In the information age, digital content is the essence of living. People now understand the necessity of access to information in their everyday living. With their computers, cell phones and PDAs, people can access today’s digital rivers from anywhere in the world. Wireless technology will further liberate people from the fixed locations of wired devices. It will allow people access to these digital rivers from anywhere and anytime.
For those keen to reap the benefits of opportunities in the wireless world, I suggest they seek a view of the future from the perspectives of the inhabitants of this world: the end users. The future appears quite different when seen through the eyes of everyday people.
The design of computers, phones, handheld devices, and browsers for the Internet will change as a new set of hardware and software features emerge to support the lifestyle needs of the evolving digital civilization. Wireless will unfold new scenarios of use that are bound to impact a wide variety of products of everyday use.
We have worked with global technology companies to gain a deeper understanding of everyday people's needs which is then used for new product development. Past research in a variety of contexts such as work, home, play, shopping, and traveling, and amongst home users, business users and network administrators has told us of people’s need to make digital content accessible anytime and anywhere. Yet people also want the option of cutting off the digital stream at will. People are demanding control over accessibility, and are now ready to explore newer ways of integrating digital technology into their everyday lives. For example, teenagers have quickly adapted to IM as a medium of communication where they can "have meaningless conversations that mean so much," for hours, (a quote from a participant in a recent research study conducted).
I attribute the failure of some brilliant concepts such as the Newton and Audry to the promoters' inability to create a shared context for their ideas in the imaginations of their target customers.
There is a dire need for technology companies to drive product development by thinking about the user experience first. If wireless is to permeate the lives of people quickly and meaningfully, companies promoting new hardware and software for wireless applications must be able to articulate to their target user how technology will change their everyday experiences. Capable companies will lead the market through a series of innovations if they are able to articulate to their customers the larger dream experience.
The context for wireless technology applications is different from the context for some of the innovative products of the past. The industry leaders are now trying to develop applications based on shared standards.
I anticipate that a collaborative approach will lead to a more convincing articulation of life with wireless, eventually resulting in the development of a new set of products of everyday use. Just as a focus on the home office resulted in a wave of innovations for the home, a focus on wireless-enabled living is likely to revitalize the industry with innovative products that will change the way people live.
The process of developing new ideas for the future wireless world should include everyday people at the front end of the development process, dreaming about future scenarios of use. Companies can anticipate which products and features are more likely to be meaningful and therefore more successful in the marketplace by accessing the future scenarios in the imaginations of everyday people.
We use a participatory design approach that allows everyday people to imagine their future in a language of experience, as opposed to a language of form, function and features. Visual tools of expression, such as scrapbooks, collages, cognitive maps and three dimensional Velcro models help everyday people explore explicit and tacit dimensions of their current realities and dreams in a given experience category (such as imaging, computing, work, home experience, etc.).
Participatory designers analyze the artifacts created by the participants to find patterns of their unmet needs and aspirations. The insights gained from this approach are translated into user-defined experience themes that provide user-relevance to the innovation process.
I would like to share some of the patterns we have consistently discovered in people's aspirations for everyday experiences in the digital world. These patterns were discovered working with a number of leading technology companies covering a wide range of life experiences.
Wireless will blur the boundaries between home and work: People recognize that as life gets more stressful and time becomes a rare commodity, the need for personal space will increase. In their dream world, the car is perceived by many as a cocoon away from home and work, where they can find their personal space and time to unwind, think, solve problems and have remote conversations with people. People will use the car as a hub, connecting home, leisure and work.
On the other hand, we find that people refer to the kitchen as the hub of family interactivity. From observational research done by many companies in the past, the refrigerator has often been cited as the center of family communication. However, the participatory design approach points to a more profound role for the kitchen as a place where families seek emotional and cognitive connection with each other.
People will need large amounts of personal storage space to keep and access memories: We have come a long way since personal computing was limited to text. Alongside the evolution of storage devices, people discovered new ways of using images (Zip drives), music (CDRW) and movies (DVD). We find that limitations of storage devices do not limit people's expectations of how they want to use digital information anymore. One consistent need that surfaces from our research is the ability to stay in touch with memories. Often, people's projection of the future involves a desire for contact with their past. The digital imagination is often a kaleidoscope of the past, present and the future. As wireless becomes a part of their lives, we anticipate that people will have a greater need to access their memories using images, video and sounds.
People will seek greater access to digital content centered around their bodies: With the advent of wireless, the industry has already recognized the opportunity to develop a network of everyday products for the home that enable the sharing of digital content. However, a new phenomenon we discovered is people's aspirations for holding the computing power within the intimate space surrounding their bodies. It would be opportunistic for the industry to prepare itself for allowing people access to the digital content both through products distributed throughout their personal environments with centralized access points closer to their bodies.
People will want access to music anywhere: One aspect of people’s dreams is very clear: music is central to their experience of life. No matter where they are: in their bedrooms, in the shower, in the car, in a park or at work, people want to surround themselves with music appropriate to the mood of the moment. The wireless world will find people moving within and between living spaces, surrounded by the music of their choices, without interfering with the privacy of the people around them. People want access to every type of music that is available and the ability to create personal collections and organization systems that allow them intuitive interface for experiencing and sharing music.
Vernacular computing will catch up: Current non-users of computers and non-English speaking populations will gain greater access to computing capabilities through objects of everyday use. As a result, the demand for computing in their native language will increase. As long as people retain the urge to maintain their cultural identity, there will always be pressure on the technology community to find ways of integrating people's natural ways of thinking and communicating with computing. I anticipate that as algorithms for sharing digital content across languages are written, handwriting recognition will provide a more natural way of putting vernacular text into the digital space.
