Tech Trends of 2015: You Do Less and We’ll Collect More By Drew Giorgi
Setting the Stage for 2015 In 2006, Time magazine named “You” person of the year. The award was given to “You” for being the individual content creator on the World Wide Web. That year witnessed the advent of a wide array of user-friendly web-based tools on what was then being called Web 2.0 that resulted in more people being able to create and communicate on the web than ever before. No longer was the web to be controlled by technologists who understood HTML, CSS, XML, PHP, MySQL, and JavaScript. The big three icons of the era were Facebook (founded in 2004), YouTube (2005), and Twitter (2006). Collectively they offered services to broadcast every aspect of “You” in text, pictures, audio and video. With time, their services have only gotten better—faster, more comprehensive, and, above all, more connected. If the 1990’s were all about getting online, learning to do email, search on Yahoo! and how to order from Amazon, the 2000’s became the era of getting connected, getting empowered to create, remix and share; the most enthusiastic tech commentators saw it as a great trend of democratization, at least in the cyberspace. Times change and trends change. In 2015, current tech are focused on automating life, collecting and managing more and more user data—even aspects of life that don’t seem to lend themselves to computational measurement— and getting users to pay on a subscription model. If the power of little brothers to watch big brother was celebrated in 2006, the developers of those web 2.0 platform have now made it possible for you—and them—to record and analyze every aspect of your life at the most granular level.
Automotive independence takes on a whole new meaning
This year Apple’s Car Play and Google’s Android Auto will be able to take over the dashboard on some 2015 models being sold with the connectivity options. Instead of using the system built by the car manufacturer, you will be able to use a limited collection of familiar apps such as Google Maps or the iOS music player repackaged to be safely used by the driver. So far Audi, Honda, and Hyundai have announced actual models that will have this capability. Other manufacturers that are part of the Open Automotive Alliance and those who have announced agreements with Apple may soon be showing off models at the upcoming car shows. While this is interesting from a user perspective, the real 44
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story in car tech may be more under the hood. For the past decade, cars featuring GPS systems and driver assistance technology have tracked driving habits. As Business Insider reported in January of 2014, a Ford executive told an LA auto show panel that Ford knows when people are speeding pretty much while they are doing it. While this may sound creepy—after all, wasn’t the point of getting your license as a teenager to be free and on your own—no real use was ever made of this data to change driving habits (or manage law breaking) on a massive scale. In a real sense, the car is a contemporary icon of American freedom, but there is also no icon of automation greater than the self-driving automobile. As of 2014, Google, Mercedes, and Audi have all produced self-driving vehicles that can navigate to various destinations in all types of traffic and road conditions. Google is ahead of the rest of the pack with a promise that 2015 will be the year it debuts its car on the road. The company considers this one of its moonshot projects and wants to start replacing cars driven by humans within five years; established carmakers have expressed a preference for a more gradual timeline. A lot of questions may need to be addressed at various legal and cultural levels before these vehicles are fully embraced. Lawmakers will have to wrestle with accountability and assigning fault for when accidents occur. This type of technology also disrupts traditional notions of freedom and accountability: Is it acceptable to let a five-year-old use a self-driving car to go to the market to pickup dinner if her parents are working late? If the market were within walking distance many would not hesitate to affirm her right to get a meal, but add the level of freedom the driverless car provides and suddenly we have to ask what limits might make sense. Other notions are more amusing. Right now insurance companies envision a driverless future with fewer accidents, but I imagine there are a number of drivers in New Jersey envisioning a future where they don’t have to pay for car insurance at all. Independence can be incredibly disruptive.
Wearable Tech: Your body, their marketplace
On a more immediate and personal level, wearable tech is receiving its biggest marketing push yet as the industry awaits the spring arrival of the Apple Watch. Unlike its competitors Apple enjoys a userbase exceptionally willing to try its new products and services (for example, Apple Pay took