The Digital Ecosystem

In our technologically obsessed world, we purchase devices of every form and function from any number of manufacturers. For the most part the responsibility is left to us, the hapless consumer, to integrate these components into our own digital ecosystem.

Sure, some companies, Sony and Apple for example, promote their ready to go ecosystem. Buy a PS3, Sony Bravia TV, a PSP, Vaio laptop and a WalkMan cellphone or get a macBook, iPod, iPhone, iPad, appleTV and you can be sure they will work together almost seamlessly.

Other than a select few consumers, most of us buy our electronics piecemeal: a new HDTV this year, a game console at Christmas, a new cellphone for the kids' birthdays. Are these companies' success defined by how well their products act as a gateway drug? If so, Apple is clearly winning. Many a Mac was sold only after an iPod, and then the more versatile iPhone.

However, I suggest that the majority of consumers make purchasing decisions based on the functions of the device and its price, and not its marketing or brand name. The device is required only if it fills a real or perceived need. This purchasing decision making process can be greatly complicated by how or whether a device inter-operates with the rest of our digital ecosystem.

Can I tether this phone to my laptop to get Internet when I have no wi-fi?
Are there drivers available for my Operating System Version?
Does it have HDMI or Component cables.
Or my personal favorite, does it work on/with Linux?

Increasingly more of our electronics now come equipped with some sort of built in networking and Internet access. Which begs the question, why is it so hard to get them to work together. The Internet works because it is structured on open standards. HTML, Javascript, XML, and RSS allow us to consume media from a variety of producers in any format/layout we choose. Each of our newly internet-enabled devices use these open technology standards to access information from the web. When it comes to actually interfacing that device, more often than not, you will need some proprietary software, if you were smart you found a device with an embedded web server with limited set of functionality.

The question I pose to these device manufacturers is this:

What disadvantage is there to allow your customers to use your device in conjunction with a competitors?

Like stereo component manufacturers before them, software publishers have recently discovering relunctantly, the more platforms you run on, the more potential customers you have. iTtunes and Safari for Windows, Office for the Mac, Firefox and Google Chrome for Mac, Windows and Linux to name a few.

It seems like every other week a new "platform" is announced, complete with its own app store.

How well do these new things "work" together?

Must we physically touch all of them in order to use them together?

Remember turning on the FM stereo and holding your tape recorder not too close to the speaker so you could record that song for your mix tape? Well, if you are under 30, trust me, it was not rare.

At this point we need to consider a more seamless digital ecosystem, under no ones control or we will all spend the first hour after arriving home turning on this, that and the other device, pinching, scrolling, clicking, and pushing buttons.

A few simple rules, agreed upon by all could change how we interact with all of our devices.

In part 2 of this series we will examine the proposed solutions that exist now.