Google Without Glasses and Going to Bits

All technology has a life cycle which starts with creation, through; prototyping, adoption, adaption, development and finally obsolescence. Some make the full cycle others stumble at first base.

Today we read that the much publicised Google Glass eyewear technology is to be effectively pulled by Google in its present form. Future versions will be pursued, but by a different division and those who shelled out $1,500 (£990) will now be owners of the latest ‘Delorean’ technology, which obviously will now become a collectible novelty.

The Glass initiative was launched in the US in 2013 and UK last year, but was plagued with a number of issues. The cost was viewed by many as too high, the battery life was poor and getting consumers to adopt it and drop those features they already had on their smartphones was proving hard. Maybe the look was just wrong and screamed ‘Nerd and Geek’ at everyone brave enough to don a pair.

The other challenge was privacy and although they gave the user visual access to information in a ‘hands free environment’ they also recorded stuff ‘hands free’ which gave those running public places and those concerned with privacy, many concerns.

So will the mass take up of wearable technology happen based on peripheral devices, or will a Pranev Mistry ‘sixth sense’ approach be based on smartphone hubs prevail? Why wear a smartwatch when you can project the time onto anything or see it on the smartphone? How will wearable glasses take a selfie? Voice and audio are already here today on every smartphone so that only leaves smell and touch.

Google has dismantled the smartphone and are to introduced a modular phone which allows consumers to buy functionality in a firmware ‘pick and mix’ fashion.

You want a camera you can select potentially one of a number of specifications and literally plug it onto the smartphone. You want different speakers, batteries, displays, application processor, wireless connectivity, blood-sugar monitors, laser pointers, pico projectors, they all just plug onto the phone and will be held into the shell by magnets. Its like selecting your firmware options and is aimed both at giving the consumer choice but also at making upgrading potentially very different.

Google claim that the objective is to make a smartphone more attractive to the five billion people that currently don’t own one. It would also prolong the life of many phones and potentially that has a big market challenge when the current life of a phone model  is two years. However, by changing the emphasis from model to module it may differentiate Google from their rivals

Google has chosen Puerto Rico to launch its modular offer. Puerto Rico was "mobile-first" with some 75% of its internet access being via mobile devices. There are also more than three million mobile phones in use in the country. Google also benefits as the country is under US Federal Communications Commission jurisdiction and this obviates any later issues getting a solution into the US market.

So the role of the smartphone is strengthened and ways to offer choice are now being developed. We can’t help wonder how much some would pay to have their own module for Prime users?

On-demand Media and Sensory Devices will Change Culture

Our dependency on electronic devices has grown over the last decade. We now appear to be entering yet another cycle of the technology escalation and it resulting cultural change. It will like those before it change how we consume media and how we communicate with others.

The ‘I’ era was one of the Pod, Phone and Pad. It enabled mobility and communication but also created the ‘I’ society who often resembled zombies, switch on, tuned out and transfixed through those white earpieces. What it finally gave us was the platform environment which enabled media to be enjoyed across multiple devices. This platform broke the single device was previously tied to single media. No more Walkmen, MP3 only, eink readers, the smartphone and tablet became the do it all devices for all.

Having created the platform we now appear primed to create sensory devices that themselves will enable a more intuitive interface and also delegate the platform to the cloud. Everything will be available online on-demand and will negate the need to have a local copy or download. This change will be significant as it truly starts to change culture from one of ownership to one of rental and subscription.

So we will have the likes of Google’s Glasses, Apple’s watch and many more sensory aligned devices. Speech recognition will become the norm and retina tracking will negate the need to pitch and squeeze and scroll. Mass robotics are still to fully happen and a device is whatever you wish it to be.

What will come first the sensory device, or the cloud on demand media? Some will suggest the technology is here today and they would be right, but they have yet to be mass adopted and in doing so change the culture.

The media industries now need to gear up for a significant change in business models which itself will create new opportunities for new and well as old media. It’s hard to find a music store on the high street today but when you do look at what they are now selling and recognise their business in now online. Add to that the new services that took up the mantle of Spiral Frog and are delivering on-demand media by subscription and we have a culture change that isn’t going back in the box.

In ten years sensory devices may have gone even further than we think possible today and the speed of bandwidth and universal connectivity will make the cloud reality. 

Today's Audience Just Got Google Glass!

The ex-Taking Heads musician, David Byrne now opens his shows encouraging folk to take pictures, film and record and share on YouTube, but to only post the good recordings. In his book ‘How Music Works’ he describe that cathartic moment when he stopped trying to fight concert recording and embraced them as a way of marketing the show and his music.

The guardian reports this week on concert pianists, Krystian Zimerman’s reaction to being filmed during a performance. He was so annoyed over seeing a member of the audience filming him perform he asked the audience member, "Would you please stop that?"  He shortly afterwards left the stage and on returning told his audience that he had lost many recording projects because of YouTube and that it was ‘destroying music.’

It’s ironic that this is reported in the same week we have written about the increasing issues of privacy in our increasingly Internet intrusive world. Is David Bryne’s world different to that of the concert pianist, or the opera singer, or should we treat them all the same? We would expect a certain decorum within the various concert halls, but if that is being observed, then we have the core issue of recording and its impact on artists.

The days of banning filming of rock and pop concerts is fast disappearing and common sense has prevailed. YouTube, is becoming for many, the most popular way of listening to music today. We first created the MTV generation, which now have spawned the YouTube generation. Many artists have realised that it can be a great way to promote their music and concerts and have in the main embraced it. Go to any rock concert today and before you have reached home we can guarantee there will be a posting on YouTube.

Yes, we expect certain decorum within a classical music concert and don’t expect people using flash cameras, standing to record, or dancing in the aisles, but that is not the issue here. Today, and certainly in a few months, we could see Google Glass being worn by the audience. No more having to hold the smartphone in one hand whilst dancing in the aisles. You can’t ban Google Glass and not smartphones. The person wearing Google glass could be sitting quietly next to you in that classical concert and be disturbing no one, as tomorrow they live stream the concert to YouTube. In fact they will be less obtrusive than those with opera glasses.

We have to find new codes of practice, separate the bootleg recordings which are made for profit from those made by fans to share. Opera, classical, pop, folk, rock concerts are inherently no different. They are based on people enjoying the music and sharing the experience with friends and the sharing should be encouraged as it grows awareness and introduces new people to the experience. Concerts and live shows are more popular than ever and they are now filmed and posted more than ever and some would suggest that there is a correlation there.