> Initial conditioned responses to new media technologies are likely to be
> wrong, and especially when the responses come from technologists. The
> inventor of the phonograph thought he was inventing a medium for the
> transmission of voice messages. The inventor of the telephone thought he
> was inventing a medium for the transmission of music. And technologists who
> came of age with computers forget that the printing press is also an
> information technology (neither advanced nor obsolete, simply mature), and
> should therefore be combined with even the newest technology where possible
> and appropriate. Exactly how? That won't necessarily be obvious. (Wasn't
> that the great Xerox PARC accidental discovery--that their attempt at a
> "paperless office" generated *more* paper, not less?)
this is a great point. this is exactly what the rest of the world should
remember when they look at the japanese mobile internet. the japanese
mobile internet has turned out much differently than most people thought,
but not because the japanese are weird, but because new technologies often
turn out differently than we thought they would. even docomo was surprised
by the success of the entertainment technologies as it was betting on
mobile banking and other financial transactions. most of the initial
approximately 70 sites on i-mode are still not successful because they were
the wrong set of applications.
Jeff Funk
kobe university
http://www.rieb.kobe-u.ac.jp/~funk/index.html
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Received on Wed Nov 21 03:24:34 2001