Arbeiten und Lieben and the Cloud
Work, love, and the cloud. Sounds like a bad 80’s Tom Hanks movie. Arbeiten and lieben comes from Freud and was mentioned in a recent Economist article entitled “Nomads at Last” describing some of the sociological changes taking place within our society through the abundance of technology and connectivity. Before we had the technology tools, but some of the ingredients were missing in the recipe including ubiquitous (l like that word) Internet service to mobile devices, phones, and computers. Recently the FCC auctioned some of the most important pieces of the sky to AT&T. The spectrum was the old UHF airwaves that we watched our 6 channels of TV on during the 70’s and early 80’s. This type of spectrum is essential in today’s fuel mixture to make the engine run. For example, the Kindle device from Amazon allows you to order books without a wired connection making book purchasing very simple. Even better, before you board an airline, just download a few books and check all your bags (if you trust your airline with them), and carry on the Kindle. Paul Saffo in the Economist article compared the elimination of cords and cables to the astronaut and the hermit crab.
Astronauts must bring what they need, including oxygen, because they cannot rely on their environment to provide it. They are both defined and limited by their gear and supplies. Around the turn of the century, as some astronauts, typically executive road warriors, got smarter about packing light, says Mr Saffo, they graduated to an intermediate stage, becoming hermit crabs. These are crustaceans that survive by dragging around a cast-off mollusc shell for protection and shelter. In the metaphorical sense, the shell might be a “carry-on” bag on wheels, stuffed full of cables, discs, dongles, batteries, plugs and paper documents (just in case of disc failure). These hermit crabs strike fear into the hearts of seated airline passengers whenever they board, because their shells invariably bang into innocent shins all the way to their seat. They carry less than astronauts-and are thus more mobile-but are still quite heavily laden with gear, mostly as a safeguard against disasters.
OK now that we can all connect with these devices seamlessly and without all the cables and cords using smaller computing machines like the Mac Air , the AsusEEE or the new Dell Vostro Machine , our computers become low power, highly portable terminals that connect us to our data living on the Internet rather than on our devices.
Cloud computing by definition is not new for most enterprises and large organizations. Employees connect to Intranet services using Oracle, BEA , or Microsoft tools that allows them to share data, see directories, coordinate teams and projects, and view shared calendars. The shift that we will see out there is not changes by large companies moving to the cloud, it is with mid-sized businesses, small companies, organizations, and families who are all becoming more nomadic and connected with small, always on machines. Why buy desktop software to manage your communications when you can do it for free with close to free tools. Working within these tools also helps users to connect socially (Google Sites - WIKI or Docs with comments). There is always the argument of security and supplying all your data to one provider is not wise. I guess that is why we place money in banks.
Last year I moved my personal domain to GoogleApps and got my wife to use the gmail tools to manage her mail and calendar. She indicated computing off of Google rather than on local software was a huge improvement. Next steps is the transition to GoogleDocs rather than Word. This may take a while since it requires a mental shift and discards old embedded ways of productivity.
Many older people will strain to recognize themselves in the behavior patterns described in this report, and indeed may never adopt them. But the lesson of history is that what the geeks and early adopters do today, the rest of us will probably end up doing tomorrow or the day after. It is the pioneers that set the direction; the mainstream will follow in time.
Modern nomads carry almost no paper because they access their documents on their laptop computers, mobile phones or online. Increasingly, they don’t even bring laptops. Many engineers at Google, the leading internet company and a magnet for nomads, travel with only a BlackBerry, iPhone or other “smart phone”. If ever the need arises for a large keyboard and some earnest typing, they sit down in front of the nearest available computer anywhere in the world, open its web browser and access all their documents online.
Once the new iPhone comes out in June, business users will connect to their GoogleApps and Exchange Services and many will leave their Blackberry’s behind. Why? The Internet experience on the iPhone is just more enjoyable and visual. Apple shows again that design fuels innovation and adoption. 2 years from now I wonder if the number of adopters of the iPhone, if opened up to all networks besides AT&T, will match the same numbers of PC vs Apple users in the marketplace. Will PC users cling to Blackberrys? The interesting part of the future adoption of cell phone services is it is not limited to first world countries. According to the Economist, half the world’s population now subscribes to a mobile phone service. My seven year old son asked yesterday at what age he would be allowed to buy one. Here it comes.<
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