The Overblown Death of the PC (part 2)

“The PC Market is collapsing.” –Business Insider

“Mobile devices like smartphones and tablets have taken the world by storm. Apple launched theiPhone six years ago. Three years later came the iPad. Google sold its first Android phone in 2008, five years ago. Is the PC dead yet?” –Yahoo Finance with the Business Insider

In Part One of The Overblown Death of the PC we talked about the reasons people believed the personal computer to be on its way out. I disagreed with almost all of them.

But that conversation on LinkedIn continued and the overall message shifted to virtualization, thin clients, and the much ballyhooed “Bring Your Own Device” or BYOD premise of bringing whatever you prefer and just connecting it to the company network.

Bring Your Own Device is not a silver bullet. BYOD is just one of a new strain of network security concerns which continue to abound in our modern age. Malware and other denial of service attacks continue to increase and are working on more sensitive integrated systems every day. As the technology for smarter devices continues to develop and as fast as new apps are being developed, malware is just as quickly propagating across this new interconnected and completely open environment.

What I hear far too little of is an understanding of the new technological ecosystem being developed. In addition to the growing iOS and Android playgrounds where few if any environmental monitoring is being done, almost no malware protections are being enacted and neither security processes, nor human awareness have kept pace with the potential for hackers to invade the privacy of billions of potential devices which lie unprotected for the most part.

Adding to this tech-soup of potential vulnerability are the complexities of virtual computing and remote desktop environments, as well as thin client systems are all becoming dependent on cloud computing technology, wide area networks and client-managed environments. Few are discussing the increasing complexity of these environments where hardware is centralized but use is distributed through a multitude of virtual environments without concern for operational capacity, network stability, and Internet connectivity.

We are seeing more outages of the Internet daily, so much so, there are applications which monitor traffic to let you know which services are currently available:http://www.isitdownrightnow.com/ . Though this tool is primarily for popular web services, Amazon has a version which is also accessible through the internet:http://status.aws.amazon.com/ . Each tool like these is predicated on the idea that no system of computer operation is infallible and the more interconnected we become the more likely we will find the opportunity to see first hand:

For Want of a Nail
For want of a nail the shoe was lost.
For want of a shoe the horse was lost.
For want of a horse the rider was lost.
For want of a rider the message was lost.
For want of a message the battle was lost.
For want of a battle the kingdom was lost.
And all for the want of a nail.

The death of the desktop computer is built around the idea we have managed to supersede what the tool has given us.

• That we have managed to secure our environments, to create infrastructure which will support wireless technologies, metropolitan area networks, and the inevitable planetary-area networks we are designing.
• That we are able to effectively isolate and route around failed areas of the largest network which connects us all, the internet. The jury is out.
• That we have greater control of our soon-to-be completely necessary planetary network in such a way, hacking vulnerabilities are a thing of the past, every system which is put on that network is aware of how to deal with potential threats, without human intervention and will do so in a fashion so humans can simply be informed without having to worry about restorations of a failed environment, first.
• That scrupulous use of said planetary network ensures no one will be using it to unlawfully monitor its users, manipulate the users or their data, socially engineer user behavior for profit, perform acts of vandalism or terrorism, using said network as part of a control system and structure for acts of military warfare or sabotage.

So, is the desktop dead? Is that even the right question?

Perhaps the question should be: Is the desktop computer being killed by corporations who want to manipulate users into a cycle of:

• Regular planned obsolescence – creating underpowered devices which need constant upgrade to deal with software bloat, development issues and a constant need for upgrades.
• Consumerism – the technology is really being structured around pushing products, dependence and reliance on said devices (extending the reign of television advertising in the new medium).
• Development Control: by getting rid of users ability to create information this creates a more passive audience waiting for new “products” and “fees” for receiving them. 
• Health issues: The long-term effect of using said devices in terms of user health (eyestrain, inattention, psychological distress) and destroying the environment to feed the engine of gadget production.

Is the death of the PC being artificially hastened to sell portable digital technology, even when financial, economic, social, and technological safeguards for that technology are not currently in place? Oh yes, I would say so, just from watching the industry and its lust for profit.

The PC is not dead. But we are sealing it up alive in the coffin for profit’s sake. Think of how much money can be made while new interfaces are being developed. Think of all the planned obsolescence inherently built into each device, replacing it after only 6-12 months. Imagine all of that technological churn being done, the billions spent on advertising new versions of old devices with only minuscule differences making corporations like Apple some of the most profitable agencies on Earth. Think of the ever-expanding app industry estimated to grow to $25 billion dollars in 2013 and continuing to grow. There is so much money to be made by Apple, Samsung, Nokia, Motorola, and other device manufacturers I can’t see them NOT promoting the device/gadget over desktops. The potential profitability is absolutely astounding. Charge as much for a handheld device as you do for a laptop with 1/10 the functionality, but call it mobile. “Make a gadget cool, and the sheep will follow.”

If the PC is dying, I suspect someone is killing it; for a profit. And it’s not the butler.

See Also: Gadgets: A Perfect Storm of Wrong – Where I discuss the environmental issues around the constant proliferation of gadget/device technology.

What happened to funding real innovation?

Is real technological innovation being overshadowed by gimmicky social media sites and apps posing as real advances in technology?

A post from the Red Shoe Agency asks the above question and then follows with the following statement: Now, before you answer this, think about it. Everything works in cycles and eventually leads to a bubble. The tech industry is no different. It seems, per media reporting, that all you have to do is create some silly app (like send a fart to your enemy or something of that nature) or set up the next Facebook killer social media site and you’re a tech darling who’s innovating and getting tons of VC money thrown at you. But are those really “tech” companies?

I can understand why this would make some techies a bit resentful. Granted, Facebook is one of the creations that changed the way we communicate. But if it shut down tomorrow, lives would not be lost (I hope). There are some real companies creating real products that qualify as tech. 

Will technology ever shift back to innovation and creation that actually contributes to changing the world, situations, lives? Why does it seem that VC is willing to continue throwing money into gimmicks?

My response: 

Yes, technology has jumped its own shark and instead of being a boon to humanity, we have become caught up in the “development” of toys (apps) which cater to the venture capitalists need to make money without actually providing society with any useful developments.

Yes, technology developers will say I am avoiding the most important part of this idea, which is the making of money. And to them, I say, nay, you are missing the most important part of this equation, innovation which moves the species (humanity) along the path toward actualization.

I suspect in this, the final century of humanity we will have to make difficult choices. One of them will be to decide what we want to develop in terms of our technology. We can continue to fritter away intellectual capacity (which seems to be stagnating overall) on toys, apps and gadgets which, while often profitable, using social conditioning to create need, do not address any real issues in our society.

We have no problem finding money for gadgets and less useful software but true research, of the kind which once allowed NASA to create a variety of technologies we use without even being aware of it, becomes harder and harder to secure. (NASA’s spin-off technologies – http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NASA_spin-off_technologies).

Venture capitalists will say the creation of money is the most important endeavor humans can make today and software development of the kind we are seeing may certainly be profitable, but in a world with a plethora of problems, what people are focusing their time and energy on will only be significant if we resolve the greater technological and sociological issues surrounding our society first.

What issues? Here is a quick and dirty list:

• reasonable and affordable health care,
• a collapsing economic structure that needs a complete retooling,
• reducing military interactions in foreign countries,
• feeding and caring for the disenfranchised members of our societies,
• our failing education system and improving its quality,
• economic disparity between the rich and poor,
• the digital divide all over the world and in all layers of economic strata,
• effective socio-economic relationships with other sovereign nations,
• global climate control and management,
• toxic waste and overall waste management,
• desertification of our food producing areas on our planet,
• destruction of our planet’s rain forests at 20 square miles a day,
• eradication of cancer,
• HIV, AIDS, and management of growing list of antibiotic resistant strains of bacteria, 
• renewable energy development,
• loss of fossil fuels and what that means to our lifestyles,
• failing infrastructures of power and roads and
• corporate malfeasance just to name the few I could think of in about 30 seconds. 

There is nothing wrong with making money. Except when making money overshadows making anything else. As sea levels rise, 200 million people all over the Earth will be forced to move, causing the greatest mass migration in human history. Find any shoreline or island, find a city within 25 miles and you can see the scope of just this one thing (climate change, rise of the seas) can cause. I can assure you, there is no app for that.

Technology can solve problems or cause them. It’s how you use it, develop it, adapt it, utilize it and innovate it that makes the difference. Choose wisely.

Thaddeus Howze
A Matter of Scale

iPad2 = Macintosh SE-30

Macintosh se30: Remember when this was state of the art?

Big business is out to steal your PC from you. You may not realize it but if you are a real consumer, you have a plethora of technological gadgets at your disposal: digital camera, digital camcorder, cellular phone, smartphone, desktop computer, laptop computer, digital reader, digital handheld (iPad, Xoom) devices.

Have you noticed the trend in the industry to convince you to consolidate your devices? They tell you its about you having the convenience to carry only one device or less devices. Hence your digital camera and your cell phone became a single unit. Now it takes crappy pictures and can barely hold a decent call while you are moving faster than a walk, but you only have to carry one device. Then they wanted you to believe your cell phone could double as a computer interface giving you access to the internet and your email, and your Facebook and your Twitter account.

So, now you have a crappy camera, connected to a barely usable cellphone that also allows you to connect to the internet at dialup speeds (Wheeeee!) and can surf the overburdened telephone network with your supersized web pages that have long since ditched any level of simplicity and instead download scripts, and php pages and database files and viruses to your handheld that does not have any anti-virus protection and they tell you its a good thing because you don’t have to wait until you get back to your computer to use Facebook or Twitter or email or whatever services they are pushing off onto your bank account next.

Lets not forget the constant push toward the cloud, and the constant need to convince you the cloud is good. “To the cloud” is the watchword for Microsoft ads these days. Does anyone watching these ads have any idea of what “the cloud” is? Do they have any idea of the fact they are simply doing what we have done for the last thirty years as distributed computing. If the word “Wang” means anything to you, you have dealt with distributed computing before. And if it doesn’t, you are likely paying for a service you don’t need or know enough about to be giving money away before you find out what it is. I am not trying to cause anyone to be concerned, per se. But I am tired of hearing about how the cloud is going to save us. Let me tell you what is really going on.

Big business has only one agenda. To separate you from your cash. If you work for corporate America, their second agenda is to make sure you aren’t make much cash to begin with, the better to keep you coming to work tomorrow. The best way to separate canny consumers from their cash today, because let’s face it, you are going to be more frugal than you have been in the past, with the economy the way it is, so you have to be convinced, okay, let’s keep it real, tricked, into giving big corporations your hard earned money.

3G, 4G, 5G: no standards for any of them, so when will you know you have it?

So the three card monty goes something like this: Big business wants more customers to pay more fees for services they don’t need so they need to convince people to use something they don’t need and create a non-existent need so people will feel they are being left out if they are not able to participate. The predicted market for smartphones is estimated to be sixty million devices by the year 2014. There are a lot of fees associated with smart phones. Phone purchase, check, service activation, check, data transfer fees, check, peak hour fees, check, non-subscriber connection fees, check, the purchase of apps for your smart device, check, antivirus (not yet available, but coming soon to a smartphone near you,) 3G or 4G or 5G network connection fees and any miscellaneous fees they can hide inside of the fine print you are too damn busy to read, check.

So what does this have to do with your computer? Glad you asked. Smartphones suck. They are, for all of their technological wonderfulness, simply inadequate for you to do anything significant on. Hence the creation of the laptop, notebook, notepad, iPad, Xoom devices designed to cost less than a desktop/laptop, in theory, and offer you access to a computer-like interface so you can be away from home and work on ideas while you are sipping your latte at Starbucks. And they sell them, like the second coming of Jesus, and if they were as wonderful as they are made out to be, they might be worthwhile, but in comparison to a good desktop, they are simply inadequate to the task.

Underpowered, overpriced, sleekly designed, and marketed with a level of cool that would make liquid nitrogen jealous, they are the most useless devices on the market today. They have all of the failings of smartphones, only bigger. Pitiful CPUs, slow performance, laughable network speeds, slow loading browsers, in some cases, incomplete or poorly performing operating systems (no Flash? Come on, only one of the most important developments since video came to the computer) No keyboards, no mice, no connectivity to printers (in earlier iterations) and most importantly, no real reason to exist except someone said they should. They are designed to required a variety of external peripherals, wireless interfaces, specialized keyboards, stands, covers, bags and the list goes on. When you are finished equipping the device with the tools necessary to be useful, you would have been better off with a laptop that you could actually work on.

Which brings me to the ultimate idea here. When you have been convinced to give up your desktop for this underpowered interface device, you are basically being told, Go Back to Being a Consumer of Content. We want to sell you access to the internet and its services. Anything you used to get for free, we expect you to pay a pretty penny for, in some cases more than you did when it actually cost twice as much to create. This is another fee you have to pony up for and you are losing your ability to create content easily because none of the interface devices: smartphone, iPad, Xoom, etc make it really easy to create content worth looking at, with the power, speed, facility, and connectivity you get from your computer. So the real message here is stop trying to make good or complex content. Just sit back and consume. Take your Soma and go to sleep. We will handle anything worth reading, creating or doing.

All of these smart devices are a menace to the internet, they are simply adding addresses and using resources, utilizing bandwidth and providing nothing useful for anyone, while big corporations lap up the network resources and leave you reading CNN and ESPN and the Wall Street Journal in 720dpi and thinking how cool you look reading while you drink your latte and drive to work at the same time. When the internet, overburdened with crappy, underpowered devices turns into the cyberghetto, you can expect that big corporations will have crafted a new internet with better security, better interfaces, more friendly tools that works better than the Internet they just corrupted and you can join them on the NewerNet for a fee equal to three times what you used to pay on their previous network. And you will pay it. The difference will be the NewerNet won’t have any means for you to create content without paying THEM.

One day, a great idea. Today, a well-designed, overpriced reliquary.

No, I am not a Luddite, or advocate running away from technology. My point of this essay is to make you question, WHY you buy technology or the company line and have you considered the ramifications when hundreds of thousands or millions of these devices, whichever they are, being created, designed and sold without any consideration for the future or the unintended consequences of those devices on everyone using the Internet. How many new devices can we create before we collapse the Internet in a twittering, social media orgasm of video feeds of cute kittens and American Idols as common as houseflies.

I don’t ever intend to give up my computer. They will get my computer and my ability to create content when they pry it from my cold dead fingers.

Soma and Lattes are counter-indicated.

If at this point, the title doesn’t make sense to you, I will help you out. In my personal belief, the iPad and all of these underpowered pieces of technological balderdash are, except for their video output a step backwards in terms of capability, usability and functionality. One day, they may grow up and be more useful or powerful but right now, we are heading backward, mesmerized by pretty video displays while we struggle to post an email using that damn touch screen.