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Category: language

QWERTY-based Amphibians

Published September 5, 2007 by cgerrish

Jeff Hawkins and the Foleo 1.0

Palm killed Foleo 1.0. But the reason for the Foleo is QWERTY, and that’s the reason there’ll be a Foleo 2.0. It’s all about the keyboard. That absurd user interface that was originally designed in 1878 to slow typists down so that the mechanical keys of the early typewriters wouldn’t get stuck together. You’d think that would be as bad as it could get, but no—then we’re given 10-key interfaces to the alphabet through cell phones. The mechanical keyboard on the smart phone was considered a huge improvement and some people can actually type very quickly using only their thumbs. But, really, is that the best we can do? The Foleo was an attempt to at least get back to the full sized keyboard and the insanity that is QWERTY. (You can assume that DVORAK keyboards will never gain a foothold.) But it’s really just a terminal style computer that hooks up to the network through your phone (and probably WiFi). I guess the real question is why the phone? Why does Foleo need to be a companion? Why can’t it simply be a little laptop or a really big phone that doesn’t fit in your pocket?

Frog with 4 legs

As the Internet struggles to emerge everywhere, we’ll see the Darwinian process of various hybrid network devices attempt to adapt and survive. It’s a dog eat dog world, and many devices, like Foleo 1.0, will not survive. But if the ubiquitous Internet is going to be more than just consumption, the problem of input will need to be solved. It’s not going to just be photographs and Twittergrams, we’re going to need to input text as well. Apple is moving toward a virtual interface with QWERTY and Multi-touch created in software. I would imagine their next generation keyboard will incorporate this approach. But there’s a lot of work that needs to be done before a virtual keyboard will rival a mechanical keyboard.

Lots of people are thinking about how to get beyond the Keyboard/Video/Mouse input paradigm, and there are some beautiful prototypes out there. But there’ll always be a need for good old plain text and a way to make it flow from your thoughts out through your fingertips.

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Mahalo & Winer: The Human Element

Published August 12, 2007 by cgerrish

Calacanis makes products, Winer makes networked formats (and products to support those formats). Calacanis thinks about the Web’s ecosystem, but he also thinks about the economics of the Web and is willing to pay for value at the leading edge (even in the so-called social network space). That makes him rare.

So why the break? What’s really upset Winer about Mahalo? That it’s not a platform? This seems unlikely. While Winer is usually good about thinking about ordinary users, in this case I think he’s really thinking only about developers as users, and not ordinary users.

What’s good about Mahalo? Compare the search results pages for “how to speak french.”

Google: How to speak french

Mahalo: How to speak french

To my eye, the Mahalo page is more useful if a person would like to learn how to speak french. Granted the Google page lists the Mahalo page in its results, but the Google page is filled with advertising. Google doesn’t really tell me how to learn french, it provides a list of pointers based on a keyword query and page rank algorithm. Google doesn’t even know or care about my interest in speaking french.

Is the Mahalo page useful to a Web developer? Is it a low-level network protocol or format that can be mashed up into something new? Not at the moment, but it would be very useful to a developer who wanted to learn to speak french. The interesting thing about Mahalo is that it brings editorial judgement into the process of searching and finding.

And that injection of the “editor” is probably what Winer objects to the most, although he hasn’t put it that way— and maybe doesn’t realize it. Most of the technology that Dave has built is for the purpose of empowering the individual. Blogs, RSS, OPML, Manilla, Frontier — all these things give power to the individual to create. Mahalo doesn’t do that, it just provides good answers to questions. And to do that it needs smart editors to compile, structure and write answers. This makes the editor an important filter. Dave prefers to build his own filters and empower users.

From this perspective, Mahalo moves things in the other direction. Mahalo may start with good editors, but that may not always be true. If I search for “Dave Winer” on Mahalo, what will the editors return as a result? Will the break between Winer and Calacanis have any affect on the results? The human element can provide the extra intelligence that makes the difference between a good list of pointers and good answer to a question. It can also inject bias, cultural prejudice, political agendas, economic agendas, etc. Will Mahalo have the wisdom and ability to respond to its inevitable mistakes? And once that process starts, will Mahalo still be able to provide good answers to questions?

So maybe Winer is thinking about users. Calacanis has created a useful product, but he needs to answer the questions that Winer hasn’t been able to articulate.

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R.I.P. Richard Rorty

Published June 11, 2007 by cgerrish

One of the more interesting American philosophers, Richard Rorty, has passed on. One of the more interesting thoughts he had was about winning arguments through changing the subject. Introduce a better idea instead of trying to disprove the idea in front of you.

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The Weight Of The World

Published November 19, 2006 by cgerrish

Wim Wender’s film “Wings Of Desire” has been transformed for the stage by Ola Mafaalani for the American Repertory Theater. During the film’s first release I saw a matinee performance — I’d taken the day off from work. I was so affected by it, that I went to see it again later that evening. Some of the most beautiful dialogue in the film comes from Peter Handke’s semi-autobiographical book “The Weight of the World.” Mafaalani talks about bringing the work fully into theatrical performance and the difficulty of leaving the greatness of the film behind. Usually I’m skeptical of adaptations of films for the theater. But Handke himself has paved the way for this kind of work with his play “The Hour We Knew Nothing Of Each Other.”

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