I have little doubt this is the way it will ultimately go – although I see a few years and hurdles before we get there.

Digital marketing really will take on a whole new face.

Crude initial forays into this business space will develop (or be replaced) by sophisticated personalization/suggestion methods as you expect. I suspect there will be early mismatches, and over time the learning systems which predict what you like best will get better or die out.

Years later (after he started using a laptop or word processor or something, I think — Crichton was an early adopter of computers) he went back to that hotel and the Four Seasons staff, trained to notice and anticipate their guests' quirks, had stuck lengths of tape to the side of the desk in his room.

I suppose you are working on some CS 903 to minimize those sorts of situations, but I guess this could become more fine-tuned as it evolved. For example, in the case of the barista, instead of simply remembering what you drank last time you were in the coffee shop, the system might take into account time of day and seasonality. Maybe the last time you were in a New York Starbucks was a January afternoon, and you've come to visit again first thing in a muggy July morning? Maybe you'd want something cooler the second time? And so on.