Tablet PCs will replace textbooks and other predictions from Bill Gates

March 13, 2008 (Computerworld) WASHINGTON - Bill Gates today outlined a future of computing akin to a Whole Earth Catalog for technology. The computing systems of the future will be more natural, responsive and capable of easily recognizing objects and people. They will also be completely customizable, he said.
Television, for instance, will be based on the Internet and it "will be an utterly different thing," that's customizable and interactive.
"In the future, instead of having the computer on your desk, you will have the computer in your desk," Gates said, and that desktop will have the ability to recognize what the user is doing, as well as the objects and papers placed on it.
In the home, "intelligent surfaces" will be pervasive, he said, to help organize a trip, photos or just about anything. "It can be done without the hardware being significantly more expensive," he said.
Data centers will be automated with little human intervention, and software development will use models that involve less code, the Microsoft chairman said.
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