There’s no way anyone can tell what will happen in the future. With a blend of diligence and luck, it’s not too farfetched to predict the future with accuracy by leveraging big data (no pseudo prophecies or science fiction involved).  After all, interpreting data has become a major part of our lives as citizens of the digital era.

Twigging today’s set of data can give us a glimpse of the feasible future. According to Michael Zappa in his blog Envisioning Technology, “Understanding where technology is heading is more than guesswork. Looking at emerging trends and research, one can predict and draw conclusions about how the technological sphere is developing, and which technologies should become mainstream in the coming years.”

Kappa mentioned a number amazing technologies ahead of us. Defective human organs will easily be replaced with organs you can print, a process that combines 3D printing technology with human tissue to recreate organs. It is expected to arrive sometime 2016 and could be among the most important technologies of all time. There’s also growing traction for robots, with some future-ready businesses even launching a Robot-Apps app store not too long ago. Here’s the infographic (see below) presenting the ideas and issues involved, some of which may be too out of this world for your liking.

By 2019, self-driving vehicles will plague the market, petabytes of storage will become standard by 2024, and life forms will end up being the only real thing by 2025, as people start to dwell in virtual reality. Moreover, internet speed standard will be measured in terabits by 2030. Just recently, Cisco and Telia announced plans for running a 120Gbps internet connection at a Swedish tech conference. However, the fastest-ever data transfer will still be 180Gbps, set by an international team at SuperComputing 2011 (SC11) in Seattle in November.

But let’s stop looking too far into the future. This infographic from dailyinfographic.com predicts that the top 3 trends this year will be the explosion of big data and internet TV, and mobile commerce will go mainstream. It also briefs us of the trends that blew up last year. Imagine, 90 percent of the data in the world was created just within just the last two years, and information doubles every two years.

And as online video captures the hearts of internet users today, internet TV may not be that bad of an idea. It eliminates poor resolution, lag-time and lack of personalization that is common to online videos. 2012 may also signal the death of cash money, as mobile banking takes over your bills, on its way to becoming a $31 billion industry.