Even though we’re still merely at the beginning of 2025, the 2020s have been marked by significant cultural and technological upheavals. Is this a kind of return to the so-called “Roaring ‘20s”?
Let’s explore this further by taking a look at some of the major trends of 2024 and what deductions we can make based on these as we head into 2025 (and beyond).
Artificial intelligence
When ChatGPT was released to the public at the end of 2022, it started a massive wave of AI & LLM hype. However, as things progressed, that hype was starting to get more and more balanced with hesitation. A lot of businesses that were quick to jump on the AI bandwagon were just as quick to find out they’re failing to see tangible results from their investments, with “AI” often being merely a tack-on buzzword that hasn’t delivered on its supposed promise.
Some top experts who have been long-time proponents of the power of large language models are having reservations about the real value of current AI innovations and question the supposed progress of an artificial general intelligence. Even OpenAI’s CEO Sam Altman just recently announced that “AI superintelligence” will be achieved in “several thousand days”, which is as vague a statement as possible and not very promising for those optimistic about AGI.
Of course there is also the question of ethics, with a lot of privacy concerns and potential for even more significant misuse and abuse in both the data management process as well as the AI technologies working with said data. This is why it’s going to be crucial for businesses to unlock the potential of AI without falling for the hype surrounding it, while making sure their data management and AI implementation are done responsibly.
Despite the hype not being as high as initially, however, there are still noteworthy advancements in AI to have top of mind as we head into 2025. Grok by X has been seeing significant progress in its prompt & image generation refinements. With techniques such as RAG, it’s also becoming easier and easier to make great use of generative AI while minimizing its main risks.
One area where we’re already seeing and are likely to see more practical applications of AI are physical and/or high-risk sectors such as manufacturing and construction. These industries have some of the highest potential of seeing benefits in terms of efficiency, but also some of the highest risks when it comes to things like security, and it will be essential to find ways to navigate these risks in order to truly unlock the benefits that AI can bring.
Cyber security
Speaking of security and AI abuse, the improvements in exploiting security vulnerabilities will necessitate an increased awareness of and focus on cyber security, or rather cyber resilience. These vulnerabilities range from simple, e.g. entering sensitive business information into a publicly available LLM, to more complex ones, such as bots finding workarounds for queues of limited edition products..
We’re likely to see a lot of emphasis on promoting and optimizing training to effectively address these new AI-related risks, which include more and more sophisticated approaches to phishing/social engineering, but can go as far as identity theft thanks to the advances in AI-powered technologies such as video generation and speech recognition.
Granted, we most likely don’t need to worry about Black Mirror-level attempts at identity theft coming as early as in 2025, but it’s an important concern to keep top of mind as AI continues to develop.
Privacy
After years of postponing the phasing out of third party cookies, Google has recently reneged on this decision, opting to keep third party cookies while keeping the Privacy Sandbox in order to address privacy concerns and meet regulatory requirements. So, how will this impact marketers/advertisers, and what will it mean for the average internet user?
Truth be told, not much is expected to change on a large scale. While some businesses are implementing more privacy-conscious marketing strategies which prioritize first-party data & cookies, the majority still rely on third-party cookies powered marketing & advertising, and consumers will naturally want to continue benefiting from the high-level personalization achieved through third-party cookies.
This means that we’re quite unlikely to see any significant improvements for users, such as the deprecation of the GDPR cookie notice, despite more and more experts voicing their frustrations with this website feature which has been ubiquitous since 2018.
Bitcoin / crypto
2024 definitely brought some great news for anyone who has invested in Bitcoin or is just generally interested in the potential of blockchain and cryptocurrency, with the price of Bitcoin as well as the total amount in Bitcoin transactions skyrocketing this year.
As reported in Euronews, “that performance is likely to continue in 2025, we will have a clearer regulatory environment and we are seeing institutional capital come to the table in a more significant manner than we’ve ever seen”, according to Josh Gilbert, markets analyst at eToro Australia. Some experts predict the price of Bitcoin will go as high as $250,000 in 2025.
While confidence in Bitcoin has greatly increased, this shouldn’t be viewed as a signal to go bullish on crypto in general. Despite the sentence of Sam Bankman-Fried for the FTX fraud in March 2024, crypto investment scams are still going strong even in late 2024, and so stable cryptocurrencies remain the only safe crypto investment.
Open source software
For those involved in the open source software world, the main highlight of 2024 was the feud between Automattic, the company behind WordPress, and WPEngine, one of the largest hosting providers for WordPress, and the lawsuit that ensued which is currently still ongoing. As WordPress community members have been pointing out, this is having serious implications for the future of not only WordPress but open source software and licensing as a whole.
What we’re already seeing is the fracture of the WordPress community as well as the loss of trust in WordPress from clients relying on WPEngine. Other leaders of prominent open source platforms have given their take on the feud as well, such as Ruby on Rails’ David Heinemeier Hansson criticizing Automattic’s approach to the matter.
Meanwhile, Drupal’s Dries Buytaert shared his renewed take on the “makers vs. takers” dilemma in open source, focusing on how Drupal is addressing it through its distributed governance model and its contribution credit system, and what lessons other OSS communities such as WordPress could learn from Drupal’s example.
Another resulting trend that we’re likely to see are forks of WordPress, with calls to fork the platform already being made. As the drama in the community continues, chances are that a fork will be the best option for people wanting to stay on the platform while avoiding the drama and newfound distrust surrounding it.
The most important question to ask is: how will all of this impact the world of open source software going forward? Are the trends we see in WordPress a herald of what awaits OSS at large? Can we expect significant changes to how open source is developed, perceived and licensed?
Since WordPress is the biggest and best known open source CMS, it is unlikely that the negative impact on its reputation would translate into a positive one for open source. I.e., those who decide to move off WordPress because of all this are more likely to move to a proprietary SaaS with advanced low-code/no-code features and AI integrations rather than to a new open source platform.
Headless CMS & low-code/no-code
Speaking of streamlined proprietary platforms, we’ve been seeing more and more advanced solutions when it comes to headless content management systems and sophisticated low-code/no-code site building platforms. The benefits of headless CMS are so valuable, in fact, that we’ve recently refreshed Agiledrop’s website with Storyblok CMS as the basis.
As more and more business, marketing and other non-technical users (i.e. citizen developers and/or ambitious site builders) create digital content and experiences, they need better tools and functionality to do this on a high level that allows their businesses to compete. User-friendly platforms offering streamlined low-code/no-code site building and content management features are thus becoming the industry standard.
This is a trend that’s likely to continue across the board in proprietary SaaS as well as in the open source platform space. Notably, Drupal, one of the longest standing open source content management platforms, is releasing the new Drupal CMS on January 15th. It will prioritize a fast setup, user-friendly features and capable AI integrations, aiming to position Drupal as a top contender in the next-generation CMS space.
Conclusion
2024 was definitely an exciting year for everyone either directly involved in the tech sector or simply interested in the latest trends and innovations in the technology space. We’re excited to see what new developments 2025 brings us!
Posted by Tim on 06 Jan 2025 in Business,Experience,Development
