Getting back to the physical world
I first heard of the distinction between bits and atoms to describe the digital and physical worlds back in the mid-90s. Back then, atoms ruled – books, factori...
Category: The Narrative
Thoughts on personal data usage in the age of ‘peak data selling’
The way we use deep personal data needs to change. Indeed, I’ve been saying this for a few years now. As everyone knows, megacorps like Google and Faceboo...
New obsession, new future?
Last September I wanted to go to a conference in Sweden and my boss asked me what I would do different from my attendance at the US edition of the event the pri...
Public/private messaging and Twitter’s stalled growth
The news today that Twitter didn’t grow in the past quarter had me scratching my head. Twitter did not add any new monthly active users in the past three ...
Might the losers of the smartphone boom suggest the losers of the wrist-top wars with smartwatches?
I recently saw (via CBInsights) this graphic of the impact smartphones had on the sales in different consumer electronic categories. Back in Nokia’s heyda...
Cars, phones, watches: Silly about our electrical anxiety
We’ve all seen the image of the folks sitting on the floor at the airport charging their devices. Yes, that’s where we are at: hyper-aware of every ...
Foreground:Background. Can watches save us from our phone attention deficit disorder?
I mentioned briefly in a previous post how the mobile phone has become a foreground object. By that I mean an object that requires two hands, full attention, le...
Smartwatches: definitions, lifestyle, what works, and haptic afterimages
Despite what many write, smartwatches have been around for a long time. I know this because I got my first smartwatch back in 2005 (or was it even earlier when ...
Fidgeting with phones
With all the craziness around fidget spinners, I just wanted to point out that back in the day, we used to talk about the ability to fondle Nokia phone. We felt...
We should all rethink the level of access of our mobile devices
A recent second phone theft in the family prompted me to revisit the extent to which the iPhone is secure from unwanted access. The key security hole is the loc...