'05: Think hot zones, hybrids and voices over the Internet
1: Internet telephone calls
No longer just for gadget geeks, phone calling over the Internet -- known as Voice over Internet Protocol, or VoIP -- is going mainstream, driven by consumer market entry of such telecommunications giants as AT&T and entertainment heavyweights like Comcast.
The VoIP market could double over the next year from about 700,000 subscribers to more than 2 million as the required broadband connections become more commonplace in the United States.
The digital packet-switching technology behind VoIP delivers calls more efficiently than the traditional circuit-switched phone network. VoIP isn't subject to the regulations and taxes on traditional phone service. And it allows consumers call-anywhere plans for $20 to $30 a month plus features like automatically forwarding calls to a home or cell phone.
VoIP also will benefit from the continued growth of cell phones, as consumers consider them sufficient backup for a VoIP landline.
2: It's a wireless world
WiFi hotspots are everywhere. Get ready for WiFi hot zones.
WiFi -- short for wireless fidelity -- uses radio waves to allow people with laptops or handheld computers to get high-speed access to the Internet.
Last year, people began logging onto their computers over wireless Internet connections, called hotspots, in coffeehouses, airports, businesses, even at the ball park. They also untethered their computers in their homes, creating home networks that allow access from the couch or the backyard hammock.
In 2005, we'll see the rapid spread of Internet ``hot zones'' -- larger areas such as city blocks or even neighborhoods with wireless coverage.
The zones will give users more freedom to move without losing their connection and will also get around the bottlenecks of traditional WiFi by letting data move along several different pathways to get to the Net.
Of course, the technology won't do anything to address the etiquette issues of Internet everywhere. And you thought BlackBerries were annoying.
3: China sells PCs
If China has for many years been the world's low-cost factory for desktop PCs sold by big U.S. brand names like Hewlett-Packard and IBM, 2005 could be the year Chinese companies cut out the middlemen to sell PCs under its own brands.
China's largest computer maker, Lenovo Group, acquired IBM's PC division earlier this month. That opens the door to China selling its PCs directly to U.S. consumers.
Until now, the computers made in China by contractors and joint-venture partners have carried all the major U.S. brand names: HP, Dell and IBM. Components for rival brands are often produced on the same assembly line.
If Lenovo is successful in convincing U.S. consumers that China can make quality PCs -- first under the IBM brand and then under its own -- the floodgates could open for China's electronics industry.
But even the biggest China boosters have a hard time imagining Chinese doing what the Japanese, the Koreans and the Taiwanese have never been able to do -- beat the United States at innovation in microprocessors and software operating systems. The future seems secure for Intel, Advanced Micro Devices and Microsoft.
4: DVR
Digital video recorders are much more than a way to record your TV football games and soap operas so you can view them at a convenient time -- they will reshape the way television programs are created and delivered.
Invented five years ago by two Silicon Valley companies, ReplayTV and TiVo, DVRs are poised to enter the mainstream in 2005 as cable companies finally catch up to their satellite TV rivals in offering set-top receivers with built-in hard drives.
Comcast shook up the Bay Area market earlier this month by announcing availability of its DVR box that can hold 60 hours of standard television programming or 15 hours of high-definition TV. Subscribers pay nothing up front for the Comcast box, unlike satellite TV and TiVo, and pay $10 a month for DVR service -- equivalent to what competitors now charge.
By the end of 2004, 6.5 million households in the United States will own a DVR, according to Forrester Research, about 6 percent of the 108 million U.S. households with a TV.
Expect a lot more people on board with DVR in 2005.
5: Cell phone appliances
Cell phones will converge with all kinds of technology appliances in 2005. They will combine with slicker digital cameras, personal digital assistants and even WiFi networking, to form almost-all-in-one communicators.
Already, sales of camera phones outnumber the worldwide sales of digital cameras. In addition, smart phones such as PalmOne's Treo enable users to load their address books into the phone and just click on a name in order to call the person. With brilliant color screens, cell phones are becoming entertainment devices, able to play games, videos and soon even digital television thanks to new chips from Texas Instruments.
With WiFi capability, phones will get true high-speed Internet access. Plus, WiFi will enable users to make calls over the Internet from inside their buildings, as long as they are within range of a WiFi antenna.
One day, users might roam from the cell phone network to a WiFi network on the same call as they move from outside to inside. But it will take many years to work out the kinks and to get all of these features into one device.
6: Hybrids go mainstream
Hybrid cars are poised in 2005 to expand beyond a niche audience, green-friendly geeks, to become a popular choice for the mainstream drivers of SUVs, sport wagons, pickup trucks and eventually even luxury sedans.
General Motors is selling two hybrid pickups, the Chevrolet Silverado and GMC Sierra. Ford will be selling its Escape compact SUV hybrid. Chrysler will sell Dodge Ram pickup hybrids to commercial fleet customers next year and follow with individual sales later.
In the meantime, the two hybrid pioneer manufacturers, Toyota and Honda, are still ahead of the pack in their hybrid sales. Toyota, Japan's top automaker, plans to sell more than 8 million hybrid vehicles worldwide next year. By 2006, Toyota will introduce a hybrid version of its luxury sedan Lexus GS.
Honda will be offering three hybrid models -- the original Insight, the Civic compact sedan and the Accord. To help mollify buyers peeved by the extra $3,000 the hybrid Accord costs over the gas-only model, the hybrid comes with heated leather seats, dual-zone automatic air conditioning and standard XM satellite radio.
7: File-swapping goes legit (so what?)
Two of the reformed bad boys of Internet file-swapping, Napster creator Shawn Fanning and former Grokster president Wayne Rosso, will launch a record-label-approved service early next year.
Rosso's new Mashboxx service will be powered by Fanning's Snocap technology, which distributes legally licensed versions of songs across peer-to-peer Internet networks and prevents the bootlegged music files from getting swapped.
The labels hope this will be the watershed event that turns file-swapping networks from pirate bazaars to legitimate retail channels.
But critics note that Snocap and Mashboxx face long odds for success. The technology would require the support of every major (and independent) label and every songwriter. Then it must face the formidable retail challenge that is Apple's market-dominating iTunes Music Store.
The even bigger hurdle is motivating millions of people to abandon free file-swapping networks, such as eDonkey, Kazaa or Morpheus, to adopt Snocap's filtering technology. That's unlikely.
The U.S. Supreme Court will have the final say on the matter this spring, when it considers whether file-swapping networks can be held liable for copyright infringement by others.
8: Satellite radio finds its frequency
Maybe it took the announced defection of Howard Stern, the self-proclaimed ``King of All Media,'' to give satellite radio some traction. Or perhaps it was something more mundane -- say, the growing number of automakers that offer satellite radio installed in cars, straight from the factory.
Whatever it was, satellite radio seems poised to hit orbit in 2005.
XM Satellite Radio surpassed 2.5 million subscribers this year, aided by its partnership with automaker General Motors. One in three GM vehicles sold comes equipped with satellite radio. And the automaker plans to offer it as an option on more than 50 car and truck models in 2005.
Sirius Satellite Radio, the network named for the brightest star in the nighttime sky, has played the underdog in the two-way satellite radio competition. But it gained a significant boost when it signed shock jock Stern in October, then snagged a respected figure in radio -- former Viacom president Mel Karmazin -- to serve as its chief executive. And it's lined up major auto partnerships with Toyota, Ford, BMW and DaimlerChrysler.
Stay tuned.
9: IPod, u2Pod, we all Pod together
If 2004 was the year of Web logs, those ubiquitous online personal essays that came to prominence during the presidential election, then 2005 is the year of Podcasting.
What's Podcasting, you ask?
It's a form of personal radio broadcasts that listeners grab from Web sites and download to their iPods (see, the name makes sense now) or other portable MP3 players.
Many Podcasts have the rambling, unfocused feel of blogs. And it's still an admittedly geeky pastime.
But you'll also find professionally produced shows, such as Boston public radio station WGBH's ``Morning Stories,'' five-minute human interest stories, or the Air America Radio's Al Franken Show.
MTV VJ Adam Curry explains its popularity on his Web site, iPodder.org.
``The reason for this overnight success is attributable to the millions of portable MP3 players currently being used, with gigabytes of empty storage space,'' Curry said.
10: Dual computer chips
Dual-core computer chips will command hype in 2005, but applications that use them will lag.
This kind of chip combines two processors in a single silicon chip, allowing a computer to focus on more than one task at the same time more easily. Intel says that more than 70 percent of its desktop microprocessors will be dual-core chips by the end of next year. Its rival, Advanced Micro Devices, is also launching its first dual-core chips for PCs, code-named Toledo, in the second half of 2005. Intel will go one step further by introducing dual-core chips for laptop computers as well.
These products should benefit consumers who do more than one thing at a time. Intel has demonstrated that a dual-core computer could complete a suite of video editing tasks in far shorter time. Users can set their computers to record a TV show at a particular time and still be able to perform other tasks -- such as instant messaging -- when the recording begins.
But software that truly exploits these chips will lag. Hence, the race to dual core is something like the competition to put a man on the moon. Once you get there, then what do you do? It all depends on how fast the software developers adapt.
Staff writers Dawn Chmielewski, Mike Langberg, Dan Lee, Karl Schoenberger and John Woolfolk contributed to this report.
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