I have seen the (photographic) future and it is weird. Just as the past ten years have turned the whole photo scene on it's head, well, just wait.

What are some of the key problems facing photographers today?

• They can never seem to get close enough to the subject
  
• They can never "freeze" the action of little Johnny or Clarissa as they score some points in some athletic event
  
• In any group, someone always has their eyes closed or
  looks goofy as the pic is snapped

I predict that within 5 to 10 years, these problems will be solved by two things:

A gigantic increase in the sensitivity of cameras to light and the vast increase in the size and speed of storage devices.

Already we have seen the ISO "speed" speed of cameras jump from 100 to 400, then to 800 and now even 6400. Imaging a sensor with an effective sensitivity of a half million! This would allow fantastic shutter speeds, even permitting action freezing shots with cameras sporting small lens apertures. This coupled with huge storage devices that can accept a continuous "burst" of images will exceed the taking ability of the fastest film-based motor drives today.

In fact, the speed of image capture will be more like a very high speed video capture, allowing the user to begin shooting or "record on" just before the baby blows out the birthday candle and then stop afterwards. They will then be able to play back the sequence and stop the action at any point to produce a high quality still image. The entire concept of "snapping" and image at the decisive moment will be banished to the dustbin of history.

Some of us will mourn this. There has always been the element of the hunt in photography as we waited for the fleeting glance, the unguarded moment or the perfect sunset. Others will say these moments will still exist and be captured, but we will no longer miss them by being a second too late.

What will these cameras look like and and when will they appear? I have no idea of when, but we are already seeing primitive options called "burst mode" that are very fast. 

I believe these cameras will have far less buttons and gizmos as consumers opt for simple modes of shooting. They may be more ergonomically designed and the screens may be quite a bit larger, or perhaps flippable or even removable.

Essentially, these will be high speed video cameras that can freeze action,

It is likely that a wireless form of moving pics and videos to the computer or other device will go mainstream. Many devices such as an iPod Touch use WiFi for this as the standard connection. This may someday require more encryption as one would not want their personal photos to be snatched from the air by a passerby.

In the mean time, learn to use what you have and remember that NO digital camera is obsolete until is cannot do something you want it to do!