What might the World Wide Web look like in 25 years?

In the time it takes to read this sentence, approximately 40 people will have joined the internet. Within a year of the world wide web going public nearly a quarter of adult Americans were using it and – just 15 years later – only a quarter were not.

A quick look at brands’ first websites shows how far we’ve come in terms of web design and building great experiences for customers. Yet, it’s remarkable to think how little the online medium of information exchange has evolved.

25 years on we still – whether on a desktop, laptop, or mobile device – consume content which, is still mostly static and text driven. That won’t be the case for much longer and not just because of the rise of video. AR and VR are likely to bring about an advent of new interfaces – with AI and chat bots set to transform the customer experience.

We’ve had 25 years of (almost) unlimited, unfiltered information. The next 25 years will see the internet get leaner and smarter, predicting our needs and creating an automated and personal experience.

Google’s Eric Schmidt once called the internet the ‘largest experiment in anarchy’ we’ve ever had. The next 25 years will see an intelligent experience in which data, applications and information will drive to connect us even closer to the things we care about.

The future of the internet is the human body. Today we talk about the growth of internet connectivity globally through mobile devices. Fast forward 25 years and the concept of accessing the internet via a device will be passé.

People will connect and control their internet experience using the human body. MIT and Microsoft have already co-created a smart tattoo that can turn your skin into a touchpad so expansion and adoption of smart technologies to enable connectivity is round the corner.

With much more physical interaction with the web, the digital landscape and economy will be transformed to take account of people’s networks, their preferences and likes to deliver a more sophisticated experience of brands than we witness today.

The biggest challenges the web faces today are cyber security, the openness and transparency of the global digital trading economy and the ability to respond to, reach and connect with youth audiences who reject traditional forms of digital advertising.

By moving towards an internet connected and controlled by the individual, the web will be able to find new sources of income and value from digital which fuels the growth of the sharing economy, on-demand services and connected communities globally. Forget CPCVV, pay per wave and pay per smile will become common currency.

If we look back 25 years, who was predicting in detail what we have today? Even Berners-Lee’s original memo didn’t stretch to virtual reality headsets or Snapchat. So, how do we picture 2041?

General consensus is that the internet will sink into the background of daily life – always there, but not something we think about – akin to electricity today. That said, our continued willingness to share data will be vital to this seamless future.

Already, the younger generations, those who live on the internet, are shocking their peers with their willingness to be open. Tied with an understanding of value exchanges, they have grown up with data being their primary currency – in all its flavours – and the benefits of such openness are very clear.

25 years ago I would now be nipping out to the post office to renew my car tax. Four years ago I paid for it online and the disk arrived in the post.

Today there is no tax disk. The money is taken automatically and the system ‘just knows’ whether my car is taxed or not. My lunch break is now my own.

The future internet will be designed to strip away the mundane. It will know us enough to let us get on with what we enjoy, so everything from paying bills online to tapping an Oyster card will go.

Life’s digital barriers will come down, but with this comes an acceptance that we share data to allow such fluidity.