Predictions for 2019: A look ahead — On the surface, 2018 has been a rather interesting year to say the least. With ad revenue declining across all platforms and the privacy concerns of the masses, 2019 just might be the year that will boil it all down with a bit of dead reckoning coupled with some hard solutions. There will both be winners and losers at both ends of the internet spectrum, from telecommunications to the huge corporate ad servers like Google. 2019 just might prove to be a true watershed moment for all.

On the Social Media scene

— Facebook will continue to languish as more of it’s disinterested and disengaged user base leave the platform. Social networking platforms will continue to be overrun by the barbarians of fake news and hate posts. The instances of privacy breeches and data abuses will continue to increase … ad revenue will continue to drop as browser development continues to offer built-in tools to deny tracking and ads.

There will be a generous decline of “Like” and “Share” buttons on private/company websites as webmasters begin to refuse to allow their visitors to be profiled by social media sites.

We will be seeing more paywalls for news media sites as ad profits evaporate into thin air because of the privacy tools being built-in to our modern browsers.

Small to medium sized publishers will continue to flee the larger ad platforms in favor of serving their own ads locally and regionally (dynamic and static).

Free website builder platforms will see a decrease in use as smaller business owners venture out to own their own for the sake of their independence and privacy.

Operating Systems

Microsoft’s operating system Windows 10 will continue to decline in market share as Microsoft continues to push for SaaS.

U.K. based Canonical Ltd (Ubuntu OS) will possibly be faced with a few generous buy-out offers from other big tech firms like Xiaomi (China) or Google.

Apple will achieve it’s total hardware manufacturing independence by late 2019.

System 76 will expand on the American market with it’s totally American made Linux laptops and PC’s.

Dell will continue and expand it’s Linux OEM offerings on new PC’s and laptops.

STEAM OS will revolutionize the gaming industry.

Telecommunications

Predictions for 2019 might also say that Smart phone sales will drop in 2019 as market saturation sets in .. Though not very likely, sales may pick up by the end of the year if things like price and true innovation are addressed.

Cable companies will continue to suffer under the onslaught of even more readily available and cheaper online streaming services.

Hardware

Intel will continue to dominate the market.

Nvidia GeForce graphics series will continue to dominate the market.

Internet Browsers

Predictions for 2019 might say that Chrome, Safari, and Firefox will remain the browsers of choice.

Technologies

Google’s AMP (accelerated mobile pages) will be discontinued as websites written RWD (responsive web design) will eliminate the need for AMP entirely.

Database driven (dynamic) sites will begin decline due to their presumed complexity and slowness and smaller much more refined, targeted, and easier to manage static sites will increase.

It’s true that some of this may be looked upon as just wishful thinking, but given the trends over the past year, we could see this stuff happening throughout the course of 2019, especially in the areas of operating systems and social media networks.

Have some predictions of your own? Share with us in the comments below.