i used to be a Wang programmer [ok, stop laughing, i know that sounds funny, but you wouldn't be reading this if it weren't for An Wang, inventor of magnetic core memory and founder of Wang computers, which kept me gainfully employed by day in the 80's while i fed my jazz and salsa music habit by night] and i clearly remember the day a brand spankin' new Wang VS80 "mini-computer" was installed in the raised-floor, climate-controlled, machine room at American Management Systems -- it cost something like $50 grand, was the size of an industrial washer/dryer, and everyone in the office got all excited because it contained an entire MegaByte of RAM ... that's ONE Mb, right?
the history of computer technology development can be described as "faster, smaller, more" ... faster processing and data transfer speeds, smaller devices and storage media, more memory. at no point has there ever been a need for slower, bigger, or less -- and the exact same trend is readily apparent when you look at the development of the internet.
let's look at connection speed:
If the internet is an ocean of data and your ISP provider is the conduit, then a 14.4 modem is a cocktail straw that lets you send and receive text, and voila! email is the new "killer app" ...
(btw, anybody reading this remember the days BEFORE email? how did we communicate!?)
with a 56k modem, you've got a soda straw, so graphics become possible, and thereby the Web ...
with DSL, you've got indoor plumbing, with hot and cold streaming audio whenever you want (enter MP3 and Napster) ...
these days, you've got a broadband fire hydrant, with full-screen video, movies on demand, and YouTube.
and now they're talking about ubiquitous Wi-Fi, free, everywhere you go, a city-wide, city-maintained, utility like street lights, so you'll basically be underwater, all day, every day, and the trick is to figure out how to drink without drowning ...
and each new speed spells doom for some long-standing industry:
14.4 = bye bye US Postal Service (practically the only thing in my physical mailbox these days is bills, junk, and NetFlix)
56k = newspapers? magazines? literally, yesterday's news!
DSL = uh, excuse me, record companies? those CDs you're selling are buggy whips!
broadband = hey, i'll give you $2 just to watch "Lost" without the annoying commercials!
now wait a minute! i thought this column was supposed to be about interactive audio in the mobile space -- and so here's my point: let's look at what happened with computers, and on the Web, and extrapolate what's going to happen with cell phones, because it really does seem to be a "same shit, different day" situation ...
let's check out storage media first, since it's easy to see where this is going. for cell phones, you really don't want motors spinning disks, since that would suck the life right outa your battery, so solid state is the obvious way to go. here's an array of storage media i've collected over the past few years ...
can anybody spot a trend developing? (N.B. you can get transFlash up to 1Gb these days)
now let's talk about cell phone bandwidth -- the predominant cell phone network is called GSM, and is just great for handling highly compressed voice data packets ... so go ahead, talk to your friends whenever you like, wherever you go (while driving, in theaters, at ballgames, ad nauseum).
piggy-backing on top of GSM is a higher capacity data network called GPRS that gives you transfer rates comparable to a 56k modem (adequate for downloading web pages and ringtones to your phone) ... and then there's competing systems like CDMA, which is a bit faster, and EDGE, which gives you better speed if you happen to be standing next to a cell tower ... and in europe, i hear they have a network called UMTS which is supposed to be as fast as DSL (though i'll believe it when i see it) ...
and soon you'll be able to get spiffy cool Wi-Fi phones ... and hello? this sound familiar to anybody!? it's practically the exact same progression we saw on the web, and soon enough, if you don't have a broadband phone, you just won't be cool anymore. ok, so, i get it, mobile data networks are going to get faster and faster ... but what does it all mean?
i'll tell ya one thing: you sure as hell won't be connecting your iPod to your computer with a special cable any more! (ooh, wires, how last decade!) instead, you'll be pulling your music out of thin air whenever you want, wherever you go. it'll be kinda like listening to the radio, only not, because everybody is tuned to their own unique station ... and no commercials!
i'll tell ya something else: you *won't* be watching that new spiderman movie on your cell phone, no matter how hi-rez those tiny screens get ... but you *might* want to follow the sunday football game while taking your family to the beach, or catch that last episode of "24" while waiting at the airport. again, how much would you pay to have your own, private, portable, personalized, commercial free, televsion studio in your pocket? (oh, and NBC? CBS? uh, you might want to start re-thinking your business model about now ... just a suggestion)
certainly, full, fast, web access with flash animations and location-based googling is gonna be pretty damn useful ... hell, might as well throw in a GPS locator while you're at it, never have to ask for directions again. even better if you're a road dog: "i'm in some city somewhere on business, at the corner of 'who knows where' and 'got no clue' and i'm hungry ... where's the nearest MickieD's?" can you imagine the frighteningly accurate targeted marketing opportunities that kind of technology will allow!?
BUT
(and here's comes the annoying audio part) some manufacturers of cell phone chips, speakers, and operating systems seem to be missing the point. they seem to be building and selling hardware and software that just barely deals with the absolute minimum sound capabilities currently available right now, with no thought of what's coming down the line ... which seems completely crazy to me, because a) we KNOW what's going to happen next [witness!] and b) it's going to happen next week since the mobile industry moves SO freakin' FAST!they say computers are obsolete the moment you take them out of the box, but cell phones are obsolete a month before they go INTO the box!
now, i understand it's a tough gig trying to balance the many factors of cost, R&D, technical limitations, and time to market, and i know all about the Red Queen's Race, but i'm pretty sure that if you build a system designed for expansion, specifically engineered to be extensible, constructed to take advantage of what's available now AND what will be available next week, AND next month, AND next year, you're gonna be in better business shape in the long run (and in the mobile space, the "long" run is less than five years!) basically, in an industry that develops new products and new technologies this quickly:
SCALABILITY has got to be the name of the game!
SO from an audio guy's POV, here's the bottom line: sooner than you might think, mobile devices are going to "just sound better" in the same way that your new MacBook Pro simply sounds waaay better than any Wang computer ever could ...
- pdx
cheers, jeers, and audio topics that annoy you can be sent to the annoying audio guy ...
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Do you mind passing this info on to Danger's hardware manufacturers?
Wang VS 65 here!
>cell phones are obsolete a month before they go INTO the box!
If this is so then their sales will hurt, and they'll notice pretty quickly. My guess is that they know what they're doing. A product only needs the features necessery to secure a sale. Extra features just increases the costs for consumers who may not care about that feature, and will hurt the manufacturer's sales and profitability.