Virtual Society: 2015

The acceptence of biometrics had grown substantially up to 2015. Almost everyone now had a biometric scanner of some sort and used it to identify themselves on the internet. Some e-commerce sites would now not even do business with anyone who did not use such a system. The same was true when it came to most employers.

Fully automated factories were taking over. Increased education levels in Asia and Latin America had corresponding rising wages had made the supply of cheap labour scarce. Most companies were automating in some way. Many were automating entirely. Those industries that still relied on human labour were increasingly moving to sub-Saharan Africa, the last bastion of plentiful cheap labour. However, most assumed rising educational levels there would bring this region on par with the rest of the world in another 15-20 years.

People today worked, learned, communicated and corresponded primarily over the internet. Ubiquitous computing was the reality.

However, the transition had not gone without problems. As factories automated and white collar labour dominated, a growing underclass of those not able to get the proper education was proving a strain in many countries. The loss of privacy was lamented by some. However, in the end, most agreed that the transition to a virtual society had on the whole been a positive development.