What goes into a good design? It's a balance of technology, business and people. That seems obvious, yet so many companies will forget the people. In Silicon Valley, people just get driven by the technology--because it's possible and because we know how to do it. A good solution looks obvious, but those simple solutions are rarely obvious. A great example of that in terms of design we have done is the first Microsoft mouse, the one shaped like a bar of soap...That product looks like it was bound to happen. It looks natural. There's not much to see, and yet there is not one detail on that product that isn't there for a very, very good reason.
You get some very ergonomic (mice), but often the problem with those very sculptured ones is that you're forced to use it in a particular way, and people don't like that. It might feel very seductive the first time, but it's just a mouse. You should be able to use it in a hundred different ways, move it with your elbow. Keeping it simple allows you to do different things.
So a good product should be simple?
That's one of the things we're always trying to focus on. What is the minimum you need to do? So much of the Valley focuses on "What more could you do? How many more bells and whistles can you add to it?" We find that most people's experiences are that they just like doing the minimum really well. Even these things (he holds up a cell phone)--there are so many things you can do, but I just want to make a phone call.
Five years from now, what do you think will be big?
Gut level: I think wireless is going to have a huge impact. I think it will happen in parallel at the enterprise level and the home level. It will start affecting how people listen to music, how people watch movies. I don't really understand what is stopping greater adoption of broadband, because that is the other thing. Those two things have to go together. I think many people two or three years ago would have predicted that broadband would have high adoption rates. Maybe it just costs too much. Right now in Europe, broadband is available for $20 a month.
It might take off once Internet access means music, but that particular one is driven by the legal issues. The entertainment industry hasn't figured out a model that makes sense. I think we would all predict that (greater broadband adoption) will happen. It's just very hard to tell whether it's two years, five years or 10 years--the idea of subscribing to music or video, not having one's personal library but having access either on a onetime, multitime or lifetime basis, depending on how you pay for it.
What about future prospects for handwriting and speech recognition?
I think it will happen, but it is very tough (to develop an accurate program) so it is hard to predict when. Many of us prefer to handwrite rather than sit there with a keyboard. However, there is a fairly low tolerance for failure.
Speech might be one of the real drivers of increasingly powerful processors from Intel...They are driven to find need for increased processing power. The car is a great environment for speech, and will probably one of the first to make inroads into speech.
Do you think the idea of an intelligent wardrobe, where a computer is woven into your shirt, will take off?
I see miniaturization but I don't see wearable computers. I think the wearable peripheral (such as hands-free wireless accessories) will take off. I wouldn't have predicted two years ago how quickly people get comfortable speaking into the void walking down the street, but they have. It's remarkable how people have become accepting of that. So I think maybe some visual peripherals, like displays built into glasses. But woven into your clothing? I don't think we're that far. I've never understood that.
So you don't think all these things will converge?
I think we have what you could call a magpie syndrome. We like stuff. We like these little personal things. That is one of the reasons I don't believe in this (idea of) integration. I don't see myself in the future walking around with one of these things that is my computer, my telephone, my PDA, my MP3 player, my camera. Because then what would I buy, what would I buy for Christmas? This is it? This is all I need?
I do seriously believe that if this (device) does it all, it can only do it in a very compromised way. Whereas there will always be demand for great photo and audio quality.
Internet appliances like the Audrey (3Com's Web-browsing appliance tailored for the kitchen countertop) were supposed to be a great success, but they didn't sell well. Why is that?
The idea of sitting at your kitchen table browsing the Internet is too early. It's really dangerous when you get your crystal ball out--is it two years from now or five years from now?--but somewhere within that time frame those products like Audrey will find great success. It will be triggered by--and this is why the timing is so difficult--higher adoption of broadband and, more importantly, home wireless networks.
What about the flexible display?
We're a long way from the rollup electronic newspaper. The e-ink I think will find some uses in large displays where you need relatively few pixels. I think it is going to be a long time before you can do good color. Everything that I have seen that's at all readable is in black-and-white. But I do think there are lots of interesting display technologies out there.
Does anything in particular excite you?
It may be off the subject, but I think power--people wanting to get off the (electricity) grid--is an interesting phenomenon that some new technologies will enable. Fuel cells might. It's not that you want to go live out in the mountains. It doesn't even matter if it is more expensive. It's just self-sufficient, not getting that bill every month.
In the tech industry, who best understands design?
Steve Jobs. Probably more than anyone else in the computer industry. He's been able to market good design and get more value out of good design than almost anyone in the industry. He turned Apple around. I recognize they still only have a small market share, but they are alive and they are doing well...He has the strongest in-house design group of anyone in the industry.
And finally--white, blue, black or silver: What is the color of the future?
Silver has become the dominant, successful color. It has replaced black. We see silver in phones. Silver notebooks have been very successful.
I think we're going to go back to people demanding more variety. It's not personalization as much as wanting products to reflect one's personality. They are personal things. It's not quite the Nokia thing of being able to buy this and change the covers, but the ability to buy something that reflects a personal decision. Apple has had some success in doing that. I think everyone else will have to dabble in that.
But for the office, beige. Beige gets an awful rap, but...if you are the IT group, you don't want people complaining that they don't like their color. They want a red one. Somebody else wants a blue one. It's a nightmare.
You sort of want these things fairly quiet in the environment. So you've got your printer and your fax machine and your keyboard and your flat panels. You have this sort of consensus that they are going to be beige. Actually, environmentally it works fairly well.
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