“I had the realization its not the money its about what does it take to engineer a machine that becomes invisible to the to the experience and that kinda blew my mind. So when you are designing anything its like you’re designing an experience. The engineering should get the fuck out of the way.” – Reggie Watts
Category: Technology
When Apple released its mapping application for iOS it confirmed what many big data evangalists had been preaching, Data Trumps Everything.(eventually)
Best design, worthless without data.
Sophisticated Software, worthless without data.
While Apple won the first round in the mobile platform wars using world class design and excellent user experience, they have shown the gap in their strategy, their Achilles heal. The rapidly approaching next generations of personal computing will be built on a foundation Hardware and software differentiated with DATA.
This reality was made even more visible at the Gartner Application Architecture, Development & Integration Summit, during a Keynote interview of Michael Abbott, a partner at Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers. Mr. Abbott expressed concern about the walled gardens of data (read Google, twitter, Facebook) becoming significant barriers to competition and innovation.
Michael Abbot is exactly right. The next innovations, as we move to a cognitive economy, will require access to data, massive amounts of data. Scale and access will become huge advantages and barriers. Start-up organizations will be hard pressed to innovate without having access to these sources of data. While some innovative companies will be able to create ways to collect and build their own reservoirs of data, others will have to partner to gain access. But the bottom line is excellent hardware and software are table stakes in the cognitive economy, but data will be the coin of the realm.
In the case of Apple Maps, it is hard to believe Apple would ever catch Google. Google has long held an advantage with search and it’s velocity of innovation and improvement are difficult to match. Apple would have to exceed the rate at which Google is innovating and collecting data. With the ever increasing population of google powered devices it doesn’t look good for Apple.
Steve Yegge over in his Google+ feed has a post I just found about his experience presenting to Jeff Bezos. His description of the experience and his approach was great. The entire post is interesting but my favorite part is the second to last paragraph.
You have to understand: most people were scared around Bezos because they were waaaay too worried about trying to keep their jobs. People in high-level positions sometimes have a little too much personal self-esteem invested in their success. Can you imagine how annoying it must be for him to be around timid people all day long? But me — well, I thought I was going to get fired every single day. So fuck timid. Might as well aim high and go out in a ball of flame.
We all have seen the timid presentation, that’s why I like the last lines so very much (my emphasis added). Read the whole post you will enjoy it.
Kevin Rose interviews Chris Sacca of lower case capital and Chris gives a great interview. I recommend you watch the whole thing. But, to hear the best explanation of how advertising has evolved and why services like Twitter, Foursquare and Square are so valuable. The explanation starts at 34 Min.
If you like this interview you might also like Chris Sacca on This Week in Start-ups
Enjoy!
I have long explained to people the value of the data corporations collect. I have seen first hand the value of large pools of correlated, linked, behavior generated data and as Tim O’Reilly points out in his post so does Google.
My favorite definition of Cognitive** is:
Having a basis in or reducible to empirical factual knowledge.
The key part of the definition as it relates to Tim’s post and Google is “Having a Basis in or reducible to” . I also like “empirical”. Cognition requires data and lots of it. Algorithms are secondary to the data for without the data there is nothing.
Google is just a stalking horse for the coming cognitive economy, there are many other players less public and less chic that are working to exploit the coming opportunities.
**”cognitive.” The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition. Houghton Mifflin Company, 2004. Answers.com 18 Dec. 2007. http://www.answers.com/topic/cognitive
Google releases Google Maps for Symbian Devices. Just more Fuel for my earlier post about the ideal combination of Nokia and Google. It is probably my wishful thinking but it has a great deal of potential.
Here are two Twitter bots I would love to see:
- Google search history bot posts at random my search queries every hour or so.
- FedEx tracking bot send it the tracking number and it twitters the location of your package.
This in my experience is a very accurate description of Silicon Valley via The New York Times:
Mr. Hettig, the estate planning lawyer, sums it up for many: “We’re in such a rarefied environment,” he said, “people here lose perspective on what the rest of the world looks like.”
Over at gapingvoid Hugh MacLeod posts about a set of questions he received from a friend about social media. I found all the questions and responses interesting. The one one question and response that stood out was #10:
10. Additional Comments?
One more thought, which pertains directly to your client. I firmly believe that the line that separates social media and ERP is going to start getting VERY blurry, and really soon. I can see a not-to-distant future where even the larger ERP solutions are built around social software, not the other way around. And I can see that day arriving in under five years. We live in interesting times.
Sorry, Hugh but I think your are a bit off on this one. Sure ERP vendors will start offering social software as part of their solutions in the next 5 years. But think about from the view point of the folks in the market for ERP solutions. That group of people have driven large ERP vendors to provide guarantees that versions of their ERP solutions will be viable for at least 5 years. The market requires ERP vendors provide these guarantees due to significant costs of major upgrades. So, the adoption cycle for existing customers will drive the adoption of radically different ERP solutions beyond your 5 year horizon. Now I agree that the principles and techniques that have driven the adoption of social software in the consumer market will be adopted over time in enterprises of all sizes.
The reality is that enterprises today are just now getting platforms that enable them to realize visions of Michael Hammer and the like. ERP solutions are complex animals that could never be built around social software. What I believe is that social software coupled with process re-engineering will create huge efficiencies and value for enterprises. All this is dependent on a well abstracted ERP platform, in simple terms it will be all about services (API). Social software has a long way to go before dealing with things like GAAP, complex logistics, Financial reporting, transactional integrity, inventory management, production planning, global regulation, process execution, the list goes on and on. I believe social software has the power to make all these things more efficient and effective.
ERP platforms will remain the core of enterprises for years to come. The smart enterprises and vendors will have ERPs with comprehensive and integrated social software. ERPs will become like utility services doing very complex and important things, social software will create information liquidity, efficiency and transparency within and across business processes.
The Department of Defense News Releases feed allows technology to present a view of the the Iraq War that news does not. This feed contains the public press releases of the names of the casulties in Iraq and Afghanistan. I for one find this feed to be filled with nothing but loss and sorrow. I consume a fair number of RSS feeds and this is one feed that makes all others trivial.
If you are anti-war here is a feed of information that only motivates one to fight for an end even harder.
If you are supportive of the Iraq war you should subscribe to this feed to ensure that you have a clear understanding of the impacts of your support.
A feed that pains my heart to read.
Tom The Architect 