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Remember the Rotary Dial telephone….before the push button phone? If you are younger than 35 you probably never had the pleasure. Today the smartphone runs our daily lives, with its touch and slide screens, and more and more voice activated command capabilities. But where is technology taking us now?
It was not long ago that the Blackberry was described as “the” cutting edge device, and salespeople and corporate executives used it as a status symbol of their prowess, clutching it in their hands while nimbly, rapidly, and dexterously punching its primary mode of operation, those shiny cool curved buttons and mechanical trackball, to send emails blazing across the web sphere.
But alas, like so many promising technologies with seemingly rapid adoption curves (read: the VCR, the typewriter, the fax machine), then along came Apple with its sexy iPhone (released on June 29, 2007) that changed everything. Immediately the long 36 hour wait lines at the Apple stores to secure the first iPhones, that no longer relied on the communications staple; “The Button.” In a relatively short period, (the first Android, released on October 22, 2008), even the iPhone has succumbed to the Android as the favored (as measured by market share, not by the millions of loyal Apple users…disclosure, I am a diehard Android user) mobile operating system.
Over 100 years ago the button was introduced as a new technology phenomena. This was the next generation of “The Switch” which was developed during the industrial age to manage and control machinery, and eventually electrical power. This gave instantaneous fingertip control to machinery, mechanisms and devices that previously had needed levers, clutches and gears to operate.
The button moved us significantly further than the switch, by improving the connection between cause and effect, allowing rapidly coded combinations, and options, past the typical on-off options of a switch. Suddenly a button, or a series of buttons, could be used in combination with multiple fingers to generate commands to a device. Over the past 100 years, the humble and awesome button has transformed our lives.
The early computers started off with the control through banks of switches, on mainframe behemoths that filled entire rooms. Many of the early computers, required several people to operate. Eventually the mighty keyboard with its rows of QWERTY monogrammed buttons became the control end of our computing devices, and later the mouse, invented by Douglas Engelbart in 1962
Today, one of our biggest challenges is managing commands to our smartphones, as we walk our streets, drive our cars and bikes (now illegal in most states), eat our meals, sit in our desk chairs or meetings, or even manipulate our intelligent and smart wireless devices while at the beach or even lying in bed (29% of Americans say their phone is the first and last thing they look at every day).
And herein lies the problem. We need to once again move the technological innovation needle forward, by moving past the tried and true tapping of buttons. It is a significant limitation on the next generation of intelligent devices, and is now limiting our evolvement into the next era. The good news is, some very smart and innovative people are already working on this.
Clearly, mobile devices are the new normal. Advanced by the massive computing power and app capabilities of our smart devices, combined with the high speed, and the anywhere anytime instant wireless cloud data access capabilities of today’s internet, the world’s information and knowledge is now available to the masses for the first time in human history.
We are moving into a new realm where our pocket devices will be our predominant knowledge and organizational technology (already preferred over desktop and laptop), to pre-think our every personal need, based on scenarios computed in milliseconds, considering past preferences (choices), real time geo-location, lifestyle or business predilections, and multiple other factors. Buttons just will no longer work. Too slow.
Already we are seeing user interfaces such as Windows 8 with it’s high personal design options, visually appealing but simple user navigation, and its move away from the classic button. Then there’s wearable Google Glass, designed and in beta trials to project information directly into the brain (through the eyes / field of vision) of the user (wearer), who will control with voice commands, eventually the retinas, and in many cases personal options (preferences) through computed algorithms. No buttons there, although Google is talking about a virtual keyboard, projected by lasers!
Eventually, it is inevitable that innovation and technology advances will lead us to devices controlled by thoughts in our brains. Still a little way off, this “intelligent augmented reality” is currently being worked on by some formidable organizations, and it is only the timing that is questionable.
What is definitive, is that we are in the midst of a pronounced technological shift. Hardware with its physical manipulation needs seems to be beginning to be passé. We will look back in 20 years to the devices, operation and capabilities of today, – much like we presently look at the VCR or those early installed car phones or Motorola bricks, and smile.
There will be exciting new innovations to move us forward, some new technologies will stay and morph into ever new, adopted mainstream capabilities, while others will come and go quickly as competitor options roll out startling new revolutions. Either way, the hard-working button has bought us here, but will likely become a quaint reminder of the technology limitations of this era.
Peter Ashworth is Partner and Chief Marketing Officer of Webhomes, a new web company that designs and develops well-designed user experiences for smart connected devices across progressive screens, as the foundation for creating meaningful relationships, commerce and brand experiences that add value to people’s lives. www.webhomes.com
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IPhone
http://inventors.about.com/od/computerperipherals/a/computer_keyboa.htm
http://www.universetoday.com/82402/who-discovered-electricity/
http://www.ushistory.org/franklin/info/kite.htm
http://www.google.com/glass/start/
http://www.time.com/time/interactive/0,31813,2122187,00.html
http://inventors.about.com/library/weekly/aa081898.htm