1. First murmurs of Facebook’s eventual decline. I think Facebook’s role as the identity system of the internet has been brilliantly executed, but they too are prone to the walled-garden syndrome of wanting to keep users in to increase revenue. It will continue to grow, but the first murmurs of its eventual decline will start next year. It’s decline will likely happen when (not if) it’s role as a proprietary identity system and social graph is slowly replaced by more open alternatives. Innovation always goes from closed to open.
2. Mobile will continue to explode. I was slow on understanding the importance of mobile, but a computer in your pocket is really the future. One of the victims of mobile in 2011 will be camera manufacturers. There’s really less and less reason to buy an actual camera, when you can buy a mobile phone for the same price.

Only two predictions, one of which everyone agrees with, so there goes, not particularly inspired today

Blogs where great for Google, creating a valuable link graph that they could mine. Facebook is bad for them, creating a valuable social graph that Google can’t (easily) mine. Blogs where also good for the internet, and Facebook’s role, I’m not sure about it. Aligning itself with what is good for the internet seems to have been Google’s smartest move so far.

OK. So the Pukka episode where the Belgians (dressed as ninjas) attack the Dutch (dressed as hippies) with waffles and fries, and are finally conquered by hippie music and lurve, dubbed in Spanish, is pretty trippy. Who invents this stuff?

Interesting pattern at Ikea: a search feedback form at the bottom of a results list.

Oh Google calculator, you make my day.

Also try this search.

Even though it’s not exactly Standard English, I like the wording here: “Wing it” versus “Guide me”:

From Blurb’s Booksmart program.

An easy usability problem to solve, instead addressed with a really oldskool “to navigate this site” note. Funny. (The book is highly recommended though.)