I've been sitting on this for a while, but never managed to get it polished enough, so I thought screw it, here it is.
While pondering what I'm gonna do for the rest of my life (well at least the next few years anyway), I created a list of things I saw the world of tech focusing on for some direction. It is not a long-sighted prediction, rather a list of what is either happening now or will be very soon. They should all be reality by 2011 I reckon.
So being the nice person that I am, I'm sharing it. Without further ado, here they are, 13 points in no particular order:
Design and user experience will become one of the main purchasing factors, and it doesn't start or end with the product - it's how it makes the consumer feel before, during and after.
Products will no longer be just products, but they will contain the brand's DNA, their philosophy. And consumers will judge a product not on the product's purported benefits, but also what it gives them, how it makes them feel, how it fits in and connects with their lives. It won't end with the product either, with consumers expecting a continual relationship with the manufacturer, either for technical support, offers, new features etc.
Manufacturers will crave to connect to the customer on an intimate level, creating an ecosystem and while they may or may not include some kind of real lock-in mechanism in their products, they will definitely develop a 'psychological lock-in', making consumers buy their brand again. The tactics of high-end brands are finally filtering down to lower-end ones.
Performance will not be important anymore, no more gigahertz speak. It'll be all about the features and quality, not quantity
The consumerisation of computers has spurred a change in consumer thinking. No longer will it be about performance figures or tech specs that sell these products, but rather how they translate into what the product can do for them and how it will benefit them.
I think the way Microsoft marketed Windows XP Media Center Edition (MCE) in Australia is a worthy example. It arrived at a time when practically no one here had heard of PVRs and features like time-shifting (we don't have Tivos here remember). Their partners came out with machines that looked like computers, retailers put those machines in the computer section, and all the advertising material conveyed the tech specs of a computer - its CPU speed, memory size, number of USB ports etc.
Sales flopped. No one understood why they needed a computer in their TV room, or what the benefits were. Along comes a range of consumer electronic manufacturers, Sony, Panasonic, LG, Philips etc., who created their own PVR units, promoted the concept of PVRs and what you could do with them, all without a mention of the tech specs. It still took them a few years, but they experienced far greater success at educating the consumer, and getting sales.
Integration and context-aware will be the new buzzwords
Electronic devices have evolved to a stage where they have gained so much traction that it's starting to lose it due to the multitude available. The next stage is to integrate them with each other. We have started with the basic sharing of files, but that's only the tip of the iceberg - devices should be sharing data (storage and runtime), functionality and resources, so what I can do in one device, I should be able to do on or from another (if appropriate of course). They should also be aware of the context they're being used in, so rather than having us tell them what they should be doing when, they should be smart enough to realise themselves.
Bluetooth-enabled mobiles and GPSes are a good example here. Jump into a car and your mobile will automatically connect to your GPS, rerouting all audio there, as well as your phone book and messages. You can then control your mobile from your GPS. This is only the start for this relationship - what if all you need to do is select an address from an SMS, your GPS will pick it up, guide you to the nearest carpark, then sends the walking directions to get to your location to your mobile.
GPSes can also be contextually aware too. One example is mode-awareness - it should be able to sense when it is removed from the car, and when it is, it reroutes your directions into ones suitable for walking. Another example is already available in some parts of the world - GPSes can now sense which area is congested and redirect you to a less congested route.
Devices can also be location-aware, e.g. your mobile detecting that you're at home and automatically rerouting all phone calls to the home phone system. Or they can be time-aware, e.g. it knows from live traffic data that you need x minutes to get to your next appointment, so it alerts you earlier. Or they can be device-aware, e.g. if I'm on my laptop, all my email, reminders and IM notifications will be routed there, and when I'm out and about, they get re-routed to my mobile. Or they can be situation-aware, e.g. if you're in a meeting scheduled in your calendar, your status will be communicated to those necessary, and any notifications will be suspended unless urgent. There are many, many more examples. Cisco's 'human network' vision is worth reading.
The web will become more and more connected and integrated to the physical world
The web started off as one of the communication methods available to us. Now, it underpins our technological and virtual identity - it is an intricate part of every second of our lives. Yet whenever we want to do something on the web, we almost always invariably have to do it in front of our computers - we have to go to the web instead of it coming to us.
Our mobile phones are leading the charge here - the mobile web revolution is gaining ground at a phenomenal pace. And because we almost always have our mobiles with us, it is ideal as our connector to the web. Need a map and directions to the nearest Maccas? Need to look up a mate's phone number on Facebook? Want to see if restaurant X is worth visiting? Want to buy and download that song you just heard at a bar?
Some other cool examples that exist on our mobiles already include loopt, which tracks your location using your phone's GPS signal and makes that available to selected friends so they know where you are and can organise a catch up (twitter and others offer a similar one, but requires you to text your location). Another one is i-spott, which is a mobile scavenger hunt game - some targets are set for each day, and you have to snap a photo of them on your mobile and send it through for points.
But our mobiles aren't the only thing we can access the web on. Imagine if you had a communal shopping list at your shared house, then when you visit the supermarket, it automatically pops up on the trolley, along with item locations, special offers, recipe suggestions and more. Items are sorted out by who requested them, and the bill is organised and charged as such.
Or what if you could walk in to Harvey Norman, scan the items you're interested in and you can get the model numbers, brochures and reviews retrieved and ready for comparison later, or get price comparisons immediately.
Maybe your local pub will project images from some flickr stream on to a wall, allowing customers to tag their flickr shots they took on their mobile and get them shown.
How about when you pay at the checkouts, your mobile authenticates you as who you say you are, and any membership cards and discounts are automatically applied - no more carrying around a wallet full of crappy cards. The checkout chick then asks if you want to pick up that internet order to be delivered next week now instead. You then realise that you're short on cash, so you ask the checkout chick to place some items on your wish list so you can buy it here or online when your pay cheque clears.
The web doesn't replace reality - it complements it and will continue to. This is the next frontier of the web revolution.
The mobile will become an extension of the user, becoming our digital identifier, authenticator, communicator and researcher.
As the examples in the above point noted - the mobile is set to be our conduit to the digital world. No longer is it just a phone, but a universal communicator, enabling us to communicate with others via video, blogs, email, micro-blogs, facebook etc. But not only to other people, but to services and devices too - e.g. enabling us to remotely check to see if we turned the oven off, and whether or not we told our PVR to record the game tonight.
It will also identify us, and reflect our personality and character traits through strong personalisation features. Not just through replaceable shells, or customisable ringtones and wallpaper - the interface (look and feel, and also the text) and tools available on it will be customised to the user's tastes. It will also learn and act as the user does, knowing what the user wants when and how.
We will no longer have to carry an array of cards in our wallet - our mobile will double as our ID, acting as our driver's licence, credit card, transport ticket, loyalty card and security pass and whatever other card we have to carry now. Our mobile will authenticate itself with us through biometrics, and if we lose it, we can immediately request a remote removal and deregistration of our ID from that mobile, register our ID with a new mobile and continue with our lives.
The mobile will also become our digital researcher, on hand 24/7. We can use it to get directions, reviews, request opinions, instructions... anything really. Effectively, it will become our second brain, one that is not bounded by our physical restrictions, one that has an infinite amount of knowledge available in seconds.
Device-to-device peer-to-peer and mesh-style networks will become more and more popular, but not necessarily replacing centrally-based systems.
Peer-to-peer (P2P) and mesh networks are ideal for discovering information from nearby sources. They can be perfect for personal devices because they act like humans do - connect with our surroundings, radiating out. They're also cheaper than server-dependent networks, potentially faster, and in some cases, can be more resilient.
There will be a backlash against everything going online, and the things that remain physical, like business cards, will be better and better designed.
As more and more things become virtual, we'll start looking at the things that remain physical in a different light. We'll start demanding things remain physical. We will value them more; they'll have more meaning and personality.
Until every wall, table, floor, ceiling becomes a display, printers will be in greater demand, as users become more and more creative on their computers, desiring to print their designs out to personalise their surroundings or show friends. Some web companies like moo.com, who allow users to easily design and order business cards, stickers and other stuff, have even built their business based on this fact. Others like TasteBook allow people to order their own recipe books, personalised with recipes chosen by themselves.
Desktops, as we know them, will not exist in homes anymore. Everyone will have a laptop, and simple, single-purpose computer devices will become ubiquitous, embedded in our surroundings, silently networked.
As the web becomes more and more embedded into our world, so will computers. We no longer have to live with the physical limitations of a desktop, namely that you must be in a particular location to use it. Instead, computers will accommodate to our location, wirelessly integrated into our surroundings so that they become part of our daily lives, rather than an intrusive and physically-limiting tool.
The openmoko guys and Mark Weiser summarise this the best, respectively:
"Ubiquitous computing means more than computing wherever you wander: It means knowing the locale, weaving seamlessly into the local fabric, and vanishing."
"The most profound technologies are those that disappear. They weave themselves into the fabric of everyday life until they are indistinguishable from it.”
Our homes will have screens everywhere, with a Microsoft Surface-like table to read the morning news, screens on the wall showing the status of family members and friends and their calendars, a flowing news feed of what's going on with the people we know. Jump on to the TV and the computer will show you the EPG, any unwatched recordings, and what's on now sorted by your preferences. There'll be ambient devices, like the Orb that subtly tells us the state of certain things, like the weather. The possibilities are endless.
There will be a rise in devices dedicated to particular tasks to power this (information appliances), all seamlessly integrated with each other. Virtualisation will also play a part.
People will become more and more concerned about privacy and lack of control, and there will be solutions to bring things back home but still accessible online.
We are currently going through a social information trend, with people providing more information than ever to anyone who cares to look. As more and more information, including confidential documents like bank statements and tax returns, go online however, people will realise that not everything that can be online should be.
This is not just about the dangers of making such information publically available, leading to identity theft or worse. It is also about handing control of your data over to a third-party, in some random country, with substantially different laws. Who will be liable if the data is leaked? More likely though, what avenues can you pursue when the service loses your data, or locks you out on a business day, costing you millions? These services do not make it easy to backup and restore data or run offline, because they are a service after all. So when they stuff up, can you contact them and what can you do?
Or what if the service decides to cease offering the service, like when Yahoo! decided to axe Yahoo! Photos earlier this year?
There are solutions coming out designed to put the data back into your hands yet remain accessible online, including NASes on steroids, doing much more than simply storing data and Windows Home Server. Other solutions in development include dedicated data hosting services, which may be located locally for further peace-of-mind, like Omnidrive's WebFS strategy or Amazon's S3, who can then authorise other services access to the data.
The personal touch will become more and more important, e.g. written (tablet) notes.
The personal touch used to be something only the rich and famous got, but the trick is filtering down the ladder. Companies are realising that it really only takes a tiny bit more effort, but the results are well worth it.
When technology came along, people used it to mass-notify everyone using a generic message because it was so easy to. The personal touch went out the window as companies and staff became lazy. Perceptions are changing though, and there is now a drive to create more personal communications using technology. Examples include customising emails to customer preferences, responding to emails directly and not via auto-replies and printing personally addressed and/or handwritten (or at least styled) messages.
Society as a whole will be drawn together again through the power of the net and be more aware of externalities and the effect on the world.
Partly driven by the massive environmental/climate change push, and also the fact that we are richer than ever before, technology has enabled us to see what is actually going on and do something about it. The entrepreneurial trend has also helped, as they give consumers alternatives that appeal to their moral belief. This new view on the world has forced companies worldwide to re-evaluate their strategy, with those doing it first reaping the benefits.
Everything you want will be accessible anywhere, anytime, anyhow.
This one's pretty obvious. Once again, our mobiles will play a vital role here. The explosion in web-based services makes this pretty real already, with services available to manage and store nearly any data.
One nice example I'd like to see happen is something similar to Palm's Foleo vision. The idea is that we can get dumb laptop-like devices that connect to our mobile device and make all our email and documents available on them, making it easier to type longer documents on a bigger screen. It would be even better if we could store a simple computer setup (virtual machine) on our mobiles, configured with our own apps. Then when we go out to say, a coffee shop, we can loan one of these laptop-like devices, which will wirelessly connect up with our mobiles and load up our personalised setup. All the apps we need are there, as are our documents/music/videos which were downloaded from our mobiles (or from a web-based service access through our mobile's internet connection). And when we're done, we simply terminate the connection, all the data gets stored back on to our mobile (or web-based service) and we can return the laptop-like device back to the coffee shop. No more carrying around a heavy laptop.
Viral distribution will become more virulent, easier to start and more and more innovative.
We have only scratched the tip of the iceberg with the viral distribution techniques in use now. Viral marketing has been quite successful, especially those involving challenges like the recent Vanishing Point game for Windows Vista. Other brands like Red Bull have created games that sit within Facebook, which can virally spread from that person's friend's list outwards.
But marketers will soon start tap into this method of distribution a lot more. For example, if Apple implemented Zune-style sharing (without the DRM fingers-crossed), complete with Facebook-style news feeds telling them of songs their friends have favourited/bought recently and integration with the iPod touch's wireless music store, it would encourage a lot of 'spur of the moment' purchases. Maybe artists can even tap in to the platform and distribute free copies of their songs; or maybe require a person to send that song to 3 other people before receiving a free copy.
This is the web embracing the trusted word-of-mouth transmission mechanism, and extrapolating it much further than any single user will bother spreading, maximising that user's value to the marketer.
And for laughs, here are some bonus ones:
- The Linux community will focus more on user interfaces and experiences.
Actually, I wish this would seriously happen soon. A personal example - check out the LinuxMCE interface for an example of how fudged up many are right now. Some people like it that way (I can't understand why, but design is subjective) but I can't see it having mass-market appeal. There are many that focus a lot on user experience - Firefox is a great example (see Alex Faaborg's blog) - but these are a minority unfortunately. Maybe what they need is more info on how they arrived at those user interface/experience decisions.
- It will finally not be cool to prefix product/service names with 'i' anymore, just like the 'e' prefix before it.
Apple, you brought this trend into the world, now please save us from iHell!
For a longer term vision, I like Adam Greenfield's Everyware book a lot. The overall idea, is that our entire environment should be catering for how we work, not the other way around. Our whole environment will be effectively like a living organism, including the things we don't perceive as living now like walls, poles and floors, reacting to their surroundings and the wider environment. It explores a lot of the issues with such a vision, not just technical or physical, but also social and personal ones too.