Kraftwerk

Michael S Malone gives us a quick preview of the coming year in tech. Mostly, he sees us getting excited about the new Google phone and the Apple Tablet: Nexus One and the Tablet

Next Tuesday, Google is expected to announce its long-rumored Nexus One smartphone. It is undoubtedly designed to run the Google Android operating system for cellphones, which the search giant introduced more than a year ago. Android was envisioned as a major breakthrough in cellphones because it offered an ‘open’ operating system – i.e., one that other companies could use and design applications for.

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Meanwhile, strong on momentum and flush with cash, Apple isn’t waiting around for the world to catch up with it. Two weeks from now, the company is expected to introduce yet another category-buster: this time it’s rumored to be a tablet device – think of an oversized iPod Touch, but no doubt with much of the functionality of a personal computer (not to mention all of those iPhone apps). It will also no doubt, have one or two very cool and unexpected new features that will make it a gotta-have for Apple fanatics everywhere. Once again, Apple will have a new product that challenges convention, seemingly obsoletes an entire multi-billion dollar industry (in this case, handheld computers) while overwhelming a second, newer industry (netbooks, such as the Kindle) and yet is still stunning to look at.

In other words, Malone sees Apple going from strength to strength, while Google struggles a bit to enter the smartphone market years after Apple led the way. We'll see. Personally, I find Google's range of services to be very useful, but get impatient with trying to use them on my cheapo Korean-built smartphone. A phone made by Google is something that I would look at lovingly.

What I would like to see in the coming year from the tech world is this: how about Facebook and Twitter show us why they are so revolutionary. I know that there are a lot of smart people out there who have written at length about these companies. Tyler Cowan, for one, discusses Facebook at length in Create Your Own Economy. I even use Facebook, and think it has a lot of utility, both as a social tool and communications forum. But, there's nothing going on there that wasn't happening on Friendster or Myspace, nothing radically different anyway. If there really is a revolution happening, I'm getting impatient for the storming of the Bastille.