In The Popcorn Report, I imagined two competing futures for America in 2010—one filled with hope, the other shadowed by decline. It was never just a thought experiment. It was a warning.
We’re now over 30 years past that imagined future that is now a reality.
But it’s not enough to revisit old predictions and say “I told you so.” We need to ask: What comes next?
Below, I’m revisiting a chapter from that book—paired with what came true, and a new forecast for what’s rising now.
Prediction: Trash is the new gold.
🔮 1991 Forecast: “The newly rich of 2010 will have made their money not by creating new products, but by making the garbage go away—these are the garbage barons.”
✅ Came True: Garbage is gold. Billions flow to circular startups like Rubicon and AMP. TerraCycle turns trash into luxury. Climate capitalism crowns a new class: The Waste Moguls.
🚀 Next 20 Years: Trash tech becomes geopolitics. Nations will weaponize waste—who controls materials, controls markets.
Prediction: “Correct” consumption will define brand loyalty.
🔮 1991 Forecast: “We will adopt a consume/replenish approach to living. Replenish and consume. Consumers and corporations alike will have learned that production and consumption aren’t the end of the line. The cycle ends with replenishing, giving back.[...]We finally understand that the archetypal givens—earth, air, water—are the real currency of the future.”
✅ Came True: “Net zero,” carbon-negative, ESG metrics—all mainstream.
🚀 Next 20 Years: Consumers demand not just zero impact—but positive return. Minimal footprint, maximum status.
Prediction: Privatized Nature becomes the new elite status.
🔮 1991 Forecast: “The air’s so bad you’re only allowed to drive your car three days a week—which is all you can afford to drive anyway, because filling the tank costs about eighty dollars. Different-colored license plates will tell you on which days it’s your turn to drive. Someone owns the air franchise. Air conditioning is now called air purifying. And it costs a fortune.”
✅ Came True: Wellness retreats, gated ‘green’ cities, exclusive micro-communities. Think Amangiri in Utah, where tech billionaires unplug in curated silence. Or NEOM and Telosa—billion-dollar visions of sustainable utopias. And then there’s Kalu Yala in Panama or the California desert land grab by Flannery Associates, building back-to-the-land societies for the ultra-rich.
🚀 Next 20 Years: Climate refugees and ecological inequality split society. Nature becomes the ultimate class divide. That's why the only board I've ever been on is Edwina von Gal's Perfect Earth Project.
Prediction: Work decentralizes. Digital life dominates.
🔮 1991 Forecast: “No one has to drive much anyway. Life feels smaller in scale—we’re working at home, involved in the world with networks of friends through the electronic systems that bring in and send out information day and night.”
✅ Came True: Zoom, remote work, Slack clans, digital nomads—and social media functions as both water cooler and workplace.
🚀 Next 20 Years: The office is dead. AI agents are our colleagues and our friends. Identity is platform-native.
Prediction: Culture returns to the people.
🔮 1991 Forecast: “Culture is back in the hands of the people. Creative talent is flourishing. We’ve reconciled business with civilization.”
✅ Came True: TikTok tastemakers. Meme economics. YouTube barons turned beverage moguls. MrBeast launches candy and burgers, Emma Chamberlain builds a coffee empire, Logan Paul peddles hydration like it’s holy water.
🚀 Next 20 Years: We don’t just consume content—we co-create it. AI tailors novels in your tone. Your favorite creator drops personalized albums that morph with your mood. TV shows splinter into choose-your-own-drama sagas. We’ll binge on ourselves.
Read the original 1991 vision—“The Year Is 2010: Two Visions: Gloom vs. Hope”.
See you in the Future.
Faith
Spot on the mark as usual. I have faith in Faith!
Thank you!