Here comes the future!

No doubt that when people first saw the science-fiction blockbuster Star Wars, they imagined that all that amazing stuff will become commonplace by the turn of the millennium, bearing in mind that Neil Armstrong already had walked the Moon a few years before. Well … perhaps not everything, but at least lightsabers (which are AWESOME!) and low cost trips to Mars.

As it turns out, technology cannot always keep pace with our imagination and for now we will have to make do with lightsaber toys, which you can get at roughly £10 a piece, and a good copy of the movie Total Recall (the 1990 one, with the one and only Arnold “I'll be back” Schwarzenegger).

However, while some of these things did not yet come to pass, a lot of great stuff is happening around us, nonetheless. With the rise of the Internet and the proliferation of smart devices (which arguably don't make us look as cool as Luke and Obi Wan) our life is becoming a lot easier, a lot less messy and much more interesting, or at least is about to, as soon as some of these gadgets break free from the R&D labs and start flooding the market.

So, what can we look forward to, besides bills that pay themselves and children that grow up on their own, which we guess will never happen, but one can dream, right?

We have been doing a bit of research for you, to get a peak into how the house of the future might look like and we came across some really interesting and exciting ideas.

In this Jetsons-like home we can put behind us the ever tedious laundry chore with the advent of self-cleaning sheets and the “magic” wardrobe that hot-steams your clothes, getting rid of 99.9% of germs and bacteria.

No more fighting over the blanket, with the “caring” sheets that warm up to suit your body temperature, and “Good Bye!” to that same old view that you wake up to every morning, with the interactive window screens, which can display any paradise snapshot that you can dream of.

Catch up with the latest news or just find out what other people have been up to, while brushing your teeth in the morning, with the cyber mirror, and doze off late in the afternoon in a magnetic floating sofa, while controlling your TV with a blink of an eye.

These, of course, are just the tip of the iceberg and by the time you have finished reading this post, it is most likely that the always restless “geeks” working on the fringes of technology and innovation will have come up with at least a dozen items that we might add to an ever growing list. However, among this myriad of things that make you hold your breath, something has left us flabbergasted:

CONTROLLING THINGS WITH YOUR MIND

This X-men plot seems plausible within the next 10 years, as the number of individual devices connected to the Internet will rise to 26 billion.

Here is a scenario for you:

You wake up in the morning (hopefully not that early) and by the time you are out of bed, your blinds are up, the coffee is pouring slowly into your cup, the bread is toasting and your shower is ready - perfect water temperature, and all this without lifting a finger.

All you need is a bit of focus, a slightly goofy headset and a bluetooth or wi-fi connection. The headset will basically read your brain waves and then translate them into commands for your mechanical minions, who will obey immediately.

This gives a whole new meaning to the phrase "You read my mind with that cup of hot coffee!".

And because brain wave patterns are unique to each individual, no one could hack your device and use it against you.

The story gets even better with the much anticipated arrival of driverless cars, which for now are lurking on the horizon, but seem to be inevitable with the expansion of autonomous technology like electronic stability control, automatic braking, adaptive cruise control, lane-departure warning system and blind-spot indicators.

Naturally, as with all technological development, the ever growing connection of house appliances to the Internet may present certain risks, especially in regards to security and privacy matters, as data stored by your household devices may be used to map your behaviour.

However, by protecting each of your devices individually and monitoring them closely, while making sure to always install the latest software and security updates, you can certainly minimise the risk of a security breach, at the same time reaping all the benefits of this new technology.

So, till our next time, have a good one! The future is here to stay!