most importantly - Who will teach me all the real-life skills that will actually help me? Like how to manage my mental health, how to stay healthy, how to do my taxes, how to build wealth, and how to learn anything fast in this fast-changing world?
I guess that's on me to figure out! You are only responsible to force me, shame me, and teach me absolute crap that will be of no use.
I know not everything they teach is bad...but I could have figured most of it out on my own, without going into debt!
The cons of our current education system outbalance all the pros. Or should I say the cons get an A, when pros get an F!
Education system that used to fail me by giving me an F has failed humanity!
But not anymore. The education system, as we know it today, will be gone. Forever. In a few years or maybe decades!
Platforms like Outlier are already bringing world's best teachers to us for minimal fees. We can get the best education there, without going into debt.
Startups and Fortune 500 companies no longer care about degrees if you have and can demonstrate the real skills!
With the rise of AI, metaverse, and VR, I can imagine a virtual school with the best facilities, best teachers, and best content; right within our reach at very affordable prices or free.
(It's important for kids to go out and socialize. I am not suggesting a world where everyone is on VR 24/7. I am just trying to put in perspective what is possible.)
3D Printers:
3D printing is a technology that has already come far on the adoption curve.
Moving forward, more and more people will start using them.
3D printers are currently what computers were in the 1990s - almost no one had them. But today we can't imagine living without a computer or a laptop (Mac users: I use a Macbook too. And I call it a laptop).
Imagine your kid wants a new toy. Well, no need to go to the store. Just 3D print it.
Do you have a screwdriver missing right when you need it? No worries, just 3D print a new one!
We can 3D print almost anything! Above, I mentioned even about 3D printing houses - so almost anything can be 3D printed as of now. Tools, toys, furniture, gears, motors, utensils, decoration items, houses - you name it!
But science is trying to take this a step further. We are trying to 3D print organs and we have made some progress.
We still have some way to go but I can imagine a world where death will be a choice. We can just keep replacing each organ before it stops working!
I know, I am probably going crazy with my imagination but it has already stepped out of the realm of 'science fiction' and stepped into the realm of 'science'.
Health Care:
Big pharma has a lot of power. Call it a conspiracy theory but they spend a lot of money to convince us why their cure is better than the prevention!
And they spend a lot of money to convince us that side-effects are just normal, and you need to pop a pill for every little fever.
The problem with that is that we don't need as many medicines as we currently consume, we are not aware of the long-term side effects in most cases, and medicines are overprescribed.
Medication is not health care anyway.
Medicines have nothing to do with 'health', and they have nothing to do with 'care'. Yet most people think health care and medicines are almost synonymous, and side-effects almost normal.
Not at all! Medicines are just an effort to manage diseases and in most cases - their symptoms. How efficient and effective that effort is, is open for debate.
I know medicines played a major role in increasing the average human lifespan and they gave us a better life. But now they have become more than a life-saver. Overprescription has made them destructive to health.
But this won't last long. Pharmaceutical industry will soon die a slow painful death in the hands of current technological revolution (and no medicine will be able to save it from dying).
There are companies like Viome that are using screening and AI technologies to make illness optional.
Viome is using AI to look at your gut microbiome. And based on your unique microbiome profile, they prescribe food (not medicine) that will end the inflammation in your body to give you a new life. (Inflammation is the cause behind most diseases.)
So you will not get to a point where you'll develop a disease that will need a "cure".
But if you do get there by chance or bad luck, that you do develop a disease like cancer...we'll be able to replace the diseased part of your body by 3D printing that organ and replacing it!
But what if you have "bad" genetics?
Calling CRISPR for rescue! CRISPR is a technique of gene editing that is still being tested, but we are making rapid progress. We have been trying to edit diseases right out of the genes so we can secure ourselves and our offsprings!
Once developed, CRISPR will be able to cure (or should I say "edit out") diseases like cancer, autism, etc.!
It's not a matter of "if" anymore, it's only a matter of "when".
I am positive that most of the current generation will see gene-editing becoming a reality within our lifetime.
Flying Cars:
Flying cars are no longer a dream, Uber is already testing them and they are planning to launch by 2023!
Pretty soon we'll be flying around in air-taxies instead of driving around!
On the other hand, people can now own aircrafts that are almost like flying cars (designed using race car aerodynamics).
Jetson has already made it possible by combining drone technology with AI and racing-car aerodynamics.
They are already taking orders and are booked till 2023. It costs $92,000 (buy me one if you like this article)!
Imagine someone passing over your building in Uber air-taxies or Jetson Aircraft, and their IoT uses surrounding infrastructure (including your building) through a blockchain network to feed data to their AI algorithms so the vehicles can make the right turns without crashing into each other, and each time your infrastructure helps make that data transfer, you get paid in Cryptocurrency.
May sound crazy, but this will actually become a reality soon - VERY SOON!
Waste Management:
Trash in our mountains, trash in our oceans, pollution in our atmosphere, and ill-health everywhere - this is the reality of today's world.
But technology has already advanced enough that we can turn trash into gold.
Okay, that was an overstatement, but we can actually turn trash into something useful.
It's just a matter of efficiency as of now. We are not able to do it because current methods of recycling are not mature, and efficient enough.
But new technologies like AI and robotics will solve this problem as well.
We'll free our oceans of plastic and trash.
The day is not far because a New Zealander has already built a machine that turns plastic into green bricks! And this is just one of the many projects that are being started all over the world!
Pretty soon using a combination of AI, robotics, and IoT, we'll be able to make waste management cheap and efficient - ready for mass adoption.
Actually, we can use smart contracts to reward people who'll give us their trash. Just put the trash in our machine and scan your public key to get paid (and scan your private key to get hacked).
After the gold rush, this will start a "trash rush"!
Time Machine:
The time machine is already developed and tested by NASA...
...okay I am kidding. I know this has been a lot.
No time machines!
Time is imaginary. So we can time travel only in our imagination. At least I do.
You know, time is measured using longitudes. And we used to read this definition in school, "Longitudes and latitudes are 'imaginary' lines on the surface of earth".
So it's imaginary! But some people say we can manifest imagination into reality. So who knows! Maybe someday we'll have time machines.
I do think we already have them though - it's called an airplane.
You board a flight at 6 pm IST, and land in another country at 12 am PT - we can already time travel!
Not shocked because time is inversely proportional to distance (time = speed/distance).
I know you are not liking it; I will stop now!
Summary:
Okay. I want to end this here by saying thanks for reading an incredibly long article.
Most of you are probably asking this very relevant question - "who is this guy hallucinating on LinkedIn?"
I am just passionate and optimistic about the future. (I promise I didn't drink or snort anything before writing this.)
I am not trying to deny all the problems that will come with technological advancement. In fact I know there will be a lot of problems. But I don't think we should put a brake on innovation just because there will be problems.
We humans are the most intelligent among all species (your dog might disagree)...and I am sure we will find solutions for any problem that will arise.
I am positive that we will get rid of all the downside while amplifying all the upside that we get as a result of technological advancement. It won't be easy, but we'll do it anyway!
We have to ask ourselves if we really believe that we shouldn't have invented ship just because there was a possibility of shipwreck?
If we didn't invent the ships, we would probably still be living in tribal colonies, fighting each other.
I am ending this article here, even though I left out so many things:
Maybe some other day I will write about other technologies and projects that are under development, but almost feel like science fiction!
Till then - Take care and Goodbye!
Regards,
Manav Singh
Note - Most of what I mentioned above is already launched or under testing. All this is already here... nothing I talk about is a far-off idea yet to be explored.
Simplifying AI For You
3 年Manav Singh - Very good information shared in this article
From Human to being Resources!!
3 年A good read! Thanks for penning it.