1. A cyberattack, possibly by a state actor, causes enough damage and loss of life that this ceases to be something only wonks and nerds care about. The threat becomes real.
2. Farisa’s Crossing (Michael O. Church’s book) is released in September or October and is actually good enough to win awards.
3. Major recession. Housing market becomes dysfunctional and illiquid. This puts the Fed in a tough spot because the only way to solve housing market illiquidity is inflation (people get anchored to the nominal prices they paid, so inflation is the only way to get them to accept losing money instead of hoarding) but inflation is something most people despise, even when it’s the good kind.
4. An act of violence against a private equity fund occurs and draws public support. Jury nullification becomes a dinner table topic.
5. Black hat uses of large language models become enough of a problem that regulators get involved.
6. Donald Trump is proven culpable enough of criminal activity that it would be fatal to a normal political candidate. Not sure it will be for him.
7. Vladimir Putin’s health worsens. What happens here is hard to predict. The people around him, on one hand, will be frantically trying to prevent a desperate old man from destroying the world. But they will also be jockeying for their own individual positions, which makes things unpredictable. They might be more dangerous than Putin, who is evil but is not stupid or irrational.
8. Elon Musk. I wish there was a verb. There isn’t. I would prefer the sentence be “Elon Musk retires to get to know his family.” But it won’t be. Just, Elon Musk.
All of these predictions are trenchant and exciting, but #2, I can't imagine happening. It's just too much to hope for. You might as well predict that The Author Himself will make a triumphant return to HN. Which, as we both know, would never happen: he's foresworn it forevermore.
2. Farisa’s Crossing (Michael O. Church’s book) is released in September or October and is actually good enough to win awards.
3. Major recession. Housing market becomes dysfunctional and illiquid. This puts the Fed in a tough spot because the only way to solve housing market illiquidity is inflation (people get anchored to the nominal prices they paid, so inflation is the only way to get them to accept losing money instead of hoarding) but inflation is something most people despise, even when it’s the good kind.
4. An act of violence against a private equity fund occurs and draws public support. Jury nullification becomes a dinner table topic.
5. Black hat uses of large language models become enough of a problem that regulators get involved.
6. Donald Trump is proven culpable enough of criminal activity that it would be fatal to a normal political candidate. Not sure it will be for him.
7. Vladimir Putin’s health worsens. What happens here is hard to predict. The people around him, on one hand, will be frantically trying to prevent a desperate old man from destroying the world. But they will also be jockeying for their own individual positions, which makes things unpredictable. They might be more dangerous than Putin, who is evil but is not stupid or irrational.
8. Elon Musk. I wish there was a verb. There isn’t. I would prefer the sentence be “Elon Musk retires to get to know his family.” But it won’t be. Just, Elon Musk.