The Consumer Electronics Show is in full effect in Las Vegas and it’s bigger than ever. In fact, it’s cooler than ever. Back in the day it was a glorified Best Buy, but now it’s a place for innovation — and gossip and deal-making and showing-off. It’s like the Oscars for nerds. Even Bill Clinton showed up to give a speech.
After Day 1, here are the 5 coolest things that are going to be a part of your life very soon.
SMART WATCHES
Those of us who scour the web for Apple news have read reports about an ‘iWatch’ being designed. No confirmation on that, but what is coming next month is one of the world’s first smart watches by Pebble. It’s Bluetooth enabled and ready to communicate with your cell phone. Check out the video:
CAR APPS
We don’t mean apps about cars, we mean apps IN cars. Remember when you first looked in your phone’s app store and marveled at all the crappy apps you were never going to pay for? Well, hopefully Ford has higher standards, because it’s going to let anyone start developing apps for its cars. Hmm…not sure how we feel about people playing Angry Birds while driving. Check it out. If you know how to write computer code, you can start building apps and make some $.
UHD TELEVISIONS
Just in case the picture quality of your High Definition television is too fuzzy, Ultra High Definition televisions are hitting the market. Trust me, you can’t afford one right now, and you shouldn’t buy one anyway because no one is making content encoded for it, but that’ll happen soon. Netflix has already promised to make its entire movie catalog ready in UHD. We’re more excited about games on a UHD TV. Oh man Assassin’s Creed is gonna be ridiculous.
BRAIN CONTROLLED DEVICES
Nerds like me know that in the coming years, you’ll control all of your devices with your brain. You can start now with the brain-controlled radio helicopter by Neurosky. The bigger story here is the wonderful future for education, where people who have learning disabilities won’t be restricted to pens and typing…and neither will you. Imagine writing a paper just by thinking the words, and they appear on your iPad, in every language known to man. Only a few years away my friends…
DRIVERLESS CARS
Get behind the wheel, start the gas (well, electric motor), turn on your music, type your destination into the GPS and go to sleep. You may not know this, but Google, Lexus, Audi, and even Continental (yes, the airplane company) are developing driverless cars. California Governor Jerry Brown signed a law in California not too long ago making them legal. Not more than 5 years to go and you’ll be seeing these.
