Ólafur Andri Ragnarsson

The Web is constantly changing. Although HTML5 will have likely have huge impact on the web the change is more in how we use the Internet. The traditional approach of building web sites was to have a server-side code (web components) that that generates HTML for display in a browser. Because it is not good to mix content with code, the HTML will include lots of stuff from content management systems (CMS) or some other source. The output is an HTML for the browser. The simplicity and ubiquity of the browser made it this ideal choice. Now we are seeing the shift to apps and APIs.

The rise of the apps is driven by mobile smartphones and the popularity of JavaScript as well as the emergence of HTML5. User experience code is executed client side while the logic is behind APIs. The rise of APIs is driven by the need to open web sites for programatic access. Full circle once again to client-server.

The App goes Native

With the success of Apple‘s iPhone, the app has gained much popularity, especially on devices like phones and now tablets. The benefits of apps are well-known as these are nothing new. However, what Apple did was to create a distribution model, an on-line App Store that made this possible. The App Store is to apps and devices running them, what iTunes is to the iPod and music. The real success behind apps is the App Store and Apple’s business model that drives developers (Apple takes 30%, developer 70%). All billing is taken care of by Apple.

Apps work well for specialized functionality and in particular, games. As the quality standards are high, the design of the apps needs to be good. For functionality where the services of the device are necessary (geo-location, accelerator etc), apps are choice. For apps that just use the web, good apps implemented in JavaScript and HTML5 can be as good as native apps and have the benefit of running in all browsers. We must realize that JavaScript is an app.

The Rise of the API

One reason people talk about the decline of the web is that the web turned into APIs. Companies offering services on web sites realized that by opening up their APIs, others would innovate, create new services and make the site more popular. Facebook and Twitter are perfect examples.

The key to these APIs is to have them simple and lightweight. This explains the popularity of REST and message format such as Json. REST is simple HTTP (or HTTP used right) and Json is compact and easy to use with JavaScript.

JavaScript is back, now with HTML5

With better and more usable JavaScript libraries, apps written in this browser-based language are becoming more attractive. Furthermore, open source JavaScript apps are available as embedable gadgets.

HTML5 is the next step in the markup language. This version has many interesting additions. Perhaps the most interesting are the APIs specified. With HTML5 several APIs are part of the standard, including Canvas 2D API for drawing, media playback, document editing, geo-location, and drag-and-drop, to name some. This takes the language from being a simple markup language to becoming an application environment. You can build apps in HTML.

Conclusions

Technology evolves in cycles. With the Web the processing went back to the server side, moving from the heavy desktop client of the client-server era. Now with the popularity of the App the pendulum has swung to the client side again. However, the server-side this time is the cloud.

When the iPad came out it generated the usual but always amazing amount of press. Even before its release this device was keeping the press and bloggers busy talking. When out, reviews were mixed, some people loved it, others failed to see any point in a device of this kind. Now, few months into the decade of the tablets, we are seeing how the iPad effect is playing out. The iPad is already starting to disrupt the laptop market. Even corporations are buying iPads. And we have not even seen the impact of the low cost clones yet.

Apple is selling a lot of iPads. In the first 80 days the firm sold 3 million units which is more than any other product in the same time. Two points I want to make about this. First, the iPad is a cool device. It can even make people look cool with it (but that might be temporary as it is new and not so common yet). Second, and more importantly, it is actually a useful device. One point that I made in my report on the iPad Effect is that the iPad is a consumer device. When I want to browse the web for news or look up something, I grab the iPad, turn it on, slide and I’m there. If I would turn on my Windows 7 Dell laptop I’m lucky with 5-6 minutes. My MacBook Pro is a little faster. Neither of them match the iPad.

The iPad is a disrupting technology. According to an RMR report (discussed at PadGadget) 49% of iPad owners said they don’t need to buy an e-reader since they have the iPad. Similarly, 38% would not consider buying a potable game device, and 32% say they don’t need a laptop or netbook. If this is any indication, iPad is surely disrupting other devices.

We are seeing history repeat itself. As with the first PCs many years ago, reviews were mixed. Low-cost, low performance and simple device. Now we are seeing the iPad disrupting laptop sales. The Silicon Allay Insider reports that the iPad is starting to invade the corporate market. Companies are buying iPads. And this is making some people sweat. SAI lists some reasons. Apple has made the iPad corporate friendly with good Exchange integration and security, it is easy to carry to meetings and showrooms, it is cheaper than laptops. I would like to add the importance of the cloud also. As more and more of data is stored on Internet servers accessible using a browser or an app, adopting a device like iPad poses no limits.

The interesting thing is that the iPad is only the first player in this new market. The iPad could be the high-end. We are seeing an avalanche of new, cheaper devices coming. It is likely that Android will be a big player in the tablet market just as the Google OS is gaining smartphone shares. Quick research shows that Samsung, LG, Velocity, and more, are coming out with tablets this fall. The race to the tablet market has begun.

Looking at this development from the perspective of technology trends, we are seeing a new era in the history of computing. The “device in the middle” is getting adopted by the market. Something between a portable computer and a smart phone, a handy device for simple browsing and playing.

Laws and treaties are killing the Internet

When the Internet first came into the mainstream the most amazing thing about it was how global it was. I could, using my desktop computer in Reykjavik, Iceland, view web pages coming from a server in Brisbane, Australia. I could get the home page of a restaurant in San Francisco to see the menu. I could read the local news paper in Eugene, Oregon. With Amazon, I could order books and with Classic FM, I could listen to classical music. The Internet was global and made the world a single united place. Now we are seeing more and more indications that the Internet is getting local. Laws are slowly destroying the global Internet.

As I mentioned in a previous post (see The State of the Internet) the law is changing the Internet for the worse. Let’s take few examples. I subscribe to Audible, a site with audio-books. Usually when I find an interesting book to buy, it ends in a disappointment. As soon as I sign in, the book is nowhere to be found. The reason is that Audible cannot sell the book in my region so it does not come up in a search. This restriction makes Audible much less interesting and practically useless to me and my credits just pile up.

UK based Classic FM stopped working one day and displayed this message:

“Unfortunately, due to music-licensing laws, we aren’t permitted to allow non-UK users to listen to our stations online.”

Hulu has a similar message:

“Hulu is committed to making its content available worldwide. To do so, we must work through a number of legal and business issues, including obtaining international streaming rights.”

Music site Pandora has this:

“We are deeply, deeply sorry to say that due to licensing constraints, we can no longer allow access to Pandora for listeners located outside of the U.S.”

There are many more examples.

What makes the Internet so special and a wonder-the-of-world is slowly being killed by old and outdated laws that don’t keep up with the way people use technology. International agreements take even more time to adjust. It is not that people outside US or UK or wherever the content is located, don’t want to pay their share to the authors of the content. If I buy a book on Audible, it is not like my money would be any different than a person in the US. The problem is that someone owns the rights to distribute the content in Europe or even in Iceland. The site mentioned above do not want to violate that right and be subject to litigation.

This shows how the laws are outdated. Now that we have technology which allows a music site like Classic FM and TV station like Hulu to have international customers and expand their revenue base, limitations due to physical distribution prohibits this. With the Internet the distribution is not a issue as distribution itself has no value, yet the laws protect those that have rights to distribute. The real problem however is that there might not even be any will to change this. The law is destroying the Internet – it should be the other way around.

The Internet is far from dead but some people are doing their best

Singer Prince made the news headlines earlier this month due to his comments that the Internet is over. A tsunami of reactions followed where people rejected this ridiculous claim coming from a singer who distributed his new album on a plastic disk with a printed newspaper. While people made fun of the singer, at least he got some exposure. But there is actually some truth in what Prince is saying. The Internet might be too important to die and disappear, but there are strong forces that are slowing killing the way we use the Internet.

Predictions that the Internet is over are not new. In the 1994 Nov/Dec issue of Internet World magazine (see Internet in a Box) Joel Snyder talks about how the Internet is choking. In his article titled Internet: Going South,  he claims that too many people are using it. Discussions are difficult to follow since too many people are posting useless comments, directory listings are getting too large and that it is difficult to find anything anymore. Mr. Snyder was right. The Internet of that time was going away. By going mainstream in 1994-5, the crowd was killing the way we used the Internet prior to 1994. Later we would get sites like Yahoo! and Google help us use the web and the Internet just continued to grow.

The Internet is always changing. Today it is not the result of too many people crowding up the network. Today there are two professions that are mainly killing the Internet as we know it: politicians and lawyers. The problem has to do with law and the lawmakers cannot keep up with the rate of change introduced by the Internet. This is causing all sorts of disruptions. Even worse, it is not clear if the politicians really understand the Internet and the way people are using it. The net-generation has adopted a totally new way to use content, yet this generation has no representatives making laws.

Unfortunately the results are that laws are passed that try to control the network instead of allowing people to use it. Content owners like big music labels have for years used the law to control their music with only limited success. Governments in countries like Germany and the US have banned all Internet betting and yet, people still bet on illegal sites that happily take all the profit and pay no taxes to the country of the punter. Many countries have or are considering adopting a three strikes rules where content owners can complain to an IPS about illegal downloads – and the offender’s Internet access is revoked.

The Internet is a living thing, constantly changing. As with many new technologies it proposes new business models and new opportunities. The problem is when the incumbent businesses and governments do not want to understand the technology and try to take laws that worked prior to the technology and try to apply them in totally different environment. Just like Mr Snyder’s Internet from 1994 is gone, chances are that today’s Internet will also die to be replaced by new uses and new rules.

Tablets are causing disruption to laptop sales. History is repeating.

Most people love cool new electronic gadgets. The iPad tablet is an example. Beautifully designed, pretty powerful and fun to use. Importantly, it is also easy to use. People are finding out that they can fulfill most of their computing or surfing needs with tablets like the iPad. Indeed we are seeing that the tablet is beginning to disrupt laptop sales.

There are indications that tablets will be popular this year and in the coming years. Tablet sales are expected to reach  15 million units in 2010, and 28 million in 2011 (see Report: iPad, tablets to cannibalize ‘Wintel’ laptops). While this will introduce new users to computers, this will also take a some cut out of the market share of laptops and netbooks. This is a very good example of disrupting technology.

This trend is not surprising since computers are moving from being technology products to becoming consumer devices (see the iPad Effect). This is a normal evolution of technology. As products become less technical and more functional, the market usually increases and the majority of people can start to use the product.

Another interesting thing is that we are seeing new types of operation systems grow in market share. iOS from Apple is on millions of devices and Android is a popular tablet OS available to anyone and growing fast according to some reports. These operating systems are based on real systems like the MacOS and Linux, but they are simpler with simpler interfaces (see Human Computer Interaction. This could have impact on operating system vendors, in particular Microsoft, makers of Windows.

The tablet is causing a new shift in computing and disrupting the current form of computers. If you compare tablets to personal computers, they may be lower performance and cheaper, but many disruptive technologies have this attribute. The personal computer itself a good example. History is again repeating itself.

An interesting documentary made by Kate Ray on Web 3.0 shows how the web is developing. Since content is increasing exponentially the problem is how to access and manage all this information. This becomes a question of scalability and semantics.

The semantic web is an interesting topic people have talked about for years, and are still talking about has the next big thing. It is still not clear how this will develop.

The documentary raises more questions than it answers:

Web 3.0 from Kate Ray on Vimeo.

Tech news over the Easter weekend were dominated by one device: the over-hyped iPad. Every major and not so major tech source has done a review of this thing. Opinions were out weeks before the device was even available. Comparing it to it’s smaller cousin, the iPhone you may wonder if this device will have similar impact. The iPhone simply turned the telecom industry upside down and reshaped how we think of mobile phones. This is sometimes called the iPhone effect. So, what will the iPad effect be? Here I’ll present some ideas.

The iPad is a Consumer Device, not a computer. There is a big difference between technology products like computers and consumer devices. With the former, the focus is on the technology while the latter focuses on the non-technical consumer and functionality. Of course under the shiny appearance, the famous tablet is a computer with an industrial strength OS, but the important thing is, as with the cousin, that this is hidden.

We don’t have to look far for a computer dressed up as a consumer device. Consider the PlayStation 3. This powerful machine is a consumer device. It has two buttons, one to turn the machine on and one to eject disks. The operating system is focused on playing games and consuming content like music and video. Anybody can operate this machine right out of the box. And in many cases it is the most powerful machine in the house. Personal Computers and the major desktop metaphor operating systems are still very much technical although they have improved dramatically over the last few years.

The subject of the desktop is also an important issue. The iPad could challenge the conventional desktop metaphor user interface. The metaphor of a desk with folders and files, documents and directories is decades old. That’s like working in an office which needs to process paperwork all the time. That’s the legacy of PCs, but who want’s to organize their personal stuff and experience in file cabinets? The interesting point is this: will iPad start the escape from the old office-like desktop metaphor of organizing content?

An interesting side-note is that tablets are not new. When Microsoft introduced its tablets in 2002, they may have looked like crippled computers that were missing the keyboard and mouse. The reason was that these tablets were computers with the same desktop operating system as desktop computers. This is what I call the Prevailing Technology Trap. Users saw tablet PCs as inferior computers, not as a new type of device. If the iPad can avoid this trap, it is precisely the point that might make the iPad an important device. Perhaps the most important issue that separates the iPad from the old tablet PCs is both the elegant hardware and the excellent and intuitive multi-touch interface. This is the most noticeable feature of these new hand-held devices.

It still remains to be seen if the iPad is a new type of device. Initial sales numbers indicate an high consumer interest. As many technology writers have pointed out, the reviews of iPad are very polarized, either people like it or they see no use for it. This is very interesting if you look at history. Many disruptive technologies had similar reactions. The early PC was dismissed by many mainframe and minicomputer users as inferior and low performance. However, non-computer users embraced it. If this is any indication, we are entering the decade of the tablet.

Another one bites the dust – TV is getting disrupted by the Internet

Last year I did a survey in my New Technology class asking about video rentals (see So, who goes to the Video Rental Store anymore?). The trend was clear: nobody goes to the video rental store anymore. This year I asked about TV. The basic question was how many hours do you watch TV each day. Again, some interesting things are happening. As it turns out TV watching is declining and viewing is going to the Internet. But only partly as it seems that viewing TV content is just declining.

With TV I mean the business model of pre-programmed schedule supported by ads or subscription fees. This model clearly does not attract the university crowd. The average time people in the class watch TV per day is 1.2 hours, compared to 1.6 hours per day last year. This is a 1/3 decline. The number of participants that don’t watch TV at all are 40% with 5 hours as the other extreme. Viewing 1.2 hours per day is much lower than the widely believed 3 hours per day which is the average viewing.

These numbers don’t mean that participants don’t watch video anymore. In fact viewing has not declined – it just moved. Now the Internet is taking the TV business over.

It is not hard to image why. Internet viewing is increasing and the statistics support that. According to OECD, broadband penetration of households in many European countries and in the US is approaching 70%. Worldwide there are about 1.7 million Internet users, 25% of the world’s population. But the interesting fact is that the rate of adoption is increasing exponentially.

This is leading to a shift in how people consume entertainment. World-wide, nearly three out of five  youth consumers logged on to YouTube to watch a music video in the last 12 months, compared to 56% who watched a music TV channel. According to YouTube  people upload 20 hours of videos every minute.

But why would people prefer Internet viewing to quality subscription based model. Here are some ideas:

Time shifting - people don’t need to wait or change their schedule to fit the program. They just watch whatever they want to watch when they feel like it.

Personalization – TV is traditionally about group viewing. With a large screen in the living room or den, watching TV is not a personal experience. There are not many shows that the whole family prefers to watch together. With so much variety of shows, they appeal to different age groups and to different cultures. Thus individual family members prefer watching their favorite show.

Fragmentation – Watching according to a periodic schedule is the TV station’s way to build the programming. Each week a new episode in a series is shown. But what if you want to watch the next episode? You just can’t wait a week. Of course, for new shows you might have to. But for older shows why fragment the viewing?

Another interesting thing in this survey was that viewing on the Internet seems to rise only slightly. If this has any meaning it is that participants are not viewing TV shows in general as much. Participants spent on the average 1.1 hour a day playing video games. And if you count only those that played, the average is 2 hours per day.

The trends here are clear. TV watching is declining and so is viewing of TV shows in general. People are get more entrainment on the Internet, including games and social interactions. Entertainment is getting more diverse.

Mobile phones are no longer just about the hardware. Now, it’s the Software.

Earlier this month Microsoft launched Windows Phone 7 Series, an new version of their Mobile OS along with new handsets. These new handsets look nice and well designed. The feature list is impressive, enough to generate high interest with the enthusiastic gadget freaks. While all these slick shiny handsets are really cool, phones are not about hardware anymore. The real news in this Microsoft launch is the software – the Operating System.

The hardware has to be good. The hardware is what defines the capabilities and the coolness of phones. The way it is designed and how it feels holding it. The design is also important in impression and image of the owners. But adding to a cool phone, inferior and poor software seems to defeat the purpose. If there are any lessons from the iPhone effect, it is that the defining factor today is the software in the phone.

Hardware improvements are mostly incremental as the product performance increase is steady. Capabilities such as microchip clock-speed, memory and data bandwidth capabilities follow a reasonably predictable curve. This is a good example of sustainable innovation. Even the iPhone was not the first full-screen phone to the market and it was not the first touch phone. But is was a great improvement with elegant design, and lots of hype. However, what made the iPhone successful was the software packaged in to an elegant device.

The touch screen of the iPhone is awesome. It was a ground breaking experience to use and set the standard. But touch screens only work if the software works. It is not the hardware, the feedback comes from the software. Also, it is no surprise that the Apple App Store is so successful that it is five times larger than all other apps stores combined. In the 2010 NetSize survey respondents valued convenience as the most important factor of an app store. Device “coolness” was not a factor. Again, software.

With WP7S comes a new OS that breaks with the old legacy Windows Mobile. When Microsoft announced Windows Mobile 6.5 last autumn, it was clear that something was missing. However, Windows Phone 7 is a new operating system. It may not be based on Windows 7 but on Windows CE, still a huge improvement for Microsoft and for those who develop mobile apps for Windows phones.

The phone business has changed. It is no longer a closed business where few players dominate. It’s becoming more like the PC business with more openness. Mobile phones are now platforms for applications. In just few years a whole new industry has emerged where software developers write software for these devices.

While this openness creates new opportunities, compatibility issues will surely come up. Both Android and Windows will be deployed to multiple devices. Anybody who has developed for J2ME can tell you horror stories of getting different handsets to run the same application. But Android and Windows are operating systems and the applications developed for them are native. Compatibility issues will be a problem but as the development tools mature these will fade away as they have with the PC.

The walled garden has crumbled down.

Combine consumer devices, the cloud and great software and you can expect many interesting innovations in 2010.

(“Birds” from Soffia. Taken in Rijoa Spain – visit soffia.net)

This is the time of year to look back and reflect on the past, and it is also time to look forward. Here are some technology trends that I believe will be important in 2010:

The cloud will continue to grow as it has for some years. More services will be offered and we will see some maturity of these services. What was once only available with installed software becomes available from remote servers. In 2009, it seems that every site was to offering APIs. This will continue but the challenge for 2010 is to make use of these APIs.

The growing market of hosted solutions will also attract more players. I would not be surprised if some of the traditional computer and software companies enter the game and offer some hosting services.

Among the hottest cloud services will be digital content management like for music and TV, with books also picking up. We have seen how the internet is swallowing all markets that produce digital content and this will continue. So far content services have been scattered and limited in functionality. However, the software for arranging digital content is going to be very important, as we have seen what iTunes does for the iPod, so we could expect some interesting innovations in how to use services that offer digital content.

But software is not enough. I would expect to see some really cool hardware for “content experience” or home entertainment boxes, with great software in the box but primarily built to utilize the cloud. And I’m not talking about a low-end, slow and frustrating STB. I’m thinking real computers dressed up as special purpose consumer devices. Granted, there are already many boxes available, but my guess is that we have room for cool innovations in the design of the services these products offer. The real challenge is in the software and the use of the cloud, but also in the way these service get distributed on multiple home devices or screens within the home. I believe there is room for improved services and someone will take that market opportunity in 2010.

Home entertainment is also about games. We have seen innovation in input controls pioneered by the Wii. This spurred a new category of games. Microsoft has done lot of research in both surface technologies and in projects like Natal which allows input with motion detection. Both these technologies will be important in gaming.

Another factor driving the use the cloud is how people access it. Consumer devices like netbooks, e-readers, and smartphones will drive the need for cloud based services. We are also likely to see tablet devices reenter the market. This is supported by the Apple Tablet rumors. Tablets are not new. Microsoft tried to push them few years back but they did not take off. What could make the difference now is how input and display technologies have improved, in particular touch screen, as well as the ubiquitous network access and cloud services. If Apple or other computer manufactures were to release a tablet, something like an oversize iPod Touch, we could see tablets (or computers that are basically the screen) enter the market as an addition to the popular netbook.

Tablets could make the e-reader market interesting. This market started to take off in 2009 and will continue, but the big question is if special or dedicated devices will win. Some believe that people will want a special reading device while others claim that people don’t read and will want a more generic device. Another outcome is that both will prevail, and the special reading device will tailor to a select group that is passionate about reading.

One  of the things that could make tablets a success is the ubiquitous network access. Today we have wireless networks, your WiFi and wireless phone networks. These will merge into the same set of standards. Your phone will use WiFi and your computer will use 3G or 4G, depending on which is available. We will see this start to unfold in 2010 but it might take longer time for seamless experience.

Augmented Reality generated some hype in 2009 but we will see more applications popping up in 2010. Mobile phone applications will be the perfect medium since many of them have web cameras and geo-location capabilities. But I would not be surprised to see totally new types of usages that will fit into this category.

AR is all about building some intelligence into our everyday live. Another field where intelligence is needed is in robotics. whether it’s in 2010 or later, but the robotics revolution will eventually move into the consumer space. We have already seen some interesting toys with robotic capabilities and this will be an interesting market, although it is very price sensitive and with low profit margins.

In other less glamorous fields of technology, battery technology will finally see some significant improvements. This is driven by rise of consumer devices and also by electronic vehicles.

These are some of the issues that I think will be important in 2010. However this develops, I think in 2010 we will see great number of new innovations. It seem that we are at some tipping point in cool consumer technologies. With great devices, software using state of art user experience design, and cloud services we can expect to see some cool products this year.