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Are we heading towards a tech armageddon?

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Paul Keith:
If it seems like marketing hype, it would be because old school pre-labeled marketing has always been central to innovation IMO and nothing has changed in that area except that as marketing gets dwindled down from innovation to marketing + PR + sales technique hybrid then it's easier to create false innovations but even the emotional high of false innovation hype (as a feeling) is no different than real innovation. It's all relative to what we consider a false innovative product versus a real innovative product and that changes based on our background knowledge and what we look for in an item.

Look at the history of cars, if cars weren't marketed, no matter how superior cars were then most people would prefer horses. For the first car to take off from luxury to choice to a viable entity for mass production and mass selling - someone needed to make that first car (that bad car) take off to enough of an audience that the next innovation for cars could be a viable innovation to pursue as a mass produced product. (that innovation of the "decent" mass produced version that's viable enough to replace a horse).  

I don't really see where the SUV analogy was a poor one and I actually thought you strengthened my idea by bringing that piece of adjective: Fashionable. Marketing always has to breed a market but when a piece of innovation gets redefined as fashionable, innovation dies because it gets redefined into fashionable so the next innovation that continues from fashionable tends to become the more commonly labeled "marketing hype" as fashion by definition can produce unnecessary hype for a mini feature depending on such cheap things as moods, seasons, colors, etc. Of course if there's something really innovative that can still be done for a product and someone did it, then both real and fake innovation lives side by side with each stealing the thunder of the other from time to time.

The paradox of course is that in order for something to get that first label of fashionable, the very first piece of concept/item has to be made interesting and sometimes interest comes from being fashionable enough the first time. Ironically that same criteria is necessary to stave off tech armageddon. If there's too much demand towards the fashionable then even innovation would try to pander to something fashionable until innovation dies because innovation is not allowed to be respected on it's own anymore.

The confusion may come from how the length may have disguised the relevance of why I made that analogy. The part where I brought up the SUV analogy was brought up to focus on the case of whether touch screens (as an isolated concept) was bringing forth a tech armageddon since my case was that it didn't where as Ren's case was more towards "look at how much waste these new pursuit for false innovation is making things more cursed":

What happens though when the day comes that you have to buy a more expensive piece of tablet that supports the latest Android/Iphone just to work a piece of software that should be compatible on all touch screens but because your piece of hardware is of an older model, you're tasked to unnecessarily move to a newer piece of technology AND THEN still buy a specific type of more expensive keyboard just to make up for the lag, the screen resolution, a hardware that can match the innovation supplied by people finding smarter ways to utilize better touch screens?
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Demand wouldn't be able to cheapen supply like there's no way to make up the difference between a bicycle and a SUV so poor people can't just replace a bicycle with a car if they have specific demands that need a SUV where as the SUV market would have better off people acquiring SUVs when they don't need to. Only again, the range of impact of cars does not compare to the impact of changing both the internet and OS interaction as far as innovation goes. Cars before the concepts of SUV were pretty much dead on innovation and the SUV was more an application of the redefined definition of innovation that involves upgrades like better horsepower, better fuel management, better some other parts so complicated to explain that they just provide better boosts.
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As you'll hopefully notice with the bolded part, the reason I used the SUV analogy was not about whether the SUV was a fake marketed innovation or a real one. Not saying my post didn't deal with this somewhat but in the case of the SUV analogy it would indeed be a poor example to use under that pretext because some might not know the marketing history of the SUV. Others might have a better knowledge of the marketing hype of the SUV. Still others who see cars in a more technical light (an aspect I am mostly ignorant of) might look down at the lack of technical prowess the SUV has when it did take off.

Instead, I try to simply bring a general comparison between SUVs and a bicycle as regardless of your knowledge of SUVs, you'll know it's not just a bicycle and most would have an idea how it's not just a car-bicycle comparison as shown by the fact that I used SUVs instead of cars.

By trying to establish this concept, it can make it simpler to present a case where demand (the want for a SUV) didn't mean that the SUV would be cheaper. The SUV (as a concept) would in turn have gone through an innovation armageddon because now even the consumers would not respect a better SUV nor would the poorer consumers who couldn't afford it be able to catch up to every latest modern fashionable upgrade of a SUV even the cheapest model that is readily sold in most areas of the world so the price for a SUV would always be an "above the normal cost" of cars especially from the perspective of poorer countries where cars even the cheaper ones are a luxury to attain.

Notice however that I said cars had already gone through a tech armageddon but because cars were a finished concept focusing on an isolated need (non-fatigue based travel), the consequences were not close to the horrors of a tech armageddon to it's users. The buyers simply have to settle on the idea that cars would now improve towards better and that better would be what is defined as innovative rather than the innovativeness of the concept of a car itself.

The same can be said if you just focus on touch screens in isolation. If touch screens usurped better utilization and you were no good with touch screens, that would be a horrible world for many people but it wouldn't kill innovation simply because in isolation, the tech can be sidestepped by innovations in the area of choice like adding keyboards, E-ink, creating a market for non-touch screens which keeps touch screens from being a monopoly + touch screen innovation (even if it's the cream of the crop of cheap gadgets)...means innovation rolls on as usability in itself could be an innovation or lead to more innovation. (The usability + fashionable perception that Apple got from the Ipod is what gave their fanbase the demand to try the Iphone and that in turn lead to the Ipad not being just a fashion statement but a game changer that many people wanted to acquire even poor people because the demand created cheap knock-offs: a phenomenon that just wasn't viable for a PPC or a Palm market.)

It's when linked to the tool of mobile to acquire just as a SUV is linked to the concept of cars to acquire that innovation could be killed because of things like fashion. Of course fashion is not the only factor and really fashion as a term is more associated to dresses, bags and less old people stuff like SUVs and touch screens where the idea of fashionable is closely linked to things like SUVs can better suit babies or touch screens can be more of a point of awe at the touch screen rather than something like a dress where you say you wear it because it makes you hip.

Let's just ignore that last paragraph and focus on fashion though. As you so highlighted with the SUV analogy, it strengthens my argument because fashion equates to a sense of style. Innovation equates to a sense of progress. By creating that distinction, you build up my case of innovation being redefined hence innovation redefined is much dangerous than the reality or perception of innovation used as a tool for slavery or innovative ideas dying out for a certain product used to be presented as innovative. Your reply then to me comes off like you're strengthening my argument and thus it's a good analogy and where it only became a bad analogy is where my poor communication skills wasn't able to create enough of a distinction to you to make you realize I was using the analogy to make the case for/against touch screens and you assumed I was bringing up the SUV analogy as a case for a real/fake example of innovation when that area of discourse is found elsewhere in my reply.

Target:
so what I get from that is that regardless of whether it's actual or percieved, an innovation is an innovation if someone says it is?

 :huh:

FWIW I have a technical background so it's probably safe to say I have a different view on this to you - i tend to view innovation in a technical light, and fashion is of little interest to me (in fact I'd go so far as to say that fashion is never innovative)

Paul Keith:
so what I get from that is that regardless of whether it's actual or percieved, an innovation is an innovation if someone says it is?

 :huh:

FWIW I have a technical background so it's probably safe to say I have a different view on this to you - i tend to view innovation in a technical light, and fashion is of little interest to me (in fact I'd go so far as to say that fashion is never innovative)
-Target (May 29, 2012, 08:26 PM)
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Ehh...no.

Oh and my stance is not exclusive to one bias for innovation. (Another aspect that may confuse you.)

It doesn't matter whether you view things from a technical or a non-technical standpoint, the core of my msg is about the overall progress. That progress is what will decide whether you think innovation is about to die in a certain branch or whether it's not.

Of course the problem I have with communicating this is that I have to communicate several examples so you have to buy into my idea but, as I stated in my previous reply all in all it's the feeling, awe and realization that makes innovation, innovation.

In that aspect, you have to reverse the flow of your previous sentence and that would be my sentence. Note that I didn't say make the opposite meaning of what you wrote.

So something like:

* Instead of regardless of what someone says, see it from the perspective of every person having a right to feel that something is innovative regardless whether someone says it or not
* Continuing from there, regard YOUR own actual or perceived idea of an innovation and then move on to other people
* Then begin to set up the contraries. When is innovation not an innovation even when you or someone else feels it is?
* Then view it like a branch or a skill tree or a timeline. When does something which improves continue to innovate and when does something which improves end up not innovate and be simply marketing hype or be simply an upgrade? (You were actually much clearer on that with your previous reply
...of course after that, you will have to be the one that makes for the allowance on how there's no absolute lineage to innovation. Sometimes things stop only to gain a paradigm shift. Sometimes things get ignored because of social preference.

Of course that's just my idea of when innovation is still innovation versus when innovation has been redefined. Bringing up tech armageddon is a whole lot more complicated. It's like trying to bring up cancer to someone who doesn't know what cancer is. How would cancer kill the body? How would internal tech cancer development on a healthy tech innovation tree (a concept closer to my idea of what's happening) differentiate from tech virus even tech tumor development despite tumors being related to cancer (Ren's stance) or eating unhealthy tech foods which increases the risk of heart attacks (tech bubbles bursting) or even tech smoking leading to tech cancer potential and other health diseases (Yahoo) and why is tech cancer deadlier (prone to heading more towards real innovation dying for a certain genre/branch/concept)? Of course the weakness of this last point is now I've branched off in an all together new analogy, one that assumes there's no debate on cancer anymore but that will always be the complexity of bringing up analogies in a mass subject such as this especially with different degrees of technical knowledge/perceived ideas. Even replacing cancer or SUVs with tech zombie-fication can have different meanings depending on which zombie movies you're referring to and with what that zombie does.

Edit:

Just to highlight one more aspect as to why technical knowledge is not important, it's because caring for one subject does not even come close to caring for all aspects of one subject.

For example, I don't care about fashion either nor do I consider most fashion being innovative, but I could never say fashion is never innovative if only because I categorize certain cool things to be a byproduct of fashion.

Example: http://www.nba.com/2010/news/09/21/adidas-uniforms/index.html

Target:
so it's all relative?

surely innovation is pretty much by definition a paradigm shift, and in the absence of such a shift products evolve.

products evolve all the time as designs, materials, and methodologies are refined.  Many of these refinements are themselves the result of innovations upstream, though that doesn't necessarily make the end products innovative (though FWIW, many of the products are only possible because of innovations upstream)

and paradigm shifts are almost certainly the result of evolution.  As we build our knowledge and experience we see new possibilities, many of which were previously beyond our capabilities.

as to the armaggedon part, I think that's unlikely

Unless the metaphorical zombie apocalypse comes and we all end up living in walled compounds out in the desert (anyone read The Passage by Justin Cronin?), at which point all this becomes moot, or we'll be sending posts by carrier pigeon (or seagull?)

In the meantime products will continue to evolve, and to innovate, though not all innovations will be apparent to us as consumer's.  As humans we can't do things any other way. 

Paul Keith:
More like it would be a flawed premise to say something as major as tech armageddon without trying to assume every person's idea of innovation. Obviously that's impossible, as like a magic trick, it can be amazing one moment and obvious as you grow old/figure it out.

If something must be relative though, it's false hype. No one really has an accurate line for what is false innovation/false hype but everyone likes to think they are on the side of being enlightened as far as judging what is rightfully hyped vs. what is sugar coated.

As far as paradigm shifts go, my stance there is that not enough people understand or want to cling to the definition of paradigm shift as it was originally defined and there's nothing wrong with that mindset because even the best experts don't like to be regressive. We want to properly acquire and explain why the next best thing is truly innovative, not why it's not. This very flaw though makes it insufficient as an absolute definition. You can have a more valid opinion by clinging to that as a reductive standard for what is innovative but until everyone agrees on the proper conservative line of what a paradigm shift is, that only goes so far.

Even technical details which are paradigm shifting innovations might not truly be a paradigm shift for the word demands that society's mindset changes along with those details.

On evolution though, that's a much safer word but evolution does not equal innovation nor does innovation always need evolution and my stance there is sort of the opposite of the word paradigm shift. Paradigm shifts have a legitimate definition as far as defining innovation but evolution is borrowed from biology and even biology does not have a true explanation for evolution is. When you add that tech is easier to turn into a hybrid than creatures, then the slang of evolution is more of an early buzz word that over time became accepted as a general phrase and it's good for defining progress but not very good for defining why innovation might be devolving.

As far "paradigm shifts are almost certainly the result of evolution", I disagree but it be another set of paragraphs as to why that is and I don't think it's notable enough to write about for this topic.

I will just say this, I'm not talking about a zombie apocalypse and if I was, yes you'd be right. Innovation wouldn't die. That's precisely why I wrote the cancer analogy while adding all those other analogies. The tech armageddon I'm talking about would not kill evolution, it would continue it in a path where we don't even need to mutate the process for it to destroy us.

Compare the inefficiency of a zombie virus vs. the survivability rate of herpes for example if you want technical details but alas we're just jumping from analogy to analogy. I won't go into details about the carrier pigeons because that's not what I'm talking about. There's no one idea for apocalyptic scenarios especially for armageddon.

From wikipedia:

According to one premillennial Christian interpretation, the Messiah will return to earth and defeat the Antichrist (the "beast") and Satan the Devil in the Battle of Armageddon. Then Satan will be put into the "bottomless pit" or abyss for 1,000 years, known as the Millennial Age. After being released from the abyss, Satan will gather Gog and Magog (peoples of two specific nations) from the four corners of the earth. They will encamp surrounding the "holy ones" and the "beloved city" (this refers to Jerusalem). Fire will come down from God, out of heaven and devour Gog and Magog after the Millennium. The Devil, death, hell, and those not found written in the Book of Life are then thrown into Gehenna (the Lake of Fire burning with brimstone).[5]
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A zombie apocalypse, metaphorical or literal, is not innovation killing because it won't lead to a 1,000 years Millenium Age. (Again both literal and metaphorical). An actual metaphorical armageddon though might actually kill this branch of tech that encompasses PC, mobile and internet services because it's not going to kill tech innovation. It's going to save/bring/innovate/false innovate tech to an entirely new progress/evolution/upgrade never before seen only to set up a post-1,000 year apocalyptic scenario similar to the modern oil dilemma and what new form of energy to replace it with only finding energy is a lot more straight forward then re-mapping a replacement for all the innovative utilities that has gone past before with regards to PC, mobile, internet innovation.

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