Why Smart Phones Are Dumb (And How They’ll Get Smarter)

Woohoo! First guest post on B6S. I really enjoy David Grady‘s writing on his blog, and I’m honored to be able to share his talent here with you. Thank you for guest posting, David!

I am grateful to Anne for inviting me to her blog as part of the virtual book tour for my novel, Red Planet Noir. On Twitter in recent days, she’s spoken a bit about iPhones, the amount of data it consumes, and its relative cost and value, which got me thinking about smart phones in general, and where things are going.

Last month, I flew to Dallas and declined the GPS upgrade in my rental car. I had an iPhone 3GS and Google Maps. What more would I need? Quite a bit, as it turned out, but the very notion that a mobile phone could, instinctively, supplant the need for a separate device spoke volumes about the way our lives are slowly changing.

And the iPhone is a really good device. It’s applications are useful and largely intuitive. Its altered people’s notions about what they should expect in a digital assistant. But a strong argument can be made that the iPhone, contrary to Apple’s sales pizzazz, is but an evolutionary device, albeit one with a gorgeous user interface. If one were to give a State of the Smart Phone Market, it could reasonably be abbreviated as such: “They’re becoming pretty good portable computers.”

I don’t think that’s the future of smart devices. If the iPad is any indication, it might be the future of computers, but the portable computer paradigm is not nearly imaginative or innovative enough to describe what is to come.

The basic limitation of the smart phone is this: you have to look at the screen. No matter how clever the app, nor how incredibly it utilizes GPS, it will never “augment reality,” as is the Silicon Valley buzzword. Reality cannot be experienced though a 3.5 inch screen.

Suppose I get a phone call from Bill. Bluetooth headsets aside, once I press answer, any benefits of a smart device vanish. The screen is mashed against my ear. Every detail of Bill’s life might be online and up to date. Google Latitude reveals him to be at a local bistro. Flickr might have even have a picture of what he’s eating. On Twitter, he might have lamented — only moments before calling — that he’s been stood up. On Facebook, his ex-girlfriend might have wall-posted that she’ll meet him there if he’s interested. Google Maps knows the traffic conditions between the two of them, and a weather service indicates rain is rolling in. And either way, Yelp might know that the bistro he’s at is terrible.

This is all useful information for a conversation — indeed, it’s almost prerequisite for a conversation that doesn’t include Bill rehashing his day to me.

But the screen is mashed against my face. My sleek and expensive phone is no more intelligent than Alexander Graham Bell’s.

I submit that the future of smart devices is not in the device itself, but on the screens around us, everywhere. The future of the smart phone is as an informational hub, as a conduit between PCs, televisions, windshields, and as-of-yet unrealized panels as portrayed in Avatar and Minority Report. Already, anyone with digital telephone knows that caller ID has merged with the television set. The phone rings, the TV displays the name and number.

That’s a good idea, and that’s the seed. As DVRs proliferate, how about a situation where the phone rings, television pauses, and all of the information listed above — Facebook, Twitter, and whatnot — is gorgeously arranged for an informational snapshot of the person calling. People are putting more of their lives online, not less, with no signs of turning back. Smart phones should one day harness, aggregate, and transmit this information to screens all around us. And not just for social networking — the future of GPS driving directions isn’t confined to a tiny screen, but overlaid on the automobile windshield. It’s common sense, really. Why look at a screen displaying a simulated road and buildings when you can actually look at the real thing, and the cars ahead and behind?

Reaching way forward — I write science fiction, I can’t help myself — how about informational overlays (“heads-up displays”) printed directly on contact lenses and eyeglasses? Everyone you meet is visually processed through the web, and the iPhone 3000 reports back, for example, that today is his or her birthday. Contact lenses need no computing power whatsoever — the smart phone does all the work.

We’re so close.

The smart device brings three interesting technologies together: processing power, GPS, and the Internet. That’s a trifecta for the future. And when we get there, the iPhone will seem like a child’s toy, and limited by the bounds of small imaginations.

–

D.B. Grady is the author of Red Planet Noir.
He can be found on the web at http://www.dbgrady.com.

Tagged as: Gadgets, GPS, smartphones