Re:Tech layoffs more than double in Bay Area
by dragonwriter on Friday May 13, 2016 @02:57PM
(#11692455)
> In the early 90s, the next big thing was WebTV, VR, or PDAs. Instead, we got the WWW.
That's kind of confused: WebTV was a predicted next big thing after the WWW (it was, in fact, seen as a progression of the WWW).
Of course, mobile (PDAs, basically) was big in the next wave you cite, and VR is, if not quite big, just hitting the consumer market in a noticeable way now. And WebTV is basically the original SmartTV STBs, which are now an integrated part of most consumer TVs. So, another one that went big, if somewhat later.
> In 2008, the next big thing was casual games, (micro)blogs, and embeddable widgets. Instead we got mobile and the sharing economy.
Microblogging was predicted earlier, and became big (as a key part of 2nd wave social networking -- FB/Twitter, which displaced MySpace, etc.). In fact, its so central to them that its just been absorbed into the concept of what social networking is rather than being called out as a separate, distinct thing anymore.
Ditto with casual games, which then moved from social networking platforms largely to mobile, and while some of the original developers went through a bust after their initial boom, that seems to because the market got more competition, not because it stopped being big. So, of these, the only one that wasn't true either before or shortly after 2008 is "embeddable widgets".
> Now, the next big thing is wearables, IoT, or AI. And who knows what we're going to get?
Well, judging from the success of the other things you point to, probably all three of those (or at worst 2 of 3), but only one of them will hit it big in this wave, and the others will be one-two waves later.
That's kind of confused: WebTV was a predicted next big thing after the WWW (it was, in fact, seen as a progression of the WWW).
Of course, mobile (PDAs, basically) was big in the next wave you cite, and VR is, if not quite big, just hitting the consumer market in a noticeable way now. And WebTV is basically the original SmartTV STBs, which are now an integrated part of most consumer TVs. So, another one that went big, if somewhat later.
> In 2008, the next big thing was casual games, (micro)blogs, and embeddable widgets. Instead we got mobile and the sharing economy.
Microblogging was predicted earlier, and became big (as a key part of 2nd wave social networking -- FB/Twitter, which displaced MySpace, etc.). In fact, its so central to them that its just been absorbed into the concept of what social networking is rather than being called out as a separate, distinct thing anymore.
Ditto with casual games, which then moved from social networking platforms largely to mobile, and while some of the original developers went through a bust after their initial boom, that seems to because the market got more competition, not because it stopped being big. So, of these, the only one that wasn't true either before or shortly after 2008 is "embeddable widgets".
> Now, the next big thing is wearables, IoT, or AI. And who knows what we're going to get?
Well, judging from the success of the other things you point to, probably all three of those (or at worst 2 of 3), but only one of them will hit it big in this wave, and the others will be one-two waves later.