Here I've just gotten my head around Android, and now there's Chrome OS. Will someone please explain, why? Why would anyone bother with Chrome OS? I mean, weren't we just talking about a netbook with Android?

I get Android. It's the open-source, linux-type competitor to Windows Mobile and iPhone OS, being helped by Google's name and stature in the mobile market.

But Chrome OS? I understand netbooks will run slightly faster with linux or some lightweight variant than with Windows XP, but really, the hardware's the limitation here, not the OS. Taking a 4-cylinder Honda Civic and reducing the weight may give you better gas mileage and a slightly higher top speed, but we're not talking much, and certainly not enough to make me at least (and I like linux!) switch to linux on my Lenovo netbook. It's a netbook. It surfs the web. Learning a new OS for a netbook just doesn't have much appeal when my main system is still running Windows.

Owning a car costs far more than just your monthly loan payment. I had an old piece of junk which cost me just $1000 a year in insurance since I did not need comprehensive. My guess is that you're looking at least at $2000-3000 a year in insurance alone for a standard newish car (banks require comprehensive for anything they have a loan out for). Add to that a monthly payment for the car of say $300-400, which gives a total of $4000-5000 a year, and you're easily at the $12,600 estimate.

There's one major wildcard in your predictions--batteries (or mobile power solutions, in the case of things like methanol-based fuel cells). I think you're on the mark with respect to the home environment--laptops and off-site storage--since we're almost there now in major cities where bandwidth is plentiful (e.g., FiOS) and with people storing everything on gmail and photo sites.

The mobile landscape outside of the home, though, will be heavily dependent on how batteries develop. Without some breakthrough in power density and miniturization, we'll still be stuck with mobile devices like laptops and iPhones that are limited to 3 or 4 hours of use, which is just not enough to provide the reliability needed to really achieve the integration to which you refer because of people's cell phone needs. Plus, physically it's impossible to achieve the quality of a typical Canon digital camera with your mobile device because you need a retractable lens. So, I think for the moment, barring any clever innovations for improving cell phone cameras or lengthening battery life, the mobile device landscape in 2017 probably won't look too different than what we have now.

And, people won't want to pay twice for the computer they use in the home and on the go, so we'll still be using a laptop of some sort in 2017.