Future Think - What will today's children expect as they grow up?

This post is part of my ongoing conceptualizing of my Future Think process (see my past post Future Think - 3, 5, 10 years).  I'm beginning to construct a method for my team to create a forward looking development strategy.

As I mentioned in a recent post, this past weekend while I was listening to Dishy Mix, Adam Kleinberg mentioned how his kids have the "Tivo mindset". While listening to the radio in the car, they wanted to rewind it to hear the song again. Not on today's traditional car stereo, except if you're listening through the new iPod Nano (which allows you to rewind up to 15 minutes, see Terry White's review here).


I guess it should have been a sign for me when I was a child and we had that brand new VCR with a remote control, even though it was a hard line remote.  That was the coolest thing ever.  Did I ever think I'd be able to control my DIRECTV from my mobile phone?  I didn't even have a dream of having a phone that fits in my pocket and could be used anywhere I went. I'm sure there were people working on these innovations back when I was just a pup.


With children these days having the fortune of certain innovative products like Tivo, they're expecting our other technologies to work in similar ways.  I guess there are always certain technologies that are late to innovate and seem so archaic.  I hope our children push us to innovate for their sake, and for them to not accept that our radio doesn't have buffering.


As part of my Future Think concept, I'm going to add a section around "Thinking like a child".