1) Actual international-conflict geopolitical risk will not bubble over in 2014. Stupid saber-rattling in Asia, insurgencies and wars in Africa, but nothing critical.
2) Security/privacy will become something normal people and businesses ask about, and ask fairly superficial questions about, during many transactions (e.g. people are going to stop being fucking morons and just relying on "the cloud" for sensitive data without questioning it; they may still end up using the cloud, but will want to make a more informed choice.)
3) Snowden, Manning, and Assange will remain in the same positions on 31 DEC as they started on 1 JAN. weev will remain in prison. aaronsw
4) Zerocoin will launch, and will be a lot more interesting than Bitcoin to many Bitcoin early adopters. Alternative digital currencies which are NOT purely proof-of-work will also start to be interesting; not necessarily USD backed, but maybe equities, or debt instruments, or whatever. Some may be based on bitcoin. Either Open Transactions or a strippled-of-XRP form of Ripple, or something like it (blinded tokens). BTC/USD will remain between 250 and 2000 on 31 DEC, even if it has excursions. If I had to bet, I'd bet today's price/no net change as the most likely center (the "most likely" single price is of course 0, but plenty of other prices are also likely)
5) Apple will continue to slide into irrelevance; the vanguard of most-technical users will move away from iOS and OSX, if not Apple hardware, due to Apple anti-freedom policies
6) Someone will actually put together a credible packaged solution for secure CPE (wifi-wifi, wifi-ether), secure basebandless pda thing, secure laptop (a modified chromebook or something), server solution, and network services, in a way which can be verified down to the metal, for pro and enterprise/intl sales, at semi-sane price points (i.e. not Crypto AG prices)
7) A non-US location will emerge as a serious startup location specifically due to NSA/USG policies. I'm betting on Germany with German/Swiss arbitrage -- people living/working in Berlin on dev and ops in Switzerland. Maybe other non-EU/EU splits.
8) US mid-term 2014 elections will consist of "fuck the incumbents", independent of political party.
9) Yahoo will continue to slide into doom, and will be revealed to be the biggest collaborator among major non-financial, non-travel, non-carrier companies in the US. Alibaba will remain their only real value.
10) China will start to try to take the "moral high ground" on issues as a counterpoint to the US. It won't be universal, but it will hopefully cause US politicians (and electorate) to rethink things. They may offer to help in Afghanistan post US-withdrawal, in the same way they help in Africa today -- economic support, little political involvement.
No. 10: " little political involvement." - I don't know but they do kind of run Africa...Someone I heard of bought some land in Namibia or Mozambique or someplace. He planned to build a house so he got a geologist to check the bedrock, which turned out to be rich in copper. He thought he hit the Jackpot so he asked for mining rights, the government's reply was "We're sorry, you may build a house on the land but we have sold the mining rights to the chinese gov't".
2) Security/privacy will become something normal people and businesses ask about, and ask fairly superficial questions about, during many transactions (e.g. people are going to stop being fucking morons and just relying on "the cloud" for sensitive data without questioning it; they may still end up using the cloud, but will want to make a more informed choice.)
3) Snowden, Manning, and Assange will remain in the same positions on 31 DEC as they started on 1 JAN. weev will remain in prison. aaronsw
4) Zerocoin will launch, and will be a lot more interesting than Bitcoin to many Bitcoin early adopters. Alternative digital currencies which are NOT purely proof-of-work will also start to be interesting; not necessarily USD backed, but maybe equities, or debt instruments, or whatever. Some may be based on bitcoin. Either Open Transactions or a strippled-of-XRP form of Ripple, or something like it (blinded tokens). BTC/USD will remain between 250 and 2000 on 31 DEC, even if it has excursions. If I had to bet, I'd bet today's price/no net change as the most likely center (the "most likely" single price is of course 0, but plenty of other prices are also likely)
5) Apple will continue to slide into irrelevance; the vanguard of most-technical users will move away from iOS and OSX, if not Apple hardware, due to Apple anti-freedom policies
6) Someone will actually put together a credible packaged solution for secure CPE (wifi-wifi, wifi-ether), secure basebandless pda thing, secure laptop (a modified chromebook or something), server solution, and network services, in a way which can be verified down to the metal, for pro and enterprise/intl sales, at semi-sane price points (i.e. not Crypto AG prices)
7) A non-US location will emerge as a serious startup location specifically due to NSA/USG policies. I'm betting on Germany with German/Swiss arbitrage -- people living/working in Berlin on dev and ops in Switzerland. Maybe other non-EU/EU splits.
8) US mid-term 2014 elections will consist of "fuck the incumbents", independent of political party.
9) Yahoo will continue to slide into doom, and will be revealed to be the biggest collaborator among major non-financial, non-travel, non-carrier companies in the US. Alibaba will remain their only real value.
10) China will start to try to take the "moral high ground" on issues as a counterpoint to the US. It won't be universal, but it will hopefully cause US politicians (and electorate) to rethink things. They may offer to help in Afghanistan post US-withdrawal, in the same way they help in Africa today -- economic support, little political involvement.