RSS feedFrom scriptable clock radios to the digital hub, the most important issue in the future for appliance manufacturers, is giving their ever more demanding and technically capable users what they want. Interface design, programming languages, electronics and digital media are no longer the domain of unknown engineers in white coats. These technologies have now become hobbies for a new generation of Internet geeks, without much formal training or corresponding choice of career.
I wrote a thesis back in 1992 for my Tonmeister audio engineering course, which was a high level design for a fully digital and extensible recording and mixing desk.
The idea was that a single set of analogue controls, including rotary pots, faders and other bits and pieces, would control whichever channels were currently selected on the desk, serving as generic controllers. EQ and filter controls, as well as signal sends/returns to offboard gear, would be virtually inserted into channel paths as required, meaning the desk could be expanded to any number of channels restricted only by memory, and any external equipment you have can be treated as inline effects for any channel, as if they were built into the desk.
I should have filed a patent, as these techniques are now starting to find their way into production mixers.
However the idea didn’t originate with a mixer, it started back in 1986 when I wanted to program my clock radio. We’d just bought a video recorder and two clock radios, and it was annoying that each had its own interface, and none did everything that I wanted them to.
So I designed a system based upon all household devices being just generic controllers, with an LCD screen and a few generic knobs and dials (rotary pots). This way not only could functionality be shared across different manufacturers, but if you built in a simple scripting language like HyperCard (or it’s current day descendant AppleScript), then users could build their own functionality which will work on any similar device. Want a clock radio that switches stations after the news? Write one and download it to whatever clock radio you own.
Nice idea, but the manufacturers never got behind it, or perhaps they never thought of it.
The electronics industry has gradually moved towards this idea with various bus protocols of course. SCSI was invented to support multiple device types, so any device connected to a SCSI bus could talk to any other, if it understood the command sequences for that particular device type. Hard drives ended up being the typical use for SCSI, with any SCSI capable computer or electonic device being able to use drives from multiple manufacturers. USB and Firewire continued the theme of multi-device buses, with generic protocol profiles for various devices, as did the Rendevous networking protocol and the newer Bluetooth protocol, perhaps not so co-incidentally all either driven or invented by Apple.
With the introduction of Windows Media Centre, we finally see computing technology controlling household devices, which means finally a single common user interface. Apple haters generally think Microsoft initiated the digital hub idea, but it was Apple who started pushing it first, even though they’ve only concentrated to date on networking and software.
The Mac Mini has the potential to lead Apple into the hub space, and compete for the first time head to head with Microsoft. A Mac OS X based device providing a single user interface for all other household devices, would allow advanced home users to develop their own interfaces and even new functionality, with AppleScript. Want to script a virtual TiVo? Sure. Suck down the program schedule from the web, and simply tell the TV to dump the incoming program to the hub’s drive. You can then rip the audio to your stereo, pump it wirelessly to another TV over a video capable Airport Express, burn it to DVD, or file it for later use. All done programatically by the user.
The day of programmable user interfaces for household devices is almost here. And with more and more people learning basic programming skills regardless of their career choice, we should start to see an explosion of capability in the space. Assuming of course that manufacturers give up their DRM restrictions, and embrace a completely open and interoperable digital world. Technologists should be working on advancing technological capability and satisfying users, not competing for who can develop the most restrictive DRM.
Update: 11-Feb-2005. iDash: Mac mini for Your Car
You should all know about MovieLens, the sight that makes film recommendations for you, based on collaborative filtering. It did the rounds of the web a few years back, and I regularly use it as a double check on films I should probably see. In about 95% of cases (yep, 19 out of 20), it is pretty dead on. If you’ve not used it, check it out.
So today I decided to see one of the top recommendations for me. Amongst the first 10 films in the list, most of which were foreign or arthouse films, out jumped Ocean’s Twelve, showing at the local, and at the end of it’s run so I was expecting a nice empty cinema. Well done MovieLens, you just made 1 out of 20, and Hoyts, you’re next on my list.
I admit it, I enjoyed Ocean’s Eleven, and Steven Soderbergh is one of my favourite hollywood directors, with Sex, Lies, and Videotape being one of my favourite films of all time, and him probably one of the few people who could possibly remake Solaris and make it different yet just as good as the original.
However, after the first 15 minutes of Ocean’s Twelve, it is obvious that there’s no real story here, just a linear and very obvious narrative, with no real twists or turns, no even remotely interesting heist, a bunch of wasted movie business in-jokes, and a final 10 minutes that attempts to reframe the entire narrative, effectively sticking two fingers up to an up to this point faithful audience, who just sat through 115 minutes of padding, waiting for the twist.
The Sixth Sense this aint, and you’ve got to ask whether writer George Nolfi actually understands the difference. With Ocean’s Twelve, the wrong story is more believable and understandable than the 10 minute correction at the end, if of course you can see past all the glitches and physical impossibilities. Moving LASER alarms? Get outa here. But then what would you expect from a writer whose only other public credit seems to be the co-writing, and subsequent ruining, of the screenplay of the Michael Crichton novel Timeline.
Product placement, flawed story, impossible physics, incorrect technical details, bad acting, and patronising the audience. Enough of Ocean’s Twelve, I could go on all day but it still wouldn’t get my AUD$14.50 and the 125 minutes of my life back. Which brings me to Hoyts.
Now on to their fourth generation web site, and still failing miserably to understand even the basics of user interface design, you’ve got to wonder whether being under the MSN banner is any better than the previous sites built in-house. Marginally.
So I wait in line outside the cinema, due to “cleaning” apparently, and when we are finally let in 15 minutes late, there’s still stray bits of popcorn and lolly wrappers over most of the seats. Luckily enough, most of the sheep tended to sit up the back as per usual, which meant I had a choice of about three different clean seats in the centre. It makes you wonder why cinema’s bother installing surround sound and the movie studios bother spending so much time on the production and the technology, when most people just sit behind the back speakers anyway. No matter, better seats for me I guess.
Finally we get to the end of this laborious film, the sheep all file out when the very first line of credit comes up, and then the lights come on. Hello? Then Cecilia and Tim enter the theatre with their trusty brooms and buckets, intending most likely to repeat the most excellent job they did last time. But do they apologise and turn the lights back off? Of course not. I’m not saying that everyone should stay for the credits, but I could give a dozen good reasons why people may wish to see them, and it makes me wonder why these ignoramuses have never asked themselves why hollywood even bothers spending money to put them there.
Welcome yet again to the dumbing down of society. While the information and personal publishing revolution is about it explode into the mainstream, it is good to see that hollywood still fails to understand that we are intelligent beings who deserve better. Copy their films for all I care, maybe it will help them get a clue.
On the other hand, a few weeks ago I was lucky enough to see the amazing A Very Long Engagement, by the fabulous Jean-Pierre Jeunet, and the experience was better by a degree of magnitude. Clean seats, good focus, courteous and intelligent staff (The Cremorne Orpheum), great story, twists and turns, clever deceptions, and believable characters. Upon checking with MovieLens… Ahh that’s better, 4.5 almost dead on. 18 more films to look forward to…