Top Trends for `10 Predicted

CNN.com has a column by Pete Cashmore, founder and CEO of Mashable.com, where he predicts the top technology trends for 2010. It’s an interesting list, two of which I’ll make a few notes on …

Content Curation – This is a huge one for me. I am, to be honest, overloaded with information every single day. (My RSS reader of choice, Netvibes.com, is currently telling me I have 890 unread feed items. Some people declare email bankruptcy from time to time, I admit to declaring RSS bankruptcy. It is unbelievably demoralizing to see that number climb and climb.)

But do I want to turn everything over to my peers? Where do people get the time to look at all of this stuff? It’s good stuff, I mean, I subscribed for a reason. But how am I supposed to find the time to go through all of this?

Maybe what I need is some social validation – how many feeds should a reasonably connected person be able to read on a regular basis? Maybe what I need is a speed-reading course instead …

Cloud Computing – Everyone’s talking about this, but it scares the daylights out of me, to be honest. I don’t want to be connected all the time and I don’t want everything I’ve created (or rely upon to create) sitting somewhere else. Think about what happens when the sun comes out – Google disappears, along with all of your email and documents. Or what happened to Sidekick users a few months back – that’s a level of personal terror I never want to experience.

Now, I’m not totally ruled by paranoia and fear. I like having access to my data, I like being able to share it at will. But I also keep local hard copies of it all. Everything that’s on Flickr exists on media I control, just in case Yahoo! suddenly figures out Flickr is a money-losing venture.

It’s my age-old refrain – Be Paranoid.

(For the record, my RSS reader just refreshed – I’m now 903 feeds behind … ughh.)