Alan's World

I am more than ever struck by the ubiquity of the iPod. Walking the streets of San Francisco, I am assaulted by Billboards pushing the device as a fashion accessory. The Olympics were dominated by images of Michael Phelps stretching on the pool deck with buds in his ears. What I have noticed most lately is how we no longer notice.

I upgraded my iPhone to the latest 3G model. It is an amazing device. With it, I text, tweet, buy, browse, blog, read, search, mail, mix, mash, locate, direct, calculate, and play. Unlike my lap top that I set up, this device is always with me--always on. It seamlessly extends my capability and constantly connects me to the people and the information I care about.

This is different than the Palm I use to carry. It is more about me than work communications. Back in the ‘70s I heard Alan Kay talk about wearable computers. He saw them as the true personal computer and that they would revolutionize the way we live and work.

At some point the automobile became more than a fast horse cart and led to a new industrial infrastructure. Similarly the desktop computer became more than a powerful typewriter and calculator and lead to the fundamental restructuring of the workplace. Each of these led to fundamental shifts in lifestyle, quality of life and commercial productivity.

We are in the midst of another such phase change. We are just beginning to understand the importance of what this device (and others like it) can do. We are beginning to weave it into our social fabric. Alan’s world is finally emerging.

Sound of Silence

Besides porn, music has been the biggest driver of technological advancement. Ever since the Victrola, the latest sound system has driven consumer electronic sales. All the while the world has gotten progressively noisier. Locomotion, automation, overpopulation, mechanization, urbanization and countless other “izations” have created a continual sonorous assault.

Rather than alleviating my auditory pain, today my technology amplifies it. Are ear buds really the best we can do? While exercising, I can barely hear my Market Place podcasts over the clamor of the treadmills. I know this may have something to do with my birth date and a million logged flight miles, but there must be something to help. Forget the jetpacks, where’s my bionic ear.

New gadgets hit the market daily that are meant to address the challenge of hearing our music, cell phones and neighbors over the ambient noise that envelops us. Proud technologists proclaim advances in adaptive noise compensation, advanced wind protection, noise navigation, voice capture, etc.

None of it does the job. Here is what I want--

• wireless, in-ear hearing extensions:
  
  + Mold them to fit comfortably all day in my ear canal. Make them no more unsightly than flaps of cartilage that already protrude from my head. Yes the model is hearing aids, not headphones.
  
  + Make them work intelligently with my ear. You can completely control what noise goes to my ear drums and inner ear: make it clean and ensure it is never a damaging volume.
  
  + Have them work wirelessly with my myriad devices: cell phone, computer, IPod, home theater, car navigation, and other people with inserted ear extensions, etc. This is not a technological problem but an implementation problem. I don’t care what is used, Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, 900 Mhz, or trained ants delivering little tiny mag tapes. Create an interface (user and network) that makes sense and get on with it.

That’s it. Doesn’t seem that hard. Nothing but hearing aids with wireless receivers combined with a voice recognition operating system in a miniaturized embedded system. I have a place for the charger on my bed stand. When they are announced I will stand in line like a Star Wars conventioneer in a Wookie costume. Look at how many IPods and cell phones are sold each year. This is a massive business opportunity and, given the rate of hearing loss, one potentially fueled by insurance reimbursements.

Ear implants are the most obvious technology to extend my physical capabilities. Steve Austin can keep his legs, but it is time I had his ears.

Brush aside the ashes and kneel before Zod no longer

The tectonic plates of the Web are moving again. Some people say the Web 2.0 bubble is going to burst reminiscent of the 2000 Internet bubble. Many of the dynamics are the same: the money being thrown at sites that are little more than ideas will dry up; early exits at silly valuations will diminish; trendy sites that are cool but deliver little value will fade away. User aggregation as a business model will again fall from grace and Web 2.0 as a category will disappear.

What will emerge is a new generation of sites and applications that incorporate the characteristics of Web 2.0 – social networking, data tagging, rich media content, mashable functional components, and immersive user interfaces. The sites that survive and emerge as the new guard of Web properties will have a monetization model that drives real and growing earnings.

Like all generational transitions some past participants will die out, and some past leaders will fade to the background. I predict that Yahoo and Microsoft will have little presence in the next round of Web apps. Yahoo was the early leader in Web applications and to this day is far and away the market share leader. You could make the argument (as Tim O’Rielly does ) that Microsoft is purchasing Yahoo to consolidate a dominant position in Web apps. Statistically this is true but a closer look at Microsoft yields a different story.

Microsoft has been working through a 6 month re-org that has consolidated the Online Service Group and the Windows Business Group under Bill Veghte. This puts the Web assets into the group responsible for SMB, and SME software products. This group lives and dies by software license sales to business customers and will find it difficult to advance an ad or subscription recurring revenue model. Worse it is consolidated under Senior Software Architect Ray Ozzie who has always had an enterprise software view of the world.

Yahoo itself took its eye off Web Apps some years ago when their lead architect Zod Nazem shifted his focus to project Panama, an advertising targeting engine. For the last several years search and advertising has consumed Yahoos focus and resources. The death nil for Yahoo apps came when Zod left last June. Yahoo still has market share but is demonstrating no leadership.

Microsoft is aligning around two pillars: 1) software and 2) search advertising. When acquired, Yahoo will be folded into pillar (2) - the search advertising group - headed by Senior Vice Presient and former aQuantive CEO Brian McAndrews. Microsoft and Google have both done the calculus and determined that their growth lies in capturing the increasing flood of online advertising money.

They will continue to be players in Web apps but it will be far from their focus. This leaves the field wide open for the next generation of SaaS and Web applications. Once again the applications of the new Web will emerge out of the ashes of too many failed companies (and millions of Venture dollars) that chased the latest trend – this time Web 2.0. And hopefully, this time the Phoenix will sport labels other than Microsoft, Yahoo and Google.