The Game Changing Power of Ubiquitous Creation

A couple of years back I decided to go on vacation. My cousin’s grandmother was going to turn 100 and we were all going to celebrate. So off we went on a road trip. It was my first vacation in years and a chance to go on a beach was pretty high on my to do list. Armed with an iPod, a notebook, cellphone and a bunch of dvds (see how dated! DVDs for crying out loud) off to the beach we went.

Six hours into the sand, I get a call from the office. Client needed files and a copy of a presentation which I had given a few days before that only I had. Which were on my notebook. That was with me. email was the fastest way to give them the files. One slight problem: there wasn’t a hotspot in range, starbucks was months away from reaching the boondocks and don’t even ask about globe or smart’s 3G offering, which is nascent at the time of this post. Needless to say, right after the party we went back and the moment i reached the house, hopped on to my dsl connection and sent the files over.

OK, so this post is starting to sound like a grandfather saying, “in my time… when we wanted to call someone, we’d lift up a phone and turn. That’s right! we were smart enough to remember numbers in our head! Not like you young people today…”

A few years down the road and you can see what a breath of fresh air Jon chronicled in his recent “The Case for Internet Ubiquity“:

I was pleasantly surprised how fast Globe Visibility connected at our hotel — making the absence of WiFi in the premises a minor issue. This allowed my wife to continue attending to her clients (some of which had emergencies at the time) during our trip.

The availability of mobile-network based internet in such a remote location gives hope for Philippine internet ubiquity: the dismal internet penetration in the country can be solved. And it can be solved in the same way the problem of having mere telephones before was solved.

It seems everyone is on 3G these days whether they use Globe’s or Smart’s. And I recently fell in love with Red Mobile, sure it has blind spots but I like it and it is still owned by Smart which by the way is an interesting question why the merger went through, but I digress. It also seems that everyone is pissed off at their 3G connection whether Globe or Smart and at the same time people are surprised when it does work.

Jon makes a very valid point:

Of course, if this does happen, this is not without potential problems of its own. There are only two dominant telecom companies capable of even beginning to imagine setting up a complete Philippine mobile internet network. Surrendering the control of the Philippine information superhighway to Smart (which is now owned by PLDT) and Globe may actually create consequences similar to the PLDT landline monopoly of yesteryears. The circumstances behind the NBN-ZTE scandal only further underscores the sensitivity of this issue.

Ever since that day on the beach, I’ve been thinking about it. We all hate telcos. We all hate the fact that our destiny is in their hands. And make no mistake this isn’t a Philippine problem alone. It is the same everywhere. If there’s one thing we all talk about other than the weather is how our telcos screw us at every turn.

So what are the facts?

1. infrastructure is fundamental and i think going forward the technology to spur internet growth in the philippines will be wireless. unfortunately, this move is slow and sluggish not just in the Philippines but across the planet.
2. more than infrastructure, the cost of getting online via a mobile device is extremely high. when i say cost, i mean the hardware device. Sure new technologies are coming into play that bring the True Web on to a mobile platform. it would take at least 2 more years before most phones make this a default feature and 5 years, at least for it to be cheap enough that ordinary Filipino get this sort of access.

At the time this ad came out:

i blogged:

“Now on hindsight, I think the insane reason why I liked the commericial is this whole notion of the umpc that products like iPhone and iPod Touch are bringing into everyday life. Devices that are letting people interact with Computers, as if they’re not computers. In fact, this interaction between man and machine, is expanding our interaction with each other in ways, people only used to dream about. And this is just the beginning, I think.

“it’s multitasking. it’s important, even for ballet dancers”. Indeed. Exciting time.”

That was in 2007. In 2009, we are still two years’ away at least for iPhone’s feature set to be default in every phone in the market, even the cheap ones. As more and more people make the phone their first taste of the Internet, the ability that mobile phones can be an instrument of creation is an essential component for tomorrow’s economy. In fact, I’m going to wager that it is fundamental.

I asked the question recently, “Is the Philippines Creating 1984?” One of the material that I mentioned was an interview with Paul Saffo and how tomorrow’s economy will be about the merging of both the consumer and the producer. The nascent Creator economy we have right now, to a great extent what is happening on YouTube, on podcasts and on blogs will be magnified and delivered and made on mobile phones. Qik. Twitter. TwitPic and others is just the tip of the iceberg.

What does, how an Economy will look like tomorrow, have to do with Mobile Phones and Networking?

I think a lot.

And not just for mobile phones and networking. Public Utilities are such a pain that one day, each Person on the Earth can be their own producer of energy, of water and an equal peer node of the Internet.

Remember that MIT guy I blogged about last year? Daniel Nocera? He gave a lecture on this at the recent AAAS. His innovation in storing solar energy by borrowing from photosynthesis has the potential to make every person their own power plant. Imagine a world where you produce your own energy.

Set that aside for a bit.

Take the Network, we each complain the high cost of access to the internet. the bad service, the sluggish connection and often mobile connections aren’t true 3G. There was a time a few years ago people would look at me crazy for wanting to bring a notebook to the beach, and look for a wifi connection.

I know you feel the same pain, now.

The most promising research to date is on mesh network (roofnet), wireless mesh networks, and mobile ad hoc networks (which is pretty much similar to wireless mesh networks). I believe that to respond to this, a broadband initiative whether private or government spurred should be based on either Mobile ad hoc networks or mesh networks would be ideal in the philippines. These networks are self healing, has been used in military application and is used with the OLPC laptop. And did i mention, they are wireless? Most ideal in an archipelago setting.

(above self-healing mesh network)

Now imagine a world where each car, every jeepney, every mobile device is part of a mobile ad hoc network? Internet everywhere. Internet becomes so ubiquitous that it would just part of the air.

Remember Nocera and how I asked you to set that train of thought aside for a bit? How does ubiquitous power and network have in common? By being the network, by being the power source— each person takes the whole Producer+Consumer idea to a whole new level. Our economics will change. More drastically than we do today. Suddenly, public utilities like power companies become irrelevant. Telcos become less relevant. Suddenly our ability to communicate, to lower barrier explodes again.

My other point is this: emerging technologies can give power, water and internet to our far flung barangays. We are not entirely powerless. Sure the road to get there is sluggish, difficult and often than not so riddled with obstacles. But we can give power, water and internet.

I’d give it at least twenty years, for Nocera’s to go to market, if the technology holds. As for mesh networking, maybe in 10 years it’ll start becoming common. The Creator/Prosumer Age is now that too is the writing on the wall .

And oh, one more thing. This UMPC vision? Looks like what the iPhone is, isn’t it?

The technology to make it happen is here. Making it a part of everyday people’s lives that’s game changing.

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