The USS Quad Damage

Originally, this was going to be a review of the last 12 months, but I had a fair bit of trouble remembering the more important happenings this year. Those events I did recall may not have actually happened this year, or perhaps at all. Speculation is more fun anyway.

Technology

- The new Intel powerbooks, even if they underperform and are overpriced, will sell awesomely if Apple allow Windows to be bootable. Another of our crew will make the conversion.
- People will say 2006 will, for real this time, no, seriously, be the year of Linux on the desktop. They will still be wrong.
- The two replacement technologies for DVD will launch relatively close to each other. Neither really catches on, as nobody wants to buy their movies all over again. All players will include all three formats, and eventually HD-DVD will win out, simply because it has 'DVD' in the name. DVD's will continue to stick around for years to come, partly because of momentum, partly because of it's maturity as a format, but mostly because they will sell for slightly cheaper.
- Some time over the next 12 months, yet another person will join the good ship Quad Damage. Subsequently, our readership will increase by a similar amount.

Gaming

- In order to deal a blow to the launch of the PS3, Halo 3 will be released on the same week, regardless of whether the game is ready or not. The Halo series will continue the trend of being (in single player anyway) 10% brilliance and 90% boredom. Just let us use the warthog everywhere!
- The Revolution will sell reasonably well, but mostly because of a single "must-have" game and it's price point. The games that fully take advantage of the controller and create new, innovative ways of game interaction won't arrive until 2008. Nintendo will still be number 3 for a long time, but it will be close. Nintendo will still be in the console war for the next generation.
- The Nintendo powerglove will make a return. It will be badass.
- The DS will gradually take the majority of marketshare over the PSP until the release of Nintencats. Nintendo will continue it's reign of terror in the handheld market (we'll kindly forget about the Virtualboy).
- Gaming in OS X will die a horrible death, but only because we can now boot into Windows. I will finally get to play Half-life 2.

Australia

- James Packer has no idea what he is doing, and Channel Nine will slowly lose it's dominance in the market. Shareholders will force him to step down and things will return to normal. For some reason, Backyard Blitz will still be showing.
- John Howard will spend most of the year rather quietly, not pushing for anything controversial or such. He will then drop the biggest bomb in his entire political career, it will somehow make it's way through, and then he will finally retire. Peter Costello's ever-present smile will get slightly larger and slightly creepier.
- There will still be no terrorist on our (embassies in foreign countries notwithstanding) soil. Australians will continue to be killed in Bali, but we love the place so much it will do little to stop us going there.
- The violence of the past few weeks will be as bad as it will ever get. People will be more open with their prejudices. We aren't becoming more racist, we will just be finding out how bad the problem really is. Today Tonight and their ilk will continue to stir the pot.
- There will be more arrests of Australians in south-east Asia in relation to drug-trafficking, but since very few of them will be young, white and female, we won't care.
- The woman whose name we don't mention here but if-you-know-who-I'm-talking-about-and-I-think-you-do will be released from gaol over some technicality or a trade of some sort. Prepare to be annoyed over this all over again.
- The Republic movement dies a quiet death, and we will continue to be a constitutional monarchy until England finally decides to do the deed themselves when The Queen dies (unless, of course, they somehow find a way to skip Charles and one of those two kids becomes King).
- Holden will bring another car name back from the dead, much like with the Monaro, and it will be met with similar success.
- Shane Warne will suffer some sort of injury, and one or more of our big names will retire. Australia's time as the undisputed number one side will come to an end.
- But England will never, ever again win The Ashes. That was just a fluke.

The World

- Some sort of natural disaster will befall on Tokyo, and major reconstruction will prompt millions of otaku the world over to rename the city Neo-Tokyo. They will be ignored.
- Every second word out of the US President's mouth will continue to be related to terror, but the general public will slowly stop taking notice.
- North Korea will eventually do something completely crazy, but it will ultimately end in failure. There will be a coup.
- Osama Bin Laden will finally be declared dead. I mean, seriously, how long can a guy survive in caves under constant bombardment whilst on a dialysis machine? Although it will be claimed that he died due to military actions in the area, we all know he probably tripped over his beard or a rock or something and hit his head.

Culture (pop or otherwise)

- The two sides that hold the rights to make the film version of The Hobbit will fail to come to an agreement. Eventually either Ian Holm or Ian McKellan will die, and hence the movie will never be made.
- There will be many, many hints that suggest Snape is Harry's father. This will eventually turn out to be false.
- Metallica will make an album that rivals Master of Puppets in both sound and awesome quotient. Lars still won't shutup.

nathan

- I'm going to be an uncle.