The economy and its industrial structure is fragmenting. Silicon Valley’s winner-take-all-dynamics. The end of apps. Tackling technological ignorance. Killing web adverts. What to look forward to in 2016. And a reader request…

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I have just returned from 4 days in the English countryside, without cell or internet access. Highly recommended. Amazingly, I survived without logging-in to Facebook even once. Happy New Year!

Dept of the near future

✨ The refragmentation: Paul Graham, founder of Y-Combinator, on the refragemention of the US political economy and industrial organisation. MUST READ

🌎 Global marketplaces will allow anyone to sell anything to anyone: a strategic analysis by EV subscriber, John Hagel, and Deloitte University. GREAT ANALYSIS

🌟But veteran Silicon Valley commentator Om Malik: “Silicon valley is now almost always a winner-take-all-game.” INSIDER VIEW

📲 The end of apps as we know them: Paul Adams, former global head of design at Facebook and author of Grouped, argues that our “experience of our primary mobile screen being a bank of app icons that lead to independent destinations is dying”. EXCELLENT

😮EV reader, Samuel Arbesman, on the problem of technological ignorance: “When we, as a society, fail to appreciate the staggering complexity of our modern technologies, we don’t just lose a sense of awe toward what is around us. We lose a sense of what we as humans can build, as well as where we might fall short.” THOUGHTFUL

⚔ Everyone hates intrusive Web adverts. Will the companies forcing them on us finally realise this? EXCELLENT by Ethan Zuckerman

Dept of reader participation

The mission of Exponential View is to provide a macroscopic take of the technologies that will affect us in the next 5-10 years. I prefer this longer time horizon. But at the end of a calendar year, it’s impossible to avoid short-termist content that looks at the previous or next 12 months.

But in the spirit of the 10-year mission, I put a question to you in the form of a tweet. 

Which technology will have the largest impact (positive or negative) in the next 10 years? Artificial intelligence? Energy generation and storage? Autonomous vehicles? Physical robotics? Space exploration? Virtual reality? Gene editing? Brain modelling? 3-d printing? Blockchain?

🌟Hit the tweet above and reply and let’s have a conversation :)

Dept of the 2016, the year that...

VC par-excellence Fred Wilson on what will happen in 2016. Also worth reading his piece “what happened in 2015”

WSJ on the technology that will change your life this year: virtual reality, personal drowns, Chinese cell phones, intelligent messengers, wireless charging and more

Will AI personal assistants make the grade? I have five smart digital assistants and still can’t get anything done.

MIT Tech Review: five robotics trends to watch in 2016

Singularity Hub: the technologies that matter in 2016 (electric cars, light-field photography for VR, smart contracts and open AI.)

🔋Wind and solar power generation set for a record year in 2016 despite declining oil prices. (Renewables represented 99% of new US energy capacity in November).

CRISPR will have a stellar year of progress in 2016 (my call, not a hard one). Jennifer Doudma, one of the co-discoverers of the technology, reflects on 2015’s whirlwind year. RECOMMENDED

Short morsels

British citizens may soon need to get permission to take photos of things they already own. (Can you say “regulatory capture” seven times in a row without tripping up?)

Haptic holograms are here. (h/t @moniqueelwell)

How America’s ultra-wealthy foster and protect an alternative, highly advantageous tax system.

This looks exciting: open-energy trading platforms for renewable energy providers. Think AirBNB for renewables.

Uber’s global New Years Eve rider data - fascinating.

End notes

Happy New Year to all EV subscribers. I’m looking forward to continuing this adventure during 2016. Feel free to ping me any recommended articles via email or Twitter.