I have to admit it – I HATE “what to expect in 20##” lists.

I’m not all that keen on listening to people tell me “tablets are going to be hot this year” or “the PC will finally breathe its last gasp of oxygen in 2013.” I think both are kind of true, and both are kind of false. You really can never tell for sure what will or won’t happen, but for this blog post, I can tell you what I HOPE will happen.

Let’s call this my first “Here’s what I hope will happen in 20##” blog post. Perhaps we can make it a tradition.

So, what do I hope happens in the CE industry? How about nothing short of a complete transformation of the television as we know it?

Recently, I watched Tim Cook, the CEO of Apple, talk about the company setting its sights on the television market. His exact quote was he thought “the TV market had been ignored for a long while.” I agree with him. Oh sure, you can get HDTV, 65-inch screens and TVs so thin they look like panes of glass hanging on your wall, but really, aside from the box itself, not much has changed.

If I may be blunt, I’d like to see Apple turn the TV into a giant iPad. As simple as that sounds, let me go into the details on what such a move would entail.

Apple has always been keen on launching a technology or UI that is intuitive and also transitional – meaning, it leads you to the next logical step. The iPod leads to iTunes, which leads to purchasing music digital files, which leads to video iPods, which leads to purchasing digital video files, which leads to purchasing apps, etc. I think the Apple Television is the next frontier.

Imagine, if you will, a large beautiful screen hanging on your wall that is seamlessly linked to your iPad. I use this iPad as the remote control (or just simply get off the couch and touch the screen to do the same thing). I go to iTunes and fire up the latest movie I downloaded, or instead of using the Xbox that is now collecting dust, I fire up Halo or Angry Birds (app form, of course).

Maybe I don’t want to sit for a movie or play a game. Maybe I’m just looking to catch up on news. Fire up the new CNN-TV app I purchased for $.99, but also subscribe to. Now I can watch the news WITHOUT a cable subscription or satellite dish. Eureka!

Looking for some other networks? Bust out your ESPN app, or the Food Network app, or even the Cartoon Network app.  Want to go local…why not your local CBS affiliate app, or the PBS app? All of these are free content, but maybe we paid $3.99 for the apps up front. Either way, changing channels is not like when I was a kid – now we just change apps. No more cable bills, no more satellite TV with 500 channels you don’t like, just the eight or nine you watch all the time. Sure, you have to buy the apps, and probably pay a monthly subscription fee, but could this be the answer to all of our TV-watching prayers?

Could Apple Television and its TV channel apps finally be the “cable TV a-la-carte” we’ve all been hoping for?

Well, that’s what I hope happens in 2013.