Ask HN: What could be the next technology boom like bitcoin?

I'm going to have to say wearable tech, even if it is becoming a bit cliche. Not necessarily products like Google Glass, but there are plenty of applications that can massively improve the users life, or help save it. In hospitals and old people's homes for example, watches that monitor heart rates, necklaces to check vital signs etc. I'm no Doctor but I imagine a way to constantly monitor the condition of a potentially at risk person without them having to lie in bed hooked up to a huge machine will be pretty useful.

Genuinely trustworthy computers (servers and clients). Still probably 5 years away. Bitcoin, NSA, etc. shows why they're needed, and we sort of know how to build them, but it's seriously difficult, and involves lots of moving parts up and down the whole stack from supply chains and designs to silicon fabs to physical packaging to firmware to OS to apps to network protocols to user interfaces.

Peer-to-peer education. People learning directly from others (any others). Not MOOC, but more like a <Khan> Academy where anyone can be Khan.

Teenagers teaching on Youtube how to do make up became a relevant niche for some years now. I think soon we will have a peer-to-peer education marketplace billion-dollar company.

Virtual reality is going to boom over the rest of this decade. The gaming industry will drive it into the consumer space over the next few years, to wide adoption. That'll dramatically increase the money being put toward the industry, leading to an ever faster cycle of improvement.

Hollywood will follow the gaming industry on this technology wise. I'd predict that within 10 to 15 years, we'll see movies attempting to build out virtual reality experiences in theaters. For $30, they'll put you into an immersive VR version of the Avengers sequel that exists at the time.

-drone industry -p2p investments/brokerages/knowledge bases/etc. p2p is still not much developed area with many promising things it could provide -fighting with corporations/governments spying

From my "big ideas" evernote:

- drones - They will be like servers for the physical world. Business opportunity is "ec2 for drones" -- drones as a service, rent by the hour, remote controlled from a web interface, programmable with API. - bitcoin - privacy - transparency - online household (IoT) - brain-computer interfaces

bitmessage as a complimentary product to cryptocurrency (cryptomessaging).

ubiquitous 3D printing with Bret-Victor-esque 3D designing software?

Renewable energy storage and electric vehicles. If enough people adopt electric only vehicles that could provide a mechanism to store and send energy to the existing grid.

A 3d printer for food. Now that would be disruptive.