Digital Life in 2025

This report is the latest research report in a sustained effort throughout 2014 by the Pew Research Center to mark the 25th anniversary of the creation of the World Wide Web by Sir Tim Berners-Lee. He wrote a paper on March 12, 1989 proposing an “information management” system that became the conceptual and architectural structure for the Web. He eventually released the code for his system -- for free -- to the world on Christmas Day in 1990.

Our first report tied to the anniversary looked at the present and the past of the Internet, marking its strikingly fast adoption and assessing its impact on American users’ lives. A canvassing of 2,558 experts and technology builders about where we will stand by the year 2025 finds striking patterns in their predictions. In their responses, these experts foresee an ambient information environment where accessing the Internet will be effortless and most people will tap into it so easily it will flow through their lives “like electricity.” They predict mobile, wearable, and embedded computing will be tied together in the Internet of Things, allowing people and their surroundings to tap into artificial intelligence-enhanced cloud-based information storage and sharing. There is remarkable consensus about the advances in technology that will occur over the next decade, which include:

• A global, immersive, invisible, ambient networked computing environment built through the continued proliferation of smart sensors, cameras, software, databases, and massive data centers in a world-spanning information fabric known as the Internet of Things.
• “Augmented reality” enhancements to the real-world input that people perceive through the use of portable/wearable/implantable technologies.
• Disruption of business models established in the 20th century (most notably impacting finance, entertainment, publishers of all sorts, and education).
• Tagging, databasing, and intelligent analytical mapping of the physical and social realms.

[March 11]