Another Scenario prepared by the Internet 2020 Visionary Group I am involved with.

Another Scenario prepared by the Internet 2020 Visionary Group I am involved with.

Researchers at the Hong-Kong university of Science and Technology have proposed a theory which can make one object look like another. The idea is to use the concepts of complementary media and transformation optics to generate a general illusion.

First, the object is optically canceled by using a complementary material. A complementary material is one in which the values of permittivity and permeability are complementary to the values in the nearby region of space containing the object. This complementary material cancels out the effect of this object on the plane wave, making it optically invisible.

Then using a transformational material, this plane wave is again distorted in a way that the ‘object of choice’ would. Therefore, anybody looking at this object would see the ‘object of choice’ instead.

Using these concepts, an Illusion Device can be designed which can transform the scattered light outside a virtual boundary into that of the second (illusion) object, regardless of the profile and the direction of the incident light thereby creating a stereoscopic illusion for any observer outside the virtual boundary.

Working principle of an illusion device that transforms the stereoscopic image of the object (a man) into that of the illusion.

(a)The man (the object) and the illusion device in real space. (b)The woman (the illusion) in the illusion space. (c)The physical description of the system in real space.

 The illusion device is composed of two parts, the complementary medium (region 2) that optically“cancels” a piece of space including the man (region 3), and the restoring medium (region 1) that restores a piece of the illusion space including the illusion (region 4 in (d)).Both real and illusion spaces share the same virtual boundary (dashed curves).

http://arxiv.org/ftp/arxiv/papers/0905/0905.1484.pdf

Since we know the storage is the only way to record our digital life, We’ve been trying to find better solution to save our data. A couple of weeks ago, GE announced hologram-type disc which can contain 500gb in a single disc. But now, seems like 1.6TB optical disc is available for the future.

According to a new report, researchers at Swinburne University of Technology in Australia have exploited the “five-dimensional” discs with a capacity that is 300 times greater than what is currently available on the market (DVDs). The researchers, who have signed a deal with Samsung Electronics, said the technique had allowed them to store 1.6 terabytes of data on a disc with the potential to one day store up to 10TB. Not only a optical storage but also SSD technology is growing very rapidly.

For now, the size is not an issue anymore. Maybe this is the time to think which type of storage we’d  take to store our data. Many IT manias consider that optical disc is an old-fashioned way to keep your digital life. As you know, we are using Pen drives(USB Flash Drive) much more than dvd-r or Bluray discs. It could be possible that in 2012~2020, we’d not use optical discs for personal use anymore. Unlimited online storage or 1.6tb usb flash drive could be a main resource of the digital life.

In a previous post I showed how the modularity of SW and HW allows the customization of products and how it can help the customer shapes his own ideas and turn them into a product.

Below, you can see a 3D model of a foot scan made with a special 3D scanner that takes only four seconds to scan a customer’s feet.

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http://www.globalfootwearsolutions.com/

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http://www.precision3d.co.uk/?gclid=CM_7weah15oCFcmS3wodgAmj2g

If we think about it, there is nothing new: my grandfather produced customized shoes with wooden shoes models of his customers.

He manufactured shoes with the help of the models shown below, made in the same shape of the customer’s foot.

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In the early years of the twentieth century, my grandfather was well-known in Bologna for his ability in making leather goods.

He was asked to make saddles and bridles for racehorses.

Back then, he also had all the measures of the horses, and he manufactured customized products for animals. In those days, he also manufactured wooden limbs for amputees in the Rizzoli Hospital in Bologna.

The interesting thing is that he had always worked during his lifetime: in the shop where he sold his products and at home when he was very old; for him, the factory has never existed.

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http://www.lablav.it/glossario/home.html

At the beginning of the twentieth century, the footwear sector had not yet taken on the industry innovation path, with automated and centralized production, like other sectors had in the previous century. Craftsman’s success was based on:

1) manual dexterity
2) creativity
3) experience
4) network of customers

After the second world war, machines had automated the production in the footwear sector; people were organized through a rigid work and process distribution and none of them had the control of the overall process as it was the case for the artisans in the previous times.

http://www.mech.utah.edu/senior_design/06/index.php/RobotHandMechanics/HomePage

Today we have technologies that enable us to return to the working model of my grandfather although with some major differences:

1) manual skills will be achieved by robots
2) the experience will increase over time and won’t be wasted (knowledge and experience sharing e.g. Wikipedia)
3) the market will be global
4) production of personalized items on a large scale (not only my grandfather’s customers in the old Bologna but in the world)                                                                                                                                5) products will integrate ICT and Robot Technology.

 Here is an example of an integration of shoes and a robot to help people with movement disabilities.

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http://world.honda.com/news/2008/c081107Walking-Assist-Device/

The transformation of production has a major impact on companies that on one hand will need to exploit the factor of scale and on the other hand will need to be closer to the consumer. Mass market and market of one will have to go hand in hand. This is made possible by more flexible production and characterization of products through services. It is likely that we will see a landscape with few large companies, able to invest huge amount of money for infrastructural deployment and up keeping and many small enterprises focusing on niche but global markets.

These smaller enterprises will need to operate in a loose cooperation framework, an ecosystem.

We had  a meeting today with people from the department of Fine Arts and the University of Udine to discuss the possibility of creating an ecosystem based on the artistic assets available in Italian Museums.

Just imagine what can be done by transforming artistic masterpieces in bits, mashing ups on these virtual representation other information and open it up to third parties to create services.

One can, as an example, imagine a art lesson in a classroom where the teacher relates information present in the students’ book to the real masterpiece that can be accessed remotely from its museum home. The teacher adds information and mashes it up on the masterpiece. Students will have the opportunity of looking at this mash up back home, with their computer or with a dedicated IPTV channel. This latter may be useful to share information with grandparents that may not be familiar with computers. The student may play with the “virtual masterpiece” using services provided by third parties, change some colours and create his own interpretation of the masterpiece, share it in the classroom community, create a social network around that masterpiece.

The possibility, once you combine atoms and bits with mash ups are really limitless.

The crucial point is enabling the ecosystem, making sure that there is a first set of actors that release their assets in a (controllable) usable open way so that other parties may join the ecosystem.

The seed, as in any ecosystems, is crucial and along with it the aspects of trust, ownership.

Google vision is now to aggregate a social network without creating an explicit social network (http://www.google.com/profiles) and to overcome the failure of Orkut. The solution is Google Profile: starting from the profiles of the users.

Google has all the components of social networks in his existing services. For example contacts in Gmail and Google Talk can became the list of “friends” of a virtual social network.

In Google Profile, users can share web content and include links to their blog, online photos, and other profiles such as Facebook, LinkedIn. Users have control over what others see.

Google could become a hub of social communications and media sharing (YouTube, Picasa, Blogger, Gmail and of course its search engine) and now the idea is to give the user the possibility to link all together with Google Profile

http://www.google.com/support/accounts/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=97703

1) Receive messages. (with a Google Account )

2) Add photos. (from Flickr or Picasa)

3) Create a page about you.

4) Add your contact information. (You control who sees it)

5) Add links to your other profiles and sites. ( Blogger blog, public Picasa Web Albums and Google Reader, Twitter, MySpace, Facebook, and LinkedIn)

6) Show your location (Google maps)

Nokia Ovi Store

As previously announced, Nokia has finally unveiled its Ovi Store where Nokia users can download and buy mobile applications. Independent developers will be able to publish and sell their programs through the publishing platform.

While Ovi’s user interface is quite similar to AppStore, at the first sight, Ovi’s main features is the ability to choose the specific Nokia model. It means that not all the application current available in the store will be available for your Nokia phone.

A brilliant article published on PCMag delivers a detailed analysis of the good and the bad of Nokia Ovi Store with particular regard to the US market.

Apple and Nokia have choosen two different approach and models: AppStore is a software, dedicated to one (two, including iPod Touch) product, Ovi is a website dedicated to many Nokia products. The business model seems quite similar: independent developers can get 70% of the price of the applications sold.

The thousand applications available on iTunes store are actually encouraging people to buy themself a new iPhone, which has always been perceived like something more than a mobile phone. New Apple models, like the third generation iPhone and the announced tablet PC, will consolidate the model.

So, the big question is: will Ovi store help Nokia drive the sales of mobile phones?

Yes, it is true. We are willing to pay something to get what may feel better to us. However, this does not solve the devaluation issue, brought forward by the abundance we find on Internet.
The fact is that such characteristics that makes me willing to pay rather than getting that thing for free has a value that is lower than the value of the “things” were I have to buy it since no free copy is available.
If a song in the “pre-Internet” world was worth 10 euros (I had to buy a record with that song and other songs I may not have fancied), now the convenience to get that song through the iTunes store, rather than getting it for free looking on the web, has a value of 99 cents.
However we are looking at it, the evolution of communications, and information technology, is driving the transaction cost downwards and this is not just pushing down the price through competition, it is also enabling new players to enter the market, expanding the offer and creating alternatives. Some of these players enter the market from a completely different point, they are not saddled with certain cost that existing players are facing and can generate revenues through different business models, not viable to the former. Another reason why the value of many things decreases.

Kevin Kelly, the cofounder of the Wired Magazine, has made a list of characteristics that people are willing to pay for.
1. Convenience – people are lazy, if you make their life easier they would gratefully pay for it. This is why people download songs from iTunes and the likes.
2. Quality – there is plenty of good things on the Internet but in many cases the good is mixed with the bad and it takes time to find it (in a way it relates to 1.). By separating the grain from the chaff you provide a service that is appreciated and people are willing to pay for it. Dating sites are available, both for free and at a price. People are paying for those because the quality is better.
3. Extra features – it is what is called Freemium. You get a slice of the cake for free but then if you want more you got to pay for it. Skype, Nikonians and Flickr’s Pro Account are examples.
4. Customization – You can get WordPress for free to publish your blogs, but if you want to personalise the lay out you have to pay.
5. Privacy –if one’s look at Facebook and how youngsters share their thoughts and experiences to the world, one may doubt that privacy is a concern. Actually, many people are willing to pay a fee to keep their address undisclosed, using services like GoDaddy.

There are other characteristics that he believes people will be willing to pay for:
a) Immediacy
b) Interpretation
c) Authenticity
d) Accessibility
e) peace of mind

What are you willing to pay for?