Wednesday, September 10, 2008

What to Expect From Google in The Next 10 Years?

This article from eWeek raised the question in the title. At this writing, Google has passed her 10th birthday. From Google Web to Maps to a newly invented browser about to rule the Web, to a Google phone, to a completely new computer operating system ... Everything she produces seems like a paradigm shift. So, what will she make happen during her next 10 years? I think it's quite possible the shift will be from information to Intelligence.

Intelligence and communication networks can't exist without each other. And in some cases (as in the Web), they symbiotically reinforce each other in a self accelerating feedback loop.

The Internet is a scaffold for Intelligent systems which compounds the power of Intelligence within the network. This combined networked Intelligence repays the favor by further diversifying, increasing the efficiency of, and enhancing the network.

I think that's why we started calling the Web "Web 2.0". It started behaving meaningfully smarter.

Lastly, as increasingly intelligent systems exchange the sum of their Intelligences at near the speed of light, a new global Intelligence will emerge with the power to focus on a single global project as one mind and switch to trillions of projects individually. Again in a self reinforcing loop.

The next really big Google sized opportunity will be the shift from organizing the world's information to organizing the world's Intelligence. If not Google then who? I mean ... besides the Intelligence itself :)