One of my first major achievements in my corporate career was being on the design team in 1974 that made the first all electronic of the Trimline telephone. There were about 70 million made in subsequent years. The original Trimline was first invented in 1965. That version was a menagerie of mechanical parts. Including cranks and levers and an actual bell for a ringer. The team I was on used some of the first integrated circuits. For years that was my pride and joy. Today, almost no one even remembers that device other than as a pre-cellphone.
Believe it or not, some time in the not too distant future, the same fate will happen to today’s cellphone, and it will happen much sooner than you imagine. The first iPhone came to market 17 years ago. iPhone 16 is now being introduced.
I will admit that cellphones have probably made the biggest impact on our lives since their invention. But, twenty years is about the lifetime for most of these types of advances. I wonder what the next “big” thing will be?
RJ's Corner 
Probably something to do with neural implants, though that is probably 10 years away. An implanted chip and holographic contact lenses. Who knows what tech is going to excite the edges and then go mainstream. Perhaps we might go the other direction and not have an internet for the masses and just the elites having access??? Blade Runner vs Star Trek or Star Wars.
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Thanks for the thoughts Harold. Yeah, I think your ideas will some day be reality in some form, but I image it will be more than 10 years. I’m thinking more like a Star Trek badge and holographic images. When I was born, about the biggest hi-tech thing was that blurry black and white tube with rabbit ears to constantly manipulate to get a decent picture. It would be beyond college that the simple calculator was invented. I feel OLD now…
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