Apps are dead! Long live seamless experiences!
From the archive: written before or outside the Architect Tomorrow newsletter, so it may be out of date.
Whilst they offered a massive leap forward in User Experience mobile and tablet Apps as you know them today will die and they will change sooner than you think. The somewhat clunky way you launch and interact with Apps from a horrible long list of icons will drastically change. And this change will only accelerate as we connect more devices through the Internet of Things / Everything revolution.
Why? It is the basket of remotes problem. Or the “screens and screens of silo’d apps” problem.
Why do I want a TV remote, a DVD player remote, HiFi remote etc etc - what I want is an integrated solution.
(The above is taken from a paper by the AllSeenAlliance)
And in fact do I even want a remote at all? I’d like my devices and environments to respond to what I am doing.
Some of this can be achieved today via a solution called “If This Then That” (IFFTT) and also Near Field Communications (NFC). IFFTT is essentially a simple rules engine. You tell it the conditions and it can fire up something in response. NFC allows you to touch things with your phone which then trigger actions. Real world use cases today are Oyster or Apple Pay - but I think these are scratching the surface - and require you to get out your phone or card for them to work.
How is this really going to happen?
I see some big shifts on the horizon:
- Smart Agents / Digital Assistants going mainstream
- “Enchanted Objects” and “Responsive Environments” (this goes beyond just wearables)
- Open standards based integration along with Security and Privacy frameworks
Smart Agents or Digital Assistants:
Think the next evolution of Siri, Cortana or Google Now. The ability to tell your phone what you want to do and have it present you with the information - but for any question (unlike the limited capabilities of the current generation of assistants). This is Smart Agent 2.0. Further out is Smart Agent 3.0 which you can think of as the Human brain cloud hybrid I talked about in my previous post. As in rather than saying “OK Google…” we will think it. As this will get around the fact that we will be self concious about talking to ourselves - which will somewhat limit the uptake of the current generation of Agents.
Enchanted Devices and Responsive Environments
I think this is where the Internet of Things has the power to change the game. As we replace our possessions as they wear out we will replace them with versions designed for the era of always on connectivity. They will use sensors to detect the world around them and will help us shift our behaviour.
To see the kind of thing I really mean here is a great video by David Rose on Enchanted Objects: Design, Human Desire and the Internet of Things:
Embedded LinkedIn content: view it on the original article
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Next generation standards based integration along with Security and Privacy frameworks
But this isn’t just about the user interface or user experience, its about transforming the less sexy backend systems too. To power this and truly break down the silos it is going to require significant integration and open standards. This will facilitate different devices to communicate with each other and with the people using them (via the devices they are wearing or holding).
The expensive, proprietary integration technology generally used within large organisations isn’t likely to work well here. It needs to be cheap, open, lightweight and event driven. Things like MQTT,Microservicesand APIs are going to be really key. This will need true decoupling (as in consumers and providers know very little about each other and yet have the ability to communicate effectively).
And I really shouldn’t mention this last but; in order to build trust, control security and deal with privacy; these concerns are going to need to be built in from the start. This means into the agents, devices and integration platforms. I really strongly believe that government has a big role to play here - both in terms of funding research and academia into this problem space but also in key pieces of regulation to ensure individuals are protected. Why Government? If its left to the private sector I do not believe market forces will drive the right outcomes. Solution providers generally compete rather than collaborate, and in the race to deliver first corners will be cut in security and privacy.
I am working on an attempt at a holistic reference architecture and capability model for the Internet of Things that cuts across the different silo’d use cases that people are talking about today. I see this as being a key first step before solutions that solve these challenges can be realised. Once I’ve made some progress I’ll share it.
In the meantimeyou might be interested in some of my other posts. And I have now written a follow up on the future of Human Computer Interaction.
Update: Interestingly a few days after I posted this a TechRadar article entitled “Goodbye apps hello smart agents are you ready for the post app world“ was published which includes recent research on this topic. Turns out they (TechRadar) have been saying something similar to this since 2014.
And here is a relevant tweet I came across from the Gartner ITxpo Symposium:
Originally published on LinkedIn. Comments and discussion live there.