As sure as the year end means a look back, a new year means predictions going forward.   These are things I generally think will happen, or not happen as the case may be.

These are mostly tech related as I couldn’t really think of anything “Disney” to predict on.  They’ve already announced their “One More Disney Day” promotion, and everything else (Fantasyland expansion, cars land, etc) is pretty set and Avatar area isn’t ready to come out for a few years now.  And food… well is food.

General Apple – Apple will go after the enterprise market now that Cook is in charge. I don’t think they will be releasing any new Xserves this year, but they will do a 180 and start reinvesting in their enterprise sector.  Siri will be coming out of beta and be able to be integrated with applications in iOS with an API for developers.  I don’t think Siri will make it to the desktop yet as I expect they will be waiting on a new OS for that.  Perhaps an Siri Lion beta like they did with FaceTime?

iPad– The new iPad will most likely be primarily a spec bump. A lot of people got their new iPad 2s and changing aching too drastically wouldn’t be typical Apple procedure. Although, due to the the lack of contracts, they don’t have to be locked into a 2 year cycle, I think it still makes sense to not completely put off recent purchases, while still making older models (or in this case first gen) appear like needing an update. An A6 chip will be in it, and they might perhaps include a new higher display (although not sure if retina display is feasible at the price point). It’ll also have an upgraded camera, and have siri support, but physically still look like the iPad 2. The higher end one might sport a new quad core A6, but due to power drain not nessairily holding my breath.  They will also include one lower price point iPad 2, much like they have with the older iPhone 4 model to allow people to buy at a lower price point.  And to boot, once Siri goes public the iPad 2 most likely to gain Siri support.

iPhone – This ones pretty much a no brainer. Whether it’s called an iPhone 5 or 4GS, the new iPhone will most likely take advantage of the new low power LTE chip sets. It will have the new A6 chip just like its bigger brother iPad. Will most likely be out late summer (July/August?). Might have a larger screen (4″) but retain the same resolution and ratio to not through off app developers. Will sport a new design, most likely something thinner. NFC might make it in the phone, but I don’t see it being a huge feature most people will take advantage of due to limited availability in retail. If anything it’ll be a side note.  Low power bluetooth will be a bigger feature than NFC.  The only other iPhone guess is “will the iPhone 4 gain Siri support?”…. sadly probably not.  Most likely Apple will be keep Siri with the A5 chip devices and higher.  Yes it can run on the 4… but not as fast and why need to upgrade a 2 year phone if it had it?

AppleTV – this is the most up to speculation. With a large portion of the country switching to alternative feeds for their tv watching, cable tv is definitely going to be hit in a big way. Many companies will be trying to beat apple to the punch. Mostly likely apple will be in the right place to take advantage of this with a long thought out solution and offer, once again some solution for cable companies still to stay in the game. I’m hoping that they will be doing some IPTV solution, with ala cart channel solutions. Most likely it wont be a traditional tv, but will be some integration with tvs in the market (AirPlay licensed to tvs?) with apple introducing their own 30″ ‘TV’ which in reality is just a big apple monitor that happens to be able to hooked up to other things. The main guts will still be a set-top box or some other external integration so all suers can take advantage of the AppleTv. Full guess on AppleTV is over here.

iPods/Small devices – I see them probably both consolidating the current iPod line, as well as expanding to newer “accessory” like iOS wearable devices.  The Nano and shuffles will probably merge into one device (they are almost there already…) and will gain linking ability to other iOS devices. It’ll probably seem more like the current nano’s. The iPod Touch will be updated with a better camera to bring it up to probably iPhone 4 (so 5MP not 8MP), and gain Siri use once it goes public.  The Touch tends to be 1 rev behind the iPhone so it’ll probably be very close to the iPhone 4 in every way, just thinner.  There will also be devices that will par up with your iOS devices to take advantage of Siri.  It will contain at least a microphone, speaker, and low power bluetooth chip.  Perhaps some that have a small screen to display a few objects.  However don’t expect to see these devices until the next version of the OS that will come out this year.  Probably same time as the iPhone release.

Android – We are going to see more companies trying to duplicate the kindle fire’s experience and fragmenting the operating system. Many of these might have nothing to involve with google. On the official front, android will slow down its OS to one major release per year (like apple) allowing those phones to catch up and not be so far out of date as they are today.

Google – With Larry Paige consolidating their projects and killing redundant or lesser programs, I think that the chrome OS is going to be seen as redundant and be killed off. Google+ is going to be seen as the android social platform mimicking a lot of the iOS functions in one place (iMessage, FaceTime, etc) and not be used by those without android devices.

Facebook – Facebook will reach 1 billion users. Thats total users. Active users probably will be about half that. Also its basically a given that they will go IPO and be a public company. Reasons come down to laws regarding company sizes and public information… But short version you’ll be able to buy Facebook stock.

Voice controlled devices – Voice controlled tech will become main stream in devices besides the iPhone. From phones to tablets, and TVs to cars, you’ll see more and more companies touting voice control, and have it be actually useful. many companies now have voice control, but it’s more gimmicky than something the average person uses. Siri really pushed voice control to the forefront of people’s minds in 2011 and were going to see most companies try to duplicate Apple’s success. Ford is already there with Ford sync and have had a lot of success with it.

TVs – TVs will continue getting cheaper, bigger and thinner… but that’s about it (other than if apple comes out with something game changing…). 3D and high def are pretty much a standard at this point.  Most people who wanted these technologies have them.  TVs as a tech will have a lot of cool upgrades such as more 3-D passive TVs and higher resolutions and neat backlighting.   But until they get to glasses free at a price point the average person can buy (sub $2,000 for 55), or content the average person can have at these higher resolution… TV as consumer tech this year will be stagnate.

Gaming – We’ll see both PlayStation and Microsoft announce there next gent technologies, but only Nintendo will actually realize the next gen systems. Microsoft will announce first, followed a couple months later by Sony. Mobile gaming will be a thing of the past, with most of the mobile gaming market moving to smart phones and tablets.

General predictions:

• Social media will stop being “the thing” for new platforms and more people will stay with the few “big” social networks.
• RIM as we know it is gone. They will most likely be either have their phone devision acquired or completely out of the game, while concentrating on enterprise services instated.
• CD/DVD drives in computers will start to be seen as optional rather than required and will start to be removed from most computers (especially laptops) that are sold.
• There will be a new market for $100 tablets. They will be the equivalent of “the free android phone”. We close with the kindle fire, but well see an explosion of incredibly cheap tablets in 2012.
• HTML 5 will continue its trend and be pushing out flash form the web. It will still be there, but will be considered a leftover technology that’s on a lot of web pages.
• World doesnt’ end in 2012… cause if it does… well bigger fish to fry than checking this list… kinda a safe prediction no?

Have you’re own predictions?  Thoughts on ones I’ve made?  Leave your thought below in the comments.