Aris Silzard

The Modern Day Vacuum Tube?… Do you still remember television sets with vacuum tubes?  Of course the CRT is a large vacuum tube and is only now disappearing from the scene.  But that is not the kind of vacuum tube that I have in mind at the moment.  I’m thinking of the ones that were replaced by transistors and then integrated circuits.  As television became popular in the 1950’s – with most programs in “black and white” — and then into the 60’s and 70’s with color sets taking over, the typical console had at least a dozen vacuum tubes.  These tubes had standardized numbers such as 12AX7, 6AU6A that served the various functions of demodulating the transmitted signal, amplification, horizontal and vertical scan generation, and so forth.   These tubes, as thermionic devices, had a limited life of perhaps a few thousand hours.  The typical failure mode in a television set was a “burned out” tube.  This might be as obvious as a failed filament or it could be that the cathode emission had dropped and the tube could no longer provide the desired output (transconductance).  For most consumers the electronics inside a television set were pretty much a mystery.  When it quit working properly, a service technician would come to the home, diagnose the problem, and in almost all cases replace a tube to get the set back into operation.   A few braver or more knowledgeable souls would pull suspected tubes and go to the local electronics store and use a “tube tester” to see if a faulty tube could be found.  These tube testers would check for continuity of the filament and for cathode emission.  The cathode emission was typically shown on an analog meter with the proper settings entered based on the tube type.  Life was simple and predictable.  Television sets were purchased with the expectation that they would last for at least 10 years and typically much longer.  Even with relatively high failure rates, the use of standardized and easily replaceable components made this long service life possible. Then in the late 50’s something came along that gave birth to a different world.  While I was still in grade school, one day a student brought in what appeared to be an impossibly small radio.  He called it a “transistor radio” and with an earphone he could get reception of the local radio stations.  The radio worked from a small battery without having to be plugged into a wall socket!  Wow, this was dramatically different than the briefcase size portable radios that used miniaturized vacuum tubes.  Soon I was reading about this marvelous new technology in Popular Science magazine and ordering my own rudimentary transistor radio experimenter’s kit.   So here we are today with television sets, appliances, cars, tools, telephones, computers, e-readers and every other conceivable gadget – all containing complex electronics that provide wonderful “features” whether we want them or not.  Given all they do, the reliability is really quite good.  But certainly not perfect.  Important devices such as cars and appliances do occasionally have a failure in one or more of these electronic modules.  When that happens how do we repair them?  Do we replace the defective components?   Unfortunately, no longer.  With all the high pin-count surface-mount packages that are soldered onto the boards, field replacement is nearly impossible – and in most cases the custom chips are not available.  So we have had to resort to replacing entire boards – i.e. “board swapping”. Given the manufacturing cost of most of these boards, perhaps that is not such a bad alternative.  After all, vacuum tubes were not cheap in the 50’s and 60’s.   A $50 circuit board is not all that different in today’s dollars from a $5 vacuum tube in the late 50’s.   Unfortunately, we cannot go to a local electronics shop and buy most of these circuit boards as we were able to do with vacuum tubes.  Each board is a specially designed part and only available from the manufacturer’s designated supplier(s).  And this availability may be for a limited time — based on the good will of the manufacturer.  There are seldom second sources for these boards. The limited and controlled sourcing can lead to behaviors that are not always in the best interest of the consumer.  Recently, I had such an experience.  Our gas-fired furnace quit working and after doing some preliminary diagnostics on my own, it became clear that there was a problem that would require replacing a component.  I just didn’t know which one.  Beyond the normal burner components, this furnace has a logic circuit board that controls the starting sequence.  The furnace repairman, who had been sent out in response to my urgent request, concluded that it was this control board that needed replacing.  Now, this control logic board consists of one large IC DIP package, a few small relays, a 24-volt power supply, and a few multi-pin plastic connector sockets.  The manufacturing cost of this board is most likely less than $10.  So I figured that even with generous mark-ups along the way, I would be told that a replacement board would be roughly $100.  But what I heard instead from this technician was  “Unfortunately these circuit boards are really expensive.  The price for this one is going to be $525.”  So here we were on a cool fall day without a working furnace being given a price that is clearly beyond anything even remotely reasonable.   What to do?   These folks were obviously trying to take advantage of a difficult situation.  Now, for the good news!  The technician didn’t have a replacement board on his truck and said he would have to order one.  That meant being without heat for one more day, but it also gave me some time to investigate further.  In short order, I was able to find a replacement board on the Internet for $135.  It gave me great satisfaction to be able to call up this repair shop and tell them

It’s Not Like HDTV… Christmas is coming, Christmas is coming — and the rush is on to create the next major consumer buying opportunity.  For the television market, many predict that the “next big thing” will be 3D.  Major manufacturers are working hard to get products to market. Their marketing departments are working overtime to create enthusiasm among consumers so they simply must rush out and acquire this exciting new technology.  The expectation is that 3D will be the next wave just like it happened with HDTV. But will it really happen this way?  Let’s first take a look at some events that influenced the introduction of HDTV.  The major challenge in the HDTV transition was for those viewers who received their programs from off-the-air broadcast signals.  These viewers had to purchase a converter box, the cost of which was subsidized by the government.  For most viewers, however, who were already on cable or used satellite dishes, the transition was facilitated by their service providers.  Beyond that, the changeover was hardly noticeable.  Today we have some programs that come to us in HDTV and others that come in a variety of formats.  For those who have large screen televisions, the HDTV images appear sharper and crisper.  But if the program is provided in some lesser format, other than the resolution, nothing else is noticeably different.  In fact, quite often on news programs there will be a mixture of multiple formats as clips of events are interspersed with the commentator’s story line.  Commercials are also often in other formats than the program itself.  Unless we pay special attention, these various formats all look acceptably similar.  Then why is HDTV perceived as having had such a major impact on television sales?  The answer is that it opened the market for larger screens.  There was a serendipitous convergence of HDTV image quality with flat panel television technology.  Prior to the introduction of large screen plasma and LCD televisions the predominant large screen viewing experience was with rear projection systems.  The conventional NTSC broadcasts did not look very good on these early larger screens with their dim images and the interlaced scan lines being obnoxiously visible.  Once HDTV images could be shown and once consumers saw the futuristic-looking and dazzlingly spectacular new flat panel televisions, sales began to grow even faster than had been predicted.  This growth was further facilitated by manufacturing improvements that led to major price decreases. Now can we do it all over again with 3D?  Is this the year when consumers begin to rush out and buy their next generation flat panel TV with 3D capability?  Or could there be something that is fundamentally different?  Perhaps 3D is not at all like the transition to HDTV?  First, we must appreciate that there is no government mandate to make a transition to 3D as there was with HDTV.  Second, the viewing experience is not seamless.  For the vast majority of 3D televisions currently entering the market there is the need for special viewing glasses.  These glasses are unique to each manufacturer and quite expensive.  The expectation for good quality 3D that does not need viewing glasses is still some years away – and perhaps many years away.  And if a program is being broadcast in 3D, it cannot be viewed unless the special glasses are worn.  Thus, there is no way to seamlessly intermix 3D and non-3D viewing as there is with HDTV.  However, the most interesting obstacle to 3D is that no matter how perfectly developed this stereoscopic technology becomes, it will never present us with truly realistic images.  The fundamental problem is that with current 3D stereo images the additional depth cues that we get from head movement and focus convergence are missing and therefore our brains perceive this viewing experience as an incomplete imitation of a real environment.  Will viewers be willing to accept this imitation 3D for everyday viewing?  My opinion is that people will tire of this novelty just as they did some years ago when 3D was similarly touted as the next wave for movie theaters.  Yes, the technology is much better now and the presentations more realistic.  Nevertheless, bringing 3D to market will not follow the same path as the introduction of HDTV – a path that provided an improved viewing experience compatible with what existed before.  For consumers, HDTV turned out to be just like analog TV – only better.   Stereoscopic 3D, on the other hand, requires cumbersome glasses and, even when done perfectly, will not provide the fully immersive experience that consumers may be expecting.  Will they buy anyway, perhaps for sports and video games?  Will this market be as large as manufacturers expect?  Perhaps Santa working in his TV factory at the North Pole has the answers.  This Christmas Season may begin to give us some clues as to this important future.   Are you going to be asking Santa for a 3D TV this Christmas?  Let me know your thoughts on this topic or others.  You may reach me directly from this site, by e-mail at silzars@attglobal.net, or by telephone at 425-898-9117.   With my sincere wishes for Peace and Prosperity in the coming year – Merry Christmas.

The Christmas Piano… Did Santa bring me a piano for Christmas this year?  Well, no.  We already have a very nice grand piano that I should play more often than I do.  However, what Santa did suggest was that we take this ordinary grand piano and make it into a “Christmas piano”.  So what we did was to decorate the top surface with a red and green quilt and three small statues of the wise men.  We then placed just a few presents nearby.  This was in lieu of the traditional decorated tree and other Holiday ornaments.  This new approach to Christmas was really very simple and elegant, but would perhaps be perceived as a bit too austere for most other folks.    Why such frugality?  Well, as time has passed we have acquired most of the items we have desired, thus making another addition to all the “stuff” we already have not nearly as exciting as it may have been some years ago.  What we decided instead was that by keeping things simple we would have more time for what mattered most to us — simply having more time to enjoy each other’s company.  And the few items that we selected were chosen for quality and lasting value rather than to see how large of a “haul” we could create under our own or others Christmas trees.  But isn’t this behavior bad for the economy?  That, of course, is a difficult question to answer because no one seems to be able to come up with a really clear explanation of how the current world economy really works.  What we can observe is that in recent years just about every product we buy is manufactured in China.  We used to complain about all the items that came from Taiwan, but that has now been entirely overshadowed by mainland China.  Merchants, of course, want us to buy as much as possible, but just how many of these items do we really need?  How many of the presents that show up under our Christmas trees will receive just a few hours of use or play and then end up in some toy-box, closet, or basement — never to be used again?  In the push to create the lowest cost products with the greatest number of features, repairability and maintainability have been sacrificed.  If it stops working, toss it and get another one.  Even if this is temporarily good for the economy, it does not seem to be the best approach to conserving our earth’s limited resources.  Wouldn’t it be better to have fewer but better quality products that can last longer?  But could that work for manufacturers who depend on consumers enamored with the latest gadgets at bargain prices?  The practical answer is that without some fundamental change in our culture, this indeed is not likely to work.  Over at least the past several decades, we have developed purchasing habits that are now deeply ingrained.  These habits will not change until some fundamental force causes a shift to a different behavior. What this means for us in the display industry is that current consumer behavior will dictate the push into further cost reduction, and product designers will receive favorable responses to even more new features and new gadgets.  Quality will not be nearly as important as the ability to claim something new and novel.  We have already seen this demonstrated in all the displays on the market today.  Consumers were willing to give up picture quality for size and flatness.  The selling of the latest “digital flat-panel televisions” caught the consumers’ imagination.  Everyone had to have one and the transition from CRT televisions to flat panels occurred much faster than most of us expected.  The same thing happened with “smart phones” and now is happening with e-readers and tablet computers.  Future Christmases for most of us will not be like the one I described with our “Christmas Piano”.  They will continue much as the one we have just observed with the search for the latest stimulating video game, electronic toy, tablet computer, flat panel television, or any of hundreds of other electronic items – virtually all with displays small or large.  Catching the consumers quickly-changing interests will be the ongoing challenge for product designers.  As soon as a new success becomes apparent, we will see many other companies jump in with similar products.  Then as the next new item comes along more of this copycat behavior will be repeated.  Displays will only have to be “good enough” since other user features will be the primary drivers of sales.  However, there will be so many uses for displays and in such a variety of sizes and image display capabilities that there will be no lack of opportunities for those of us in the worldwide display industry. The few of us who tend to resist the latest gadgets and look for quality and lasting value will have to get our satisfaction from simply taking a sideline seat and observing all the action of this consumer frenzy.  We will have a few opportunities to find those extra special products that give us true satisfaction, but mostly we will have to just enjoy the occasional buying experience of whatever everyone else is rushing out to get and consume. Whether you are the consummate consumer or the fussy and selective buyer, I would enjoy hearing your thoughts about where the future of display technology is likely to take us.  You may reach me directly from this site, by e-mail at silzars@attglobal.net, or by telephone at 425-898-9117.  Wishing each and every one of you the best in 2011.

The Soccer Ball… Some years ago, I became involved in youth soccer, first as a coach and then as a referee.  Coaching, I didn’t like all that much.  However, refereeing suited me much better because the non-stop running allowed me to burn off the stress and tension that a competitive environment naturally engenders.  My first on-the-field experiences were with seven and eight year-old beginning players, but as the years went by I found myself working high school and then college games.  Eventually, I was qualified to referee at all levels including the adult competitive leagues.  And although some players may have disagreed, I think I achieved a decent level of competence.  One observation that I made quite early on was that some players seemed to be extra “lucky” and were always in a great position to play the ball.  Then I noticed that there also seemed to be something like this “luck” among referees.  Some were always having to run extra hard to catch up with the play.  Others seemed to just move a little bit here and a little bit there, with relatively little effort, but always seemed to be in a good position to observe where the “action” was taking place.    It wasn’t long into my growing recreational “career” as a coach and referee that I learned perhaps the most important lesson in playing or refereeing soccer – always play to where the ball is going to be, not where it is now.  In other words, if you can anticipate and correctly assess where the ball is going to go next, then that allows you to in effect “get ahead of the game” and be in the right place at the right time.  Such anticipation not only puts you in the optimum position, but it also takes a lot less energy to get there.  Sprinting belatedly after the ball – a ball that is now too far away to properly assess the play – predictably leads to bad outcomes such as incorrect calls and frustrated players. This wisdom can be summarized in one simple word – anticipation.  Once this concept had become thoroughly ingrained in me, I realized that this approach has value, not only on the soccer field, but also in managing organizations and businesses.  Being able to anticipate and correct problems before they become serious is much easier (and usually less expensive) than waiting until a full-blown crisis has developed.  I remember some years ago, as a member of a program committee for a technical conference, observing the Conference Chair as the conference was taking place.  He was running from room to room dealing with one crisis after another.  It seemed that nothing could go right — moderators didn’t know how to introduce the speakers, slides were incompatible with available projectors, speakers were not observing time limits, event announcements were not being made, etc.  I think you get the idea.  A few years later, I had the privilege of being in that very same Conference Chair position.  And during the conference – I had almost nothing to do, other than to give the welcoming talk.  What was the difference?  During the previous weeks and months, I tried to anticipate all the items that needed to be done (including having back-up plans) so that the event would go smoothly.  It didn’t take all that much time to do this, but the end result was a successful and worry-free conference.   The same approach has served me equally well in business.  I’m sure others have used similar terminology; I call it — “anticipatory management”.  Anticipating and taking care of situations before they become serious problems saves both time and energy.    When I was first cajoled into refereeing youth soccer games, I did not expect it to become a serious learning experience that would serve me well in my real career and even in my personal life.  But chasing that soccer ball around every weekend proved to be of significantly more value than just giving me an excuse to run 5 or 6 miles each game.  Anticipating where that darn ball was going to go next was important, but something else that was equally important was learning to anticipate the behavior of the players, coaches, and parents.  Emotions can and do run high during a game and some players (as well as coaches and parents) can handle this better than others.  The ability to control what happens on the field, and on the sidelines, depends very much on being able to anticipate and calm potentially volatile situations.  In managing any group of energetic and intense individuals, similar behaviors will be encountered.   Being able to anticipate and guide these behaviors in constructive directions before tempers flare and serious problems arise is a skill that can serve us all well.  Should you wish to share your own experiences in participating in, or managing, groups of highly capable individuals, you may reach me directly from this site, by e-mail at silzars@attglobal.net, or by telephone at 425-898-9117.

Whatever Happened to?… Do you still read conventional printed newspapers?  I do and I find the Sunday editions especially interesting for all the extra inserts such as the supplemental magazines, comic strips in color, and the many colorful advertising brochures.  Surfing the Internet just does not create the same feel of random discovery that comes from browsing through all of this wonderful promotional material that helps pay for the rest of the paper.  Two insert categories that always catch my interest are, of course, anything to do with electronics or photography.   Last Sunday, in this spirit of curious inquiry, I started to analyze what the major merchants consider to be the most important promotional features for each product category.  For example, let’s take a look at laptop computers.  Apparently, the most important selection criteria currently are screen size, memory, hard disk capacity, and battery life.  These are listed under each and every one of the laptop computers being advertised.  The other apparently important specification is the name of the Intel or AMD processor.  Now, I’m not sure what the casual looker is supposed to learn from names such as: “Atom”, “Core I3”, “Phenom II Triple-Core Mobile”, and “Core I5 Processor with Turbo Boost Technology”.   I suppose “Turbo Boost” must be especially good because is sounds like a really powerful car engine.   The desktop computer packages similarly feature memory capacity, super-sized hard drives, and mysteriously named processors.  But wasn’t there another crucial specification that was considered of utmost importance just a few years ago?  Do you remember what that was?  Remember the days not so long ago when a processor with a 100 MHz clock speed was considered state-of the art?  And then we had 200 MHz — and then 500 MHz.  Soon we hit the magic number of 1 GHz.  Was there any end in sight?  The worshipers of Moore’s law and exponential growth were predicting that we would soon have processors with 10 GHz and then 100 GHz clock speeds.  However, with my background in microwave technology, I was skeptical.  I knew that life gets considerably more difficult at frequencies above 1 or 2 GHz.  Signal propagation delays and impedance matching problems can overwhelm the best intentions of circuit designers.  So did Moore’s law and exponential growth triumph or did we hit the wall?  Well, as far as clock speeds go, we did indeed hit the wall.  The faster we tried to go the hotter the processors ran.  Heat and power management became critical issues.  So what happened to solve the problem?  We quit trying to go faster.  Instead, for laptop computers, conserving battery power became more important.   And for desktop computers the newest processors took a multi-core approach.  The growth of clock speed followed more of an S-curve rather than an exponential.  So to answer the question of “Whatever happened to…?”   Well, it got good enough that it was no longer a limit to performance for the products of interest and other criteria became more important.  Similarly the pixel count in digital cameras is now approaching the “as good as needed” criteria.  With 14 or 15 megapixel image capture capability there is really little more that can be accomplished by going to 20 megapixels or higher.  Therefore, this performance race is also coming to an end.   And again if you think back a few years, the exciting time was when the newest digital cameras had 1 or 2 megapixel imagers and were being compared to traditional film cameras for their imaging capability.  At that time, I wrote a column suggesting that 2 megapixels was about all most consumer cameras needed for typical casual photography applications.  This is still true today but the competitive environment pushed the pixel counts higher than most consumers will ever appreciate.  So where do we stand today with flat-panel displays?  The last decade was one of major performance improvements, dramatic price reductions, and incredible growth of product shipments.  We went from small computer monitors to large screen televisions.  Each year brought a new generation of ever-larger screens at lower selling prices.  But as with all other growth scenarios, we are reaching the limits.  For most consumer use, a flat-panel television of about 50 inches in size with full HDTV resolution is about all that can be appreciated.  Of course there are those who may want to go up to 60 inches of even larger.  But the limits are there even for the ridiculously affluent.  Anyone interested in a 100-inch television?  Well, of course, there are always those few!  From these examples, we can see that we have now reached the “good enough” point in a number of product categories.  But isn’t that the way it has always been?  Airplanes and cars travel at about the same speeds as they did 30 or 40 years ago – (note the attached photo taken 30+ years ago).  Our homes are built using many of the same materials and mostly the same methods as they were 60 or 70 years ago.  Today, we wear clothing that our forefathers would have been embarrassed to be seen in.  Whatever happened to those svelte jumpsuits that we saw in the science fiction movies of the 50s and 60s?  Just think if you were magically transported back to the 50s and had to try to explain to your colleagues what most people wear in the 21st century in public places such as airports.  Would anyone believe you that in 2011 shorts, flip-flops, and t-shirts are acceptable attire for all occasions – including dinners at upscale restaurants? Perhaps we should think about these technology cycles as waves on the ocean.  We paddle our surfboard out some distance and wait for the right wave to come along so we can catch that magical ride.  Some of us are more observant or more fortunate (or some of both) to enjoy that magical ride to commercial success.  But once the wave comes ashore we have to paddle out again and find a new wave to catch.  In

To Love a Gadget… Isn’t it great to see how many people have fallen in love with their smart phones?  They take them to bed each night and say goodnight to their phone as they are drifting off to sleep.  They greet their phone first thing in the morning as they are waking up.  And during the day they take it along wherever they go.   During their travels as soon as the plane lands they rush to get it out and gently caress the touch screen to elicit the latest messages.  They walk down the street so intently engrossed in the colorful images that they forget where they are and sometimes wander into oncoming traffic.  With such an all-encompassing and intimate bond can there be a love any stronger than this?     And now, we are beginning to experience this same intimacy and love for our even more caress-able and even more lovable IPADs.  How did all this come to be?  We certainly did not develop such bonds of intimacy with our personal computers or laptops.  One would think that with a name like “personal computer” at least a good friendship could blossom.  But apparently not.  We’ve never migrated beyond using them as utilitarian tools to do our typing, calculating, and communicating.  The PC’s bland beige box just sits there under my desk and hums its monotonous hum from the cooling fan.  What made the difference?  Well, recently perhaps the greatest product genius of the computer age explained it all.  Steve Jobs said the following during the introduction of the IPAD2:  “It’s in Apple’s DNA that technology alone is not enough – it’s technology married with liberal arts, married with the humanities, that yields us the result that makes our heart sing and nowhere is that more true than in these post-PC devices.  A lot of folks in the tablet market are rushing in and they’re looking at this as the next PC.  The hardware and software are done by different companies and they’re talking about speeds and feeds just like they did with PCs.  Our experience and every bone in our body says that is not the right approach to this.  These are post-PC devices that need to be even easier to use than a PC… where the software and the hardware and the applications need to intertwine in a more seamless way than they do on a PC.” Is this an entirely new idea that no one has ever explored before?  Not to me.  Early in my career I had a work experience that demonstrated the success of just such an approach to the design of products where raw performance and superior technical specifications would by most of us be considered the primary and perhaps only determining criteria.  The company that taught me that design criteria beyond pure technical specifications are of major importance in the commercial success of state-of-the-art products was Tektronix.  Throughout it’s history, beginning in the late 1940s, Tektronix has been known as the pre-eminent company for oscilloscopes.  I started working at Tektronix on a part-time basis while attending Reed College in the early 60s.  By then, the company had already achieved considerable success with its strongest major competitor being Hewlett-Packard.  Nevertheless, there were a few other less prominent test equipment companies who tried to surpass the Tektronix products based on raw performance.  Oscilloscope frequency response has always been an important parameter and in 1960 getting to 100 MHz was considered an almost impossible goal.  Tektronix products were pushing the limits and could not do better than about 80-85 MHz.  Then one day the bad news was announced that a new competitor – Fairchild – had achieved the magic 100 MHz bandwidth with a product that looked quite similar to the Tektronix laboratory oscilloscopes.  There was great concern among Tektronix employees that this would have a major negative impact on sales.  But surprisingly it didn’t. Why not?  As it turned out there was much more to the Tektronix products than raw performance.  They had a distinct look and feel that competing products could not duplicate.  The layout of the controls, the precise operation of the switches, the excellent waveform images produced by the Tektronix-designed and Tektronix-manufactured CRTs, and the overall look and feel of superb mechanical and electronic precision turned out to be more important than an extra 15 or 20 % of bandwidth.  Engineers and scientists were requesting their employers to purchase Tektronix oscilloscopes because they were in fact in love with them.  The Tek ‘scopes were a pleasure to use and made every laboratory look state-of-the-art.   Howard Vollum, the key founder of Tektronix, recognized this early on and the culture he instilled lived for many years after his passing.  As a part-time employee and then later as a full-time technology and business manager at Tektronix, I always appreciated this culture of product excellence that transcended the drive for pure performance specifications. Thus, it is easy for me to appreciate what Steve Jobs is saying.  This attention to the human side of technology can be even more important in consumer products, especially since we all have our smart phones and IPADs with us for many more hours each day than our oscilloscopes.  However, the next time you are in a laboratory and see a Tektronix scope – go ahead and give it a good caress.  Perhaps turn a few knobs and punch a few buttons – it will feel almost as good as caressing the screen on your new IPAD.  Should you wish to comment on this topic or others – using your smart phone or IPAD of course — you can reach me directly from this site, by e-mail at silzars@attglobal.net, or by telephone at 425-898-9117.

A Future Full of Surprises… For a moment or two, let’s take ourselves back about fifteen years to the middle ‘90s, and let’s pretend that our job is to try to predict what new technologies and products will be available in 2011.   If we are correct, we will become rich and famous.  However, if we miss, we will also be rich and famous because we will write books about how computers will soon be smarter than humans and how we will achieve immortality by 2020 because of medical technology advances.  So even though there is no way to lose at this game, let’s give it a try anyway. In the mid-90s, would you have predicted the ubiquitous presence of search engines in 2011?  Type the name of any product, part number, software routine, or generic language term into your computer and instantly find out everything that anyone may know about it.  If you did anticipate this capability, you were probably one of the early participants in the founding of Google.  Would you have predicted the evolution of multi-touch technology?  Would you have imagined the capabilities currently available from cell phones and tablet computers?  Microsoft certainly didn’t.  Would you have imagined that everyone would be downloading hundreds of “apps” that expand the capabilities of portable communication devices?  And would you have predicted that in a span of just a year or two we would all be participating in social networks such as Twitter and Facebook?  Well, if you saw even some of this coming, you are probably a superior being from another planet or another dimension.  From what I have been able to determine, all of the self-proclaimed futurists that were born on this planet missed forecasting each and every one of these major new developments.  In the mid-90s what was predicted — and that more or less came about — was that computers would continue to evolve in their capability and that the cost of computation would continue to decrease.  However, CPU clock speeds did not continue to increase as anticipated because we hit the wall with how much heat could be dissipated.  Display technology, and especially large flat-panel displays, actually progressed somewhat faster than predicted.  Also, LCD technology became more dominant, at the larger panel sizes above 40 inches, and became more cost competitive with plasma panels than most of us in the display industry anticipated. Some well-recognized futurists predicted that by now we would be interacting with our computers through voice recognition, automated language translation, and we would be using “retinal” displays to access information.  But was there even a passing mention of the possible future for “touch” or “touch and swipe” technology?  And what about “apps”?  Who imagined how those would pop into our lives and become indispensable in just a year or two? How could so many have missed so much in such a short time span?  Perhaps some things are easier to predict than others.  I have found that it is possible to predict with reasonable accuracy technology developments that are based on the behavior of materials and subsequent manufacturing scale-up.  For example, the growth of flat-panel displays was predictable with a careful analysis of the status of the basic materials and how they performed in the laboratory and in prototype displays.  From this knowledge, it was possible to analyze and forecast how long it would take for manufacturing process development and factory construction.  This basic process of analyzing materials and their technology implementation is as valid today as it was in the mid-90s.  However, where we seem to get unpredictable surprises is when we combine technology with human behavior.  Base technologies give us a “tool-box” for making a variety of products.  Then when we introduce new features that evolve from certain unfulfilled or unrecognized desires that we may have for ourselves or for interaction with others, we open the field to some unexpected and surprising results.  What is especially amazing and surprising about this product evolution process is that it seems to have a period of randomness about it followed by a sudden jelling of a dominant outcome.  So given this, what can we predict for the next 10 years? We can predict with good certainty that evolutionary technologies that depend on the development of new materials will occur just about the way we expect.  The development of manufacturing processes and manufacturing scale-up to deliver new products to the marketplace will also occur at a predictable rate.  But how this infrastructure will translate into new products that are exciting and capture consumer enthusiasm is, in my opinion, about as predictable as the next earthquake.  We know that there will be some quite surprising developments forthcoming, but what they will be and when they will happen – that we don’t seem to be able to foresee.   For the answers you may need to check back with me in 2021.  And as for all those futurists who have books in print from the mid-90s.  Well, perhaps they can hope that no one will remember to look them up.  Should you wish to offer your thoughts on the future or on my observations, you may reach me directly from this site, by e-mail at silzars@attglobal.net, or by telephone at 425-898-9117.

IF ONLY – in Stunning 3D Perhaps you have heard or read some of the following: “We need to come up with the next great technology advance to sell a whole new generation of flat-panel TV’s.”  “3D TV will be the answer – if only we didn’t have to put up with those heavy and expensive active shutter glasses.” “3D TV with passive polarizing glasses is the answer – if only we could find a way to not need glasses at all.” “3D TV with auto-stereo is the answer – if only the viewer didn’t have to sit in a particular location to see the 3D effect.” “3D TV with perfect auto-stereo is the answer – if only the image would show parallax shifts like a real scene as the viewer’s head changes position.” “3D TV is the answer to achieving immersive reality – if only the image focal plane would shift with the object’s position.”  If only we could do all this, then indeed we might be on the way to having the great technology advance that leads the way to a generation of new display products; the technology that make consumers want to rush out and replace their existing flat-panel TVs and computer monitors.  But we can’t! At the recent SID Display Week, there were many demonstrations of the latest advances in 3D technology.  I was especially interested in the half-dozen or so new products that showed auto-stereo images.  By some industry pundits, this is considered to be the holy grail of 3D technology because it will eliminate the need for either active or passive glasses.  It would certainly be a step in the right direction if the viewing experience were as good as with the glasses.  But so far, it is not even close to approaching that level of “goodness”.  All of the demonstrations that I saw had serious limitations.  The viewer had to be positioned in one of several “sweet spots” to see the 3D effect.  That in itself presents a serious limitation.  However, the real problem I observed with every one of these displays was that as I moved my head from the center of a sweet spot to where the stereo effect was beginning to disappear, I experienced severe eyestrain.  It was bad enough to make me feel dizzy and I needed to look away to regain my bearings.  Apparently, as one eye was leaving the zone of the 3D sweet spot and the other eye was still within the zone, a visual conflict was created that caused the eyestrain that was so bothersome.   My conclusion from seeing these demonstrations was that this technology is not yet ready for serious product applications.  There may be some early 3D applications for hand-held games.  But if these displays are used for extended periods by children there could be undesirable side effects on their still developing visual systems.  Currently, both the display industry and the motion picture industry seem to be in a mad rush to push ahead with stereo 3D in the hopes of creating the next generation of hot new products that will dominate the marketplace.  But as we have noted before in these columns, the path to 3D stereo is not going to be the same as the path that led us to HDTV.  On June 2, I presented a talk at a conference put on by the Vision Performance Institute of Pacific University.  My talk covered many of the challenges that will be faced in bringing 3D products to market.  Should you wish to review the slides from my talk you may do so by clicking here on 3D Presentation.    I would be interested to hear your thoughts on how you think this technology will evolve and when, or if, it will become a mainstream viewing experience.  You may reach me directly from this site, by e-mail at silzars@attglobal.net, or by telephone at 425-898-9117.

Cloudy with a Chance of Information Rain… Suddenly, “Cloud Computing” seems to be bursting out everywhere.  The basic concept has been drifting around for some time, but recently the computing skies have been darkening for an apparent gathering downpour.   What do these information clouds really hold?  Some info-casters say they will soon store all the information that our desktop and laptop computers currently store.  But why would I want to pay someone to store all the information that my local little-bitty cloud can currently store for free?  Do I want the extra assurance that this big cloud in the sky is somehow more reliable than my local cloud?  However, I’ve already given my own little cloud a companion backup cloud in case something goes awry.  Frankly, I’ve never found a good reason to trust those big puffy corporate information clouds drifting by.  They too can have their vagaries of when and how they respond to my requests for information rain or when they choose to pretend not to know anything at all about me. Of course if you are in a large group environment, such as a medium-sized or larger corporation, there may be advantages in reliable centralized storage where everyone can access and share information.  The question then may be whether a bigger cloud is more reliable and less susceptible to undesired intrusions.  Even then, is it more cost effective than a smaller cloud that is locally maintained and managed? While these potential — and mostly financially driven — advantages cannot be denied, are they sufficiently compelling to create the behavioral shift that will be needed to move us from smaller local information clouds to great big sky-filling ones that will be created and supposedly maintained for our benefit by a few humungous corporate entities?  My personal conclusion has been that I will not make any changes in how I work with my desktop and laptop computers until I see advantages that I cannot readily implement on my own.  To add a bit of perspective to this discussion, consider the recent history of the tablet computer.  Microsoft introduced and promoted a version of this concept several years ago.  At every presentation by a Microsoft manager, the speaker held a tablet in the crook of one arm and used a pen pointer with the other hand to advance the slides.  It looked quite uncomfortable and did not provide any advantage anyone could see.   Beyond that there was really no reason to do word processing, spread sheets, or presentations on a tablet – tasks that could be done easier on a laptop or desktop computer with a keyboard and a mouse.  So in the end, we all took a good look and walked away.  Then along came Apple with the iPhone and the era of the touch screen and “apps” was born.  Once this happened, the realization grew that with all the information now being accessed and downloaded a larger version of an iPhone display could be an interesting product.  Suddenly, in this new “information acquisition” mode the tablet becomes a useful device.  Microsoft was working from the viewpoint of the PC where the device is primarily used to create information such as Word documents whereas Apple recognized the new paradigm where the device is used primarily to acquire information.  This fundamental change in thinking about how this device can be used allowed a failed concept to become a highly successful product category.Is it possible that Apple can do this again with Cloud computing?  Recent news releases hint at an approach that could introduce a capability that would cause even someone as conservative as me to move all my data into this big Apple-shaped cloud in the information sky.  As I understand some of the announcements, Apple will create a capability that will allow us to effortlessly have any of our information accessible on each and every device we own.  So, for example, if I take a photo with my iPhone, it will instantly be available on my laptop and desktop computers.  If I download a song on my iPod, it’s also available on all my computers.  No more transferring of information onto a flash drive and then loading it onto other devices.  And, of course, other family members could also be connected to this personal cloud.    Suddenly, even in rainy and cloudy Seattle this cloud computing stuff begins to make sense and look exciting.  Perhaps, it just took someone with a new perspective to convert a brute force, mostly financially driven, concept into something exciting and highly useful to each and every one of us.  Should you wish to share your thoughts on this topic or others, you may contact me directly from this site, by e-mail at silzars@attglobal.net or by telephone at 425-898-9117.

Lost Convenience… Seattle used to have two major daily newspapers.  They were natural competitors and worked hard to deliver an excellent product and provide excellent customer service.  However, as happened in many other metropolitan areas, over time these newspapers began to struggle to stay financially viable.  Soon, as advertising revenue continued to drop, the struggle became one of basic survival.  The classified ads that had for many years been a major source of steady income went away to the land of electronic communications.  Stopgap measures were attempted to try to save both papers.  It was agreed that the one more dominant newspaper would provide printing and delivery services to the other. But given the natural competition, it wasn’t hard to predict that this arrangement would soon fall apart.  And it did. Unfortunately for me, I preferred reading the newspaper that was having the biggest financial struggle.  The final outcome was that this newspaper decided to stay in business but to be an on-line only publication.  The dominant paper took over all the printed and home-delivered subscriptions.  And, since I still enjoy reading a paper while having my breakfast cereal there was nothing to do but switch to this one remaining home-delivered newspaper.     There was, however, some editorial content and a few other interesting features that could not be found in the surviving paper.  Thus, the obvious solution was to incorporate a bit of electronic on-line news reading into my daily schedule.  This experience soon led me to a natural comparison of what works best on-line and what doesn’t. One obvious benefit of the on-line version is that the news can be posted as quickly as events occur.  The “front page” can be changed and updated many times during a day.  Content can be as colorful and dynamic as the editors wish it to be.  And, of course, there are no printing or home-delivery expenses.                        But no matter how much I try to adapt to on-line reading, there is a lost convenience that I am unwilling to accept.  In the printed version, many pages can be scanned quickly and items of interest are instantly visible.  The on-line access is slow and laborious by comparison.  Take, for example, something as trivial as reading a page of comic strips.  In the printed paper, I simply turn to this page, scan through them, and stop and enjoy a more detailed look at the ones that contain the most “wisdom”.  On the other hand, on-line I have to access and open the home page of the paper, then click on the “comics” tab that then brings up a list of the ones available.  Then I have to click on each one individually and wait for the page to open.  Next, I have to close this page, go back to the list, and click on the following one of possible interest.  There is no way to quickly overview all the strips and see which ones may be of interest to me.  This in itself is a clumsy and time-consuming process, but there is something else that makes it even more frustrating.  To pay the bills the paper of course has to sell ads.   And to make sure that we see the ads the on-line newspaper places an ad that covers the entire screen every time a new page is accessed.  An option is provided to “cancel” the ad with a small box in the upper right hand corner.  However, even when this box is clicked the ad remains on the screen for several more seconds.  I’m sure that this slow response is not by accident.  It’s a method that purposefully forces me to view the ad no matter whether I wish to see it or not.  The end result is that if I want to see all the comic strips available in this on-line paper, it will take me many times longer to access and read them than in the printed version of a conventional newspaper.  And most certainly it would not be nearly as convenient to do this while having my breakfast cereal.  I would need to have one hand on the mouse continually scrolling and clicking to access all the comic strips.  The process is similarly clumsy for other subject matter.  The home page has all the major categories of news, sports, weather, and a dozen others.  But each subject must be accessed one screen at a time and for many items it’s not easy to guess where they might be found in the generic menu.  And, of course, by this method the opportunity to browse quickly is lost.  Each category has to be opened, the article titles read, and then the article itself has to be opened.  This three-step process — with mandatory ads interspersed — is far more time consuming and less informative than just scanning a printed page and moving on to the next one.   Electronic communications has given us near-instant access to the latest information and the latest events.  However, there are advantages to the traditional printed media that we should not forget.  Personally, I like to do a quick on-line check a few times during each day to get a summary of the latest world events.  However, I then find it much more efficient and relaxing to read the more detailed descriptions on a printed page the following morning while having my breakfast.  And I can do this without the continual irritation of full-page ads being “pushed” at me every time I try to look at the next screen. I would be interested to hear your thoughts on how you have managed the transition from print to electronic publications.   Are you ready to spend all your time in front of an electronic display or do you still find printed pages a useful way to access and organize information?  You may contact me directly from this site, by e-mail at silzars@attglobal.net, or by telephone at 425-898-9117.