Divide and conquer: Can be damn cool; depends whether it creates more issues than it solves. I find it's healthier to look at "P2P" as "the way crap would've been built when we could remember how to design" than with some sort of hip management-book perspective. Things like mesh routing for wireless networks have a 'divide and conquer' aspect to the problem-solving, sure, but ignore the newspeak and you get the simple "What use is it if you can't just turn it on like a television?" feeling that drove the old guard of innovators at places like Apple, Commodore, and even IBM/MS.

Today, we're willing to accept way too much bullshit to accomplish any task.

Spam: I'm lucky, it's never been a real problem. I still prefer email to IM services for a few good reasons...

Single Sign On: No need for a centralized repository; we've had the technology to run it from the desktop for years. Unfortunately, smartcards (of the truly 'smart' variety) and reliable, removable, securable (in-a-safe) storage haven't been big sellers.

The good thing about a physical token is that, if it disappears, you at least *know* to revoke it, while a password can be stolen and go unnoticed for years. Managing the revocation system is a bitch, of course, and probably shifts the central authority problem over to there... Okay, tough problem.

Other holy-shits in the making: Honda and Toyota selling hybrid cars, "alternative" fuels really being considered, even if it comes down to coal-fired electricity in the end.

Holographic storage finally works. (Too bad for Constellation 3D, I guess; FMD-ROM was pretty cool, too.)

CRTs will be truly obsolete in 5 years. Hallelujah.

Ethernet is replacing *everything;* power-over-ethernet may soon replace wall warts for small wired devices. What ethernet doesn't replace, USB, Firewire, and other serial attachments will.

Now, consider for a moment how many upcoming holy shits come off the "Holy Duh" list. The "Holy Duh" list is the complete list of all good ideas that have been ignored and neglected. The biggest one on my mind, as I watch ethernet creep in everywhere, is the total ignorance that's been given to broadcast and multicast modes, both on-the-wire and in IP. Anyone who's fooled with analog video distribution might have a clue what I'm aiming at, there; Peer to Peer was also on the list until it became en-vogue, as are way too many other concepts.

Getting off-topic, but the most annoying thing on that list at the moment is "Anything with a microprocessor is a computer." It's 2002, the average $20 organizer has more processing power than a C64, but try finding one that can do something as simple as read Gutenberg-size ASCII text from your pocket. "Oh, that's a 'computer' task, not an 'organizer' task- you need a $300 Zaurus!" I want the crack product-designers are smoking.