Siftables
I’ve just watched a really amazing TED-Talk about some new toy blocks called ‘Siftables’. Ok, so what is so amazing about some toy blocks? In this case, each toy block is actually a micro-computer (about 1 inch square) with wireless connectivity and an ability to interact with each other. To really understand, you need to check the video out: Siftables TED-Talk.
There are a number of really interesting ideas worth commenting on with this talk, though one significant idea for me was this new human-machine interface. This is a step in the direction of a more natural human interface. Over the decades human-machine interfaces have evolved and improved from punch cards and print-outs, which are very unnatural, through to mice and graphical interfaces. This is a further step to where we can physically interact with computers.
I cannot mention the evolution of human-machine interfaces without discussing the craze of cell-phone texting (otherwise abbreviated to ‘txting’). In technology, by identifying a trend, it is easy to predict a radically different future just by considering the consequences of the trend. However texting is something that I didn’t predict at all. Over the decades there has been a trend to human-machine interfaces that are more natural to humans, though following this trend it would be difficult to predict that instead of talking into the device we’d start using the 9 keys to punch out messages to each other in a way that is similar to morse-code! I am sure this is an aberration of the trend, and once devices improve and cell-service prices reduce, I predict that texting will almost completely disappear.
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By Shane Legg, February 13, 2009 @ 6:53 pm
My current thinking is that what you need with a new technology is a sufficient “utility gradient”.
Every new thing has a cost and a benefit associated with it, and that includes the cost of change. In the case of texting, for many people the utility of being able to send a short message “good luck” before an exam, or “10 min late” before a meetup (or however you do it in text speak) instantly and directly to a person outweighs the cost of messing around with the keyboard. And let’s not forget that the technology is very simple to learn. Even my mother got her new cellphone and sent my sister a message without opening the instruction manual. With something like Xero, the cost of trying the system out and potentially not liking it is sufficiently high that many people won’t try it, at least until they have been told enough times by friends how great it is and have been seen it in action.
Perhaps my point isn’t very clear. What I’m saying is that you need people to be able to make a small step that has an obvious benefit to them. Then they will take it. One there, they might then take another. And so on. Essentially, people act just like local gradient based optimisation algorithms much of the time.
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By Kelvin Hartnall, February 13, 2009 @ 8:20 pm
Shane, I like your “utility gradient” theory, and I agree that it makes a lot of sense. Hopefully a new easier to use ‘texting’ system will emerge that will have a clear obvious utility: a significantly easier way to send short little messages while on the go. The obvious benefit in this case would be the more natural, easier, and simpler way to send a short message.
Greg Day made a good point the previous week which could explain part of the utility of this morse-code type texting. People who use texting a lot can touch-text. That is, they turn predictive texting off, and without even looking at the cell-phone, they can send messages. Therefore, for them, this type of input is very natural. Similar to how I find the Qwerty keyboard very natural just because I have learnt to touch-type.
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