Portable Entertainment Analysis

It's about that time again - yes, where I tell you what shall become obsolete, what shall bloom like a new age flower, and what you should look forward to in the coming years.

First, after having played around with iPods for the years I worked retail during my college years, I can tell you iPods will become obsolete within a few years. Where these shall fall, we will have multiple iPhone mock ups; in different variations and colors, bigger hard drives, a high-definition camera, and integrated GPS. Obviously, this means no more iPods, GPS devices, or dedicated point-and-shoot cameras.

Secondly, portable gaming will continue to thrive. The DS Lite will continue to dominate over the PSP, mainly due to the PSP's lack of user-friendly integration, dated "UMD" slots, and overly industrial styling. Future revisions are definitely plausible. Furthermore, these systems will not be integrated into all-in-one solutions, like phones, primarily due to manufacturer disinterest and the inconvenience of cellular service on a gaming device.

A mainstream market currently attempting to make its way up are eBook readers such as Amazon's Kindle and Sony's Portable Reader System. The idea of completely removing books from the shelves may seem troubling to some, but this does help reduce production costs of printing, which helps the environment in the long run. Also, the ability to search textbooks for research and reference via a thin tablet device sounds convenient enough, but once laptops reach a similar size and weight, the device will become dated.

Finally, either Bluetooth or another wireless technology by another name will become completely mainstream. This will allow full cohesive between one's home PC, car, and workplace by allowing synchronizations of calendars, mail, and playlists (given there is enough room in the iPhones now to carry server sized media collections). There will be another Steve Jobs that will make this simple enough for the mainstream consumer to understand. This is where I hopefully come in sometime in the near future.