The laptop will be obsolete by 2020 and will be as archaic as a Discman from 1984 is today.
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Written by Rejean Bourgault (Canada); Edited by Olivier Adam (France), Co-founders of 5Deka Inc. – All Rights Reserved
We could have written the title for this article in many different ways: “My iPhone, Blackberry and my G1 would have been the size of the Pentagon in 1984...” or “My computer will be dead by 2020”.
You’re probably wondering, what do we mean by that? Basically we are saying that the form factor of the computer, both laptop and desktop as you know them today will be totally obsolete by 2020. Computers will be as archaic, in many ways, as a Sony Discman that was introduced in 1984 is archaic today. Even today, just look at your laptop (unless you’re using one of those small form factor netbook), it is so big compared to a Smartphone. Why do you need a Laptop?
In the future, you will only need a powerful Smartphone type of device for all your computing needs. You will carry around your iPhone, Blackberry, G1 or Pre wherever you want. Once you arrive at the office or at home, you will simply put down the device on your desk and you’ll have access wirelessly to a keyboard, a mouse and a flat screen, using technologies such as Wireless HDMI or Ultra Wide Band (UWB) for the Flat Screen. Those devices (screen, keyboard and mouse), will be purely “dumb” devices and they will be able to interact with any type of device that you bring close enough. (*)
Think about the beauty of this evolution. The other day, as I do a few times a week, I was biking to the office, a 42 Km ride each way. Normally, I leave on Monday am, with my car and my bike in the trunk, bike back home Monday evening (leaving the car at the office location downtown) and bike back to the office on Tuesday morning. The main reasons to do this, versus biking back and forth the same day is three fold; first, the distance of 84 Km in a day could be sometimes exhausting, second, I might need the car to visit customers who are located outside of the downtown area during the day, but, to be honest, the real reason is that I want to have my laptop with me at the office and I don’t want to carry it on my bike. But... I always carry my Blackberry with me and I suddenly realized last week the power of that little device.
Now, let’s compare my Blackberry’s “bike ride” as just explained today in 2009 with all the tools incorporated in this little device with a similar bike ride that would have been done in 1984. How big my back pack should have been and how heavy would it have been to carry the same quantity of features? Back then, you would need some of the first generation cellular phone weighting close to 1.5Kg. Then, you would have to add a camera, again quite bulky and weighting around 1Kg. Next item is the agenda and notepad, back then I was using a whole size binder with “Timetext” priority management tool… (another kilogram easily). Add to this a Rolodex with all my business cards (one kilogram again), my Sony Discman with one CD and about 15 songs (more than a kilo), then all my preferred CDs, a computer (well… add 10 kilos easily), a calculator, then what about all the reference books, newspapers, dictionaries, encyclopaedia and games… WOW, that would easily be the size of the Pentagon!