Social Machinery

How the world will looks like in eleven more years. What are the mega trends that will forge our society? How people will live? What will be the main challenges that humankind will face? What type of technologies will affect our way of communicating, sharing and connecting with others?

I tried to list some interesting areas to discuss about the future in this post.

1. Where we are today – Mega trends that will impact the future

a.  Social media becoming a mainstream communication engine that is revolutionatizing the way we interact share and communicate with people, brands and companies.

 Some facts about today’s social media world:, 55% of all online users belong to a social media site, Facebook is already 300 Million subscribers and  if this site  where a country it will be the fourth largest one. Also, the fastest-growing segment on social networking sites is +55 years old. Finally the relationship with brands is changing;l78% of online users only trust on other people’s recommendation and only 14% trust on advertising messages

b. Mobile broadband everywhere is becoming a reality. Broadband is becoming a basic need for our daily anywhere connected life.  Just some days back, Finland make 1MB broadband access a legal right. But this is just the tip of the iceberg. In the next years more than 1 Billion users will be connected via mobile broadband access, creating a so called anywhere consumer.

Interesting facts related to this is that: By year 2012 more than 1 Billon people will access the internet by mobile networks. Also, are becoming a connected user; 70% of users believe that a PC without internet access is useless. Another interesting element is that online users   spend 20 hours per week  watching streaming content and the top one activity on internet and mobile internet  is social networking 

c. Digital natives are surpassing in size Digital Immigrants. Gen Y is 15 to 29 in 2009. They are socially conscious, they distrust companies and media and they have a completely different communicational behavior. By 2011, this generation will surpass baby boomers in terms of size. By year 2015 the will spend more than compared to this older segment.

2. Likely truths – Mega trends by 2020

 a. The economy will onboard more than 1Billion new middle class consumers globally by 2020. 40% of them will come from China and emerging market. This will have deep consequences on China social class structure, bringing a strong and booming middle class, well educated and with high spending power.

b. 50 Billion Devices will be connected by 2020. Anything that needs an internet connection will have one. We will move from a connecting world to a connected world, where devices will talk to each other thanks to mobile broadband. Smart metering for managing your electrical or water usage, smart home that will determine ways to reduce your energy consumption. E-health devices for tracking chronic-patient, connected cars that can talk to each other in other to reduce traffic jams and accidents. We will move from connecting people to connecting devices.

c. China and India with powers fundamental impact. From an economic context China nominal GDP will be the second highest below US. India Nominal GDP will be higher than countries like France, Germany and UK. There relevance in the economy will be fundamental.

d. Eco-friendly will not be an option anymore, it will be about survival. Sustainability will shape political agendas. For the last 10 years, ecology has been a nice thing to do for most of us, basically just an option. By 2020, ecology will be a matter of life and death. Countries will face unprecedented natural disasters due to climate global change. Floods and droughts in several regions of this world will change political agenda and will encourage local governments to create incentives and tax-based on people’s carbon footprint. Also, consumer will demand an eco-conscience from their brands.

e. Our life will be mainly in a digital form. By year 2020, most of our information; personal information, user behavior, friends, picture, videos, health and even thoughts will be digital. This will create a new way of relating with people and also will re-define our way of looking privacy. All our actions will be informed to the network. Due to this, security and safety will increase in terms of importance (Cyber crime, Malware, virus, social identity hijacking).

f. Media industry will be redefined. Services will be network agnostic, and the barriers to produce content will be extremely low. Access to information will be real time on any device and seamless. This will reshape the current role of Telcos, media companies and device manufacturers.

g.  Social media will take part of all our daily activities. Social shopping will be a common way of get information about products and services. Most of the OS that are running in our devices will be social networking enabled. 50% of Youth lives today in Asia (600 Million people), by 2020 more than 75% of youth will be located in Asian countries

h. Consumers – Changing norms. By 2020, Today’s digital natives will be in their 30+. They will make decisions in companies and will have a high buying power. There will be a new paradigm shift in terms of media consumption, multitasking, prod-summing, communication and ways of working.

i. Devices and technology – By 2020, new technology will come into the picture. Mobile devices will take advantage of a ubiquitous network to fetch real time information. Augmented reality will help people to find information about place by just pointing their camera phone. Laptops will use holographic keyboards and will project their keyboard on any type of surface. E-health kits will help doctor to monitor on real time patients, some times thousands kilometers away. Also eco-conscience companies will bring technology to reduce our carbon foot print like electric cars, automated traffic lights and toll gates, and cars that communicate between each other via v2v networks. Mobile phones will not look like today’s phone as voice calls will be only one of the things that will be using these devices for. Flexible materials, holographic capabilities, projector embedded will revolutionize the mobile industry in the next years.