Interesting vision of the future!

[ethicaldesign]

http://www.letitblog.com/epic/

Found this really interesting.

[websterworld]

I dont know why but I laughed and laughed... :lol:
Actually I do know why, the maker(s) of that flash have absolutely no clue what the hell they are talking about.

GoogleZoon, heh!

[ethicaldesign]

Hmm...They're talking about a possible future. Some of the ideas that they express there are quite interesting and would seem quite logical steps to me (particularly the google matrix idea). Obviously speculation because they can't see into the future not having a crystal ball, but I though it was quite interesting as a hint at some of the possibilities and downsides.

I'm not really sure how you can say they have no clue what the hell they're talking about, because none of this has happened yet so nobody can say (at least not past the 2004 point). Already the effect of the net on traditional media is being felt though, so perhaps they mightn't be too far off the mark with at least some of it. Stranger things have happened. I think it's kind of meant toungue in cheek aswell.

Cast youself back 10 years and wonder at some of the things that are around now, that you might have thought were crazy ideas at the time (there are plenty of things that I can see that would have sounded like strange propositions at the time). Like a startup company by a couple of kids fresh out of college whooping the pants off microsoft in the internet technology market perhaps? Crazy!

[websterworld]

Oh come on! Its a cheesy pseudo-intellectual movie.
Spielberg might as well have made it, I'm sure he would like it...

Ok, so its all very dramatic with the black background, soft modern background music and TV commercial voice.

Just try and look beyond that and think about what they actually said, the content of it. In my eyes... total baloony.

[the_pm]

Interesting indeed. That's one opinion/forecast of the world in 10 years, a bit fatalistic and in many ways very flawed, but interesting nonetheless.

Flawed? Yes, for it treats the online evolution as if it was isolated and even larger than the real world. The thing is that it tends to overlook media trends in virtually every other media type. Here's the normal media cycle.

1. The medium is invented. A small number of companies pioneer its initial progress.
2. The medium is established. The market opens up wide and companies, new and old, pile in.
3. The medium reaches critical mass. Every household has it. Companies consolidate, powerhouses emerge and a financial ceiling is reached with the medium being treated as a universal entity (one-size fits all).
4. The medium fragments. This isn't to say the medium loses power or size. Just the opposite. It becomes a special interest commodity, a little something for everyone with more businesses providing each little something than ever before.

Want proof of the cycle? Think about magazines. For a short while, these were a novelty item. Then traditional news and human interest magazines began to emerge (Saturday Evening Post, Life, Time, Natl. Geographic, etc.). Magazine producers began to consolidate, and magazines reached a heyday of distribution. Then the market became special interest. Out of the critical mass of magazines emerged Golf Digest, Popular Mechanics, PC Gaming, Cat Fancy and 40+.

Newspapers. A few local papers were available when they were first being printed. This grew until most major markets had newspapers. Then multiple newspapers started to spring up in markets. In many cities you could purchase four or five newspapers that covered the same local and national news from different perspectives. Then newspapers began to consolidate. Even wonder where all those hyphenated names came from? The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. The Akron Beacon-Journal. The Chicago Sun-Times (which is a national franchise now). And many others simply chose the name of one of the two. There are still some markets that support multiple papers - New York Times and Post, Washington Times and Post. Chicago Daily Tribune and Sun-Times, etc. But in an age where 5 or 6 was normal, two is now rare. But out of nowhere came special interest papers. In Cleveland, we have Scene and The Free Times (recently close down :( ). The Chronicles is a gay newspaper. Practically every mid-size and large market has it's own collection of special interest newspapers with their own distinct markets.

Is the Internet any different? Well, for 40 years, the net was a pioneer effort between the defense department and a group of universities. In the early-mid 80's it became available in limited ways to regular consumers - I had my first email account in 1986 through Cleveland Freenet, Case Western Reserve University. Then, online communities started to spring up, like AOL and Compuserve and Prodigy. I think the nature of the Web moved us right through what might have been a period of consolidation, though there's some notable large-company influence that's taken place. We all know the heavies, and the video pointed many out. But the Internet by its nature breeds special interest. It's one of the few media where growth is not engineered by multi-billion dollar corporations, but is dependent upon the contributions of individual developers, customers and consumers alike. To consolidate so many individuals under a single corporate umbrella would be a step backward. While Google may indeed become as big as they say, it will not be at the expense of all of the individual effort that continues to feed the need for other individuals, nor do I believe the Web is small enough for a single entity to dominate in this way.

Well, those are my initial thoughts seeing this video. Interesting, but IMNSHO, flawed and overly cynical.

[ethicaldesign]

:lol: Yes, I do see your point. I think it was meant in to be done in that way though. I doubt it's meant to be taken literally, in the same way that the day after tomorrow can't be considered a serious documentary on environmental issues and climate change. Neither are intended in that way as far as I can see, and have ofcourse been dramatised/sensationalised for effect.

That doesn't mean that some of the underlying premises aren't worth thinking about however. I agree, it can't all be taken literally in all seriousness, and I think looking at it in that way is missing the point. As a way of presenting some interesting ideas in a more interesting way (rather than some dry geeky tech-head text file on a web gurus site) I think it works myself :)

[Pauly]

I doubt it's meant to be taken literally, in the same way that the day after tomorrow can't be considered a serious documentary on environmental issues and climate change.

The day after tomorrow film is possible, just not in 10 days ;)

Anything could happen, something I would love to see is that Google Grid thing, we'll see ;) Only 10 years :lol:

[ethicaldesign]

Is the Internet any different?

Indeed it is imho. That's why many of the analysts who predicted how it would go based upon exprience with other media got it so wrong. A lot of people lost a lot of money based upon that attitude imho.


But the Internet by its nature breeds special interest. It's one of the few media where growth is not engineered by multi-billion dollar corporations, but is dependent upon the contributions of individual developers, customers and consumers alike.


This is one area where I agree that the medium is very different from what has come before it. Regular print news outlets in particular I know are concerned about this at the moment because people are increasingly relying on online sources of news, so much so that it's beginning to effect newspaper sales. There has been coverage of this in the UK recently. Part of the reason why I found their projection quite interesting.

At the moment one of the arguments against mainstream print media is that more up to date and accurate information, unclouded by bias can be found online. That's one of the other things that I found interesting about this (that it mightn't always be the case and ironically perhaps traditional print media could end up being the preserve of accurate unclouded information). I doubt that would be the case, but it's still an interesting proposition.

I talked to a physicist not so long ago about the space elevator plans. Now those plans to me seem strange and I doubt it'll ever happen myself, but it still was interesting.


To consolidate so many individuals under a single corporate umbrella would be a step backward.

I completely agree. But it would be naive to think that there aren't forces at work trying to do this (if not for diabolical dictatorial paranoid reasons, simple business and profitability). Microsofts palladium rights management plans for future operating systems for example has massive implications outside of simply managing copyright (the subject of another discussion perhaps) that could effect independance in application development and the wider internet.

The anti-competition/trust and monopoly cases against microsoft in the past are a prime example of where a large commercial concern has tried to achieve control for their own commercial interests.


While Google may indeed become as big as they say, it will not be at the expense of all of the individual effort that continues to feed the need for other individuals, nor do I believe the Web is small enough for a single entity to dominate in this way.

That's all it is at the moment though, belief. It's hard for any of us to say what the future holds, any more than it was for scientists and experts who laughed when writers were speculating that one day we'd travel to the moon.

When the original inventors of the military version of the internet were working on it, they probably didn't forsee the way that their initial work would explode in the way it did (if they had they would have put tighter controls on it imho).

Often actual advances are predicted long before they happen in creative literature (and are met with ridicule by the experts in the fields they concern).

I'm not saying that any of this is going to happen, just that some of the ideas were interesting. The idea of the google grid, although it had its downsides, and although I personally, like you wouldn't think that it would take over the world like that, is regardless an interesting idea (and in some ways I liked the basic ideas behind them).

[ethicaldesign]

The day after tomorrow film is possible, just not in 10 days ;)

Well, that in itself (that it can happen) is open to speculation. I personally feel that most of the climatologists are right and that global warming is happening, but there are plenty of opposing scientists.

I would disagree that the events that happen in that movie could actually happen in the way they do given a longer timescale. Sure, the ideas about the gulf stream and such have a basis in reality, but a lot of the actual events in that film probably wouldn't actually happen at all if you expanded the timescale over hundreds of years or even decades (mass population movements would have taken place to the safest areas over a longer period of time for example, so you wouldn't have populated skyscrapers being knocked down by tidal waves because they would have moved out of those areas long before then due to flooding etc.).

What I'm trying to get at really, is that I would tend to view this link in the same way as that movie. Not to be taken literally, but perhaps to give us an opportunity to think about some of the possibilities in the future and some of the underlying issues and ideas.

Anything could happen, something I would love to see is that Google Grid thing, we'll see ;) Only 10 years :lol:

Yeah, although the google grid was presented in a negative light in there, I thought that was perhaps my favourite idea out of the whole thing. That's a completely logical progression imho and it would actually be pretty cool (as long as it didn't take over the world in the way they suggest - which I doubt it would).

[Captain Howdy]

I liked it. I thought it was well done, well thought out and delivered nicely. I liked the Matrix'ish type of feel it had to it. I think it's more for entertainment than a "real" prediction of the internets future. Looking for any factuals in that flash piece is like watching the Matrix series for to seek answers about life.

Enjoy it for what it was meant to be...entertaining

[websterworld]

Looking for any factuals in that flash piece is like watching the Matrix series for to seek answers about life.

Which surprisingly, or maybe rather unsurprisingly a lot of people seemed to do when those movies came out.

[Jamie]

2020 - 70% of the population within economically developed countries work for Google. ;)

Scary... but I like it!

[ethicaldesign]

2020 - 70% of the population within economically developed countries work for Google. ;)

Scary... but I like it!

:lol: I must have missed that bit. At the moment it seems like 70% of the population within economically developed (or otherwise) countries would kill for a job at google.

Supposed to be a very cool company to work for, but quite hard to get in.

[Jamie]

It sure does look like a great place to work. Take a look at:
http://www.google.com/plex/index.html
http://www.google.com/jobs/inside.html

Lets face it, we would all love to work in a place that has:
"On-site Gym"
"On-site Massage"
"On-Site Physician"

Maybe it is all a big scam and really Larry Page has been working out in the on-site gym and he is now feared by all the employees. :lol:

Edit: I was going to add some mighty muscles to a photo of Larry from the Google site, thought I wouldn't run the risk of him knocking my door down during the night complaining about copyright. :)

[ethicaldesign]

Oops. I must have hit the quote button instead of edit Doh!. Tried to edit out the first post and delete it but the 15 minute rule got me. Sorry about that! Just ignore the first post if you can :)

[ethicaldesign]

Thanks to whoever deleted my double post :) , but you deleted the wrong one (the second one had my edits/additions in!). No worries. It was basically the same points and completely my fault for hitting the quote button in the first place :(

[Jamie]

eeek. It was me who deleted the post. I think I actually have a copy of the correct post, I will check it to make sure it is the correct one and if so will edit as required. :)

Edit > Seems it was the post that is still above that I copied. Sorry about that. :slap:

[the_pm]

Side discussion on my media convergence article moved to Web Content

[inimino]

Nothing in the essence of that short is implausible or even unlikely.
It's also about as far from 'simple entertainment' as you can get, and I would suggest questioning your assumptions if that was the conclusion you came to.
Like 1984, it is a crystal-clear vision of a potential future by extrapolation of current trends.


Local storage (hard drives, etc.) will become irrelevant as data storage moves to the network (the "Google Grid" as they called it). Everything is going to end up online, and it's all going to be searchable and indexable. Everything.
Purchase databases, index data gathered from scanning blog and email entries, tagged photos, in short, everything that users create and store online, will be used to deliver highly targeted and supremely effective advertising.
This advertising will come to dominate the online experience while at the same time becoming increasingly unobtrusive and even seeming to disappear.
Existing media (The New York Times in the short) will eventually exist only online, and finally not at all.
Software (represented in the short by Microsoft) will become irrelevant as a revenue stream and will be supplanted by the mining and exploitation of user data for advertising and direct retail (represented by "Googlezon").
A single, unified interface for communication and content consumption, (represented in the short by "EPIC" the "evolving personalized information construct") will replace everything that people currently do with computers, including all applications people currently use.
The ability to research and understand all aspects of human knowledge will increase dramatically, as will the ability to mindlessly consume.
The short said something to the effect that "At its best, and for its savviest users, EPIC presents a deeper, broader view of the world than anything has before, but far too often and for too many, it provides merely a collection of trivia: much of it untrue, and all of it narrow, shallow, and sensational".
Television is currently the easiest media to simply plug into, turn off your mind, and become the perfect consumer, but that will change.


Technologically, nothing that was presented should even be controversial among experts in the field. The technology is happening already.

Socially, the assumption is that progress and developments of the next decade will continue to be dominated by large corporate interests. As things stand, there is absolutely no reason to see why this should not be the case.

[Jamie]

I certainly missed this thread before, as I went and posted the new version in a different thread yesterday (that version goes to 2015).