Nvidia Ion Solves One Wearable Display Dilemma

The Nvidia Ion is a netbook processor solution capable of running up-to 2560x1600 resolution- well beyond true 1080p HD. It's light, small, and energy efficient. Go ahead and take a look at how small the reference platform is. It's portable.

Ten years ago dozens of companies thought the future of computing was going to be found in "virtual reality" displays. So they built the best stuff they could, at the time. As recently as five years ago, the best HWD had a resolution of around 800x600. And yet, it was suppose to go right in front of a person's eyes. And compete with conventional monitors. Because it wasn't particularly portable.

The human eye can see about 1 pixel per arcminute of viewing angle- about sixty pixels per degree. Let's take an example.

The Sun is about 32 arcminutes in angular diameter (it varies depending on the time of year, but 32 is a good enough average). That means the Sun is just over half a degree across. That means that, in reality, the Sun in the sky represents about 157 pixels. And a 800x600 display represents a spot of reality that is 6.5 degrees in diameter. A large orange held at arm's length. To really be immersive, it needs to be a beach ball. And each eye needs it's own independent display driven by its own graphics processors or else it isn't going to be 3D when you need it to be. But let's not worry about that too much.

Let's take a single HD display running at 1080p, which is 1920 pixels wide. That gives us a horizontal viewing angle of 32 degrees at maximum detectable resolution. That means that if the display is close enough that it takes up more than about 1/5th of a person's maximum field of view, they'll be seeing less than optimum resolution. What this also means is that it would take 5 HD displays, arranged side-by-side, to account for just the horizontal axis for a truly immersive Omnimax-type VR experience- all positioned at exactly the right distance to make the maximum use of their resolution (not so close that you see individual pixels, not so far away that pixels blur together). Do we really need that many? Depends on what we're trying for. Short answer: no. Not yet. We don't have any applications that could make use of such a technology. Every one of those displays would require a PS3 to drive it- if it were a game- plus a whole extra layer of complexity to get them all to work together. Not counting the fact that games and movies don't represent the same level of visual reality.

The human eye sees high resolution detail only for the center 50 degrees or so. I was going to say 60, but I mistyped it and decided to leave it that way. At the same time, the eye and mind are aware of detail surrounding that central focal point- detail that can be focused on by simply looking at it. And there's no way to just render the center while leaving the periphery blurry unless you're controlling what the eye looks at. Think cutscene vs. playable content. There's no getting away from the fact that, for immersion to be achieved, HMD's need to pump something like 16 (4 wide x 4 high) HD monitor's worth of imagry options for the eye to look at. That doesn't even count what you'd need if a person's head could move.

There's ways of cutting that down. And there are practical ways of using VR without it being either immersive or reality-resolution.

What's interesting, and what I'm pointing out in this post, is that if the display optics were available, the computing power needed to run it is *almost* portable.

For the moment, I'd be satisfied with an HD-resolution HWD positioned so that it takes up 45 degrees of viewing angle- the center 1/4 of the a person's field of view. At that range, I'd be able to pick out pixels, but it wouldn't be too bad since computing environments are already pixelated. It would be preferrable to having the display represent less than 32 degrees (which is wasteful).

Is it possible to make HD displays smaller than the window pane in a pair of reading glasses? Yes. How do I know? Simple. DLP chips are about that size. CCDs and optical CMOS chips are in that size regime.

What would the technology look like when it all finally comes together?

1. Think 5th generation "Netbook" with a cheap eReader display on the box for traditional viewing and sharing. More importantly, it comes with a pair of HD or HD+ resolution glasses.

2. Think multi-touch pad (could be the unlit conventional display) as a finger-controllable pointing device.

3. Multi-touch works as a keyboard as long as you can see the keys. For invisible typing, you need two things: A. You need to be a touch typist. B. You need tactile response- a physical device.

4. Tracks eye movements so you can use the device without resorting to finger movements. Voice activated search. Btw, for voice activation to be truly useful, it has to be able to hear you whispering. Or read your lips.

5. Now that you're wearing your computer, you need to be able to do all the things computers do. Which, these days, is all the things smartphones do. Including taking video. So your head mounted display, in the from of a pair of glasses, needs to have cameras built in.

6. How is the HMD powered? Is it connected via a cord? Why not? People wear headphones without complaining.

Ehh. I'm done writing for now. The rest of my ideas take too much space to explain.

Salvation for Magazines: The Future of eReader Design

Back to thinking about advertising.

In this post I will ellaborate on an idea I mentioned here.

I subscribe to exactly two magazines.  Wired and Time.  If I were to subcribe to a third, I'd probably go with Popular Mechanics.  Ask me about a fourth and a fifth, and I might not know what to say.  I'm a man of many interests, but few of those interests are expressed in a desire to subscribe to a magazine on the subject.  Instead, the internet is all I need.  Or is that the only way the magazine market, as it currently exists, allows me to think?  

Perhaps there are dozens of magazines that, if I had them within reach, I'd give them a meaningful share of my time.  Biblical Archeological Review, New Scientist, the Economist, Kitplanes, Backpacker, Cinefex... oh, the list could be really very long, if I were willing to shell out.  I'm casually, and perhaps convertibly, interested in plenty of magazines.  I'm not willing to pay any amount of money for 100% of what I can get a reasonable 30 or 40% for free elsewhere. Or at least feel that I am.  In reality, I know there's no replacement for paid writing.  

Unfortunately, there are more and more people that feel this way.  Many venerable, once-essential magazines are gradually dying off.  New magazines arise only by appealing to a broad, shallow interest.  Perhaps correlationally, just as the technology for reaching any conceivable microniche is coming into its own, the previous technology (print) is flattening into grocery store subjects (decorating, fashion, hot rods, guns, and body building).  

I could go on and on about the problem.  I could expound at length on how we got here.  But I'm ready to talk about the solution.

E-readers, like Kindle, are being designed wrong in that they ignore one of the most important ways that writers get paid- not through royalties, but through ad revunue.  They are designed for books.

So I'm about to describe the e-reader of the future.  The one that saves the magazine industry from inevitalbe information age demise.  

The next e-reader must have two screens, preferably a dual-mode, two-layer display: low energy epaper and color OLCD.  One page for text, one for a full-page ad that is present while you read the text.  Color is essential for simulating a vast number of books, not just magazines. A dual-mode display would vastly broaden the available book market at the same time. Textbooks require color.  E-readers for children must have color.  A two-page spread is essential for some kinds of information, some kinds of illustrations.  

It will cost more, but that's of no concern.  A two-screen, dual-mode e-reader can can be sold for close-to, or less than cost as long as a profit sharing arrangement exists in which advertising revenue is added to lost profits.  And the potential revenue is enormous.   

Advertising on such devices should be subject to a voluntary feedback model like the one I described in an earlier post.   People appreciate the ads in magazines.  Don't feel shy about putting ads in front of people- as long as those ads are for things your readers are interested in.  

New e-readers should always have wireless capability, netbook capabilities, but must be usable far from any available network.  They should operate in a low-power, black-and-white mode.  If you are interested in an ad, you simply tap it to see the full-color version.  Ads should be allowed to animate, or force you to see full color, only during the first few seconds after "turning the page."  I mean one to three seconds max.  Constantly moving ads are annoying and distracting. You should be able to click on an ad- all the way through to a purchase decision- without losing your place in the article you're reading.  The ad page is also a browser, or an Adobe AIR interactive document, or an order form.

Naturally, this dual-screen e-reader should fold.  You should be able to fold it closed, to protect the screen and hide what's inside, or fold it open, so that it can be read one-handed.  The button for turning to the next page should be only on the right side.  Turning back, only on the left.  That way, you must look at both pages before you can advance.  

Not every page of text would  be opposite an ad.  Sometimes you would have two-pages of text, or a two-page illustration.  Sometimes you'd have two-page ads.  It should balance out.  

Instead of flipping through a magazine, you could have a visual table-of-contents.  Each page of the magazine, including the ads, would be visible in miniature on a page that is cached for fast accessibility at all times.  The ad page could be used for this.  It is good to encourage the reader to interact with the ad page (which would, most often, be the right hand page).  The reader should feel good about the ad page.

You'd still pay for subscriptions.  But you'd pay a lot less than you do now.  No paper, printing, mailing, or mail-based subscription service charges.  More timely, targeted ads. Transparent, instant feedback.  In fact, some magazines could be distributed free to the consumer.  

You could also have an ad-royalty model in which writers get paid a bonus for the revenue generated by the ads that accompanied their writing.

Magazines themselves would become more sophisticated.  There is no reason you couldn't have interactive flash illustrations, embedded video, or links directly to related material built into the magazine articles of the future.  The same is true of books.  

The window of opportunity is rapidly closing.  The chance to employ the existing two-page magazine model will not always be available.  We will outgrow it.  There is already a well established alternative model- the internet advertising model (banners, sidebars, embedded text ads)- to compete with.

How would google feel about controling the print advertising market as well?  I imagine they'd be willing to invest in the technology that allowed them to do that.

As a consumer, reader, and technology user, wouldn't you rather have a dual-screen solution? 

As a magazine publisher, wouldn't you rather not die?  

As an advertiser, wouldn't you rather have a full page ad instead of a sidebar, or a banner?

E-readers need to evolve in this single, essential, non-negotiable way.  Once they do, all previous e-reader innovations will become instantly obsolete.

As a technology designer, wouldn't you rather make a sale than a footnote to history?  

The Next Decade in Advertising

Ideas about the future of advertising don't leap to mind as being particularly compelling reading. Well, okay.

There was a road that I often traveled with my parents when I was a kid. It was a road going west out of Randolph, VT. There was a place in the road where you could make a choice. You could go up over a hill, or around to the side of it. Beyond that choice the road rejoined and went on. What strikes me about that choice was that they were, in a sense, nearly equivalent. Neither was a shortcut. One represented lateral displacement, the other vertical. Often my parents would call for an instant vote. "Over or around." We usually voted to go over.

Since the beginning of modern advertising, messages have been targeted as members of demographic groups. If you wanted to sell luxury cars, you advertised them in the business section of the newspaper. If you wanted to sell diapers, you might put them in women's magazines. If you wanted to sell toys, you marketed them directly to the children that would play with them, hoping that the children would act as an unpaid sales force.

What you didn't do was advertise to too small a niche. You went for the greatest common denominator (GCD). And in the process of advertising to the largest group possible, you actually had a hand in defining that group. Advertising, especially after World War II, when American capitalism entered its strongest chapter, has had a homogenizing effect on how culture sees itself. We're still living with the labels and assumptions that were first developed for that era.

But this is a very different age.

When we were choosing whether to go over or around, we knew that we would end up in the same place either way. We knew it would take about the same amount of time. The only thing different was that particular part of the journey.

Those who use advertising- a group that encompasses the whole gamut of business in our post-industrial society- don't need to care about how they get to their destination. They need only one thing. They need to arrive. They need to convert customers. Whether taking them from the pool of the previously uncommitted, new spenders, or by stealing them from competitors, the path isn't as important as the destination.

And therein lies the problem with old style advertising.

If you don't care how you get there, you'll choose the more direct route. If you were to look at two roads on a map- a 2D flattening- you'd be tempted to believe that the straightest, most-direct seeming route was by far the best. You'd be missing the hill altogether.

Successful advertising has, for a long time, consisted of large campaigns targeted at the GCD of huge numbers of people. The finesse approach, which focuse on smaller cross-sections of a product's target market, often used the same advertising assets. There was an expectation that, to some degree, a product represented those that would buy it. In other words, the brand was mistaken for the product itself. It was even misconstrued as representing the target market itself. Someone could be a "Marlboro man" or part of the "Pepsi generation." Car salesman sold image overhauls in the form of hood ornaments (attached to automobiles). If you participated- as all were required to do to some degree- then you could be identified by the labels on your clothes. One could even use brands to identify oneself.

That's still how most advertising works. Big brands require big piles of money. They not only reach a broad demographic, they actually define it.

But I'm not here to write about going over.

A new form of internet technology opens up a completely new road. And the ramifications of traveling that road stand to have a profound effect on the concept of product-based identity.

Instead of pushing people into categories and hoping that they fit well enough to be durably branded, it is now possible to reach people where they already are. Instead of advertising to million of people an once in hopes of reaching those who actually could be customers (if they could be converted), it is now possible to target, with greater and greater sophistication, smaller and smaller definitions of the buying public. Microniches are now addressible.

But I'm not thinking about targeted marketing. I'm thinking about something a whole step beyond. Let me describe what it would look like.

Let's say, for the sake of argument, that you're a 25-year-old male with a new car in your garage and a hungry dog by your side. Let's say you want to watch a program on the History channel. Traditionally, you can expect to see ads for the AARP, term life insurance, and comfortable sedans. But you're not in the market for any of those things, and if the advertisers of those things knew a little more about you, they wouldn't be wasting their money trying to sell them to you. So, in our next-age example, you see ads for pet food, new tires, the most recent FPS. And you're more than happy to give that information about yourself because it means not having to watch ads that hold no interest for you.

Let's take it a step farther. Suppose one of those ads is successful. You decide, based on the ad, and how happy your dog is, to go with a particular brand of dog food. Let's say that you let Purina know that you're now one of their loyal customers.

Purina now has a vested interest in keeping you while other dog food manufacturers have an interest in poaching you. Purina won't try to convince you to switch anymore. Instead, they'll let you know when and where to find their products on sale. They make sure you know about other products your dog might like. They'll change the tone of the conversation and, in so doing, they'll solidify their advantage.

Purina's competitors may be able to identify you as a loyal customer and try to lure you away. But the same system that would allow them to craft a campaign specifically for that purpose would also allow Purina to keep tabs on the competitor's exposure. Both parties would be able to exercise their campaigns with greater efficiency. It would come down to who did a better job. Who offered a better product. Who made the customer feel more appreciated. In essence, customer service- even at the level of initial advertising.

Let's take it another step. Let's say that two competitors are vying for your patronage. One of them, unfortunately, has ads that annoy you. They're whiny, manipulative, and desperate. In fact, every time you see such an ad, it makes you want to punish that product's maker by going to the competition. So, you let that company know. You tell them, "I don't want to see this ad anymore." And they are faced with a choice. They can ignore your request and risk annoying you further, or they can honor it, replace the ad with something else, and improve their standing with you. The better their ads- the more amusing, the more powerful- the more likely you are to watch them.

One more step. Let's say that you're in the market for a new car. So you say so. Upto that point you were being shown a slow steady stream of car ads calculated to get you in the mood to buy something new. But the moment you admit to being in the market, the conversation changes. One company in particular starts putting a series of ads in front of you. You find that you now know about the car's engine and fuel economy. You have a feel for its interior. You've seen it accelerate. You've seen it in the snow. And then, one day- when the advertiser knows you know everything you need to know- they offer you a deal and tell you where to go to take advantage of it. They issue you a personal invitation to do a test drive. And because you have no real need for pickup truck, not once did you see an ad for one.

And I'm not talking about TV advertising- though TV is part of the picture. I'm talking about the ads you see while watching shows online. Sidebar ads on practically any website you might visit. Even the ads you hear while listening to your nextgeneration car radio. I'm talking about the ads you see while reading a ereader version of your favorite magazine. By the way, ereaders need to two pages as soon as possible. One page for the print, one for the ad. If you can do that, and do it soon enough, you can preserve and perfect the existing print advertising paradigm. Otherwise, print advertising dies.

What can you do about it today?

Well, if you an advertiser, stop trying to sell to the idea of the single perfect ad. Don't get stuck taking just one road. Improve your footwork. Stop thinking of yourselves as contractors and start thinking of yourself as partners. As a consumer-marketer-producer feedback loop is developed, expect to be paid on the success of your ideas, not merely for your ability to sell them.

If you're a business owner, expect more specific ideas. Expect sophistocated psychology. Expect to pay more in creativity as part of the tradeoff in getting your message more efficiently to market. Expect to learn things about yourself you neven knew. And be prepared to employ more than one ad agency. Update your approach to image-branding. Alter your expectations of what advertising can accomplish.

If you're a consumer, start volunteering information. If you have an opinion about an ad, let the company know. Use words like "boycott due to annoyance" and "great job!" At the end of the day, the consumer is the one that stands to benefit the most. The more valuable your advertising, the more power you have to support the TV shows you enjoy. Less of your time is wasted in watching ads that don't interest you. More access to news and articles, based on the increased value of the advertising that accompanies it. More power as a consumer.

The choice was whether to go over the hill or around it. The distance was the same. The destination was the same. The difference was how you got there. Do you go uphill- spend the money, build the brand, change the basic fabric of societal identity? Or do you go around?

You go around, because, as it so happens, that's where your customer lives. You don't need to look down from the high vantage anymore. You can go right up to the front door. You might even get invited inside.