In a new article in Wired, Clive Thompson interviews Microsoft’s principal researcher, Bill Buxton, about the “long nose” theory, which holds forth that innovations that seemingly come out of nowhere are actually incubated for a long time. At the piece’s conclusion, Thompson predicts which technology is ready to dominate in the next decade. An excerpt:

“Using a ‘long nose’ analysis, I have a prediction of my own. I bet electric vehicles are going to become huge—specifically, electric bicycles. Battery technology has been improving for decades, and the planet is urbanizing rapidly. The nose is already poking out: Electric bikes are incredibly popular in China and becoming common in the US among takeout/delivery people, who haul them inside their shops each night to plug them in. (Pennies per charge, and no complicated rewiring of the grid necessary.) I predict a design firm will introduce the iPhone of electric bikes and whoa: It’ll seem revolutionary!”

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Prodeco Technologies introduces the next generation of electric bikes: