The middle-children of Technology

We are in the middle of a war; the platform war that is making life very difficult for some (read most) of us who are now collateral damage.

BlackBerry (not RIM mind you) launched the BB10 with radical changes to the core interface with much joy and gusto. Reviews say both the Z10 (pure touch) and the Q10 (qwerty, relief for the addicts) retain BlackBerry essence, but provide fresh life to the BB OS.  

Whatever that means, it sure does not solve the dilemma of being in the firing range of Apple and Google.  

I am a Blackberry user. This, considering I make my home in a country without 3G, puts me at an advantage. I am always connected, paying a flat rate for staying in touch. Then we have Android. Intelligent, smart, attractive interface and open source. It has visual delight, lots of applications and lots of connectivity. Android, considering the people behind it, represents the future. 

However, it also represents tug of war that can be frustrating for those of us who want (nay, need) connectivity without the price tag. I am also an Android user (Sony Xperia, thank you very much), and I am often tearing my hair out (despite being bald) when faced with the platform switch and the data costs

Consider the following: 

Knowledge and it’s tools (read communication and it’s tools) should always be free:

Google’s premise is software, universal access and freedom of choice. It is not proprietary; it gives you all without asking for the price. You can video chat, so long as you have a front facing camera, and Google drive is phenomenal. All this without much fanfare. So discreetly done, one wonders why so few people are doing it. Hang out is slow on the laptop, that’s my first clue. 

Google wants a differentiated offering then Skype. On Android though, within which lies the essence of the future OS, it is like a phone call. Better, actually. Because it is for free. Designed to be seamless.

      Microsoft remains a bully:

Skype is more or less the same on my droid as it is on my phone. However, it is faster on my laptop, but is entrenched on my hard-drive, and bothers me with updates. It is quite the bully for my system, and will cut my video off without my permission (if my connection is slow) – A typical MS offering. Windows 8 is neither here nor there (again, from reviews. As a Linux user, I shudder to think what will happen when the touch generation laptops come out). As a bully, it is fast becoming a nuisance simply due to its sheer presence. Like a dinner guest who just won’t leave. Ever!

      Apple is dying, but remains a relatively youthful dinosaur:

Steve Jobs, RIP, took the soul of Apple with him. Gone is the imagination, the elegance or navigation (due apologies to Apple lovers, I too loved, once. Today, however, it is the stuff of mainstream, and has had to dance to the tune of the masses for far too long. It is now, alas just like Windows, becoming a ‘dumb terminal’). Many an Apple user later, we now have an OS which has a split personality. 

On an Iphone or Ipad, even a Linux user would want to smash the machine in half (having come from Android). On the Mac, it is joy re-defined. It is decidedly proprietary; and decidedly holding a large share of the market. So I do not expect it to disappear overnight. However, I do feel (well, ‘know’ is an arrogant word to use), it’s days are numbered.

Convergence issues:

The crux of the problem is this, there is yet to be a convergence of hard-ware and soft-ware on one single platform. Switching between your phone, between qwerty to touch, between Blackberry Messenger and Whatsapp is still a pain. Moreover, unless this convergence happens (which is why I wait anxiously for Chrome to be the OS for everyone not using Linux) the digital divide is set to remain. Billions will have to live without access.

Android was a clever move. It pitted hard-ware against hard-ware, creamed the cash reserves of giants like Samsung and Apple (and poor old HTC; fought a good fight, but is slipping behind, and fast) in lawsuits and legal battles. Being free, it prevails without having to ask the resident lawyer about each and every feature. Moreover, it allows millions of coders to make apps at leisure. Sony, I shall abstain from writing about. I cannot do so without prejudice. Let us just say, the king is coming back, if nothing else, to join the court’s inner most circle.

Google forged a path for itself that truly represents the open source paradigm; perhaps to a fault. It rakes in the cash on the data behind it all. It is not a ‘do no evil’, but do evil for a larger purpose (privacy laws out the window, Google and Facebook are you go to guys if you happen to work for a powerful Government and want to know EVERYTHING about someone). It owns us by the, well, you know what. As my friend used to say “they just choose not to squeeze”.

The digital divide, defined as that line in the sand where only a small population of the world own and operate smart-phones, is a poignantly forgotten aspect of this war. Which is why, it needs to end.

For the vast majority of the global population, a simple phone set is a new found luxury. Communication is voice and, if you happen to be literate, text. For the smart-phone users, the technology empowered; the world is becoming a vastly crowded and muddled communication playground.

Ours is the middle-age. We are the lab rats, the various platforms, application environments, hard-ware conflicts and lawsuits will ensure confusion and mayhem for a few years yet.

Let us hope that knowledge and communication, and its inherent freedom, is a given within this technological race. Let us also hope that open source, seamlessly connected to all, is the future. Let us hope Linux and Chrome are the last two standing. Let us hope my niece, who has just now discovered Android, grows up in a world where there are no proprietary rights over information and it’s tools.

Let us hope I can find that one single device that does it all.

Shahbaz Ali-Khan

Lahore, 2013