In the year two thousaaaaand

If you watch Late Night with Conan O'Brien with any regularity - you probably already understand the title of this post. If not, basically this is my attempt at clairvoyance with regard to the software industry

1. Personal computers will become more and more powerful, and also continue to fall in price. The irony of this will boggle minds as the browser becomes the most used desktop application by far. 4.8Ghz processors and 2GB of ram will be used to "make that JavaScript scream". Firefox will show in Task Manager as using 472mb of ram. Wait, sorry...that last part is already happening.
2. Some company somewhere will come up with a "WebOffice" suite of applications that offers such a large percentage of the functionality actually used by Microsoft Office users that people will pay $20 a year for using WebOffice and never suffer through another 45 minute install or upgrade of Microsoft Office only to find out other applications need to "configure office" when they're run. Inevitably, animated .gif's of clippy will make at least one appearance.
3. The claim that "The Browser/Web is the new OS" will have a snowball effect and gain more momentum than most people have predicted. Longhorn Vista will boast a cool new feature set - most of which will be heard by those already using the browser for e-mail, photo sharing, document sharing, VOIP chatting, and most of the stuff that's already easy and seamlessly done over the web. These people will be heard to say, "I guess I'll upgrade for the spiffy new UI" with a confused look on their face.
4. Microsoft will research the feasibility of offering Visual Studio as a web application. After stumbling through the development of a proof-of-concept application, they'll buy the company that made "Web Office" and put them to work on it.
5. New technology businesses starting up won't need to employ anybody that knows how to administer e-mail server software, database server software, etc. They'll simply pay a monthly fee to have it hosted for them or use a free service. The majority of revenues generated for these types of server products will come from sales to hosting provider businesses.
6. A few years after that, nobody will be using Outlook, Enterprise Manager SQL Management Studio, or any form of desktop software to connect to their server products. Rich JavaScript/AJAX/DHTML browser UI's will take their place. Hundreds of gigabytes of disk space will go unused forever. The average "temporary internet files" folder will be 42.7GB in size.
7. Component vendors will be selling more copies of DHTML widgets than for Win32, .NET, or Java. Combined.
8. Media streaming technologies will see major improvements and your collection of movies, mp3's, and television shows will be stored online, accessible from anywhere but most often accessed from a device at home.
9. Broadband and WiFi will become ubiquitous and homes will enjoy T1-speed connections coming in, and Gigabit speeds across their home networks. LAN Party enthusiasts (nerds) everywhere will use this as an excuse to increase the number of get-togethers they have.
10. Soon after that, telco providers will stop offering anything but VOIP over a broadband connection. If you tell the company you are still on dial-up, they will put you on hold while they tell their colleagues what a loser you are.
11. Several people will submit comments on this post about how "oh yeah?..well I'm so cool I already (have or do) that!!". I will reload my apathy cannon.
12. The "Xbox 900" will come out, which will do two and a half rotations each time you turn it on. Tony Hawk will be used heavily to market it. Meanwhile, Sony will wonder, "doesn't anybody care about substance?" as sales of the PS4 diminish.