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In the prediction business, I say go hard or go home. Anyone else? I'll be reviewing these in July and December next year for accuracy.

1. The Koreans will start a kerfuffle that will define the 2012 elections like the Iranian Crisis defined the 1980 election.
2. The Chinese economy will contract, adding tension to the growing US/China trade war.
3. Putin will attempt to increase the autocratic controls in Russia, because next year's Russian elections will badly weaken his party.
4. To keep the Euro afloat, the EU countries will move closer to a federal system.
5. Mugabe will die. The western powers will attempt to install a figurehead and let foreigners confiscate the land.
6. There will be a major terrorist attack within the 3 months leading up to the US election. It will be instigated by domestic terrorists.
7. If the election starts to looks like a blowout weeks early, like last time, Obama or his family will be attacked on the campaign trail by domestic terrorists.
8. The Amazon tablet family will erode Apple's market share. Amazon will announce a smartphone.

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Those are some damn good ones. Let's see who does better. As for December 21st, @Boise_Lib - I predict that nothing will happen å la Y2K, but some people will still freak out and the media will fan the flames. There will be a big anti-climax let-down feeling when January 2013 rolls around. But there will be a large natural disaster in early 2013 that will be ascribed to the Mayans. By crazy people.>> ^longde:

1. The Koreans will start a kerfuffle that will define the 2012 elections like the Iranian Crisis defined the 1980 election.
2. The Chinese economy will contract, adding tension to the growing US/China trade war.
3. Putin will attempt to increase the autocratic controls in Russia, because next year's Russian elections will badly weaken his party.
4. To keep the Euro afloat, the EU countries will move closer to a federal system.
5. Mugabe will die. The western powers will attempt to install a figurehead and let foreigners confiscate the land.
6. There will be a major terrorist attack within the 3 months leading up to the US election. It will be instigated by domestic terrorists.
7. If the election starts to looks like a blowout weeks early, like last time, Obama or his family will be attacked on the campaign trail by domestic terrorists.
8. The Amazon tablet family will erode Apple's market share. Amazon will announce a smartphone.

1) iPad 3 will definitely come out this year with a retina display.
2) Apple will flirt with idea of making apple TV into a playstation with iPad 3 innards, controllable by ipad/iphone and make a contender to console gaming. (Natural progression of Airplay).
3) Ron Paul will do better than ever in the polls, but won't win.
4) Obama will win.
5) SOPA will not pass.
6) SOPA-light will pass and will be almost as bad.
7) Esports, primarily Starcraft2, will continue to grow. (2011 was HUGE)
The mayan calendar will end and no one will notice. (Wave hello to Harold Camping)
9) God will continue to recede into obscurity as our common knowledge grows.

1. Kim Jong Il, Steve Jobs and Andy Rooney will come back from the dead and form a Rush cover band. They will split up a year later to do mediocre solo projects.

I have fuck all knowledge of international politics, or really how the world works at large, so I think I must take a leaf from the Nostradamus style guide for predicting the future:

(You'll just have to imagine that each of these is written in a different language, where each could be translated in of a number of ways)

1. The eagle will hunt the rabbit, but the rabbit will fight back.
2. Lo the earthbound will take to the skies, and the skies will rip asunder. (Or ass under if you prefer)
3. Mighty is the beast who tramples the weak, but mightier is the meek who defend the poor.
4. A vast sea of fear will be watered with the liquid of hope
5. Children scream unto the night while unbridled tortoises ride waves of flowering gypsies.
6. Apple will release something, and shitloads of people will buy it.

1. A couple of people you know will get jobs, a couple people you know will lose jobs, and your own employment status will determine which of those you remember.
2. Someone will read something on the Internet that makes them angry.
3. A kitten will have its photo posted on the Internet for the first time.
4. A corporatist will be elected as president of the United States.
5. Someone you know will be trying to figure out what to do with a year's supply of beans on December 22, 2012.

These are my predictions for the next 5 years.
1. Distributed human computing will have a major impact on science and technology.
2. A treatment for multiple sclerosis, muscular dystrophy will be developed and brought to market.
3. A new seed-crop hybrid will be developed that grows twice as a fast and is nearly completely disease resistant.
4. Europe will be united under a centralized banking system, headed by the German government.
5. New computing algorithms that adaptively learn will be created, taking the first major step toward AI.
6. An implant that cures paralysis will be developed and brought to market.
7. Wireless data transfer rates will quadruple. Information transmission/reception will move into the K-band of the microwave regime.
8. A new electric motor and transmission design will revolutionize electric motors, leading to a invigorated electric car market.
9. Smart surface technology will find their way into flexible materials, allowing people to change the color of their clothing on demand.
10. Lab grown meat will be brought to market.

(1)......NASA responds by buying MySpace & they claim ownership of the ENTIRE known Universe.

(2)......Correct, it flops because you can only watch THEIR programmes.

(3)......They change their name to "Amazonflix" & are sued by a small porno company with the same name.

(4)......Not a chance.

(5)......See (4)

(6)......Well, at least we agree on something.

(7)......Too nerdy for me, I'll take your word for it.

(8)......See (7)

(9)......I honestly didn't know they had oil.

(10)......YouTube being aware of this invades the site in a sneak attack & sets about destroying it.....realising only too late that most of the embeds are from it's own site & ends up destroying itself from within.

From Cosmic Variance
Predictions for 2012
by Sean Carroll

So you don’t enter the new year completely unprepared, here are my most secure predictions for 2012. Unlike other prognostication websites, these predictions are based on Science!

1. Freely-falling objects will accelerate toward the ground at an approximately constant rate, up to corrections due to air resistance.
2. Of all the Radium-226 nuclei on the Earth today, 0.04% will decay by the end of the year.
3. A line drawn between any planet (or even dwarf planet) and the Sun will sweep out equal areas in equal times.
4. Hurricanes in the Northern hemisphere will rotate counterclockwise as seen from above.
5. The pressure of a gas squeezed in a piston will rise inversely with the change in volume.
6. Electric charges in motion will give rise to magnetic fields.
7. The energy of an object at rest whose mass decreases will also decrease, by the change in mass times the speed of light squared.
8. The content of the world’s genomes will gradually evolve in ways determined by fitness in a given environment, sexual selection, and random chance.
9. The entropy of closed systems will increase.
10. People will do many stupid things, and some surprisingly smart ones.

Happy New Year, everyone.