I loved the Long Now Foundation since I first heard of it. I almost think of it with the authority and reverence of "The Church of the Long Now". ;) Well, they are working on several major projects. One: To build a ten thousand year clock that will remain accurate for ten thousand years. Two: To build spheres that can be viewed with microscopes to view the Chapters 1-3 of Genesis (The Bible). Three: To add 0 to the beginning of all 4-digit years (ex: 02009). This is to allow for the bug that will be in future computers that are not ready for the decamillinium. Check them out. And keep your eyes out for the future.

The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders is putting out its newest version (DSM-V) by May 2012. I am a mental health consumer, and I think this could finally bring some resolution to many of the problems that are going on in Mental Health at the moment. A paradigm change, if you will. Is homosexuality nature or nurture? Or a disease? It was in the DSM at one version or the other. This is a very important book and will define many of our buzzwords for the next 20 years or so. It may not be a big change, but the Talking Heads and the Newspapers will have to change their tunes. This is very exciting and could lead to more (or less) disabiity payouts. More or less medication perscriptions. And more or less people called "jerks" instead of "ill".
You can find out more at http://www.psych.org/dsmv.asp

I found Ten Forecasts by the World Future Society and thought I'd add a bit of commentary to them. Here goes nothing:

1. The world will have a billion millionaires by 2025. According to FORBES magazine, there are 691 Billionaires in the world. With inflation driving down the value of the Dollar and the Euro in the future, I could fully see this happening. The WFS also points out that Globalization and Technological innovation (such as the internet) are making this possible. This aligns with my thoughts, such as e-commerce being some 75% of total business by 2025.

2. Fashion will go wired as technologies and tastes converge to revolutionize the textile industry. While researching for this project, I ran into glow-in-the-dark paints in crayola-16 colors. Also, there is Make Magazine inspiring wearable computers and Arduino Microcontrollers that sew into shirts and other fabrics. With the Arduino-Ethernet Shield this is entirely possible as well. The Arduino is open source and open source will take over the electronics market in the wearable field.

3. The threat of another cold war with China, Russia, or both could replace terrorism as the chief foreign-policy concern of the United States. The War on Terror is hardly talked about under the Obama Administration. The threats in between the US and North Korea and China and their "Hacker State" will lead us ino a Cold War with China. Russia is a wild card. It could go either way, but Russia will be innovating and leading the way in technology soon.

4. Counterfeiting of currency will proliferate, driving the move toward a cashless society. I believe the counterfeiting of money will lead us to Japanese style Credit-Over-Cellphone systems. Either that, or we will use Credit styl cards entirely.

5. The earth is on the verge of a significant extinction event. I don't know about this one. Possibly a mass genocidal event in terms of flu. But that goes against technology and number 7.

6. Water will be in the twenty-first century what oil was in the twentieth century. If they mean costing 1.27 a quart at Wal-Mart and being 50bucks a barrel, it probably already is.

7. World population by 2050 may grow larger than previously expected, due in part to healthier, longer-living people. Futurist Ray Kurzweil predicts that by 2040 or so, we'll have figured out vast long-life or immortality. He also says that the first millenarian is already about 60.

8. The number of Africans imperiled by floods will grow 70-fold by 2080. With the Rainforests being cut down, we're on the way to this in South America as well.

9. Rising prices for natural resources could lead to a full-scale rush to develop the Arctic. This could also lead to us developing other worlds as fast as possible. Or at least two way rovers to bring back as much resources as possible.

10. More decisions will be made by nonhuman entities. Game theory will vastly control our lives. Supercomputers will be commercially available to me and you at a desktop size once quantum computers are properly developed, so I can see this happening by 2030.

I saw THIS and decided it had to be posted. It's super cool, fits like a.... glove(?). And uses leds to light. The best we had was the little lights that hung onto our buttonholes in the Army. They put out a lot of light when squeezed. Shined in different colors. These would be good because the light would be just where you need it, but a good headlamp is always appreciated for when you need to touch something.
Those GloveLED things would be great worn while carrying an M4 into a crowded house. You point your fireteam where you want them to go, and there is no confusion because of the light. Get them in IR for ultimate effectiveness with night-vision goggles (NVGs).
I'm ready to sign the contract now, are you?

If there's one positive thing that has come out of the entire Zeitgeist, Loose Change, 9/11 Truth Movement, it has been The Venus Project. The Project calls for a total realignment of our culture. A new paradigm if you will.
It operates out of a 21.5 acre research park in Venus, Florida. It believes that social reforms and think tanks can get together and make big decisions to change our culture. But it will take our whole world.
It seems to involve no ownership. From the projects Essay site:

"One of the basic premises of The Venus Project is that we work towards having all of the Earth's resources as the common heritage of all the world's people. Anything less will simply result in a continuation of the same catalog of problems inherent in the present system. "

Are we ready? Are you ready? I don't believe we are.

The future is NOW.

And if you need proof of it, there is a site called http://www.longbets.org/ that specializes in futuristic bets. Some of them, already have came to be claimed. All of them go to charity. There is a 200 US Dollar minimum and the charity has to be Federally recognized. My favorite was Ray Kurzweil and Mitchell Kapor betting whether by 2029 the (in)famous Turing Test will have been beaten. The stakes are a donation to the Electronic Frontier Foundation or the Kurzweil Foundation. I like those odds. Two of my favorite charities. You can even make your own bets of challenge someone else who made a wager to the air. Check it out....