I'm pretty optimistic about the future. The information age is young yet and only recently starting to come into its first full stage of maturity. And there are a ton of very hopeful signs out there, especially in terms of long term trends. I think the chances that things will turn out well are actually higher than not doing so.
Don't get me wrong, I'm optimistic myself. I'm just a bit concerned about how some poorly defined cohort of 'people who don't read HN' are going to fare; not all of those trends are looking super rosy.
Oh, certainly. There are a lot of scary trends right now, but there are also a lot of very positive trends. Personally I think the forces behind the latter are more powerful, but it's not exactly a sure thing necessarily. If someone told me that in 2070 the developed world was basically neo-feudalist with strong class divisions amidst an effectively world-wide police state I could easily believe it.
I think there are a few major, mostly technological, developments which haven't happened yet but are essentially inevitable which will tend to tip things even stronger toward the "good" side. I should probably write about that at some point.
