a miniature table computer, and try to turn it into some intelligent discussion. Nice job. ;p
I'm not sure if I want to post this publicly. You know how all public discussions end up, one way
or another, with a comparison to nazis... or Republicans.
Isn't the historical trend away from communal information dispersal to a more personalized,
'narrowcast' one?
It seems to be a question of control. A few hundred years ago if you were an illiterate person,
you'd get your news verbally, in a mass forum: from the town crier, priest at mass, etc. These
sources would have complete control in how the content is framed and delivered.
As literacy rates rose, the printed medium has turned from broadcast to narrowcast, through
newspapers to magazines. Each successive wave of titles narrows the focus even further. There
are still control issues, but it becomes easier to find a source that fits your world view, so you
either don't notice or mind the level of control.
The same progression that happened in print happened in radio. Initially a broadcast medium
with very few sources that relied on the previous medium for content (reading from books,
newspapers,) it's become more narrowcast in focus as new stations came up. The same thing
happened with TV and web sites - each successive medium can be subdivided into increasingly
smaller segments.
The next shift, which we're in the middle of for new mediums, is both mobile and temporal.
People don't want to have to go to a specific place at a specific time to get information. They want
it on demand, wherever they happen to be. All mediums go through this - Print started out as
bulletins posted to church doors. You had to go there to get the info. Books, papers, magazines
removed part of that constraint - you could read it at a time and place that suited you, but you
still had to go somewhere to buy the thing until home delivery came along. The shift seems to
happen in two stages - first mobility, then temporal.
In the modern age, the transistor radio started the shift. Followed by the walkman, portable
CD player, etc. For photography, the first shift to mobility was the invention of roll film. The
second, temporal shift was digital - you didn't have to wait for somebody to develop your film,
you just look at the back of the camera and can see your photo.
For computing, the shift didn't start until a 'new' medium was developed exclusively for computers:
web sites (yes, it's another historical trend - transplanting one of the three basic media to every
new distribution platform that comes along. Print comes to computers via network distribution.)
I bet if you look at the sales of laptops against the number of web sites, there's a very strong
correlation.
The cell phone itself is the mobility part. Voicemail is temporal.
Now that there are so many different mediums and many devices to collect and display content
from each medium, it makes sense that the next step would be to consolidate these devices.
Maybe in the initial stages a communal surface computing device which combines these disparate
devices will gain some use, but I think it's inevitable that such an uber-device will end up in your
pocket. Like an iPhone. ;)
-bStatistics: Posted by Bobby — Sat Jun 23, 2007 11:48 am
]]>