Future casting from Intel – Storage Visions 2011
January 5, 2011, Storage Visions, Las Vegas—Brian David Johnson, futurist and director of future casting, interactions, and experience research at Intel peeked into the future and saw the TV was still there. Intel has to look 5-10 years into the future to predict computing and storage needs because it takes almost that long to develop a new chip architecture.
As content moves from cable to the web, there are many opportunities and avenues for entertainment. Unfortunately, most depictions of the future show a person in a clean, uncluttered space with some viewing device. A more likely scenario is a “normal” space with clutter and a relatively high level of comfort with multiple platforms for the content. People are unlikely to change the basic lean-back mode of TV consumption, they will just change the source of that content.
Intel’s research looks directly at consumers with respect to the future of research, technology, and design and looks at the people first. The research center has anthropologists, culturalists, and social scientists to try to understand the consumers and their directions. Some of the trends and metrics they measure include data and storage. By 2015, there will be over 500 Billion hours of content on the Web. Between 12B and 15B devices will be connected to the Web and connected devices will greatly outnumber people on the planet.
At the same time, TV will still be central to most peoples’ lives. For those too impatient to wait to get home, the content will be available on mobile devices. After you get home, you can change to a different screen to be more comfortable. People have the expectation that TV indicates the health of the world. So the definition of TV will have to change to reflect users’ desire for flexibility. Content will be a mix of traditional shows, games, DVD, and other sources that are not bounded by business or technology terms.
Users will demand that any screen is equal to TV and to the TV viewing experience. TV will inform people, with its ubiquitous nature, and it will connect to personal and social networks and media. One requirement is that the computers must “understand” the screen content and trade parts of the image into user actionable data. The user will then be able to search, move, and otherwise manipulate the images as desired.
Ubiquitous TV will move with the person and will become personal TV. The TV will use localization data and activities to find any desired content based on existing profiles. These capabilities will facilitate personal ads that match the user profile and can be inserted into programs. People say that they don’t like ads, but are willing to watch if the ad is relevant. The social TV and its connectivity will be a platform for social activities and interaction. The integration of TV and the Web will be a dramatic change in the way that people access and consume TV content.
