Photo: Andrius Aleksandravicius/Getty Images
Tech’s best 2021 predictions

Happy (slightly belated) New Year! Hope you had a fun and safe holiday. Mine involved a remarkable number of board games, a lot of champagne and a five-minute Screen Time limit on Twitter. Wins all the way around.
This morning, let's take a quick look at what's coming in 2021, including predictions from both our team at Protocol and a few smart people around the web. We'll have more on the year to come in tomorrow's newsletter, too, so please send us all your thoughts and predictions and we'll include them in there!
Oh, and we're also kicking off our text-messaging experiment tomorrow, so be sure and sign up to chat about the news with us! You can sign up here, or text us at (415) 475-1729.
As always, let me know what you think, and what you'd like to see more of in our weekend edition. I'm david@protocol.com, or you can just reply to this email. Thanks! Onto the good stuff.
(Was this email forwarded to you? Sign up here to get Source Code every day.)
The tech IPOs to watch in 2021
Tech legislation to watch in 2021
How Big Tech is preparing for all that regulation
2021 consumer electronics trends
Virtualized service business models previously on the horizon waiting for consumer habits to catch up have accelerated at break-neck speed. And consumers are tapping their feet, waiting for more. Now, think about the dilemma that consumers are faced with going into this tax season. Because of the pandemic, many tax situations seem more complex and are sparking questions never before imagined.
Eight themes for the near future of tech — Scott Belsky
Endnotes on 2020: Crypto and beyond — Vitalik Buterin
2020 letter — Dan Wang
What is going to happen in 2021 — Fred Wilson
2021 predictions and person of the year — Scott Galloway
Notes on technology in the 2020s — Eli Dourado
To mark the end of 2020 (and now the beginning of 2021), we asked the same questions of some of the most interesting people in tech to find out what they've learned this year, how their work has changed and what's going to stick going forward. Last up, Cruise SVP of Engineering Mo Elshenawy.
What was the biggest change to your personal work habits in 2020, outside all the obvious stuff like "more video calls?"
Before the pandemic I could have never imagined myself as someone who would download a meditation app, but working from home has required me to put some physical boundaries around my work and home life. Personally, I believe in work-life harmony, not work-life balance, because the reality is that our personal and professional lives blend together and we need to find a productive, healthy way for these aspects to coexist. Being intentional about how I start my morning with meditation, exercise and reading — sometimes even all three if I'm feeling ambitious — has helped me keep this harmony in line.
Is there anything you wish you or your team had done sooner (in 2020 or even before), knowing what we know now about how the world works?
The safety of our future passengers is at the center of everything we do, and as a leader, it's important to me that we keep the people building this tech in focus as well. In the swirl of those early weeks of the pandemic I was focused on making the transition to working remotely as seamless as possible for the team, but as we got settled into our new normals I was reminded that that means more than just mastering the unmute button on Zoom and remote desktop connections. In hindsight, the social moments and times we are able to come together as a community — not just as teammates — ended up being just as important, if not more so, during this transition.
What's one thing that was new to you or your team in 2020 that you're definitely going to carry over in 2021?
We started hosting completely open forums with no agenda to give folks an opportunity to reconnect, ask questions, and discuss top-of-mind concerns with teammates and leadership. Everyone's circumstances are different and these forums provided valuable insight into how our teammates are doing, what they need help with and where we can offer more support — beyond what's on their to-do list. We also recently started a mentorship program with leaders designed to connect engineers from across the organization.
Through these programs we've been able to carve out dedicated time and space for our teams to reconnect with each other on a more personal level, like we would if we were back in the office sharing desk space and snacks from micro-kitchens, and they have provided folks with a human connection without needing to raise your hand and ask for help. It's early days, but I can already see the effects this is having in building more allyship and support for our employees as we all continue to navigate uncertainty.
What company, other than your own, have you been most impressed to watch this year?
General AI is an extraordinary technical challenge and I've really been impressed by the progress made by the partnership between Microsoft and OpenAI to develop supercomputing technologies in Azure. Combined with the example OpenAI set in establishing its charter for how it will advance its mission, I see OpenAI as a defining player in the future of technology as it opens up new potential for what is possible.
What 2020 tech story or trend are you most interested in following next year?
We are in the middle of the largest social experiment in history as millions of people are living and working from home. What I think is really interesting is that many people are also starting new jobs and getting hired into entirely new roles, which means that soon we could have organizations of people that have never met in person. I'm curious to see how this will play out from a socioeconomic perspective and how we move forward.
I think a hybrid approach to working remotely will give us the best of both worlds by offering people a flexible environment that can adjust to individual circumstances, and the opportunity to continue to foster these important interpersonal connections to company culture and our colleagues. With this I think we can really set people up to do the best work of their lives.
Virtualized service business models previously on the horizon waiting for consumer habits to catch up have accelerated at break-neck speed. And consumers are tapping their feet, waiting for more. Now, think about the dilemma that consumers are faced with going into this tax season. Because of the pandemic, many tax situations seem more complex and are sparking questions never before imagined.
Today's Source Code was written by David Pierce. Thoughts, questions, tips? Send them to david@protocol.com, or our tips line, tips@protocol.com. Enjoy your day, see you tomorrow.
To give you the best possible experience, this site uses cookies. If you continue browsing. you accept our use of cookies. You can review our privacy policy to find out more about the cookies we use.