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Software might never end. It will grow and grow and grow and grow until everything is software (or food). Your chair? Software. Your medicine pill? Software. Yo

Software might never end. It will grow and grow and grow and grow until everything is software (or food). Your chair? Software. Your medicine pill? Software. Your glasses? Software. Your boots? Software. Walls of your house? Software. Your car? Software. The road you drive on? Software. I think we've not even yet tapped this. Not only we're not over "peak software" hump - it's not anywhere in sight, we're not even on the main exponential growth curve.

capex 15y ago
This feels like 'The Matrix'..
- guard-of-terra 15y ago
  It would in fact be the opposite. Matrix was about emulating an old boring world in software for people living in jars. Here you will have the real thing. Real but no longer boring.
grogs 15y ago
Interesting ideas. I'd love to read some good sciene fiction novels based on this. It has the potential to be very relevant. 3D plastic printers are interesting, but too limited at the moment. 3D concrete printing has existed for a while though, that can definitely allow software to be/create the walls of your house. For medicine it's just a case of getting the simulation down. It'll also be interesting if robots get better. There's a lot of boring lab work in the natural sciences, if this can be automated and controlled by software... Your testing can be done by software... Genetic algorithms could be used to find cures to things. (Although using robots to physically test would presumably be much much slower and more expensive than a computer simulation. :( )
- andrewflnr 15y ago
  I think by "your walls are software" he meant that your walls are controlled by software. Think heat management, view screens, maybe re-arranging them with a remote. But they're probably constructed with software, too.
  - kragen 15y ago
    I think he meant more than simply "your walls are controlled by software". Think of Utility Fog: your walls could be made of hundreds of little robots linked together, and can be reconfigured to a different shape in seconds under the control of software. The robots are sort of like three-dimensional pixels; the shape they assume at any given moment is just the shape that the currently running software gives them. Or perhaps dozens of little robots built the wall in the first place (by lashing together sticks and filling the space between with gravel, say) under software control, and can disassemble it and reassemble it in a different form under software control in an hour or two. In this case the sticks and stones are the pixels.
- oillio 15y ago
  I recommend reading The Diamond Age by Neal Stephenson. It is classic cyber-punk about what happens socio-economically when damn near everything can be made by the 3D printer in the corner of your house, as long as you have the raw materials...and the software.
ippisl 15y ago
Most of them do already exist. Software based pill: There's already a pill the uses a sensor to measure it's place inside you're gut and release it medication in a specific location. There's also an in-body device that release medicine on regular intervals. Software based glasses: augmented reality glasses. They might be a growth area for apps. Programmable shoes: There are shoes with a programmable pattern and shoes for people with Alzheimer that transmit you're location. Programmable cars: cars are already programmable. they contain huge amounts of software. Programmable chairs: some dental chairs are already programmable. You have programs for different seat positions. My guess is, to create a new software employment boom, you need to create a new mass market programmable platform, that needs a lot of small volume applications and that developing for it is neither too complex(windows gui before VB) and neither too simple(excel).
- guard-of-terra 15y ago
  When they finally arrive you'll see that no, they do not. They are just blossoms here and there, not a mesh of grass. Everything will not be simply programmable: it would be flexible, changing. Your wall would not be concrete with some software. It would be software with some concrete.
ansgri 15y ago
Moving into deeper fiction, we'll return to 'no software' again: inherent inefficiencies of digital hardware will force us to build analog systems, sort of pure hardware, that will be in fact software for the machine that runs this world.

capex 15y ago

This feels like 'The Matrix'..

guard-of-terra 15y ago
It would in fact be the opposite. Matrix was about emulating an old boring world in software for people living in jars. Here you will have the real thing. Real but no longer boring.

grogs 15y ago

Interesting ideas. I'd love to read some good sciene fiction novels based on this. It has the potential to be very relevant. 3D plastic printers are interesting, but too limited at the moment. 3D concrete printing has existed for a while though, that can definitely allow software to be/create the walls of your house. For medicine it's just a case of getting the simulation down. It'll also be interesting if robots get better. There's a lot of boring lab work in the natural sciences, if this can be automated and controlled by software... Your testing can be done by software... Genetic algorithms could be used to find cures to things. (Although using robots to physically test would presumably be much much slower and more expensive than a computer simulation. :( )

andrewflnr 15y ago
I think by "your walls are software" he meant that your walls are controlled by software. Think heat management, view screens, maybe re-arranging them with a remote. But they're probably constructed with software, too.
- kragen 15y ago
  I think he meant more than simply "your walls are controlled by software". Think of Utility Fog: your walls could be made of hundreds of little robots linked together, and can be reconfigured to a different shape in seconds under the control of software. The robots are sort of like three-dimensional pixels; the shape they assume at any given moment is just the shape that the currently running software gives them. Or perhaps dozens of little robots built the wall in the first place (by lashing together sticks and filling the space between with gravel, say) under software control, and can disassemble it and reassemble it in a different form under software control in an hour or two. In this case the sticks and stones are the pixels.
oillio 15y ago
I recommend reading The Diamond Age by Neal Stephenson. It is classic cyber-punk about what happens socio-economically when damn near everything can be made by the 3D printer in the corner of your house, as long as you have the raw materials...and the software.

ippisl 15y ago

Most of them do already exist. Software based pill: There's already a pill the uses a sensor to measure it's place inside you're gut and release it medication in a specific location. There's also an in-body device that release medicine on regular intervals. Software based glasses: augmented reality glasses. They might be a growth area for apps. Programmable shoes: There are shoes with a programmable pattern and shoes for people with Alzheimer that transmit you're location. Programmable cars: cars are already programmable. they contain huge amounts of software. Programmable chairs: some dental chairs are already programmable. You have programs for different seat positions. My guess is, to create a new software employment boom, you need to create a new mass market programmable platform, that needs a lot of small volume applications and that developing for it is neither too complex(windows gui before VB) and neither too simple(excel).

guard-of-terra 15y ago
When they finally arrive you'll see that no, they do not. They are just blossoms here and there, not a mesh of grass. Everything will not be simply programmable: it would be flexible, changing. Your wall would not be concrete with some software. It would be software with some concrete.

ansgri 15y ago

Moving into deeper fiction, we'll return to 'no software' again: inherent inefficiencies of digital hardware will force us to build analog systems, sort of pure hardware, that will be in fact software for the machine that runs this world.