A colleague of mine held a presentation and talked about user interfaces and ergonomics. He gave following example that he had observed: "When I see my wife in front of our big television screen and she wants to check the weather, she takes her iphone." And as she started toggling on the tiny device, he wondered: "Why can't this data be sent and displayed on the big screen?"First of all, a service called "teletext" exists already for decades in many countries. But this low-bandwidth, low-resolution information channel is in no way comparable to the bandwidth and quality of wireless internet connections of today.
So why doesn't the frustration above -- which is typical of techno-savvy people who see the worlds of telephony, CATV and computers converge -- lead to a solution? First, there are fundamental differences in technology; second, the enineers and scientists have different backgrounds and can't cross-over to the other technologies; and last but not least, commercial interests inhibit it.
To explain the last reason: there isn't a market. The iphone (or smartphone) is for mobile people who need some data from the web. The big TV screens are for couch potatoes watching football.
(photo: laptoplogic.com)
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