The Next Infotech Breakthroughs (written in 2014)

Television

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March 2013 - a train station - an advertising poster for Sky – We can now watch SkyGo on the train.
Netflix and Blinkbox also provide you with the opportunity to watch television programmes and films on a variety of devices.
With all the technologies competing and all the providers competing, it’s like a nip and tuck horse race to a finish line that does not really exist.
The early predictions suggest that Smart TV is not just a catchy advertising description, it is the immediate future. We will use the television for the internet and communication. We will use computers to watch television. We will use mobile phones to watch films.

Gaming

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We will keep this summary short and sweet. We will see new games and slight improvements to graphics, but we are waiting. Back in the 1960s, Moore’s Law predicted that technological advancement would see a density increase of transistors on an integrated circuit doubling every 18 months. It held firm for a number of years, but it has slowed to around every three years.
Ultimately, this is what is required – power and speed.
For gaming companies it could be likened to a Holy Grail that they manage to grasp, but then drop, only to pick it up again, and then drop. A repeat cycle that will not make gamers happy until they can share their nights with holographic super models that they can touch and feel.
A lack of power does not stop the gaming industry progressing however. In around a decade we have seen a DVD drive put in the PS2, a move to urban realism in games, fully interactive motion and dance games, touch screen gaming, and most recently, incredible advances in social gaming.

Personal Networking

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It is perhaps surprising that you cannot yet close your computer at work before picking up where you left off on your tablet on the train home, before finally getting to bed at midnight after picking up where you left off on the train, on the home laptop.
The smart money is that working across multiple devices will happen at some stage before the end of 2014.

Mobile Phones

Although many of the manufacturers have caught up with Apple, it is still to the iPhone that the consumer looks, for updates and technological advances.
It has been widely reported that a new iPhone will be released in 2013, and there are numerous rumours about what it may include. The interesting thing about these rumours is not necessarily what will or will not be include, but the fact that the speculation alone suggest what is and will be possible in the near future.
These include:
A Fingerprint Sensor
Sonar for facial recognition and 3D modelling
The fastest processor yet seen in a mobile device
A flexible screen
An unbreakable screen
In February 2013, Apple had a patent approved describing a system that would allow an iPhone to automatically switch modes by anticipating your needs.
Article Link

Google Glass

An uninspiring and confusing name – hands up who thought it was Google Glasses, when they first came out? Nevertheless, it was the ‘big tech thing’ of 2012. Google had already brought us the driverless car LINK and are clearly looking at innovation as a way of spending their incredible cash pile. CEO Larry Page said, “I get chills when I use a product that is the future, and that happens when I use Glass. Some day we will all be amazed that computing involved fishing around in pockets and purses.”
While people entered a lottery to pay $1,500 to try out Google Glass before its expected release just in time for the Christmas market of 2013, it looks very much like the first step towards a future.
This project will probably be a fully integrated contact lens product in a few years, but at present they are a cumbersome, easily breakable, eyesore (quite literally). 
However, they have some useful tricks available and if the military adopts them, the tech will progress even more quickly.

Summer 2013

Blackberry Q10

Blackberry's new Q10 phone has a unique feature that the ailing company hope will help them regain their position in the marketplace: A QWERTY keyboard and a touchscreen. It is not new technology, but it is expected to be the best of its type. The initial price; around £575.

The Samsung Galaxy S4 is the most pre-ordered phone in mobile history. The effort enthusiasts go to to learn what communication device is worth committing a two year contract to, would suggest reviews are not that important - this will be a very good phone!