Welcome to Tech Stuff, a production from iHeartRadio. Hey there, and welcome to tech Stuff. I'm your host, Jonathan Strickland. I'm an executive producer with iHeart Podcasts and how the Tech are you? Happy New Year, everybody. Welcome to tech Stuff. Predicts twenty twenty four. Just so y'all know, I'm actually recording this on December twenty eighth, so I build that in just in case anything I predict for twenty twenty four already happened in the last couple of days of twenty twenty three, and I thought, you know that it had been years and years since I did the last one of these. Because these episodes are actually really hard to do. Unlike a standard episode, there's not really anything I can research before I start writing and then recording. I can have an idea about something that might happen that I could do a lot research to determine is it a plausible prediction or am I just shooting in the dark. But that's about it. Plus I also have to revisit the episode at the end of the year to see how well I made out with my predictions because I believe in accountability, So these episodes tend to be arduous. They're time consuming, they're frustrating because I don't have a great track record, and I thought I had not done one in many years because of how hard they are. In my mind, it was like, man, it must have been since like maybe twenty seventeen when I did the last one of these. But then I look back in my archive and I saw I did a prediction episode in twenty twenty one for the year of twenty twenty two, which shows you how incredibly unreliable my memory is, which also makes it hard to do a predictions episode. It's why I say, like, maybe I predicted something that already happened. Heck, maybe I predict something that happened like two years ago, because that's how bad my memory is. But anyway, gather round the old coat while he tells you about the future, and you wonder if maybe you could just quietly ship them off to a home or something. Let's get started, now, why don't we just jump on board with a prediction about x AKA, the platform formerly known as Twitter. Now, I'm tempted to say that twenty twenty four will be the year when x folds. The company has obviously been on the decline since Elon Musk bought it, and it actually wasn't in the best of shape before Musk bought it either, But with advertisers becoming increasingly gun shy around X due to Musk's tendency to not only allow hate speech on the platform, but also he occasionally promotes it himself, it's hard to imagine Elon and company finding a way to course correct. On top of that, there are tons of issues mounting for the company. One big one is that X as a whole hasn't been so good about paying a lot of the bills. Last year, we heard about vendors and landlords bringing lawsuits against X because the company failed to pay what it owed. Current and former employees have also brought lawsuits against the company arguing that it hasn't paid out contractually obligated compensation and severance, so less money's coming into the company due to boycotts from advertisers, and a lot of parties are coming up saying you need to pay your debts to us. It is not a very good situation economically speaking. But I am not going to predict that X will die in twenty twenty four for a couple of reasons. One, while I personally disliked the platform and Elon Musk, I don't want to see any company go under. I don't want all the folks working at X to find themselves without a job. And two, it's too easy of a prediction right. Plus, like Elon Musk has what appears to be kind of an obsession with this concept of turning X into the everything app, and I don't think he's going to be willing to give that up, even if it's costing money. So instead, I'm going to predict that X actually gets its act together this year, that Elon Musk perhaps realizes that maybe he should back away from being such an active and visible part of X and maybe let the actual CEO, Linda Yakarino, work on repairing the relationship the company has with brands and advertisers. Maybe they will actually determine that X needs to commit to paying the amount it o's to all those parties, and that slowly it starts to set itself on the right path. I don't think X is going to be in a remarkably better position by the end of twenty twenty four, but I'm predicting that I'll be pointed the right way. For once, do I believe in my own prediction. If I'm being honest, I don't. I really think X is just going to be a bigger mess. But I'm going to predict the opposite because if it pans out, won't it be a ma that I was calling a shot like this that'd be phenomenal. And if it doesn't work out, then it essentially just meets everybody's expectations. So here's to looking forward to a new and kinder X by the end of this year. Maybe I suppose the next one should have actually been my first prediction. Considering all the fuss around AI in twenty twenty three, I think twenty twenty four we're going to see a lot more AI integration. There was a lot of talk about it last year, but we didn't really see a lot of actual integrations and implementations of AI. We saw a lot of hype around it. So I think that a lot of those integrations we're going to see this year are actually going to turn out to be more trouble than what they're worth, because I think a lot of business leaders are going to look at AI as some sort of cure all for business challenges. Now that's not to say that every AI implementation will be bad. I think we'll hear about some really creative and effective ways to incorporate A into business, whether it's for customer facing experiences or behind the scenes where it's largely gone unnoticed by anyone outside the organization. But with all the hype around artificial intelligence paired with a gap in understanding as to what it can and cannot do, I suspect we're going to see something similar to when companies first heard about the concept of the metaverse. They're going to rush in because they're going to be afraid of missing out. FOMO will be serious, They're not really going to have grips on what AI is good for, and we're ultimately going to see a situation similar to what we saw with NFTs a couple of years back. There's going to be a bubble, and that bubble will then eventually collapse, perhaps before the end of twenty twenty four. I actually think this is a shame, because I do think there are ways that AI can make a positive change for work. Those changes don't necessarily lead to layoffs or perhaps saddling some poor human employee with the job of double checking to make sure the AI didn't make some sort of dumb mistake or invent something that doesn't exist that would eventually tank the company. And if there is a bubble, and if it does burst, I think that's going to set back the AI field in general, not just generative AI, although that's where a lot of the focus has been in the last year, but for AI across the board, because we've seen similar things like that happen with other technologies. We've seen it with blockchain, we've seen it with virtual reality a couple of times actually, and we'll talk more about mixed reality a little bit later in this Predictions episode. And I think it's there's a good chance we're going to see it with AI. And again it's not that AI is bad or that there's no place for it, but that the hype around it and the expectation around it has a large gap between what is an actual good implementation of it, and I think particularly we're going to see that in generative AI. In fact, we started seeing it in twenty twenty three, but I think twenty twenty four is the year where we'll really see generative AI put through the paces and in at least several areas it's going to come up short, or it's going to cause headaches that could have been avoided if the AI had not been implemented in the first place. On a related note, I think we're going to see a lot more legislators and regulators all around the world try to tackle AI. However, I don't think we're going to get very many meaningful laws or regulations out of it. Perhaps this is because I have become cynical when it comes to lawmakers wrapping their heads around a technology and then trying to draft legislation, or it's possible that I feel this way because there are influential people in the AI space, for example Open AIS on again off against CEO Sam Altman, who are taking an aggressive role in trying to shape these regulations. When the parties that are going to be governed by regulations are taking an active role in forming the regulations, you should expect that they have an agenda and they're trying to have the regulations meet that agenda. So my worry is that we're going to see regulations that perhaps serve the interests of particular parties like open a Eye, while simultaneously holding back competition like a startup. Maybe it's also because I see a lot of politicians use technology more as a way to promote that they have a certain ideology. You know, think of the various politicians who point at efforts to think of the children when it comes to like taking an approach to objectionable material online. Right, if you look closely at the legislation, it almost never addresses any of the root problems. Instead, it's like patching symptoms. And sometimes they don't even patch the symptoms, so you end up with rules that don't address the actual problem and don't do anything useful, and it just makes things more muddy. In some cases, lawmakers go on and on about a problem, but they don't even draft anything. They just use the problem again as sort of a political stepping point to try and signify to potential voters. Hey, this is what I stand for, and the perceived problem is just a target, right, It's not anything that they're actually going to do anything about. The last few years have perhaps taken a lot of my optimism with them. So maybe I am being just incredibly pessimistic and cynical, but this is how it seems to play out to me. Anyway, we may get a few definitive rules in twenty twenty four regarding AI, similar to how a judge in the US deemed that works authored by AI are not eligible for copyright protection. But I think there's going to be very specific for particular use cases. I don't think we're necessarily going to see comprehensive, effective legislation or regulations around AI not in twenty twenty four. On a related note, because twenty twenty four is an election year here in the United States, and because we've seen in recent years arise in attempts to influence voters, I suspect we're going to see an awful lot of AI assisted attempts to mislead, misinform, and deceive US citizens. I think deep fakes will play a big part, whether it's video or audio or whatever it may be, in a way to try and sway voters from one point of view to another or to reinforce certain ideas. I think AI drafted misinformation campaigns will be a big part of this too, And in turn, this is going to prompt the US government to pressure the social platforms to identify and remove misinformation quickly and accurately. But again, this doesn't actually address the underlying problem, right, because even if you are putting pressure on the social platforms, the parties that are actually generating the misinformation are still active and they're still going to be flooding any available channel with that misinformation. So again, it's not addressing the underlying issue, although I don't even know how you would go about doing that, but the point being that it's a little reactive, it's not proactive, and it doesn't solve the problem. It just shifts the problem to a different party, that being the platforms that serve as the launching ground for these misinformation campaigns. And I don't think it's going to mean that we're going to see less of it. I think one consequence of this is we'll see even more opposition to TikTok in particular, not that I think TikTok necessarily deserves that treatment, but we're already seeing a growing belief that the platform purposefully directs users to specific videos to push an agenda. Various investigations by journalists have shown that there's very little evidence of this, that TikTok is more focused on serving up content that will keep a user on TikTok longer, and that it doesn't really care what the messaging of that content is as long as it's not breaking the law, in which case TikTok wants to remove it so that they don't get in trouble. If someone stays on TikTok longer because of misinformation, and that misinformation has a particular like political ideology associated with it, TikTok will just keep serving up that content to that particular user, not because it's trying to radicalize that person, but because TikTok benefits from folks staying on TikTok longer. But this is a system that bad actors can gain. Right Meanwhile, lawmakers look at TikTok as being the problem rather than those who are creating the actual content. So I think we're going to see a lot more political posturing about how TikTok is destroying the United States and should be banned. And to be clear, I am not a fan of TikTok, but I really feel like the concern is directed at the wrong place here. I will say that I expect there to be increased rhetoric around banning TikTok here in the United States, but we're not actually going to see that happen at least not on a national level. I think it'll be used more as a political tool for folks who are running in the election rather than as an actual policy. So I predict that by the end of twenty twenty four, TikTok will still be a thing and folks in the US will still be able to access it legally. Okay, I've got several more predictions to go through before we get to those. Let's take a quick break to think our sponsors. Okay, Next up, I'm gonna stick my neck out about an Apple product. Now, historically, I have a terrible record for this because I famously dismissed the iPad back in the day because I thought no one wanted a tablet form factor computer system. Tablet computers had been around for years before the iPad came out. Also, I thought the iPad was a really dumb name. It's funny because now it's been around for a while, but when it was first and an lots of folks said, iPad, are you serious? But then boom, the product comes out and like the iPhone, it establishes itself in the hearts of consumers and Apple fanatics everywhere. Hecker Ment other companies could actually produce their own consumer tablets and sell those to the public as well. And previously you would only really come across tablet computers if you happen to work in certain environments, like say a hospital, But now you know, like kids are using them as playthings. However, I really feel that the Apple Vision Pro headset, which is an upcoming mixed reality device that leans heavily on the augmented reality part of the mixed reality spectrum, I don't think it's going to be a big success, and that's partly because no one has managed to make a mixed reality viable consumer product that is at like the high end of the tech spectrum. Obviously, there are VR headsets that are popular among a subset of gamers, but even that, it's like a slow of a slice of a demographic, right, it's not the general public. General public has not adopted VR, but some gamers have. Now, I'd say that there's no real precedent here, and that's why I think Apple's going to fail. However, I also have to face the fact that that's the same thing I said about tablet computers years ago, before the iPad had come out. But that's just one reason I think it's going to fail. Another one is because the price tag the Apple Vision Pro is going to retail for three four hundred and ninety nine dollars thirty five hundred dollars is incredibly expensive, and it puts the Vision Pro outside the price range for most consumers. Now, I have not experienced the Vision Pro personally. I have watched some videos and I've read some reviews that said the experience is really impressive, that Apple delivers a good experience, But a lot of those reviews also raise concerns that there are a limited number of things you can do with the Apple Vision Pro, that some of those things probably aren't practical at least not for say, like productivity purposes for a full day of work, because you know the battery won't last that long. And this also leads us to a chicken in the egg problem that a lot of new technology faces. Maybe instead, I should say the hardware and the software problem. So launching any new computer, hardware or platform is a tricky thing, whether that's a video game console, a brand new computer system, or an augmented reality headset. And that's because the hardware needs good software in order to be useful, and something that's valuable to consumers. Otherwise you end up with a very expensive piece of technology, like a pair of electronic goggles that only is able to perform a limited number of tasks, and so consumers don't see the necessity of purchasing such a thing, right Apart from the desire to have the newest, coolest techechnology, if the tech only does a limited number of things, then you might say, well, how is this worth the money? Meanwhile, software developers need to feel confident that they're going to see a return on investment for their work for developing applications for the hardware platform. If you're a developer and you have the chance to build apps for a platform that's brand new, but you also see that the platform is not likely to receive widespread adoption, you might pull a fagin and review the situation, because it won't do you any good. If you spend hundreds of developer hours, spending significant amounts of money to develop something that only a few people will ever purchase or experience, you're not going to get a return on your investment. That time and money could go to something else that would actually reach more customers. So software developers really want a large user base. They want to have as many users as possible on the hardware so that they're likely to see success with their app. Meanwhile, the user base or potential user base wants a product to have lots of apps on it. They want a real good library of applications, and that needs to be there for the consumers to feel confident to purchase the product. So you have potential users waiting for more features and functionality, and you have developers waiting for enough users to justify the work that is needed to build out those features in functionality, and it's a classic Chicken and the software problem or something. I'm bad with metaphors. So I think that the Apple Vision pro will impress reviewers at least as far as the functionality goes when it launches, But I don't think it's going to become an Apple flagship product like the iPhone. I'm not sure what, if anything, will ever make mixed reality headsets a successful consumer item. I worry that the form factor as it stands now, the bulky headset is a really big herd. Just like people didn't flock to three D televisions despite multiple manufacturers really pushing three DTV like a decade ago, because nobody really wanted to deal with the hassle of having to wear special glasses just to watch TV at home. So I predict that the Apple Vision pro will be a commercial failure. I look forward to being gobsmacked at the end of twenty twenty four when it becomes one of the top selling items on the market or something. But I just I don't think the market is there. I think if Apple had been able to actually create a pair of ar glasses that look like eyeglasses, it would be a totally different story. But it just didn't happen. That form factor is so small that cramming in all the components, you would need to have a decent pair of AR glasses that one could do all the things he wanted to do, and two had a battery that would support it for longer than say, five minutes. It just was isn't realistic, And I just don't think consumers are eager to strap a big headset to their face for multiple hours a day, even though it honestly could be super cool as far as the experience goes. I just don't think it's going to be there. Another thing I think is going to be big in twenty twenty four will be news about quantum computing. But that being said, a lot of stuff actually has to happen for quantum computers to transform from being impressive technological and scientific achievements to becoming a practical technology. Quantum computing has the potential to totally change the world. It could disrupt fundamental technologies like encryption methodologies, but that only is true if the quantum computer is paired with the proper quantum algorithms and programs. Again, it's a hardware software issue. It's not just that you have a device that from a technical level could do these things. You have to actually build the programs or algorithms to achieve those things on the hardware, and we haven't heard a whole lot about that second category of developments in quantum computing. We've heard a lot about the incredible advancements companies have made in building larger and larger quantum computers, but not so much on the algorithm development side. So my guess is we're going to see more stories not just about impressive quantum computing hardware, but on the development of the software side of the equation. So again, it's one thing to make a quantum computer work. It's another thing to make it work for you, and I think that's really where we're going to see more of the story shift in this year, because otherwise you're just going to have a really powerful machine, but you have nothing to run on it. It's not very useful. And it's not like quantum computers can replace classical computers. They work on entirely different principles, at least from a a scale perspective, and quantum computers would be terrible at the things that classical computers are good at, just like classical computers would take ages to complete tasks that quantum computers, when paired with a correct algorithm, could complete in a fraction of the time. So I think we're going to see the narrative shift a bit in twenty twenty four as we approach a future where quantum computers are actively doing incredible stuff. Now, some predictions are a bit too easy. For example, I could say we're going to see a lot more development around electric vehicles, but that's no brainer. With various regions passing laws that will phase out internal combustion engines over the next decade or so, it's pretty much a guarantee that electric vehicles are going to be big news from this point moving forward. Likewise, I could make a prediction about, say, the next Nintendo video game console. I could say, oh, we're going to get a new Nintendo in twenty twenty four. But there's there's been leaks of internal Nintendo documentation that already suggests that that's going to happen, right that we're going to get a follow up to the Switch. No one knows outside of Nintendo anyway. No one knows what it's going to be called. We're pretty sure the form factor isn't going to be that different from the Switch. It'll still be some sort of handheld console hybrid. But beyond that, you know, we don't have details, but we do know it's coming. There's not much point predicting something that is already pretty likely to happen due to the bits we know. I do think I can make a couple of other interesting predictions. I think we're going to see a lot of change in the streaming media space. For the last couple of years, streaming services have encounter challenges when it comes to running a profitable business. It turns out you can't depend entirely on never ending growth of subscribers, because sooner or later you're gonna plateau because adoption will hit us saturation point. There just won't be more people willing or able to subscribe to your service. And if that's how you are looking at growth and revenue is by adding subscribers, you're kind of up the creek. The cable industry faced the same thing because you had cable networks that we're trying to solve this problem, right, how do we get more subscribers when we're already on pretty much all the cable packages. Well, the solution that the cable industry adopted, for the most part was to find new regions to launch their networks in and just start the process all over again. Right when I worked for Discovery Communications, or rather when Discovery Communications owned the company I was working for before they sold us off, I observed this personally. I saw the plans being, well, we can't really expand in the United States anymore because pretty much every cable package has the Discovery network as part of it. So what we're going to do focus on other regions like Asia or South America, and we'll just do it there. Which, if you're thinking about this, eventually run out of places to expand into, and you're back at the problem you were already facing. How do you grow when you're already everywhere? Well, streaming services have kind of run into a similar issue. The snazzy thing it looks like to do in twenty twenty four is to bundle streaming services with other streaming services to kind of spread both the risk and cost and also the profits around a little bit. So again, the hope is really to reach new customers, new subscribers, and then share the expense of generating content for folks to watch. This is the really complicated thing with streaming services, right, How do you generate enough revenue to support the generation of content that you need to have in order to convince people to subscribe and stay with you. If you stop me content, eventually your subscribers are going to say, I've already watched everything that i'm interested in on here, there's no reason for me to stay, and they cancel their subscription. But if you keep generating content, especially like high end, high quality content, that's expensive, and if you're no longer adding lots of subscribers each quarter, it looks like your service isn't profitable. It's a tough position to be in. It's a very tricky business, and maybe that's why Amazon Prime Video is introducing advertising to its service. The costs keep coming, but the subscriber numbers aren't increasing at a rate that's fast enough to satisfy leaders and stakeholders. So if you can't compensate the cost by adding more subscribers, you've got to find some other way to generate revenue. So with Amazon, they're going to add advertising in with the service, which could be really frustrating for those people who are actually spending the money to be subscribed to Amazon Prime and who had previously enjoyed a relatively ad free experience. Disney Plus and Hulu are merging. In fact, if you're subscribed to both already, you've seen this for yourself, but the rest of us have to wait till later this year to get the truly bundled service. As I record this, Warner Brothers Discovery is reportedly considering an acquisition of Paramount, though various analysts say that it's doubtful this will actually happen, but it does show how media companies are looking for solutions to this tricky problem, and it's a problem that has extra weight to it in the wake of the union strikes. In the entertainment industry, artists and crafts people want a slice of the profits, and that makes sense. They're the ones actually creating the content, so they deserve compensation. They should not be cut out of things like residuals. However, for the companies, the media companies, it means profit margins get even trickier for them. So I suspect we'll see a few streaming services fail outright in twenty twenty four as companies decide they're just not profitable enough and they cease to be Like, I'm actually surprised that Max hasn't been completely scrubbed at this point. Consumer frustrations are going to continue to grow because no one wants to subscribe to a dozen different services in order to get the entertainment they want. That's another reason why I think the consolidation is going to happen. Partly is going to happen because otherwise consumers are going to drop their subscriptions out of frustration and out of a need to prioritize, especially in an economic climate where things are still seen as being uncertain. Okay, with that in mind, we're going to take another quick break when we come back. I've got a few more predictions to close out for twenty twenty four, so we're back, and a lot of predictions that I would try to make depend on factors that are outside of the tech world. So, for example, in recent years, the US government has taken a more hardline stance on anti trust issues, right about anti competitive practices, companies becoming monopolies, that sort of thing. But that can all change depending on how the twenty twenty four elections go. I'm not sure that we're going to see the same momentum heading into twenty twenty five depending on how those elections turn out, right, And I don't know if we'll see dramatic events unfold as a result of, say the anti trust lawsuits brought against companies like Google, or if those efforts will actually fizzle out. Maybe there'll be a change in administrations and the support for going after companies that are seen as being anti competitive will just drop out. That's a possibility. I'm tempted to say that even without a change in administrations, we're not likely to see much happen with Google. It's actually been a couple of decades since the US government really pushed back against a giant corporation on anti trust issues, and I suspect there's not enough political momentum to make things actually have a meaningful change. So my prediction for the Google anti trust lawsuit is that Google will come out of it just fine. It may have to pay some fines, but ultimately it will remain intact and will continue to consolidate its power. And maybe it'll be freaking out because AI enabled search is totally disrupting the advertising market. In fact, I'm sure that's happening already. But likewise, besides political factors, you have economic factors that play a huge part in the tech world, especially in the space of startups. You know, we've already seen a major Silicon Valley bank, in fact, it was the Silicon Valley Bank collapse because of factors like high interest rates. With the unpredictability of the global economy, it's hard to say if twenty twenty four will be a rough year for funding startups. You know, as angel investors show their angelic natures, can only go so far, because if they can't take out a loan to pour into startup investments, they might not be willing to part with their own cash. So it could be another tough year for folks who dream of starting a company and then getting acquired before you know, they have to figure out a way to make money themselves. I might also be really cynical about startup culture in the podcast world. I think we're actually going to see the number of shows decrease. Overall. We're still going to get new podcasts launching throughout the year, I have no doubt about that, but with companies like Spotify cutting back on how much they spend on podcast production, the money will dwindle and you'll see less that will be available to fund the creation of shows they're Also I'm guessing there's going to be a decline in the willingness to support shows that aren't pulling in big numbers. Right, Like, there might be a show that's a prestige on a network, but if it's doing really poorly a number of listeners, Like maybe it's highly regarded among critics, but no one's really subscribing to it. I think we're going to see less support for those kinds of shows, because, I mean, it never looks good to cancel a Prestie's show, but it also is not great to fund the production of something that's not making its money back. So I think we're going to see a reversal of the podcast trend this year. Like over the last couple of years, we've seen so many podcasts launch that we've even joked about everyone and their dog getting a podcast. I think in some cases that's true. I think there probably are podcasts that are hosted by a person and their dog. I don't think we're going to see as much of that this year. Now. For independent podcasters, the people who are doing everything themselves, maybe they're doing it just as a hobby, maybe they're not looking for a way to make a living through their podcasts. I don't think this is applicable. I think we're still going to get those folks who have a story to tell and they're willing to put in the work to tell the story, and they're not expecting anything back out of it. I don't see that changing necessarily in twenty twenty four. But when we're looking at the big networks, I suspect we're going to see some scaling back. Now, in the interest of full disclosure, I have to say I am an executive producer for iHeart Podcasts. But I don't actually have any insight into what will happen here. It's not like I've been part of deep strategic discussions about whether or not we personally as a company are going to launch more or fewer shows. I do not know. I am not privy to that information. In fact, it may very well be that by the end of twenty twenty four I'll have a ton of new shows added onto my slate, and it may turn out that I'm one hundred percent wrong on this and that we'll actually see another boom period for podcasts on big networks. But I don't feel like that's where things are headed for twenty twenty four. And this is just a gut feeling I'm going with. And that is a selection of my predictions for the tech space in twenty twenty four. I didn't go into a lot of specific like products or anything like that, because honestly, it's if you're looking at products, chances are you're looking at things like leaked information about stuff that's already been in development for a couple of years. It would be a real a miracle if I just predicted something out of the blue that no one is knowingly working on. But I don't have that kind of creativity in me right now. However, at the end of this year, I will revisit this episode and I will see how I did with my predictions. One thing is for certain, twenty twenty four will have a ton of events that no one saw coming right, stuff that just isn't predictable. Maybe a massive company will go out of business, Maybe some tech leader will end up behind bars, Maybe NFTs will have a massive comeback. Maybe the most will become more than just a vague collection of ideas fueled by wishful thinking. By the way, for that last one, I do think you're gonna still have evangelists talking about the metaverse, but there'll be an increasing number of people who will have the mean girl's reaction of stop trying to make the metaverse happen. It isn't going to happen. But we'll see. I could be wrong about that too. Maybe it turns out that the metaverse was one of those ideas that was announced a little early and then took some more time to kind of solidify and become cohesive, and will be the next big thing. That is a possibility. I am personally skeptical of it, but as I've said many times before in this episode, I've been wrong before, so we'll see. I'll definitely come back and talk to y'all about these predictions at the end of the year, and until then, I hope you all are having a wonderful new year and I'll talk to you again really soon. Tech Stuff is an iHeartRadio production. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.

Welcome to Tech Stuff, a production from iHeartRadio. Hey there, and welcome to tech Stuff. I'm your host, Jonathan Strickland. I'm an executive producer with iHeart Podcasts and how the Tech are you? Happy New Year, everybody. Welcome to tech Stuff. Predicts twenty twenty four. Just so y'all know, I'm actually recording this on December twenty eighth, so I build that in just in case anything I predict for twenty twenty four already happened in the last couple of days of twenty twenty three, and I thought, you know that it had been years and years since I did the last one of these. Because these episodes are actually really hard to do. Unlike a standard episode, there's not really anything I can research before I start writing and then recording. I can have an idea about something that might happen that I could do a lot research to determine is it a plausible prediction or am I just shooting in the dark. But that's about it. Plus I also have to revisit the episode at the end of the year to see how well I made out with my predictions because I believe in accountability, So these episodes tend to be arduous. They're time consuming, they're frustrating because I don't have a great track record, and I thought I had not done one in many years because of how hard they are. In my mind, it was like, man, it must have been since like maybe twenty seventeen when I did the last one of these. But then I look back in my archive and I saw I did a prediction episode in twenty twenty one for the year of twenty twenty two, which shows you how incredibly unreliable my memory is, which also makes it hard to do a predictions episode. It's why I say, like, maybe I predicted something that already happened. Heck, maybe I predict something that happened like two years ago, because that's how bad my memory is. But anyway, gather round the old coat while he tells you about the future, and you wonder if maybe you could just quietly ship them off to a home or something. Let's get started, now, why don't we just jump on board with a prediction about x AKA, the platform formerly known as Twitter. Now, I'm tempted to say that twenty twenty four will be the year when x folds. The company has obviously been on the decline since Elon Musk bought it, and it actually wasn't in the best of shape before Musk bought it either, But with advertisers becoming increasingly gun shy around X due to Musk's tendency to not only allow hate speech on the platform, but also he occasionally promotes it himself, it's hard to imagine Elon and company finding a way to course correct. On top of that, there are tons of issues mounting for the company. One big one is that X as a whole hasn't been so good about paying a lot of the bills. Last year, we heard about vendors and landlords bringing lawsuits against X because the company failed to pay what it owed. Current and former employees have also brought lawsuits against the company arguing that it hasn't paid out contractually obligated compensation and severance, so less money's coming into the company due to boycotts from advertisers, and a lot of parties are coming up saying you need to pay your debts to us. It is not a very good situation economically speaking. But I am not going to predict that X will die in twenty twenty four for a couple of reasons. One, while I personally disliked the platform and Elon Musk, I don't want to see any company go under. I don't want all the folks working at X to find themselves without a job. And two, it's too easy of a prediction right. Plus, like Elon Musk has what appears to be kind of an obsession with this concept of turning X into the everything app, and I don't think he's going to be willing to give that up, even if it's costing money. So instead, I'm going to predict that X actually gets its act together this year, that Elon Musk perhaps realizes that maybe he should back away from being such an active and visible part of X and maybe let the actual CEO, Linda Yakarino, work on repairing the relationship the company has with brands and advertisers. Maybe they will actually determine that X needs to commit to paying the amount it o's to all those parties, and that slowly it starts to set itself on the right path. I don't think X is going to be in a remarkably better position by the end of twenty twenty four, but I'm predicting that I'll be pointed the right way. For once, do I believe in my own prediction. If I'm being honest, I don't. I really think X is just going to be a bigger mess. But I'm going to predict the opposite because if it pans out, won't it be a ma that I was calling a shot like this that'd be phenomenal. And if it doesn't work out, then it essentially just meets everybody's expectations. So here's to looking forward to a new and kinder X by the end of this year. Maybe I suppose the next one should have actually been my first prediction. Considering all the fuss around AI in twenty twenty three, I think twenty twenty four we're going to see a lot more AI integration. There was a lot of talk about it last year, but we didn't really see a lot of actual integrations and implementations of AI. We saw a lot of hype around it. So I think that a lot of those integrations we're going to see this year are actually going to turn out to be more trouble than what they're worth, because I think a lot of business leaders are going to look at AI as some sort of cure all for business challenges. Now that's not to say that every AI implementation will be bad. I think we'll hear about some really creative and effective ways to incorporate A into business, whether it's for customer facing experiences or behind the scenes where it's largely gone unnoticed by anyone outside the organization. But with all the hype around artificial intelligence paired with a gap in understanding as to what it can and cannot do, I suspect we're going to see something similar to when companies first heard about the concept of the metaverse. They're going to rush in because they're going to be afraid of missing out. FOMO will be serious, They're not really going to have grips on what AI is good for, and we're ultimately going to see a situation similar to what we saw with NFTs a couple of years back. There's going to be a bubble, and that bubble will then eventually collapse, perhaps before the end of twenty twenty four. I actually think this is a shame, because I do think there are ways that AI can make a positive change for work. Those changes don't necessarily lead to layoffs or perhaps saddling some poor human employee with the job of double checking to make sure the AI didn't make some sort of dumb mistake or invent something that doesn't exist that would eventually tank the company. And if there is a bubble, and if it does burst, I think that's going to set back the AI field in general, not just generative AI, although that's where a lot of the focus has been in the last year, but for AI across the board, because we've seen similar things like that happen with other technologies. We've seen it with blockchain, we've seen it with virtual reality a couple of times actually, and we'll talk more about mixed reality a little bit later in this Predictions episode. And I think it's there's a good chance we're going to see it with AI. And again it's not that AI is bad or that there's no place for it, but that the hype around it and the expectation around it has a large gap between what is an actual good implementation of it, and I think particularly we're going to see that in generative AI. In fact, we started seeing it in twenty twenty three, but I think twenty twenty four is the year where we'll really see generative AI put through the paces and in at least several areas it's going to come up short, or it's going to cause headaches that could have been avoided if the AI had not been implemented in the first place. On a related note, I think we're going to see a lot more legislators and regulators all around the world try to tackle AI. However, I don't think we're going to get very many meaningful laws or regulations out of it. Perhaps this is because I have become cynical when it comes to lawmakers wrapping their heads around a technology and then trying to draft legislation, or it's possible that I feel this way because there are influential people in the AI space, for example Open AIS on again off against CEO Sam Altman, who are taking an aggressive role in trying to shape these regulations. When the parties that are going to be governed by regulations are taking an active role in forming the regulations, you should expect that they have an agenda and they're trying to have the regulations meet that agenda. So my worry is that we're going to see regulations that perhaps serve the interests of particular parties like open a Eye, while simultaneously holding back competition like a startup. Maybe it's also because I see a lot of politicians use technology more as a way to promote that they have a certain ideology. You know, think of the various politicians who point at efforts to think of the children when it comes to like taking an approach to objectionable material online. Right, if you look closely at the legislation, it almost never addresses any of the root problems. Instead, it's like patching symptoms. And sometimes they don't even patch the symptoms, so you end up with rules that don't address the actual problem and don't do anything useful, and it just makes things more muddy. In some cases, lawmakers go on and on about a problem, but they don't even draft anything. They just use the problem again as sort of a political stepping point to try and signify to potential voters. Hey, this is what I stand for, and the perceived problem is just a target, right, It's not anything that they're actually going to do anything about. The last few years have perhaps taken a lot of my optimism with them. So maybe I am being just incredibly pessimistic and cynical, but this is how it seems to play out to me. Anyway, we may get a few definitive rules in twenty twenty four regarding AI, similar to how a judge in the US deemed that works authored by AI are not eligible for copyright protection. But I think there's going to be very specific for particular use cases. I don't think we're necessarily going to see comprehensive, effective legislation or regulations around AI not in twenty twenty four. On a related note, because twenty twenty four is an election year here in the United States, and because we've seen in recent years arise in attempts to influence voters, I suspect we're going to see an awful lot of AI assisted attempts to mislead, misinform, and deceive US citizens. I think deep fakes will play a big part, whether it's video or audio or whatever it may be, in a way to try and sway voters from one point of view to another or to reinforce certain ideas. I think AI drafted misinformation campaigns will be a big part of this too, And in turn, this is going to prompt the US government to pressure the social platforms to identify and remove misinformation quickly and accurately. But again, this doesn't actually address the underlying problem, right, because even if you are putting pressure on the social platforms, the parties that are actually generating the misinformation are still active and they're still going to be flooding any available channel with that misinformation. So again, it's not addressing the underlying issue, although I don't even know how you would go about doing that, but the point being that it's a little reactive, it's not proactive, and it doesn't solve the problem. It just shifts the problem to a different party, that being the platforms that serve as the launching ground for these misinformation campaigns. And I don't think it's going to mean that we're going to see less of it. I think one consequence of this is we'll see even more opposition to TikTok in particular, not that I think TikTok necessarily deserves that treatment, but we're already seeing a growing belief that the platform purposefully directs users to specific videos to push an agenda. Various investigations by journalists have shown that there's very little evidence of this, that TikTok is more focused on serving up content that will keep a user on TikTok longer, and that it doesn't really care what the messaging of that content is as long as it's not breaking the law, in which case TikTok wants to remove it so that they don't get in trouble. If someone stays on TikTok longer because of misinformation, and that misinformation has a particular like political ideology associated with it, TikTok will just keep serving up that content to that particular user, not because it's trying to radicalize that person, but because TikTok benefits from folks staying on TikTok longer. But this is a system that bad actors can gain. Right Meanwhile, lawmakers look at TikTok as being the problem rather than those who are creating the actual content. So I think we're going to see a lot more political posturing about how TikTok is destroying the United States and should be banned. And to be clear, I am not a fan of TikTok, but I really feel like the concern is directed at the wrong place here. I will say that I expect there to be increased rhetoric around banning TikTok here in the United States, but we're not actually going to see that happen at least not on a national level. I think it'll be used more as a political tool for folks who are running in the election rather than as an actual policy. So I predict that by the end of twenty twenty four, TikTok will still be a thing and folks in the US will still be able to access it legally. Okay, I've got several more predictions to go through before we get to those. Let's take a quick break to think our sponsors. Okay, Next up, I'm gonna stick my neck out about an Apple product. Now, historically, I have a terrible record for this because I famously dismissed the iPad back in the day because I thought no one wanted a tablet form factor computer system. Tablet computers had been around for years before the iPad came out. Also, I thought the iPad was a really dumb name. It's funny because now it's been around for a while, but when it was first and an lots of folks said, iPad, are you serious? But then boom, the product comes out and like the iPhone, it establishes itself in the hearts of consumers and Apple fanatics everywhere. Hecker Ment other companies could actually produce their own consumer tablets and sell those to the public as well. And previously you would only really come across tablet computers if you happen to work in certain environments, like say a hospital, But now you know, like kids are using them as playthings. However, I really feel that the Apple Vision Pro headset, which is an upcoming mixed reality device that leans heavily on the augmented reality part of the mixed reality spectrum, I don't think it's going to be a big success, and that's partly because no one has managed to make a mixed reality viable consumer product that is at like the high end of the tech spectrum. Obviously, there are VR headsets that are popular among a subset of gamers, but even that, it's like a slow of a slice of a demographic, right, it's not the general public. General public has not adopted VR, but some gamers have. Now, I'd say that there's no real precedent here, and that's why I think Apple's going to fail. However, I also have to face the fact that that's the same thing I said about tablet computers years ago, before the iPad had come out. But that's just one reason I think it's going to fail. Another one is because the price tag the Apple Vision Pro is going to retail for three four hundred and ninety nine dollars thirty five hundred dollars is incredibly expensive, and it puts the Vision Pro outside the price range for most consumers. Now, I have not experienced the Vision Pro personally. I have watched some videos and I've read some reviews that said the experience is really impressive, that Apple delivers a good experience, But a lot of those reviews also raise concerns that there are a limited number of things you can do with the Apple Vision Pro, that some of those things probably aren't practical at least not for say, like productivity purposes for a full day of work, because you know the battery won't last that long. And this also leads us to a chicken in the egg problem that a lot of new technology faces. Maybe instead, I should say the hardware and the software problem. So launching any new computer, hardware or platform is a tricky thing, whether that's a video game console, a brand new computer system, or an augmented reality headset. And that's because the hardware needs good software in order to be useful, and something that's valuable to consumers. Otherwise you end up with a very expensive piece of technology, like a pair of electronic goggles that only is able to perform a limited number of tasks, and so consumers don't see the necessity of purchasing such a thing, right Apart from the desire to have the newest, coolest techechnology, if the tech only does a limited number of things, then you might say, well, how is this worth the money? Meanwhile, software developers need to feel confident that they're going to see a return on investment for their work for developing applications for the hardware platform. If you're a developer and you have the chance to build apps for a platform that's brand new, but you also see that the platform is not likely to receive widespread adoption, you might pull a fagin and review the situation, because it won't do you any good. If you spend hundreds of developer hours, spending significant amounts of money to develop something that only a few people will ever purchase or experience, you're not going to get a return on your investment. That time and money could go to something else that would actually reach more customers. So software developers really want a large user base. They want to have as many users as possible on the hardware so that they're likely to see success with their app. Meanwhile, the user base or potential user base wants a product to have lots of apps on it. They want a real good library of applications, and that needs to be there for the consumers to feel confident to purchase the product. So you have potential users waiting for more features and functionality, and you have developers waiting for enough users to justify the work that is needed to build out those features in functionality, and it's a classic Chicken and the software problem or something. I'm bad with metaphors. So I think that the Apple Vision pro will impress reviewers at least as far as the functionality goes when it launches, But I don't think it's going to become an Apple flagship product like the iPhone. I'm not sure what, if anything, will ever make mixed reality headsets a successful consumer item. I worry that the form factor as it stands now, the bulky headset is a really big herd. Just like people didn't flock to three D televisions despite multiple manufacturers really pushing three DTV like a decade ago, because nobody really wanted to deal with the hassle of having to wear special glasses just to watch TV at home. So I predict that the Apple Vision pro will be a commercial failure. I look forward to being gobsmacked at the end of twenty twenty four when it becomes one of the top selling items on the market or something. But I just I don't think the market is there. I think if Apple had been able to actually create a pair of ar glasses that look like eyeglasses, it would be a totally different story. But it just didn't happen. That form factor is so small that cramming in all the components, you would need to have a decent pair of AR glasses that one could do all the things he wanted to do, and two had a battery that would support it for longer than say, five minutes. It just was isn't realistic, And I just don't think consumers are eager to strap a big headset to their face for multiple hours a day, even though it honestly could be super cool as far as the experience goes. I just don't think it's going to be there. Another thing I think is going to be big in twenty twenty four will be news about quantum computing. But that being said, a lot of stuff actually has to happen for quantum computers to transform from being impressive technological and scientific achievements to becoming a practical technology. Quantum computing has the potential to totally change the world. It could disrupt fundamental technologies like encryption methodologies, but that only is true if the quantum computer is paired with the proper quantum algorithms and programs. Again, it's a hardware software issue. It's not just that you have a device that from a technical level could do these things. You have to actually build the programs or algorithms to achieve those things on the hardware, and we haven't heard a whole lot about that second category of developments in quantum computing. We've heard a lot about the incredible advancements companies have made in building larger and larger quantum computers, but not so much on the algorithm development side. So my guess is we're going to see more stories not just about impressive quantum computing hardware, but on the development of the software side of the equation. So again, it's one thing to make a quantum computer work. It's another thing to make it work for you, and I think that's really where we're going to see more of the story shift in this year, because otherwise you're just going to have a really powerful machine, but you have nothing to run on it. It's not very useful. And it's not like quantum computers can replace classical computers. They work on entirely different principles, at least from a a scale perspective, and quantum computers would be terrible at the things that classical computers are good at, just like classical computers would take ages to complete tasks that quantum computers, when paired with a correct algorithm, could complete in a fraction of the time. So I think we're going to see the narrative shift a bit in twenty twenty four as we approach a future where quantum computers are actively doing incredible stuff. Now, some predictions are a bit too easy. For example, I could say we're going to see a lot more development around electric vehicles, but that's no brainer. With various regions passing laws that will phase out internal combustion engines over the next decade or so, it's pretty much a guarantee that electric vehicles are going to be big news from this point moving forward. Likewise, I could make a prediction about, say, the next Nintendo video game console. I could say, oh, we're going to get a new Nintendo in twenty twenty four. But there's there's been leaks of internal Nintendo documentation that already suggests that that's going to happen, right that we're going to get a follow up to the Switch. No one knows outside of Nintendo anyway. No one knows what it's going to be called. We're pretty sure the form factor isn't going to be that different from the Switch. It'll still be some sort of handheld console hybrid. But beyond that, you know, we don't have details, but we do know it's coming. There's not much point predicting something that is already pretty likely to happen due to the bits we know. I do think I can make a couple of other interesting predictions. I think we're going to see a lot of change in the streaming media space. For the last couple of years, streaming services have encounter challenges when it comes to running a profitable business. It turns out you can't depend entirely on never ending growth of subscribers, because sooner or later you're gonna plateau because adoption will hit us saturation point. There just won't be more people willing or able to subscribe to your service. And if that's how you are looking at growth and revenue is by adding subscribers, you're kind of up the creek. The cable industry faced the same thing because you had cable networks that we're trying to solve this problem, right, how do we get more subscribers when we're already on pretty much all the cable packages. Well, the solution that the cable industry adopted, for the most part was to find new regions to launch their networks in and just start the process all over again. Right when I worked for Discovery Communications, or rather when Discovery Communications owned the company I was working for before they sold us off, I observed this personally. I saw the plans being, well, we can't really expand in the United States anymore because pretty much every cable package has the Discovery network as part of it. So what we're going to do focus on other regions like Asia or South America, and we'll just do it there. Which, if you're thinking about this, eventually run out of places to expand into, and you're back at the problem you were already facing. How do you grow when you're already everywhere? Well, streaming services have kind of run into a similar issue. The snazzy thing it looks like to do in twenty twenty four is to bundle streaming services with other streaming services to kind of spread both the risk and cost and also the profits around a little bit. So again, the hope is really to reach new customers, new subscribers, and then share the expense of generating content for folks to watch. This is the really complicated thing with streaming services, right, How do you generate enough revenue to support the generation of content that you need to have in order to convince people to subscribe and stay with you. If you stop me content, eventually your subscribers are going to say, I've already watched everything that i'm interested in on here, there's no reason for me to stay, and they cancel their subscription. But if you keep generating content, especially like high end, high quality content, that's expensive, and if you're no longer adding lots of subscribers each quarter, it looks like your service isn't profitable. It's a tough position to be in. It's a very tricky business, and maybe that's why Amazon Prime Video is introducing advertising to its service. The costs keep coming, but the subscriber numbers aren't increasing at a rate that's fast enough to satisfy leaders and stakeholders. So if you can't compensate the cost by adding more subscribers, you've got to find some other way to generate revenue. So with Amazon, they're going to add advertising in with the service, which could be really frustrating for those people who are actually spending the money to be subscribed to Amazon Prime and who had previously enjoyed a relatively ad free experience. Disney Plus and Hulu are merging. In fact, if you're subscribed to both already, you've seen this for yourself, but the rest of us have to wait till later this year to get the truly bundled service. As I record this, Warner Brothers Discovery is reportedly considering an acquisition of Paramount, though various analysts say that it's doubtful this will actually happen, but it does show how media companies are looking for solutions to this tricky problem, and it's a problem that has extra weight to it in the wake of the union strikes. In the entertainment industry, artists and crafts people want a slice of the profits, and that makes sense. They're the ones actually creating the content, so they deserve compensation. They should not be cut out of things like residuals. However, for the companies, the media companies, it means profit margins get even trickier for them. So I suspect we'll see a few streaming services fail outright in twenty twenty four as companies decide they're just not profitable enough and they cease to be Like, I'm actually surprised that Max hasn't been completely scrubbed at this point. Consumer frustrations are going to continue to grow because no one wants to subscribe to a dozen different services in order to get the entertainment they want. That's another reason why I think the consolidation is going to happen. Partly is going to happen because otherwise consumers are going to drop their subscriptions out of frustration and out of a need to prioritize, especially in an economic climate where things are still seen as being uncertain. Okay, with that in mind, we're going to take another quick break when we come back. I've got a few more predictions to close out for twenty twenty four, so we're back, and a lot of predictions that I would try to make depend on factors that are outside of the tech world. So, for example, in recent years, the US government has taken a more hardline stance on anti trust issues, right about anti competitive practices, companies becoming monopolies, that sort of thing. But that can all change depending on how the twenty twenty four elections go. I'm not sure that we're going to see the same momentum heading into twenty twenty five depending on how those elections turn out, right, And I don't know if we'll see dramatic events unfold as a result of, say the anti trust lawsuits brought against companies like Google, or if those efforts will actually fizzle out. Maybe there'll be a change in administrations and the support for going after companies that are seen as being anti competitive will just drop out. That's a possibility. I'm tempted to say that even without a change in administrations, we're not likely to see much happen with Google. It's actually been a couple of decades since the US government really pushed back against a giant corporation on anti trust issues, and I suspect there's not enough political momentum to make things actually have a meaningful change. So my prediction for the Google anti trust lawsuit is that Google will come out of it just fine. It may have to pay some fines, but ultimately it will remain intact and will continue to consolidate its power. And maybe it'll be freaking out because AI enabled search is totally disrupting the advertising market. In fact, I'm sure that's happening already. But likewise, besides political factors, you have economic factors that play a huge part in the tech world, especially in the space of startups. You know, we've already seen a major Silicon Valley bank, in fact, it was the Silicon Valley Bank collapse because of factors like high interest rates. With the unpredictability of the global economy, it's hard to say if twenty twenty four will be a rough year for funding startups. You know, as angel investors show their angelic natures, can only go so far, because if they can't take out a loan to pour into startup investments, they might not be willing to part with their own cash. So it could be another tough year for folks who dream of starting a company and then getting acquired before you know, they have to figure out a way to make money themselves. I might also be really cynical about startup culture in the podcast world. I think we're actually going to see the number of shows decrease. Overall. We're still going to get new podcasts launching throughout the year, I have no doubt about that, but with companies like Spotify cutting back on how much they spend on podcast production, the money will dwindle and you'll see less that will be available to fund the creation of shows they're Also I'm guessing there's going to be a decline in the willingness to support shows that aren't pulling in big numbers. Right, Like, there might be a show that's a prestige on a network, but if it's doing really poorly a number of listeners, Like maybe it's highly regarded among critics, but no one's really subscribing to it. I think we're going to see less support for those kinds of shows, because, I mean, it never looks good to cancel a Prestie's show, but it also is not great to fund the production of something that's not making its money back. So I think we're going to see a reversal of the podcast trend this year. Like over the last couple of years, we've seen so many podcasts launch that we've even joked about everyone and their dog getting a podcast. I think in some cases that's true. I think there probably are podcasts that are hosted by a person and their dog. I don't think we're going to see as much of that this year. Now. For independent podcasters, the people who are doing everything themselves, maybe they're doing it just as a hobby, maybe they're not looking for a way to make a living through their podcasts. I don't think this is applicable. I think we're still going to get those folks who have a story to tell and they're willing to put in the work to tell the story, and they're not expecting anything back out of it. I don't see that changing necessarily in twenty twenty four. But when we're looking at the big networks, I suspect we're going to see some scaling back. Now, in the interest of full disclosure, I have to say I am an executive producer for iHeart Podcasts. But I don't actually have any insight into what will happen here. It's not like I've been part of deep strategic discussions about whether or not we personally as a company are going to launch more or fewer shows. I do not know. I am not privy to that information. In fact, it may very well be that by the end of twenty twenty four I'll have a ton of new shows added onto my slate, and it may turn out that I'm one hundred percent wrong on this and that we'll actually see another boom period for podcasts on big networks. But I don't feel like that's where things are headed for twenty twenty four. And this is just a gut feeling I'm going with. And that is a selection of my predictions for the tech space in twenty twenty four. I didn't go into a lot of specific like products or anything like that, because honestly, it's if you're looking at products, chances are you're looking at things like leaked information about stuff that's already been in development for a couple of years. It would be a real a miracle if I just predicted something out of the blue that no one is knowingly working on. But I don't have that kind of creativity in me right now. However, at the end of this year, I will revisit this episode and I will see how I did with my predictions. One thing is for certain, twenty twenty four will have a ton of events that no one saw coming right, stuff that just isn't predictable. Maybe a massive company will go out of business, Maybe some tech leader will end up behind bars, Maybe NFTs will have a massive comeback. Maybe the most will become more than just a vague collection of ideas fueled by wishful thinking. By the way, for that last one, I do think you're gonna still have evangelists talking about the metaverse, but there'll be an increasing number of people who will have the mean girl's reaction of stop trying to make the metaverse happen. It isn't going to happen. But we'll see. I could be wrong about that too. Maybe it turns out that the metaverse was one of those ideas that was announced a little early and then took some more time to kind of solidify and become cohesive, and will be the next big thing. That is a possibility. I am personally skeptical of it, but as I've said many times before in this episode, I've been wrong before, so we'll see. I'll definitely come back and talk to y'all about these predictions at the end of the year, and until then, I hope you all are having a wonderful new year and I'll talk to you again really soon. Tech Stuff is an iHeartRadio production. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.