Lunatic's "What Tech Companies COULD Do" In 2012

In previous years' tech prediction articles I have added "Bonus Predictions" that I felt were possibilities, but I didn't feel confident enough would happen, at least that year, to add to my set of actual predictions. I didn't do this for my Tech Industry Predictions for 2012. This year I had so many similar "possible, but maybe not so likely" thoughts that I decided to pull them out into this separate article.

• Adobe
  
  Adobe could adopt webOS and turn it into a cross-platform runtime for HTML5 apps.
  
  
• Amazon
  
  Amazon could create a social network.
  
  
• FaceBook
  
  FaceBook could buy AOL (ha ha).
  
  
• Google
  
  Google could do a car software project, to try to compete with the Microsoft-powered Ford Sync product.
  
  
• Microsoft
  
  Microsoft could integrate Skype into the Xbox and Kinect, allowing people to use the cameras for both full living room video chat and interactive games with "virtual" objects.
  
  Microsoft could "embrace and extend" Android, replacing all of its Google services with their own (the way Amazon did with the Kindle Fire), then offer that version to manufacturers of Android phones for LESS than the patent royalties they're curently charging on each Android device sold.
  
  Why would Microsoft do this? Well, Google wants to commoditize operating systems, in order to destroy any profits that can be gained from selling them. This hasn't been quite so successful with Android, since Microsoft is getting patent royalties from all the major Android device manufacturers. What Google wants to get, and makes their money on, is traffic and metrics, which they use to get advertisers to spend money on Google ads. If Microsoft can get Android device manufacturers to switch to their own version of Android that integrates Microsoft's services instead of Google's, they can cut the traffic and metrics legs out from under Google, just like they did to Netscape with Internet Explorer.
  
  
• Samsung
  
  Samsung COULD still do great product and software design without copying Apple so much; even down to the accessories and packaging. Not even Microsoft is or was as shameless.
  
  Bonus side effect: Fewer lawsuits against Samsung from Apple.
  
  
• Sony
  
  Sony could create a tablet that can play PS3 games, with wireless controllers. ("Hey, kids, would you rather play with an iPad in the back of the car, or a fully-compatible PS3 tablet?") Yes, Sony has the PSP Vita, but this would have a larger screen and compatibility with the much larger library of PS3 games. See: Nintendo's Wii U.
  
  
• Apple
  
  Apple could be (more) aggressive about getting the iPhone on as many carriers in all territories as possible. Like a CDMA iPhone was created to get it on Verizon in early 2011 (and later Sprint), an iPhone adapted for T-Mobile's unique 1700 MHz AWS 3G band could be released early in 2012. If Apple decides to add T-Mobile compatibility, but only with the launch of a 6th generation iPhone, then there wouldn't be an earlier generation iPhone already available to be sold on T-Mobile at a reduced cost—like they did with the iPhone 4 on Verizon. In the same way it would be best for Apple to release an iPhone adapted for China Mobile's TD-SCDMA 3G data as soon as possible, even if it means losing the "world phone" compatibility with GSM and CDMA that the iPhone 4S has. Much of the share of Android has come from phones being available on carriers that the iPhone hasn't been available on. Aggressively adding (more) multiple carriers in all regions would level out this imbalance of availability.
  
  Apple could add a front-facing notification light to the next iPhone/iPad/iPod touch, for when you have notifications that haven't been viewed. (Please!)
  
  Apple could allow alarms in the iPhone/iPod touch Clock app to be set to play music instead of an alarm sound. (Again: Please!)
  
  Apple could replace the Mac Pro with a two part solution. The first part would be a chassis that holds PCI cards and multiple hard drives, connecting via Thunderbolt to any Mac. The second part would be "Pro" versions of iMacs and Mac minis that could be configured with multiple high-end multi-core processors. A 1U server version of the chassis could even be offered (there's already a third party solution like this for Mac minis).
  
  Apple could expand Mac desktop iTunes music library sharing and iPhoto image sharing to include music and photo libraries on iOS devices. Right now an iOS device can use AirPlay to send content to an Apple TV, as a "push" action initiated from the device. Expanding library sharing like this would allow a "pull" action: While you're in range of a WiFi network the iOS device in your pocket or bag broadcasts its presence to other computers and devices on the same network. Using one of those you'd see a new item its music or photo library for your iOS device. Clicking on it and entering a password would allow you to browse the music or photos on that device. To save your iOS device's battery life this could be tied into iCould, so that the only content that is available like this is that which has been synched to iCould, and thus the actual data is loaded from the iCloud servers.
  
  Apple could expand AirPlay access so that the iOS device in your hand could browse content in iTunes/iPhoto/etc. on computers in your local network and then have THEM send that content to a nearby Apple TV. It could also do this with content on iCloud that hasn't (yet) been synced or downloaded to your iOS device. So instead of synching the data first it would just be sent directly from iCould to a nearby Apple TV.
  
  Once Apple TV supports add-on streaming video "channels," Apple could add an "overlay" type interface to it, to allow quick switching between them without having to cycle through all the channels to get to the one you want.
  
  
• Acer, Asus, Lenovo, (others?)
  
  Several companies could come together to fork Android into a shared platform for "ultrabook" style laptops, running on ARM processors (maybe built on an existing fork of Android like OPhone or Baidu Yi). This could allow them to be less beholden to Microsoft and Intel, yet have a familiar base with which to court developers who have been writing software for Android. These "ultrabook" style laptops could have improved battery life and lower costs due to running on ARM and not needing a Windows licence. At the same time the hardware could be made compatible with Microsoft's Windows 8 on ARM, so buyers would be reassured that they could get a measure of Windows compatibility if they wanted it.
  
  
• Some consumer tech company (maybe Archos?)
  
  Someone could make a WiFi-enabled portable CD player that rips CDs and uploads them to an online locker service. The locker service would provide a minimal amount of storage for free, and then charge for more than that. Apps on iOS/Android/etc. as well as a web player and apps on Mac and Windows could allow streaming/syncing of the music. In this way it would be the spiritual successor to turntables with USB interfaces that let you rip your vinyl to your computer. In this case, though, this CD player would allow you to get the music from CDs onto smartphones, iPads, iPod touches, etc. without needing a computer (and, for iOS devices, iTunes) as an intermediary. These devices running mobile OSes could then go even more "PC-free."
  
  The CD player could additionally have a USB port and/or SD card slot, to allow import of music, videos, photos, etc. from Flash drives, USB hard drives, and memory cards. Any files uploaded that aren't natively compatible with iOS devices (such as .avi and .mkv videos, FLAC audio, etc.) could be transcoded by the online locker's servers to be compatible with H.264, MP3, AAC, and/or Apple Lossless, etc.
  
  To be really cheeky, a DVD player version could be available that could rip video from non-CSS-protected DVDs in the same way (as well as DVD audio discs). No doubt unoffical hacks could later be found to unlock region coding and bypass CSS.
  
  

Next: This year I'm also trying to offer advice for What Tech Companies SHOULD Do in 2012.