The future

Looks like I'm not the only one who wanted a google brain implant. But Stu Wolf of DARPA has an even better idea.

Stu Wolf, one of the top scientists at Darpa, the Pentagon's scientific research agency which gave birth to the Internet, seriously believes we'll all be wearing computers in headbands within 20 years.

By that time, we'll have super fast, super tiny computers that make today's machines look like typewriters. The desktop will be dead, says Wolf, and the headband will dominate.

"We already know we can trigger neurons mechanically," he says. "You can interact directly with the brain without implanted electrodes. Then the next step is being able to think something and have it happen: Flying a plane, driving a car, operating household machinery."

Controlling devices with the mind is just the beginning. Next, Wolf believes, is what he calls "network-enabled telepathy" - instant thought transfer. In other words, your thoughts will flow from your brain over the network right into someone else's brain. If you think instant messaging is addictive, just wait for instant thinking.

Awesome! Now combine this with the knowledge that soon we won't need tethered power supply for short distances and the upcoming e-paper (so that you can can electronically and wierlessly send and receive data that isn't so easy to think about) and the whole world is really transformed in an awesome way. The information won't even be at our fingertips anymore; we'll just have it almost in our heads already. It's going to kick ass.