The Next Wave | Edge.org

A long-view perspective from John Markoff

"These new platforms, they're increments, and they only come along every half-decade or decade. The smart phone happened in 2007 and a huge ecosystem was created in its wake. The entire population of the world walks around looking at their phones. This can't be the end of human evolution. We have to go someplace else. 

It's quite remarkable. It's moved people off of personal computers. Microsoft's business, while it's a huge monopoly, has stopped growing. There was a platform change. I'll be fascinated to see what the next platform is going to be. It's totally up in the air, and I think that some form of augmented reality is possible and real. Is it going to be a science-fiction utopia or a science-fiction nightmare? It's going to be a little bit of both."

The Next Wave | Edge.org