Speaker A
These are all arguments that we make to ourselves without even understanding what we're saying.
Sinead Bovell explores why smartphones will become obsolete and how converging technologies like AI and AR will redefine human interaction and entertainment.
Key Takeaways
- Smartphones are a transitional technology that will be replaced by more integrated, autonomous systems.
- Technology is increasingly embedded in human identity, making us cyborgs in a functional sense.
- AI and augmented reality will converge to automate and enhance social and personal interactions.
- The entertainment industry is undergoing a fundamental transformation driven by new digital platforms.
- Automation and AI will save time and improve communication, despite concerns about loss of authenticity.
Summary
- Smartphones are currently a bridge technology and will eventually become obsolete as new technologies emerge.
- Humans are already 'cyborgs' because technology is deeply embedded in daily life and identity.
- The iPhone revolutionized technology by combining data, internet, and smartphone capabilities, enabling industries like social media and navigation.
- Future technologies such as augmented reality, artificial intelligence, and the metaverse will converge to transform social interaction and autonomy.
- Social technologies will act as entities with names and personalities (e.g., Alexa, Siri) that manage daily tasks and augment human life.
- Autonomous technologies will remove mundane chores and improve behavioral efficiency, impacting attention and cognitive function.
- The concept of 'end of the beginning' describes moments when technology matures enough to enable the next revolution.
- AI will automate social media presence and communication, creating personalized, optimized content without manual effort.
- The future of entertainment will be radically different, with streaming platforms already reshaping the industry and new formats emerging.
- Technological evolution follows a pattern where old devices and methods become obsolete, replaced by more integrated and efficient solutions.
Full Transcript — Download SRT & Markdown
Speaker A
They are cyborgs right now because they cannot exist without a piece of technology.
Speaker B
In 2007, Apple comes to market with the iPhone, a lot of analysts missed it.
Speaker B
They didn't just say it would fail, it would fail badly.
Speaker B
For people when it comes to technologies like augmented reality, virtual reality and the end of smartphones, which we all know is coming, for people who are resistant, what are they not seeing about the future?
Speaker A
They're not seeing that they are cyborgs right now.
Speaker A
So they're cyborgs right now because they cannot exist without a piece of technology.
Speaker A
They think that the technology is not embedded in them, but it is.
Speaker A
It happens that you carry a phone in your pocket or purse, but the the phone is embedded in you.
Speaker A
You do not exist without that phone.
Speaker A
I mean, the nightmare of anybody connected to data right now is to get that data wiped.
Speaker A
Which happened to my daughter recently, her computer was wiped.
Speaker A
But that's how we have iCloud.
Speaker A
That's how you have cloud services, that's how you have Amazon cloud.
Speaker A
Like all of this cloud services, which become the new the new phone.
Speaker A
What people are missing is that every technology is fundamentally a bridge to the next technology.
Speaker A
It is what human nature is about.
Speaker A
We are seeking always the lowest energy state manifested as industrialization, robots, and so forth.
Speaker A
And it's not us, this is not me saying it.
Speaker A
We know this forever.
Speaker B
Every technology is a bridge to the next technology.
Speaker A
Sure.
Speaker B
And it just seems insane for people to think of life without their smartphone.
Speaker B
Until you wake up and realize that was just a bridge to the next.
Speaker A
But where is your fax machine?
Speaker B
Right.
Speaker A
Where's your home phone?
Speaker A
Yeah, where's the where's the Commodore 64 computer?
Speaker B
No.
Speaker A
I think you've lost us in this.
Speaker A
Where's your Atari computer if you even know what that is?
Speaker B
And you know, when you think about the invention of the smartphone, I think was incredible.
Speaker B
Like it's nothing short of a miracle.
Speaker B
But it was the smartphone, data and the internet, three separate technologies that gave rise to most of the industries we depend on today, whether it's social media, Google Maps, FaceTime, email, anywhere.
Speaker B
What do you think the combination of future technologies such as whatever ends up happening with the metaverse and artificial intelligence, what could be possible when those words collide?
Speaker B
That it's hard for us to imagine right now.
Speaker A
You mean collide or converge?
Speaker B
Converge.
Speaker A
Converge.
Speaker A
Well, they converge before.
Speaker A
So if you look at the I was mentioning my life with seven technologies revolutions.
Speaker A
I I wrote a while ago in one of my books this idea of the end of the beginning.
Speaker A
That occasionally every couple of years, you get this moment.
Speaker A
In which you have the end of the beginning.
Speaker A
So everybody now has everything that they needed to do to move to the next level.
Speaker A
So augmented reality and usually this is the moment where when Apple shows up with the best product in the category.
Speaker A
When everybody is ready to do it, right?
Speaker A
They're just extending their hand and boom.
Speaker A
The iPhone shows up.
Speaker A
So, so the converging technologies of social augmented and autonomous, um, transform everything.
Speaker A
In the same way in which the old.
Speaker B
And what do you mean by social augmented and autonomous?
Speaker A
Social meaning it has a story to tell and has a name, Alexa, or it has Google or Siri.
Speaker A
And it has a social function.
Speaker A
In other words, you think of it as a social entity.
Speaker A
And then that social entity talks to you, reads your emails in the car.
Speaker A
Drives your car.
Speaker A
Makes your food at home.
Speaker A
Uh, and so forth, takes your kids to school.
Speaker A
And tells you when to wake up.
Speaker A
That's way more than a nanny does, right?
Speaker A
So then that augments your life because now you can do all sorts of stuff you couldn't do before.
Speaker A
Not that you have time, but you have interest.
Speaker A
Do it.
Speaker A
And then you have the autonomous functions of everything being autonomous.
Speaker A
Removing again, chores, attention span, uh, behavioral sequence.
Speaker A
Neurons.
Speaker A
Neurons are important because that's how we age.
Speaker A
And that's how we know we don't we understand or don't understand things.
Speaker A
So if you take this idea that at one point in the 80s, every office had to be redesigned to accommodate computers.
Speaker A
And nobody said, why do we need computers?
Speaker A
Because we need to process words.
Speaker A
Word processing.
Speaker A
Wow.
Speaker A
And then we need to photocopy the words we process.
Speaker A
Wow.
Speaker A
And then we need to store the data on some disk drive.
Speaker A
Wow.
Speaker A
All of this stuff was sold at Staples.
Speaker A
Or Business Depot it was called.
Speaker A
Those sections don't exist in the store anymore.
Speaker A
And that is in your lifetime.
Speaker A
So.
Speaker A
So that's what I mean by things that have converged and transformed.
Speaker A
It was the end of the beginning.
Speaker A
So if I have right now the end of the beginning again, which is I have technologies which are social.
Speaker A
Take care of all my social image.
Speaker A
You will never post anything.
Speaker A
You will be essentially your presence here.
Speaker A
If you allow yourself to be discovered, will be your posting.
Speaker A
Everything happening right now will be.
Speaker B
Happening on Instagram.
Speaker B
If I allow myself to be discovered.
Speaker B
So I no longer post on something like Instagram in the future.
Speaker B
I am always discoverable.
Speaker A
Yes.
Speaker A
You're always discoverable, you're always allowing yourself to to tell the best story possible about this moment.
Speaker B
How?
Speaker A
Well, select attributes.
Speaker A
Select where you want to be seen from, what words should be used or not.
Speaker A
And then the the story is created automatically.
Speaker A
Imagine you are not creating the story.
Speaker A
You post on Instagram.
Speaker A
Now, the story includes me today.
Speaker A
It includes you, it includes exactly this table.
Speaker A
So the attributes are very simple, very clear, right?
Speaker A
And and you will use them in your stories that you are posting later on today anyway.
Speaker A
Except that they will be automatic.
Speaker B
So in a in a combined world of the metaverse, artificial intelligence.
Speaker A
So you will get a choice to look at the options.
Speaker A
Just like I look at my AI generated images.
Speaker A
And select which story you would like to post.
Speaker B
So you're saying AI would generate my social media existence.
Speaker B
And it presents to me, here's an image.
Speaker A
Not only your social media existence, your emails, your responses.
Speaker A
Everything that has to do with everything you want to allow it to communicate to other people.
Speaker B
And I think the um.
Speaker A
And it will use the best language you can possibly use.
Speaker A
In every language possible.
Speaker B
The immediate reaction could be for someone to say, look how much we've lost in that process.
Speaker B
But then the response is, do I gain anything sorting through images to see which one was the best?
Speaker B
Um, or do I gain more in terms of time back?
Speaker B
If AI just presents.
Speaker A
Well, you discern, first of all, you start having a discerned palette of.
Speaker A
Now, in other words, you educate yourself into yourself.
Speaker A
Because right now, what do we do with?
Speaker A
Like, why do we take selfies for the exact same reason?
Speaker A
Oh, look at me now.
Speaker A
Look at me then.
Speaker A
Oh, now.
Speaker A
So all of these things were are not things that you ever grew up expecting of yourself.
Speaker A
I'm going to take a selfie.
Speaker A
But then why is it more clear in people's minds why they take selfies and the idea of automatic posting?
Speaker A
It's obvious.
Speaker A
It's going to happen.
Speaker B
15 years ago, the selfie didn't exist.
Speaker B
Now here we are.
Speaker B
Why would things.
Speaker A
Five years ago.
Speaker A
Yeah, ten years ago the selfie did not exist.
Speaker A
The selfie stick was the best selling item of 2015.
Speaker B
And when it comes to something like entertainment, the year is 2030.
Speaker B
How am I experiencing a movie at home?
Speaker B
What could be possible?
Speaker A
I saw an interview recently with um Tarantino.
Speaker A
Who was asked, is this your last movie?
Speaker A
He said, I don't even know what a movie is anymore.
Speaker A
He said, I don't know what a movie is anymore because he, you realize that the the big directors in Hollywood.
Speaker A
Were completely against Netflix.
Speaker A
And completely against Prime, and completely against Apple.
Speaker A
And so forth.
Speaker A
Look around today.
Speaker A
Netflix is the largest movie producer of all time.
Speaker A
In money, numbers and everything.
Speaker A
So then you realize, wait a second, this has transformed what entertainment is.
Speaker A
Because entertainment is not going to the movie theater and getting overcharged for Pepsi and and popcorn.
Speaker A
It's not a night out with the family.
Speaker A
It's a night in with the family.
Speaker A
So all of a sudden, how can I reconcile OLED TVs?
Speaker A
And a gigantic movie screen.
Speaker A
I can't.
Speaker A
Why would I spend time going to a movie theater?
Speaker A
Like, how can that experience be better than home?
Speaker A
Haptic devices.
Speaker A
And then you can say, oh, but it's about a.
Speaker A
Socializing with other people.
Speaker A
That's not why you turn the lights off in a movie theater.
Speaker B
You're actually not supposed to talk in the movie theater.
Speaker A
They don't invent that dimmer for nothing.
Speaker A
You don't want to socialize with other people.
Speaker A
You actually want to tell other people, shut up.
Speaker A
That the so so the thing is, these are all arguments that we make to ourselves.
Speaker A
Without even understanding what we're saying.
Speaker B
So entertainment in the future, it comes more to me.
Speaker B
It's around me in my home.
Speaker A
And I and I direct most of it.
Speaker B
We direct our own movies.
Speaker A
Yeah.
Speaker A
It is essentially imagine the dreams that you have.
Speaker A
Being able to see them.
Speaker A
And actually come up with the best version of them.
Speaker A
You may say, how do I direct my own movie?
Speaker A
We are doing this right now.
Speaker A
We can go to you watch Detroit that series, that the game, interactive game.
Speaker A
You dictate what happens in that game.
Speaker A
It is your course of action that dictates.
Speaker A
Now, should a movie be like that?
Speaker A
Not all movies, obviously.
Speaker A
Some people have a story to tell and they should tell that story.
Speaker A
But do I have to go to a movie theater to see that story?
Speaker A
No.
Speaker A
I can see it with my right now with my Oculus Quest.
Speaker A
Which has a movie option.
Speaker A
And I can feel even even that one is has lack of imagination.
Speaker A
I don't know if you ever used it.
Speaker A
But you put Oculus on and you are and you feel you are in a movie theater.
Speaker A
Like you see the rows before you.
Speaker B
Mhm.
Speaker B
I think with technology in the in the history of entertainment, there was a time when movies had no sound.
Speaker B
And our time when movies were black and white.
Speaker B
There are all these senses that we still don't incorporate.
Speaker B
What about a movie that you feel?
Speaker B
In the future, so technology is breaking down those barriers.
Speaker B
And expanding what could be possible.
Speaker A
Plus, we seek pleasure by all available means.
Speaker A
So we're right now we are seeking pleasure in a story.
Speaker A
In the surprise of a story.
Speaker A
But who is to tell what pleasure will be 50 years from now?
Speaker A
What was pleasure 100 years ago, right?
Speaker A
So the idea of seeking beauty in that form or pleasure in the form of beauty or pleasure in the form of food, whatever.
Speaker A
Changes all the time because your palette changes.
Speaker B
So that's it for my series of questions.
Speaker A
All right.
Speaker A
Thank you so much.
Speaker B
Thank you for being in the hot seat.
Speaker A
Thank you so much.
Speaker B
Question.
Speaker B
So what do you you guys think?
Speaker B
Thank you for having me.
Speaker A
Wow.
Speaker A
That was very good.
Topics:smartphonestechnology evolutionaugmented realityartificial intelligencemetaversecyborgautomationsocial mediafuture technologydigital transformation
