Predictions for 2017?

Chalky

JezWynd said:

Chalky said:

JezWynd said:

richardhomer said:

I think Donald Trump will be president of the US.

Impeached.

On what grounds?

Telling fibs.

Alas, telling fibs is not sufficient for impeachment unless its under oath.

earwighoney

It will end on December the 31st. 

richardhomer

earwighoney said:

It will end on December the 31st. 

Or sooner if you really want to hedge your bets....

EricTheWeary

I will be tempted by several things released at the NAMMs but not buy anything.

HM the Queen still unwell today so her passing or abdication may be on the cards. She is, I think, already our longest serving monarch and the formal proceedings that follow the death of a serving monarch are hugely disruptive ( closure of financial institutions, etc) so abdication would make sense.

Chalky

EricTheWeary said:

I will be tempted by several things released at the NAMMs but not buy anything.

HM the Queen still unwell today so her passing or abdication may be on the cards. She is, I think, already our longest serving monarch and the formal proceedings that follow the death of a serving monarch are hugely disruptive ( closure of financial institutions, etc) so abdication would make sense.

The markets will close for one day, the funeral. I love the way 'formal proceedings' keep being reported, as if they are used regularly - last time they were used was the middle of the last century. But it gives the papers something to talk about...

RocknRollDave

snakemanStoo said:

Chalky said:

Also, during every month of 2017, someone famous will die.

And people will act as though death is unusual and surprising.

Nobody acted as though death was surprising, people acted as though the number of high-profile deaths was unusual, which I maintain it was.

alcxam

For 2017 this: The rich will get richer and the poor will get poorer.
Also, I predict that the world will keep spinning. Hopefully not out of control...

Blueingreen

In terms of the geopolitical situation this is the gloomiest I've felt in my lifetime.  The president elect of the US is a thin-skinned, narcissistic sociopath whose just been given even more reasons to believe that ignoring wiser counsel and being recklessly aggressive and confrontational is the best way to get what he wants.  How that's going to play out if there's a serious confrontation with China, North Korea, Iran or Russia I shudder to think. 

Russia's nuclear arsenal is in the hands of a murderous tyrant whose solution to domestic problems is military expansionism and empire building abroad:  he's been ever more blatantly testing the West's resolve and so far the lesson he's learning is that it's absolutely feeble.  I believe that he will keep pushing his luck to the point that the West is forced to warn him that one more step will have immediate military consequences.  The worry is that by then it's too late.

All that against the backdrop of Islamic fundamentalism, ISIS and the arrival of China as an economic and military superpower.

I hope and pray things don't deteriorate further next year but for the first time in my life - and I'm old enough to remember the Cold War - I'm genuinely scared.

breakstuff

Drew makes a reappearance.

p90fool

Blueingreen said:

In terms of the geopolitical situation this is the gloomiest I've felt in my lifetime.  The president elect of the US is a thin-skinned, narcissistic sociopath whose just been given even more reasons to believe that ignoring wiser counsel and being recklessly aggressive and confrontational is the best way to get what he wants.  How that's going to play out if there's a serious confrontation with China, North Korea, Iran or Russia I shudder to think. 

Russia's nuclear arsenal is in the hands of a murderous tyrant whose solution to domestic problems is military expansionism and empire building abroad:  he's been ever more blatantly testing the West's resolve and so far the lesson he's learning is that it's absolutely feeble.  I believe that he will keep pushing his luck to the point that the West is forced to warn him that one more step will have immediate military consequences.  The worry is that by then it's too late.

All that against the backdrop of Islamic fundamentalism, ISIS and the arrival of China as an economic and military superpower.

I hope and pray things don't deteriorate further next year but for the first time in my life - and I'm old enough to remember the Cold War - I'm genuinely scared.

I think Russian military expansionism is grossly overstated - it is and always has been tiny and insignificant compared to that of the US. 

We're taught to fear Russia from birth, but the figures in terms of foreign-based military bases sees them outnumbered by the US by something ridiculous like 50-1. 

Also, Russia is skint. 

Heartfeltdawn

breakstuff said:

Drew makes a reappearance.

But the gender won't be the same one we remembered. 

ZenOvertone

I foresee a Nuclear related accident within North Korea, rendering some parts uninhabitable for some considerable time.

sev112

Blueingreen said:

In terms of the geopolitical situation this is the gloomiest I've felt in my lifetime.  The president elect of the US is a thin-skinned, narcissistic sociopath whose just been given even more reasons to believe that ignoring wiser counsel and being recklessly aggressive and confrontational is the best way to get what he wants.  How that's going to play out if there's a serious confrontation with China, North Korea, Iran or Russia I shudder to think. 

Russia's nuclear arsenal is in the hands of a murderous tyrant whose solution to domestic problems is military expansionism and empire building abroad:  he's been ever more blatantly testing the West's resolve and so far the lesson he's learning is that it's absolutely feeble.  I believe that he will keep pushing his luck to the point that the West is forced to warn him that one more step will have immediate military consequences.  The worry is that by then it's too late.

All that against the backdrop of Islamic fundamentalism, ISIS and the arrival of China as an economic and military superpower.

I hope and pray things don't deteriorate further next year but for the first time in my life - and I'm old enough to remember the Cold War - I'm genuinely scared.vc

So, basically the same as the late 70s and early 80s - look at the superpowers involved, look at the  people leading the countries, the apparent threats, and the civil wars going on between eg Isarel, Palestine, Lebanon.  Not really much different.

we had Thatcher in the Uk who you all hate, an actor as US president, China as one of the superpowers and the USSR with more power than Russia.

ok, it's a scaremongering thread, I get that, but we've been here before and will be again.

i think Baader Meinhof might still have been doing their stuff in the late 70s and so were the IRA so major urban city terrorism also isn't a new thing 

bodhi

Gibson will release truer and more expensive historics than ever before (and people will continue to buy them), and start marketing them as better than the vintage originals (and people will fall for it).

The market for original vintage guitars will collapse.  I'll be able to afford one.

crunchman

Europe (the EU anyway) will start to unravel.

Some geriatric celebrities will die.  From a quick google: Brucie, KIrk Douglas, Ken Dodd, Doris Day, Dick Van Dyke, Roger Moore, Angela Lansbury, Honor Blackman, Olivia De Havilland, Vera Lynn, David Attenborough, Tony Bennett, Chuck Berry, the Queen, and Prince Phillip are all 89 or older.  You would get very long odds on all of those making it through the year.

Some slightly younger celebrities who have led a bad lifestyle full of cigarettes and/or alcohol and/or drugs will die.

People will make an enormous fuss about the celebrities who die and the press will give it a lot of coverage.

Some aging celebrity (maybe a Rolling Stone again) will have child with a woman younger than some of his kids.  This will also get lots of press coverage as celebrity gossip sells papers.

Joe B will release branded gear.

Chappers will release annoying videos.

Both of the above will cause arguments on the Fretboard.

Guitar companies will use the CITES stuff on rosewood as an excuse to put prices up by at least 3 times what the extra paperwork costs them.

I will have to repeatedly unglue my daughters from Youtube.

ToneControl

Donald Trump will steal the Heart of Gold, or at least grab it by the  *****

https://www.buzzfeed.com/jsroberts/who-said-it-trump-or-zaphod-beeblebrox-2bxq9 ;

ToneControl

p90fool said:

I think Russian military expansionism is grossly overstated - it is and always has been tiny and insignificant compared to that of the US. 

We're taught to fear Russia from birth, but the figures in terms of foreign-based military bases sees them outnumbered by the US by something ridiculous like 50-1. 

Also, Russia is skint. 

yes, People think Russia is big and scary.  It used to have a lot of oil money (which it spent a lot of on weapons), and lots of  very poor peasants. Now it just has the latter
The USA has more than twice the population, and 15 times the GDP
Russian GDP is  12th largest - South Korea, Brazil,  Canada, Italy are all bigger. Probably Australia too.
The UK has more than double the Russian GDP

ToneControl

from wikipedia:

in 2014, Russia's military budget of 2.49 trillion rubles (worth approximately US$69.3 billion at 2014 exchange rates) was higher than any other European nation, and approximately 1/7th (14%) of the US military budget.
However, a collapse in the value of the Rouble greatly reduced the dollar-value of the planned 2015 Russian military budget to US$52 billion, despite a 33% increase in its Rouble-value to 3.3 trillion.[2] Due to the ongoing crisis the planned 33% increase had to be reduced to 25.6%, meaning the 2015 Russian military budget totalled 3.1 trillion rubles. The originally planned 3.36 trillion budget for 2016 has also been reduced to a planned budget of 3.145 trillion rubles, an increase of only 0.8% over 2015.

so that means the 2016  Russian military budget was  about 8% of the USA's  budget of 2014

Fretwired

ToneControl said:

from wikipedia:

in 2014, Russia's military budget of 2.49 trillion rubles (worth approximately US$69.3 billion at 2014 exchange rates) was higher than any other European nation, and approximately 1/7th (14%) of the US military budget.
However, a collapse in the value of the Rouble greatly reduced the dollar-value of the planned 2015 Russian military budget to US$52 billion, despite a 33% increase in its Rouble-value to 3.3 trillion.[2] Due to the ongoing crisis the planned 33% increase had to be reduced to 25.6%, meaning the 2015 Russian military budget totalled 3.1 trillion rubles. The originally planned 3.36 trillion budget for 2016 has also been reduced to a planned budget of 3.145 trillion rubles, an increase of only 0.8% over 2015.

so that means the 2016  Russian military budget was  about 8% of the USA's  budget of 2014

Meaningless though as Russia has the raw material and tech to make its own weapons - it doesn't buy anything from the USA. And the US wastes vast amounts of money on high tech weapons which are of dubious value - Lockheed-Martin F-35, the Zumwalt-class destroyer that costs over $4.5 billion a ship (the first one keeps breaking down), £4 billion on the Littoral Combat Ships which the Navy have classed as 'useless' and the US is still making the outdated M1 tank (due to the original contract) - there are now 9,000 in storage. The Pentagon has wasted $1.8 trillion over the last 10 years .. it's not the budget but what you do with it.

Fretwired

I think Corbyn will stand down in 2017.