INDUSTRY INSIGHTS :
ON NERVE & IMAGINATION
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The sound started simply enough . A bleep here , then a bloop , a buzz and a beep . But slowly the sounds gathered and folded onto each other to form deepening layers . It ’ s robot music , I thought . I knew , because Star Wars had arrived in theaters that spring . The auditorium filled with the sound of a hundred R2-D2s chirping in harmony . It was electronic , unnatural , but still … distinctly musical .
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At the center of the sound was our visitor , in t-shirt and sneakers , a wild-eyed composer creating a one-man symphony , just him and his machines . He was making the machines sing .
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The significance of new combinations tends to escape us . When someone embeds a computer inside a watch , it ’ s all too natural for us to assume that it will be used like either a computer or a watch . A smartphone on your wrist ! A failure of nerve prevents us from imagining the entirely new thing that this combination might represent . The habits of the original technology blind us to the potential opportunities of the new .
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Today ’ s combinations are especially hard to parse because they ’ re no longer about individual instances of technology . The potential of a smartwatch , for example , hinges not only on the combination of its component parts but on its combination with other smart and dumb objects in our lives .
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As we weigh the role of the smartwatch , we have to muster the nerve to imagine : How might it talk to other devices ? How can it interact with the physical world ? What does it mean to wear data ? How might the watch signal identity in the digital world as we move through the physical ? How might a gesture or flick of the wrist trigger action around me ? What becomes possible if smart watches are on millions of wrists ? What are the social implications ? What new behaviors will the watch channel and shape ? How will it change the way I use other devices ? How might it knit them together ?
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As we begin to embed technology into everything — when anything can be an interface — we can no longer judge each new gadget on its own . The success of any new interface depends on how it controls , reflects , shares , or behaves in a growing community of social devices . We are bridging the gap between digital and physical , one small step at a time . Nerve demands that we take the long view .
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114 THIRDWAVE · ISSUE ONE