I’m generally not enthusiastic about photography in museums. Walking through New York’s Metropolitan Museum last week, I could have easily passed by a show of contemporary photography called ‘Surface Tension.’ I found something about the title intriguing and decided to walk through the exhibit. While there were a number of pieces that merited further exploration, it was Ann Hamilton’s piece ‘abc‘ that stuck with me. At the dawn of a new era of multi-touch interactive personal computing, there’s something about Hamilton’s video image that has a haunting resonance. It’s a kind of visual poetry, even visual thinking, that connects on so many levels.
Comments closedCategory: simplicity
A couple of three things came together for me and I wanted to set them down next to each other.
The first was Jon Udell’s keynote at the Kynetx Impact Conference. There was a moment when he was talking about a meeting in local government where the agenda was managed using a web-based tool. Udell talked about wanting to be able to hyperlink to agenda items, he had a blog post that was relevant to one of the issues under discussion. The idea was that a citizen attending the meeting, in person or virtually, should be able to link those two things together, and that the link should be discoverable by anyone via some kind of search. And while the linking of these two things would be useful in terms of reference, if the link simply pulled Udell’s blog post into the agenda at the relevant spot, that might be even more useful.
The reason this kind of thing probably won’t happen is the local government doesn’t want to be held responsible for things a citizen may choose to attach to their agenda items. A whole raft of legal issues are stirred up by this kind of mixing. However, while the two streams of data can’t be literally mixed, they can be virtually mixed by the user. Udell was looking at this agenda and mixing in his own blog post, creating a mental overlay. A technology like Kynetx allows the presentation of a literal overlay and could provide access to this remix to a whole group of people interested in this kind of interaction with the agenda of the meeting.
The Network provides the kind of environment where two things can be entirely separate and yet completely mixed at the same time. And the mixing together can be located in a personal or group overlay that avoids the issues of liability that the local government was concerned about.
The second item was Apple’s acquisition of Siri. While I never made the connection before, the kind of interaction that Siri gives users is very similar to what Kynetx is doing. I can ask Siri with a voice command for the best pizza places around here. Siri orchestrates a number of data services to provide me with a list of local pizza joints. Siri collects identity information on an as needed basis to provide better results. While Kynetx is a platform for assembling these kinds of orchestrations, Siri is a roll up of our most common activities – find me the best mexican restaurant; where is this movie playing? What’s the weather like in New York City; Is my flight on time?
While I haven’t hooked my credit card up to Siri yet, it does have that capability so that a transaction can be taken all the way to completion. On the other hand, Apple’s iTunes has had my credit card information for years. Once the deal closes, Siri will have acquired my credit card.
Phil Windley, in his presentation to the Kynetx conference, discussed an application that could be triggered by walking in to, or checking in to, a Borders bookstore. The Kynetx app would push a message to me telling me that an item on my Amazon wishlist was available for purchase in the store. It strikes me that Siri might do the same thing by orchestrating my personal context data, my Amazon wishlist, which I’ve registered with it, a voice-based FourSquare check-in, and Border’s local inventory information.
The third and last item is Facebook’s open graph protocol. This is an attempt to use Facebook’s distribution power through it’s massive social graph to add “semantic” metadata to the public internet name space. This is an interesting example of the idea that the closed can include the open, but the open can’t include the closed. Jon Udell’s story about local government and blog posts has the same structure. The private network can include the public network, whereas the reverse isn’t true if each is to maintain its integrity.
While there’s a large potential for mischief in letting everyone make up their own metadata, it provides more fodder for the business of indexing, filtering and validating of data/metadata. Determining the authority of metadata is the same as determining the authority of data. The ‘meta’ guarantees syntax, but not semantics or value.
By setting these events next to each other, you can begin to see that to include both private and public data in an algorithm, you’ll have to do so from the stance of the personal and private. It makes me think that privacy isn’t dead, it’s the engine of the next evolution of the Network.
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The philosopher George Santayana’s aphorism: “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it” seems to underlie many of the stories bubbling up around the leap from fixed computing to mobile computing. Especially with regard to Apple’s role in forming the ecosystem, the market and some of the decisions they’ve taken about what to leave behind. Santayana’s aphorism has been restated in a number of ways, another popular formulation is: “Those who cannot learn from history are doomed to repeat it.” At any rate, there’s an implication that history, the past, should never be repeated— doing so is the occupation of the doomed. There’s also a sense of coming upon a node, as we move through time, that contains the possibility of looping back to a previously experienced stretch of history. Although we don’t replay it note for note, the chord changes seem follow the same pattern.
There are two stories that run through the minds of observers:
1. The Apple and Microsoft story. An integrated computing system that pushed the boundaries of human-computer interaction into the realm of usefulness, and the lower-cost modular computing system (DOS paired with any manufacturer) that provided a ‘good enough’ experience and a solid return on investment. In the end, Microsoft’s Windows became the dominant personal and business computing platform.
2. The Monopoly and Anti-Trust story. From its position of market dominance, Microsoft used its position to maintain power. The law is fine with the use of soft power (you choose it because it’s best, whatever best means to you); but steps in when hard power is exercised (you choose it because it’s the only choice). A settlement was reached: Microsoft’s brand suffered damage, some APIs were opened up and market dominance was largely maintained. The second act of this story has developers starting to route around Microsoft by creating cloud-based applications of ever-increasing sophistication.
And so, as the mobile computing space comes into focus we see:
1. Apple and iPhone/iPad Touch/iPad as an integrated platform and device
2. Google and Android/Chrome across multiple manufacturers
3. Microsoft and Silverlight/Windows Phone across multiple manufacturers
Tech pundits expect an exact replay of The Apple and Microsoft story. Although, Google has been cast in the role of Microsoft this time. Steve Jobs, they say, has not learned from history. Apple will eventually be overtaken by a more “open” and commodified horizontal platform. On the other hand, both Google and Microsoft have learned from Apple and have bought in to integrated design practices while maintaining a multiple-manufacturer production model. And while Apple is thought to be repeating its mistakes on the one hand, on the other, they’ve been cast in the role of Microsoft based on their dominance and control of the new mobile market. On a recent Gillmor Gang, Blaine Cook suggested that Apple is courting an anti-trust action based on their recent behavior. The implication being that there is no choice but the iPhone/iPad, and that competition is hindered by Apple controlling their own device platform.
Google and Microsoft have understood that more control and tighter design integration will be required to compete with Apple. Google has started down that road with the Nexus One. Microsoft, with their Windows Phone 7 announcements, have shown that they’ll be moving in the same direction. They’re very fast followers, some might even say they’re tailgating Apple. As in any race, drafting into the slipstream of the leader provides many advantages.
The term “slipstreaming” describes an object traveling inside the slipstream of another object (most often objects moving through the air though not necessarily flying). If an object is inside the slipstream behind another object, moving at the same speed, the rear object will require less power to maintain its speed than if it were moving independently. In addition, the leading object will be able to move faster than it could independently because the rear object reduces the effect of the low-pressure region on the leading object.
A fast follower wants to put himself into the position to execute a slingshot pass. By drafting in behind the market leader, the follower can exert less energy while keeping pace. The slingshot allows the follower to generate passing speed by optimizing the aerodynamics of their relative positions. The leader wants to adjust position to block this kind of move. The analysis and play-by-play has been based entirely on the assumption the lessons of history have been locked in, and this new race will play out with exactly the same dynamics. The lesson Apple may have learned is that a post-PC approach and strong portfolio of patents could change the outcome of some key points of the narrative.
A subplot to the main story involves Adobe and its Flash runtime. Adobe’s Flash is playing the role of Netscape in the current transition. Although Hal Varian was referring to Netscape in his 1999 book Information Rules, the thought applies equally well to Adobe. They face a classic problem of interconnection. Their competitors control the operating environment in which they are but one component. Adobe owes its current level of success in the fixed computing environment to Microsoft’s dominance.
At a key point, Microsoft had no competitive product and agreed to distribute the Flash runtime along with its operating system and browser. This put Flash on a high percentage of the installed personal computing user base. This kind of market penetration probably could not have been achieved if users had been required to download and install the plugin on their own. Once the Flash player was in place, apps could be pushed over the wire, and there was a high likelihood that they would operate. The Flash runtime could even update itself once it was established on the local Windows machine. The Macintosh and Linux platforms were filled in by Adobe, but were given a much lower priority based on market share.
Adobe has two problems in this transitional environment. The first is that their competitors control both their operating environment— and the distribution channel. Secondly, where they once had a willing partner, Microsoft now has Silverlight which competes directly. Because Adobe has had a high penetration percentage, they claim as much a 99%, they feel entitled to ship with any new operating environment. It used to be that way, but things have changed. The problem that Adobe’s Flash solved now has other solutions in each of the mobile stacks.
In the post-PC mobile computing world all of the original assumptions and agreements are being reassessed. This new environment isn’t an extension or an evolution of the fixed desktop environment– the blackboard has been erased and the project has been built up from scratch. That means you don’t assume Adobe’s Flash runtime, you don’t even assume copy and paste, multi-tasking or a file system. The first couple of things you might put on the blackboard are 10 hour battery life and always-on wireless network connectivity— that’s what makes the device usable in a mobile context. From there we can add location and streaming services, real-time responsiveness and the rest. But it’s battery life that’s the limiting factor. It’s the invisible tether that eventually draws us back to the power source to recharge. Where silicon once ruled, we now look to lithium.
The assumption that history will repeat itself relieves us of the burden of figuring out what’s going on, of understanding out the differences that make a difference. No doubt some threads of history will repeat themselves, but they may not be the ones we expect. When we come upon a node, as we move through time, a moment that contains the possibility of looping back to a previously experienced stretch of history. We also have the opportunity to take a familiar melody and go off and explore unexpected directions.
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The voices from a certain segment of the developer classes cry out that the iPad has left out too much. That the simplicity of the device has cut them off from the toolsets with which they’ve become comfortable and productive. There’s no keyboard, no mouse, no windows, no multitasking, no hierarchical file system. Perhaps they state the obvious when they say it’s not the laptop they already have. The device, they say, is too simple to be useful. The computing environment is too vertical. Somehow this crowd imagines a linear incremental evolutionary development from personal computing as they’ve always known it to a simple tablet device. A simple device that includes all the complexity and clutter to which they’ve become accustomed. Of course we know the fate of the complex tablet device they’re describing— it never caught on. That wasn’t what they wanted either.
There’s another segment that says that this new iPad device won’t inspire the tinkerer, the maker. The person who, as a child growing up, reveled in taking apart things to see how they worked. There are no screws to let the user open up this device and have a peak inside. The device is both too simple and too complex. The integrated design and manufacture of the product is at such a high level that there’s not much for the tinkerer to play with. This crowd believes the iPad kills play. But tinkering and play is always a relative matter. With the iPad, tinkering is simply displaced— it moves up the stack to the level of web/cloud and native software. Tinkerers, if they are tinkerers, are not so easily dissuaded.
A third segment thinks that the iPad will re-incarcerate the audience. Social media and various crowd-sourced content sites have transformed the audience from passive observers to active participants. But, the iPad is deemed an evolutionary step backward, an evil plan by the incumbent media companies to preserve their dastardly business models. The device, they say, is purely for consumption of media— it’s a screen, much like a television. Because it lacks the traditional input tools, the keyboard and the mouse, it can’t and won’t enable the user to interact or create. Multi-touch is a gesture of consumption, not one of creation. Those making this argument defend the “new media of the internet” from the next generation of innovators and the kids who’ll learn to type on glass.
In each of these cases there’s a defense of an inconvenient complexity. The complexity must be preserved to extend the stability of the existing ecosystem. There’s even a moral edge to maintaining the status quo, as if embracing this new platform was a kind of degenerate act. And instead of the device that’s available today, a non-existent device of the future is peddled in its place. A device where choices don’t have to be made, where everything you want, everything you have, and everything you can imagine exist in a simple package. Of course, if you wait long enough, the thing you’re looking for might just come along. Either that or you’ll run out of heartbeats.
In the end, what the simplicity of the iPad allows is more participation by more people with real-time personal and social networked computing. By eliminating levels of complexity, the barriers to practical and emotional engagement with the device are reduced below a significant threshold. But we’re only in the year zero, as the platform expands and matures, as competitors flesh out variations of the theme, new levels of complexity will emerge.
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