Robot law: what happens if intelligent machines commit crimes?

I'd buy that for a dollar. Or, just steal it from you. elbragon, CC BY

The fear of powerful artificial intelligence and technology is a popular theme, as seen in films such as Ex Machina, Chappie, and the Terminator series.

And we may soon find ourselves addressing fully autonomous technology with the capacity to cause damage. While this may be some form of military wardroid or law enforcement robot, it could equally be something not created to cause harm, but which could nevertheless do so by accident or error. What then? Who is culpable and liable when a robot or artificial intelligence goes haywire? Clearly, our way of approaching this doesn’t neatly fit into society’s view of guilt and justice.

While some may choose to dismiss this as too far into the future to concern us, remember that a robot has already been arrested for buying drugs. This also ignores how quickly technology can evolve. Look at the lessons from the past – many of us still remember the world before the internet, social media, mobile technology, GPS – even phones or widely available computers. These once-dramatic innovations developed into everyday technologies which have created difficult legal challenges.

A guilty robot mind?

How quickly we take technology for granted. But we should give some thought to the legal implications. One of the functions of our legal system is to regulate the behaviour of legal persons and to punish and deter offenders. It also provides remedies for those who have suffered, or are at risk of suffering harm.

Legal persons – humans, but also companies and other organisations for the purposes of the law – are subject to rights and responsibilities. Those who design, operate, build or sell intelligent machines have legal duties – what about the machines themselves? Our mobile phone, even with Cortana or Siri attached, does not fit the conventions for a legal person. But what if the autonomous decisions of their more advanced descendents in the future cause harm or damage?

Criminal law has two important concepts. First, that liability arises when harm has been or is likely to be caused by any act or omission. Physical devices such as Google’s driverless car, for example, clearly has the potential to harm, kill or damage property. Software also has the potential to cause physical harm, but the risks may extend to less immediate forms of damage such as financial loss.

Second, criminal law often requires culpability in the offender, what is known as the “guilty mind” or mens rea – the principle being that the offence, and subsequent punishment, reflects the offender’s state of mind and role in proceedings. This generally means that deliberate actions are punished more severely than careless ones. This poses a problem, in terms of treating autonomous intelligent machines under the law: how do we demonstrate the intentions of a non-human, and how can we do this within existing criminal law principles?

Robocrime?

This isn’t a new problem – similar considerations arise in trials of corporate criminality. Some thought needs to go into when, and in what circumstances, we make the designer or manufacturer liable rather than the user. Much of our current law assumes that human operators are involved.

For example, in the context of highways, the regulatory framework assumes that there is a human driver to at least some degree. Once fully autonomous vehicles arrive, that framework will require substantial changes to address the new interactions between human and machine on the road.

As intelligent technology that by-passes direct human control becomes more advanced and more widespread, these questions of risk, fault and punishment will become more pertinent. Film and television may dwell on the most extreme examples, but the legal realities are best not left to fiction.

Three wireless technologies that could make 5G even faster

5G, wringing out the network cloth for the most capacity possible. towers by hin255/www.shutterstock.com

The capacity of today’s wireless communications networks has increased one million-fold since the introduction of the first cellular network in 1957.

But this improvement isn’t due to improving connectivity technologies such as WiFi, 2G, 3G and so on, which have contributed only a five-fold increase. Using additional radio frequency spectrum to carry network traffic accounts for a 25-fold improvement – but the largest single improvement, accounting for a 1,600-fold increase, is via shrinking the size of the network “cells” that constitute the network. In other words, installing more physical network towers, repeaters and other equipment to create a more dense network of nodes that can carry greater network traffic.

But this has been very expensive – digging for cables, putting up towers and base stations, installation and maintenance, and all the planning and bureaucratic requirements that entails. So much of the next generation 5G mobile network design focuses on squeezing greater speed and capacity from what we already have, without the costs of adding more infrastructure.

Decoupling send and receive

One area under investigation is the concept of downlink (DL) and uplink (UL) decoupling, dubbed by some of its co-inventors DUDe. From the first generation mobile networks to the latest 4G, the downlink (or receive) and uplink (or send) connections of any communication session have been coupled together. This means a mobile phone associates with one base station at a time and data is both sent and received through the same connection.

Historically this was a near-optimal approach, since that way the base station and mobile phone would establish the strongest connection that could be provided in both directions. However as mobile networks have become more diverse, mixing together network cells of different sizes and transmission towers of different transmission power, it now makes more sense to separate the two. A phone could receive information through a high-power, large network cell for maximum speed, and use smaller cells to send data through its lower-power radio. This can yield double capacity and make connections up to ten times more reliable.

Doubling up on duplex

Another area under investigation is that of full duplex radio transmission. Full duplex refers to the concept of being able to transmit and receive over the same frequency at the same time, in the same way we’re able to talk over each other on a traditional, analog landline telephone.

The sort of repeaters used to extend network coverage in the satellite, broadcasting and mobile network industries have used full duplex for decades. But this is achieved using two different antennas placed sufficiently far apart that the strong transmitting signal does not interfere with the weaker receiver signal. Who can design a single-antenna system that provides full duplex operation?

It all comes down to using signal echo cancellation. The first milestone work appeared in 1978 but was not made operational until the 1990s. The essence of all these systems is to cancel the strong outgoing transmit signal from the weak incoming receive signal, eliminating interference. However this technique only works over a fairly narrow bandwidth of a few MHz or so.

Only recently has the ability to offer full duplex over wide bandwidths become available, ranging from 10-100MHz, where cancellation is achieved both in the analog as well as digital domain.

CoSMIC, the first full-duplex wireless transceiver in a single silicon chip. Jin Zhou/Harish Krishnaswamy/Columbia University

One firm leading in this area is Kumu Networks, a spin-out firm from Stanford University engineers which garnered US$15m investment funding following its first demonstration of full duplex using signal inversion cancellation techniques four years ago. The technology refines existing theoretical work and is compliant with real-world cellular systems. This is an important step from a proposed feature to a viable product.

Using similar techniques, engineers at Columbia University have recently implemented this on a single chip, miniaturising the circuitry required for full duplex into a single silicon chip for the first time. At this scale, the technology could be introduced to mobile phone handsets or tablets to improve performance – potentially a game-changing moment as adding further silicon chips to existing mobile phones or tablets is relatively straightforward. With some extra tuning, if introduced universally this could essentially allow us to double network capacity overnight.

Significantly more antennas

Another approach is massive multiple antenna systems, dubbed Massive-MIMO. Invented by Tom Marzetta at Bell Labs, it uses a very, very large number of antennas stuffed into base stations and mobile phone handsets if possible. We’re talking thousands of antennas, rather than the three to six commonly used today. Counter-intuitively, in theory this would in fact eliminate interference in the system and significantly boost network capacity and reliability.

For now, all these approaches are still at an early stage and face considerable challenges. However, while these 5G designs would require some software and hardware upgrades, one thing they won’t require is digging holes and laying cables.

How we discovered the dark side of wearable fitness trackers

Under the electronic thumb Shutterstock

You no longer have to look to science fiction to find the cyborg. We are all cyborgs now. Mobile phones, activity trackers, pacemakers, breast implants and even aspirins all act as biological, cognitive or social extensions and enhancements of our bodies and minds. Some have even predicted that human beings as we know them will be replaced by technically enhanced, god-like immortal beings within 200 years. Or at least rich people will.

The next generation of wearable technology is set to take us one step closer to this predicted future. We are now looking at a future of bionic, data-rich and in-body technologies that may forever change what it means to be human.

The company Athos plans to launch fitness clothes that measure muscle activity, heart rate and respiration in real time. Its marketing material encourages consumers to “upgrade” and become “the ideal version” of themselves. In doing so, Athos clearly reveals its transhumanist stance: the idea that technology will take our species to the next evolutionary stage.

Together with jeans manufacturer Levi Strauss & Co, Google is developing clothing that interacts with your devices. With touch-sensitive surfaces, the garments will be able to monitor weight gain, understand your gestures, make phone calls and more.

Fitness and activity trackers as we know them may also soon be surpassed by biometric wristbands that can measure what is going on inside your body. Researchers at Echo Labs are currently working on a biometric band that can measure your oxygen, CO2, PH, hydration and blood pressure levels via optical signals.

Several initiatives are even underway to create implantable technologies, that could essentially augment human biology. Internal microchips and digital tattoos could replace smart wristbands, payment devices and the like in the next few years.

The question that is often not asked however is: “How do we feel about living with technology on (or in) our bodies 24/7?”

Always on, always on me

We recently conducted a study with 200 women who wore a Fitbit activity tracker. It revealed that most users embraced the devices as part of themselves and stopped treating it as an external technology. It was “always on, always on me” with 89% of participants wearing it almost constantly, only taking it off to recharge the battery.

We also found that the Fitbit was an active participant in the construction of everyday life. It had a profound impact on the women’s decision-making in terms of their diet, exercise and how they travelled from one place to another. Almost every participant took a longer route to increase the number of steps they took (91%) and amount of weekly exercise (95%) they did. Most increased their walking speed to reach their Fitbit targets faster (56%). We also saw a change in eating habits to more healthy food, smaller portion sizes and fewer takeaways (76%).

Fitness handcuff? Shutterstock

Most women in the study believed it was important to quantify their daily activities (88%) and checked their progress dashboard more than twice a day (84%). The chase was on to receive gratifying “hooray” and “champ” messages when a target was reached. One person even said: “I love my Fitbit Flex because it gives me a pat on the back every night.”

We were particular interested in finding out how women related to their Fitbit. For many, it was seen as a friend who helps them reach their targets (68%). Reaching the daily targets creates feelings of happiness (99%), self-satisfaction (100%), pride (98%) and motivation (98%). A good day where the targets were reached made them like Fitbit more (96%). Most (77%) would even go back home to fetch their Fitbit if they had left without it.

The darker side

But in analysing these findings, we also started to notice that the relationship is perhaps not as pure and unproblematic as first believed. The idea that technology is both liberating and oppressive, first articulated by philosopher Lewis Mumford in the 1930s, started to shine through. When we asked the women how they felt without their Fitbit, many reported feeling “naked” (45%) and that the activities they completed were wasted (43%). Some even felt less motivated to exercise (22%).

Perhaps more alarming, many felt under pressure to reach their daily targets (79%) and that their daily routines were controlled by Fitbit (59%). Add to this that almost 30% felt that Fitbit was an enemy and made them feel guilty, and suddenly this technology doesn’t seem so perfect.

Wearable technologies can have a positive impact on the way we lead our lives by giving us insight into ourselves and enabling us to interact in new ways. However, it is also clear that when we invite technology onto or into our bodies, we have to be willing to share everyday decision making. As wearables crunch our every move, we will increasingly be told what to do and how best to behave and communicate with others.

For now, we believe wearables can be our companions, but the early signs of a technology takeover are there, questioning the sustainability of the current relationship. Whether we want to or not, we are slowly, but steadily, transforming into a new human species. Enter: homo cyberneticus.

We don't need digital detox, but there is a need to rethink our relationship with technology

'My name's Steve and I'm an internet addict' Alatele fr, CC BY-SA

We all know the scare stories. Growing numbers of people are becoming addicted to the internet and constantly checking their digital gadgets. They are steadily disconnecting us from real life, real relationships and real meaning. To this supposed problem of digital dependence, an antidote has been emerging: the “digital detox” retreat. Companies are advertising technology-free resorts, holiday packages, city breaks and summer camps.

One operator has even trademarked the concept. Digital Detox® LLC is a Californian travel company that’s motto is “disconnect to reconnect”. Its customers are offered a “restorative” break on a ranch in northern California including yoga, meditation, hiking, art and organic food, with no digital devices allowed. At a destination named Camp Grounded, campers are promised a chance to get back to childhood – “with campfire songs instead of YouTube videos, and board games instead of Angry Birds”.

And if you were thinking this was only in America, you would be wrong. The Westin in Dublin offers a digital detox minibreak to “give you the chance to escape from all that electronic chatter”. Liberate yourself, the website reads, from your smartphone, laptop and gadgets and replace all that digital clutter with relaxation and renewal.

Digital Detox, San-Francisco style Rusty Blazenhoff, CC BY-SA

Beyond the travel industry

The digital detox is just one manifestation of the now widespread notion that to live well in a digitally dependent world, we need to disconnect from technology. In her 2012 book, The Winter of Our Disconnect: How One Family Pulled the Plug and Lived to Tell/Text/Tweet the Tale, the author and journalist Susan Maushart explains how she grew so concerned about her family’s dependence on electronic media that she took them into what she calls “rehab” and a “digital detox” for six months.

In a similar vein is Unplugged: How to Live Mindfully in a Digital World, by Orianna Fielding, whose London-based Digital Detox Company provides training and retreats for people and businesses. The book gives readers “techniques that teach you how to manage your online world in a healthy way”, including step-by-step detoxing programmes that can last from a few minutes to a weekend.

Many of us are instinctively moving in a similar direction. People are creating technology-free times and zones at home, turning notifications off on their mobile phones and hiding technology from their children or limiting its use. At certain times of day, some people close their email or switch off their internet routers.

Never popular: child technology rationing Sabphoto

Another view

The difficulty with all of this is that it identifies the wrong problem. Talking about internet addiction starts from the premise that the technology is intrinsically bad and therefore needs to be rationed. In reality technology is neither good nor bad, but simply a means to an end. The notion of living without it is virtually inconceivable. Many of the things we used to do, from buying groceries to calling parents to writing postcards, are now things that we either do or substitute using digital technology.

It doesn’t mean to say that spending your life online is necessarily a good thing, but detox is not the answer. It may provide temporary respite, but we have to make up for it as soon as we plug back in. What is the point of coming home after an offline mini-break only to face 200-plus new emails in your inbox?

Unplugging also increases the onus on individuals to manage their digitally dependent lives. It becomes the responsibility of employees to develop strategies to deal effectively with the likes of large volume of emails – a workload unknown to previous generations.

Why you may as well answer some emails on your holiday. Cartoonresource

More meaningful discussions

The more pressing issue is how these technologies are being used to create and sustain the market economy that we live in. Online retailers can collect data on our purchases and preferences and sell this information on to advertisers, turning us into commodities. Engaging effectively in social media and professional networking sites requires constant updating of our profiles and content so that we become marketable individuals. Email can be used as a tool to raise our productivity by making us available outside working hours.

I come up against some of this in my own working life as a university lecturer, at a time when the student-lecturer relationship is moving from learner-teacher to customer-service provider. Students frequently email me about lectures they increasingly do not attend, and questions that I have already answered in the course handbook and on our website. In a sense, these emails require me to do my job twice.

But responding still matters in a context where student satisfaction feeds into university rankings, and academics are under pressure to help make their institutions more marketable. For years I responded by repeating the information, but recently I introduced a policy that they could only email me to arrange a one-to-one meeting, while strongly encouraging them to ask any questions during lectures and tutorials. I now ignore most other emails.

The number of student emails in my inbox has since decreased and I am having many more meaningful discussions with my students at lectures, tutorials and one-on-one meetings. Digital detox would have had no answer to this problem, except to postpone dealing with the emails. Instead I have both reduced my email traffic and, more importantly, restored my identity as a teacher and my students’ identities as learners.

A little recalibration

Individuals and organisations are also changing how they use email in other sectors. Daimler, the German car and truck manufacturer, implemented a new programme last year that allowed employees to set their email software to automatically delete incoming emails while on annual leave. This “mail on holiday” programme issued an out-of-office reply indicating that the email would be deleted and for pressing matters, offered the contact information of another employee.

Martha Payne. Danny Lawson/PA

All of this goes much further than email, of course. Martha Payne, the Scottish school pupil who started the NeverSeconds blog on her thoughts and experiences of school meals, became an international hit and put pressure on caterers to improve their food. Social media in the Arab Spring became the key medium for organising the protests that overthrew governments. Social media is used to bring about social change, not just share the latest selfie.

Disconnecting from digital technologies is like sticking our heads in the sand. It prevents us from asking how technologies are changing our lives in particular ways and whether it is for the better. It also stops us from reclaiming these technologies and re-purposing them for different goals and values.

Time to disconnect: why the SIM card has had its day

Old school and old fashioned - time to drop the SIM. Yui Mok/PA

The small microchips known as “subscriber identity modules” or SIM cards that are required for mobile phones to log on to a phone network will soon be 25 years old. While mobile phones and network technology have progressed in leaps and bounds, SIM cards are still lodged in handsets.

And they’re vulnerable too – it was claimed recently that US and UK intelligence agencies stole potentially millions of SIM card security keys which would allow spies to track users and eavesdrop on calls.

Gemalto, the Dutch SIM card manufacturer that was reportedly the victim of an NSA and GCHQ attack, responded with assurances that little, if any, information was stolen. The firm stressed how important its products were to mobile phone security. But the reality is that SIM cards are now more of a drawback than a benefit.

A solution of their time

SIM cards were a useful feature when they came onto the market in 1991. At the time mobile phones were bulky devices, usually mounted in cars or carried on a shoulder strap. They were often rented along with a car. A SIM would help customers quickly and easily transfer their phone number and contacts from one phone to the next, without the need to type in long identifiers and access codes each time. Having to enter access codes into a phone that was essentially shared also meant users might forget to delete them before returning the device. Storing the login details in a removable personal plastic card elegantly solved this problem.

This is no pocket phone. projectmgmt

But the days of huge or rented car phones are gone, and today smartphones are lightweight, personal devices that we entrust with passwords to many sites and services – access to WiFi, email, social networks, app stores, and online shopping.

A QR code, an easier way of inputting usernames and passwords. brdall

The fact is that the SIM could have been replaced long ago with a simpler alternative: typing in a user identifier and password directly into the phone is an option – just as we do to access WiFi. QR codes – the square, 3D barcodes – are a more convenient alternative for smartphones with cameras, where an app could read the details encoded in the QR straight from the camera.

Modern cryptographic techniques mean that passwords no longer have to be very long. Password-authenticated key exchange (PAKE) techniques exist that use passwords as simple as a five-digit PIN to create highly secure encrypted connections that even the supercomputers of eavesdropping intelligence agencies cannot break. And thanks to email and the web, network operators today have much better mechanisms for keeping in touch with their users to inform them which devices are authorised. None of these options were available when the SIM was conceived in the late 1980s.

Smartphone app stores like those from Apple and Google already make good use of modern authentication techniques. They could, today, be used to easily transfer all the functionality of a SIM into the phone using an app. All that’s needed is a new standard interface for mobile operating systems such as Android or iOS that would allow apps (software) to take over the functions of the SIM (hardware). Technically, a mobile network login is no more challenging than similar applications such as payment wallets, online banking, digital rights managed content, and so on.

Vested interests

Manufacturers are understandably against anything that would eliminate their business – an estimated 5.2 billion SIM cards were sold in 2014. Many network operators are also wedded to the SIM because it allows them to lock customers to their network, preventing easy access to competitors.

The size of SIM cards has shrunk. Justin Ormont, CC BY-SA

Modern SIMs are tiny, difficult to access, and easy to lose once taken out of the phone. In fact many users may not even know how to find or remove theirs, because it was inserted for them when they bought the phone. This inconvenience allows providers to charge high roaming fees when customers use their phone abroad, when using a local operator would be cheaper.

If the SIM were replaced with a password or extra software, users would be able to keep several pay-as-you-go subscriptions from different providers in their phone simultaneously, so they can easily switch to the most attractive rate depending on where they were. Apps that functioned as brokers could even negotiate which network to select based on best price automatically.

Another obstacle, besides the SIM itself, that hinders customers from easily switching between network providers is the cumbersome procedure required to transfer a telephone number. Currently you need to call your outgoing provider to request a Porting Authorization Code (PAC) to pass to your new provider. This process was designed to ease switching contracts every few years, rather than to help a phone switch between networks automatically several times a day.

But modern internet-based telephony has demonstrated that moving a telephone number between networks can be accomplished in seconds – the same needs to be implemented in mobile phone networks.

‘I don’t know, it says ENTER SIM CARD.’ Aaron Amat/Shutterstock

Given that the SIM card and phone-number transfer are barriers preventing customers from fully gaining the benefits of market competition, regulators should watch out that vested interests are not able to undermine efforts to provide alternatives.

The European Commission has long tried to improve mobile phone competition, mostly through price-control measures of roaming charges. Ditching the SIM would remove a major obstacle to competition, something that would likely generate market solutions to the problem of excess roaming charges without the need for further regulation from above.

Gemalto hack shows how far we are from deciding acceptable 'security norms'

SIM cards contain the key to unlock your phone. Oleksiy Mark/Shutterstock

Is it true spies hack technology companies? Can governments really listen to your phone calls? Should we care? The latest details of NSA and GCHQ intelligence agency activities to come from files leaked by Edward Snowden are of the apparently massive theft of mobile phone SIM card encryption keys from the Dutch firm Gemalto.

This “great SIM heist” targeted Gemalto because it produces billions of mobile phone SIM cards for 450 telecoms providers worldwide, and acquiring copies of encryption keys would make it possible to eavesdrop on cell phone calls with comparative ease. While press reports state these attempts were successful, after a brief internal audit – far too brief, some experts say – Gemalto has stated that nothing was stolen.

Who is right? Whether this is resolved or not, in this particular case the handbags will no doubt fly. But the fact of the matter is that there are bigger issues we should all be considering.

Putting walls around data

In the physical world we do a fairly good job of keeping ourselves secure. I assume, for example, that you locked your front door when you left your house this morning. In the digital world we tend to be a lot more careless. We tend to leave doors wide open. In many cases we don’t even put doors between the outside world and our data. For intelligence agencies this is very fortunate since our emails, social media posts, and browsing habits are usually conveniently just lying around.

Encryption, on the other hand, provides a secure place with a front door behind which data is inaccessible. That is, unless you have the front door key. Encrypted data is meaningless and of little use to an intelligence agency – to make sense of it the keys to decrypt it are needed.

Mobile phones encrypt calls between the phone and the nearest mobile phone mast, preventing anyone who intercepts the call as it travels through the air from making any sense of it. The encryption key used is derived from the phone’s SIM key, which is a personal key that comes pre-installed on your SIM card. Anyone who knows the SIM key – normally only your phone and your mobile operator – can decrypt the call if they listen in.

Gemalto’s business is putting SIM keys into SIM cards; if someone breaks into Gemalto’s systems then it is certainly possible that they could make off with SIM encryption keys. This isn’t great news for the security of whatever mobile phones they later end up in.

Sidestepping the locks

Bad though this sounds, it’s really just the latest of many revelations of this type that have leaked out of the Snowden files. The picture that has emerged is of intelligence agencies clearly frustrated by the increasing use of encryption in our everyday technology. As the encryption is (mostly) too good to break, so the intelligence agencies have been using every technique imaginable to find a way around it.

Broadly speaking, there are really only two ways to get around good encryption. Option one is to try to access data either before it is encrypted or after it is decrypted – Snowden’s files suggest the intelligence agencies have been doing plenty of that. Option two is to try to get hold of the keys needed to decrypt the data. The Great SIM Heist seems to be the latest example of attempts at this second strategy.

What do we want for the future?

In one sense this is not a new development. As encryption has been deployed more widely, its use has created tension between the rights of the individual to privacy and the duties of the state to protect society. Over the last few decades governments have made several attempts to mediate between these, attempts which appeared to have concluded in favour of strong encryption and individual privacy.

Prior to Snowden it was publicly believed that the “crypto wars” had largely been lost by the intelligence agencies; instead, leaked files such as these reveal that the wars have just become bloodier than any of us really imagined.

Many people are outraged by the many Snowden revelations. Others take the view that this is the intelligence agencies' job and they ought to be left to get on with it. There are good arguments supporting both of these viewpoints.

So, should you care? If you do, then there has never been a better time to stand up and make your feelings known. We as a society really ought to form an opinion on what “security norms” we wish to see developing around our increasing use of the internet as a place where we, partially, live our lives. If we don’t, then clearly others, with perhaps very different agendas, will decide them for us.

Why it makes sense for BT to shut down its telephone network

The telephone network is dead, long live telephone calls! guy_hatton, CC BY-NC

As the telecoms regulator Ofcom embarks on its next strategic review of the UK’s telecommunications services, BT has called for it to be allowed to close down its telephone network. Perhaps somewhat counter-intuitively, this actually makes sense.

As Ofcom’s studies confirm that landline and mobile telephone call use continues to fall, telecoms companies have faced mounting pressures to find other ways of making money.

BT, like many others, has sought to diversify by offering so-called “quad play” packages, common in the US, which bundle together telephone, broadband, mobile and television services. So it could be said that BT is as much a television company as it is telephone company these days. The world has moved on, and BT with it.

However, BT and KCOM Group (formerly Kingston Communications, serving Hull) are alone within the industry as they are designated by the Communications Act 2003 as “universal service providers”. This means that both companies must provide basic telephone services on request and at the same price to all customers throughout their areas of influence.

In the 12 years since the world has changed dramatically: in 2003 people were starting to switch their internet access from dial-up modems to the new, speedier connection called “broadband”. The UK’s first, relatively primitive 3G mobile phone network opened, the Freeview digital television service turned one year old, and BBC iPlayer was still many years in the future.

Today in 2015 the internet is everything; the average UK adult now spends more time per day interacting with connected digital technology than sleeping, and the average household has at least three internet-connected devices.

BT’s argument is that the future is not telephones but digital services over the internet. BT has an entire network built to handle the telephone calls of the last century (and the century before that) - the so-called Plain Old Telephone System (POTS). The rest of its network is a modern telecommunications network that’s digital right up to the cable that connects the exchange to the home, which carries both voice and data signals. Today telephony is just another service that can be delivered over the internet – why do we need a large and expensive network dedicated to offering telephone services?

POTS and kettles

The answer is we don’t. Telephone services can be provided in what’s called an “over-the-top” service running on a data network. The mobile industry has already recognised this and re-designed its networks accordingly. While first-generation, second (2G) and third (3G) networks provided both voice and data, today’s fast 4G networks are data only. Voice calls are just another form of network traffic like web browsing, social media or streaming video.

BT (or more accurately its arms-length Openreach division which provides the infrastructure), argues that it wants to do the same, but its hands are tied by the legally-binding requirements of the “universal service” clause of the Communications Act.

However, we need to be very careful here with our terminology. According to Ofcom, 16% of UK adults now live in a mobile-only household. This means those people rely solely on their mobile phones for making telephone calls and don’t have a landline telephone. Does this mean Openreach has removed their telephone line? No, because that same line is what provides broadband services to our homes – you can have a telephone line without connecting a telephone to it.

BT’s argument is that today the concept of a universal service has become a millstone around its neck that forces it to maintain a large and outdated telephone network at great cost to support telephone exchanges that fewer and fewer people use.

Despite the growing trend that sees people using apps such as Skype, Viber or Whatsapp to communicate through the internet, the companies responsible have no requirement upon them to build or maintain their own networks – they rely on those provided by telecoms firms. Why should BT be lumbered with offering a basic telephone service to all, when the same thing can be achieved via broadband? Scrapping its network that is solely responsible for providing a telephone service would allow BT to re-invest in the further development of its broadband and internet provision and so compete more freely with other “over the top” providers.

There is of course an obvious caveat to all of this: the concept of universal service is to ensure that every household has access to basic telephone services. This remains an important and worthy obligation, it’s just that there are now other ways of achieving it. That’s the point that Ofcom really needs to grasp: scrapping the telephone network does not mean scrapping the telephone.

'Windows 10 on everything' is Microsoft's gambit to profit from its competitors

Windows on anything means revenue from everything, at least that's the idea. gadgets by aslysun/shutterstock.com

Microsoft’s aim to make Windows 10 run on anything is key to its strategy of reasserting its dominance. Seemingly unassailable in the 1990s, Microsoft’s position has in many markets been eaten away by the explosive growth of phones and tablets, devices in which the firm has made little impact.

To run Windows 10 on everything, Microsoft is opening up.

Rather than requiring Office users to run Windows, now Office365 is available for Android and Apple iOS mobile devices. A version of Visual Studio, Microsoft’s key application for programmers writing Windows software, now runs on Mac OS or Linux operating systems.

Likewise, with tools released by Microsoft developers can tweak their Android and iOS apps so that they run on Windows. The aim is to allow developers to create, with ease, the holy grail of a universal app that runs on anything. For a firm that has been unflinching in taking every opportunity to lock users into its platform, just as with Apple and many other tech firms, this is a major change of tack.

From direct to indirect revenue

So why is Microsoft trying to become a general purpose, broadly compatible platform? Windows' share of the operating system market has fallen steadily from 90% to 70% to 40%, depending on which survey you believe. This reflects customers moving to mobile, where the Windows Phone holds a mere 3% market share. In comparison Microsoft’s cloud infrastructure platform Azure, Office 365 and its Xbox games console have all experienced rising fortunes.

We’re way into the post-PC era. Blake Patterson, CC BY

Lumbered with a heritage of Windows PCs in a falling market, Microsoft’s strategy is to move its services – and so its users – inexorably toward the cloud. This divides into two necessary steps.

First, for software developed for Microsoft products to run on all of them – write once, run on everything. As it is there are several different Microsoft platforms (Win32, WinRT, WinCE, Windows Phone) with various incompatibilities. This makes sense, for a uniform user experience and also to maximise revenue potential from reaching as many possible devices.

Second, to implement a universal approach so that code runs on other operating systems other than Windows. This has historically been fraught, with differences in approach to communicating, with hardware and processor architecture making it difficult. In recent years, however, improving virtualisation has made it much easier to run code across platforms.

It will be interesting to see whether competitors such as Google and Apple will follow suit, or further enshrine their products into tightly coupled, closed ecosystems. Platform exclusivity is no longer the way to attract and hold customers; instead the appeal is the applications and services that run on them. For Microsoft, it lies in subscriptions to Office365 and Xbox Gold, in-app and in-game purchases, downloadable video, books and other revenue streams – so it makes sense for Microsoft to ensure these largely cloud-based services are accessible from operating systems other than just their own.

The Windows family tree … it’s complicated. Kristiyan Bogdanov, CC BY-SA

Platform vs services

Is there any longer any value in buying into a single service provider? Consider smartphones from Samsung, Google, Apple and Microsoft: prices may differ, but the functionality is much the same. The element of difference is the value of wearables and internet of things devices (for example, Apple Watch), the devices they connect with (for example, an iPhone), the size of their user communities, and the network effect.

From watches to fitness bands to internet fridges, the benefits lie in how devices are interconnected and work together. This is a truly radical concept that demonstrates digital technology is driving a new economic model, with value associated with “in-the-moment” services when walking about, in the car, or at work. It’s this direction that Microsoft is aiming for with Windows 10, focusing on the next big thing that will drive the digital economy.

The revolution will be multi-platform

I predict that we will see tech firms try to grow ecosystems of sensors and services running on mobile devices, either tied to a specific platform or by driving traffic directly to their cloud infrastructure.

Apple has already moved into the mobile health app market and connected home market. Google is moving in alongside manufacturers such as Intel, ARM and others. An interesting illustration of this effect is the growth of digital payments – with Apple, Facebook and others seeking ways to create revenue from the traffic passing through their ecosystems.

However, the problem is that no single supplier like Google, Apple, Microsoft or internet services such as Facebook or Amazon can hope to cover all the requirements of the internet of things, which is predicted to scale to over 50 billion devices worth US$7 trillion in five years. As we become more enmeshed with our devices, wearables and sensors, demand will rise for services driven by the personal data they create. Through “Windows 10 on everything”, Microsoft hopes to leverage not just the users of its own ecosystem, but those of its competitors too.

Parties short of ideas on how to secure Britain's digital future

There's few enough bright sparks here. ev0luti0nary, CC BY-ND

Opening Labour’s 2015 manifesto made me wonder whether I’d downloaded the right document, as it states that we’re “at the start of the internet revolution” – a peculiar viewpoint for a supposedly future-focused policy. It had me wondering what the party thinks has been happening for the last 25 years since the birth of the web.

The manifesto contains some principles that are right for delivering a sound digital future, but the party comes across as out of touch with the cutting edge of digital innovation by offering a series of predictable and uninspiring (if necessary) policies. For example, the need to invest in skills to ensure there is no shortfall of next-generation coders and creatives. Yet there’s no mention of updating those skills, or even trying to nurture a skillset within the population that’s more adaptive to changing digital needs.

More required than just a connection

The need to plug holes in the UK’s broadband infrastructure and fill in the mobile phone coverage “not spots” is obvious, but is no different from other parties' aims including the ubiquitous desire to achieve “digital inclusion”. The Conservatives take a similar line, focusing especially on ensuring libraries have free Wi-Fi on offer.

Yet in this race online, none of the parties offers much explanation of what this means beyond getting more people connected. Nor do any of them distinguish between different levels of access and the effect it has on civic participation. Getting the last 10% of people online is no guarantee they will reap the rewards. We have moved on from mere access to the internet to the need to inform how and what to do with it – a matter of digital literacy that is crucial if the internet is to provide any empowerment.

Labour’s manifesto really puts digital at the heart of government, through aims for greater efficiencies through better data sharing and use of technology across the civil service. Labour’s eggs seem to be all in one basket, yet its aspirations do not go far enough to confronting the major digital issues the public faces. In contrast, the Conservative party focuses on highlighting next generation technology: ultrafast broadband and 5G mobile networks.

Rights and data

Labour’s digital promises are found within its economic strategy, and scant attention is paid to other more wide-ranging issues that stem from the adoption of the internet into our lives. For example, the Liberal Democrats make a point of championing the need for a digital bill of rights – a proposition set out by Sir Tim Berner-Lee in 2014, and by others before and since, as necessary to ensure the internet remains a place of freedom and innovation.

It’s important that governments protect people from exploitation or other harm online, and setting forth citizens' rights to control their own data deserves to be a major priority of any party in government. But there’s little said about data beyond that held by government – in fact most personal data on citizens is held by private companies and stored for proprietary services – something that goes without mention in Labour’s manifesto.

With an exponential growth in health data from wearable trackers produced by Apple and other tech firms, there’s a need for a framework for controlling, migrating and protecting this data across different services from different providers. No firm should be allowed to lock users, and their data, into a single platform in perpetuity. In fact the lack of attention paid to the growing mobile health market alone is glaring, but the same applies to online medical records, music collections on streaming services, or all manner of data.

Policymaking for the present

Politicians need to recognise that this isn’t the “beginning” of anything, but a mature global platform that in a little more than 10 years has reshaped most markets on the planet. Policies need to reflect what’s happening now – with the growth of the internet of things, something also absent from any party’s manifesto, the challenge will exponentially increase.

Overall, Labour’s digital manifesto doesn’t go far enough to identify what’s really at stake, nor bold enough to promise the changes required to ensure we’re best placed to reap the benefits of the digital economy.

The Lib Dem’s aspiration for a digital bill of rights is heading in the right direction but is founded in paranoia, rather than empowerment. The Conservatives are similarly focused on protecting people online, but campaign’s like the Web We Want need to be so much more, focusing on empowerment, ownership, authorship, and on the changing digital desires of our population.

How 3D printing helped robots tackle their greatest obstacle: stairs

Is there a lift? I'm trying to conquer the universe and I need to reach the first floor. Les Chatfield/Flickr, CC BY-SA

We’ve long attempted to recreate living creatures in robot form. From very early age of robotics, there has been attempts to reproduce systems similar to human arms and hands. This has been extended to flexible and mobile platforms reproducing different animals from dogs to snakes to climbing spider octopods, and even entire humanoids.

One of the key actions performed by animals from mantises to kangaroos is jumping. But incorporating a jumping mechanism into autonomous robots requires much more effort from designers. One of the main challenges for robots is still travelling efficiently over rugged surfaces and obstacles. Even the simple task of going up or down a staircase has proven to be rather difficult for robot engineers.

A jumping robot could provide access to areas that are inaccessible to traditional mobile wheeled or legged robots. In the case of some search-and-rescue or exploration missions, in collapsed buildings for example, such a robot might even be preferable to unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) or quadcopter “drones”.

There has been increasing research in the robotics field to take on the challenges of designing a mobile platform capable of jumping. Different techniques have been implemented for jumping robots such as using double jointed hydraulic legs or a carbon dioxide-powered piston to push the robot off the ground. Other methods include using “shape memory alloy” – metal that alters its shape when heated with electrical current to create a jumping force – and even controlled explosions. But currently there is no universally accepted standard solution to this complex task.

A new approach explored by researchers at the University of California San Diego and Harvard University uses a robot with a partially soft body. Most robots have largely rigid frames incorporating sensors, actuators and controllers, but a specific branch of robotic design aims to make robots that are soft, flexible and compliant with their environment – just like biological organisms. Soft frames and structures help to produce complex movements that could not be achieved by rigid frames.

Soft landing Jacobs School of Engineering/UC San Diego/Harvard University

The new robot was created using 3D printing technology to produce a design that seamlessly integrates rigid and soft parts. The main segment comprises two hemispheres nestled inside one inside the other to create a flexible compartment. Oxygen and butane are injected into the compartment and ignited, causing it to expand and launching the robot into the air. Pneumatic legs are used to tilt the robot body in the intended jump direction.

Unlike many other mechanisms, this allows the robot to jump continuously without a pause between each movement as it recharges. For example, a spring-and-clutch mechanism would require the robot to wait for the spring to recompress and then release. The downside is that this mechanism would be difficult to mass-manufacture because of its reliance on 3D printing.

The use of a 3D printer to combine the robot’s soft and hard elements in a single structure is a big part of what makes it possible. There are now masses of different materials for different purposes in the world of 3D printing, from flexible NinjaFlex to high-strength Nylon and even traditional materials such as wood and copper.

The creation of “multi-extrusion” printers with multiple print heads means that two or more materials can be used to create one object using whatever complex design the engineer can come up with, including animal-like structures. For example, Ninjaflex, with its high flexibility could be used to create a skin or muscle-like outer material combined with Nylon near the core to protect vital inner components, just like a rib cage.

In the new robot, the top hemisphere is printed as a single component but with nine different layers of stiffness, from rubber-like flexibility on the outside to full rigidity on the inside. This gives it the necessary strength and resilience to survive the impact when it lands. By 3D printing and trialling multiple versions of the robot with different material combinations, the engineers realised a fully rigid model would jump higher but would be more likely to break and so went with the more flexible outer shell.

Once robots are capable of performing more tasks with the skill of humans or animals, such as climbing stairs, navigating on their own and manipulating objects, they will start to become more integrated into our daily lives. This latest project highlights how 3D printing can help engineers design and test different ideas along the road to that goal.

BBC micro:bit aims to turn children from digital consumers into digital creators

Good things come in small packages, but are all small packages a good thing? BBC

The way computing is taught in schools is going through its greatest upheaval since the subject was first introduced at the turn of the century. After considerable lobbying by the industry, professional societies, universities and schools, the national curriculum has been re-oriented towards establishing computing as the “fourth science” for schools.

Out go interminable lessons on how to use specific word processor or spreadsheet applications. In comes more rigorous teaching about the scientific principles of technology and how to put it to use creatively – to be taught, importantly, by example rather than by rote.

Plugged in to this change of tack is the recently announced BBC micro:bit, a tiny, inexpensive pocket-sized computing device. The BBC plans to give away a million of these devices free to every Year 7 child (11 to 12-year-old) in the country this autumn, to encourage children to become a generation of digital creators.

Conceived by the BBC, the micro:bit has been developed by organizations including ARM, Microsoft, Freescale, Nordic Semiconductor, Element 14, Samsung and Lancaster University.

One of the goals of this initiative is to create a greater number of students that go into computer science and related fields of study with a better understanding of technology, transforming the UK from a nation of digital consumers into a creative powerhouse. To place this in context, a recent House of Lords select committee report suggested some 35% of current jobs in the UK could be lost to automation over the next 20 years. In my personal opinion, that’s an understatement. The strategy for the nation here is made clear: to create new jobs through digital innovation. This will only be possible if today’s children are adequately skilled and motivated to rise to this challenge.

This is an ambitious strategy, and one that requires an equally ambitious approach to delivering it. The response to this call to arms has been quite simply staggering. Not from the government, but from enthusiasts, volunteers and evangelists. To name but a few such organisations picking up the challenge: Computing at Schools support almost 20,000 teachers throughout over 600 regional UK hubs, Code Club organise after school programming clubs throughout the UK and Teen Tech who expose teenagers to the wide range of career possibilities in science, engineering and technology.

The BBC’s first foray into computers was more than 30 years ago. Stuart Brady

Not the BBC’s first computer

But we’ve been here before. It’s hard not to draw a parallel to the Model B, a computer released by the BBC in the 1980s for the same reason – to forge a new technologically-savvy generation of future students, innovators and entrepreneurs. The BBC Model B typified the computer of its day, a modestly-specified desktop machine with integrated keyboard that could connect to a home television. At just 4cm by 5cm, the micro:bit is a very 21st-century computer: compact, with built-in sensors and wireless communication, and an ARM Cortex M0 processor around 18 times more powerful than its forerunner.

Packed full: what the Micro:bit comes with. BBC

The micro:bit supports Bluetooth Low Energy, which means it can interact wirelessly with other nearby devices such as mobile phones and tablets. This pitches it more as part of the emerging internet of things, made up of small low-powered devices that can provide services or data to other, more powerful devices such as smartphones.

It has a simple display of 25 LEDs arranged in a 5x5 matrix, just enough for simple graphics and text, and it is also equipped with an electronic compass and three-axis accelerometer so it can detect its orientation, and standard connectors that provide an easy way for children to integrate the micro:bit into their own creative electronics projects. It’s not a motivational toy – it’s a computing case study, a simple demonstrator for how complex computers can be used.

Building a community, not just a device

Running the code simulator on a tablet. BBC

The device is only part of the package. The micro:bit can be programmed through the web, in a variety of programming languages tailored for different levels of ability. It will support highly visual drag-and-drop languages ideal for beginners, Microsoft’s Touch Develop, Python and JavaScript for intermediate users, and C++ for older, experienced programmers. The accompanying website also provides teachers access to pre-written learning resources and also a platform to create and share their teaching materials with other teachers, or to publish their pupil’s work if appropriate to inspire others.

After the initial 1m units are delivered, the devices will be available for commercial purchase with proceeds directed to a not-for-profit foundation. All the micro:bit hardware and software will be open-sourced, allowing others to build on the foundations laid.

The micro:bit is aimed at fostering an ecosystem to support digital creativity, balancing motivation and education while reducing the barrier to entry for both children and teachers. Will it be successful, inspiring fond memories in a generation like the Model B? We’ll see.

Researchers are looking to a surprisingly old idea for the next generation of ships: wind power

University of Tokyo

In many ways, it’s an obvious solution. For many centuries, world trade over the oceans was propelled by wind power alone. Now that we’re seeking an alternative to the fossil fuel-burning vehicles that enable our modern standard of living, some people are turning again to renewable solutions such as wind to power our tankers, bulk carriers and container ships. Globalisation and economic growth might mean a direct reversion to the wooden sailing boats of yore makes no sense, but there are several 21st-century ideas that could make wind-powered shipping commonplace again.

Ship design certainly has a way to go to return to its heritage and take advantage of the wind’s free, renewable resource in the same way we have reinvented the windmill to produce electricity. However, it’s worth remembering wind turbines took a long time to evolve into the structures optimised and deployed at scale we have today. In fact, they’re still developing. Scientists and engineers have debated for years about the relative merits of two, three or more blades, of horizontal versus vertical configurations, and of onshore versus offshore generation.

For ships, the design process for wind technologies is potentially even more complicated and multi-dimensional. There are soft sails, rigid “wing” sails, flettner rotors (a spinning cylindrical vertical column that creates lift using the Magnus effect, originally conceived by Flettner in the 1920s) and kites all vying for a share of this market. Soft sails are fabric sails, most reminiscent of existing sailing ship designs, examples include the Dynarig and Fastrig. Rigid wing sails replace the fabric with a rigid lifting surface like a vertically mounted aircraft wing - for example the oceanfoil design.

A flettner rotor is a vertical cylinder rotated by a motor. The rotation modifies the air flowing around the cylinder to generate lift much like the lift generated by an aircraft wing (it’s referred to as the Magnus effect). While there are many examples of all four, so far it’s the kites and the flettners that have seen the most significant implementation on large merchant ship designs.

Notable examples include the work that Cargill and Wessels have done trialing kite systems , and the experience of two separate operators, Enercon and Norsepower with installations of different flettner designs on different ships. These trials have produced important full-scale experience, lessons about costs, performance data, and evidence for investment cases. All of which are undoubtedly taking us closer to the tipping point when wind once again becomes a ‘no brainer’.

Enercon’s E-Ship 1 with flettners Carschen/Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA

Trials of these new technologies, in combination with the history of wind turbines, can help us understand why any transition to modern wind-powered ships won’t happen overnight. For one thing, no one yet knows which of the many candidate designs will be the most successful.

Modern wind-powered shipping technology also carries a significant engineering challenge that wind turbines don’t: it needs to be mobile. It’s not as simple as bolting a rig to the deck. The highest safety standards have to be maintained and the rig must pose no constraints to loading and unloading cargoes in an uncertain and wide range of different ports (many of which might be obstructed by bridges).

Resolving these issues will take time, money and investors with the appetite for risk and stamina to see an emerging technology from a prototype to a fully developed new product. But I believe the change will happen because of the price of fossil fuels and environmental regulation. Wind power is free so the technology will become a worthwhile investment once it can be clearly evidenced that the saving from moving away from fossil fuels outweighs the costs of installing and operating a wind-powered ship.

Many think that threshold oil price has already been achieved and exceeded, as evidenced by the large and growing number of projects proposing wind propulsion solutions, even allowing for the recent fall in oil prices.

While there is currently only weak regulation on shipping’s greenhouse gas emissons, the sector – like all those producing carbon dioxide – is likely to face more stringent controls as its emissions continue to grow. Exactly what form such controls will take remains the subject of further ongoing work. But any meaningful regulation would reinforce the case for wind-powered shipping as a favourable investment.

Shipping is a vital, if somewhat hidden, part of modern economies. Decarbonising those economies is the only way to avoid destroying them (and the environment). Wind power presents an astoundingly obvious and elegant solution to these combined challenges. But it will languish in the sidelines until we see rapid change from investors, politicians, or ideally both.

New iPad? Tech firms have abandoned radical innovation for mediocrity

Shutterstock

The dust has now settled on the latest product launch from Apple, which for many trumped headlines about refugees, poverty and the battles for the Republican nomination and leadership of the UK Labour Party. We have new iPads, iPhones and more. But how new are they really?

Innovation is often characterised as being either “radical” or “incremental”. When it is radical, it sets new precedents and fundamentally changes the way we do things. From self-administered insulin to solar powered houses to driverless cars, radical innovation releases potential. Incremental innovation on the other hand builds upon what is already there in small steps.

In the world of mobile phones and tablets, incremental has become the new radical, and true radical innovation has been relegated to the sidelines. Incremental innovation has become the norm because of a belief that “slow and steady wins the race”, that people don’t like the risks that come with big dramatic changes. That seems to be Apple’s long-term strategy and, as a dominant player, it is setting the culture for other players in the market.

Using staged marketing in the form of annual or biannual high-profile media launches, tech firms have groomed us as consumers to accept small change as normal. More radical innovation, such as a modular phone that can be continually upgraded, is seen as crazy, quirky or even science fiction.

No radical innovation

The new iPad Pro that is a few inches bigger than the last one is being hailed as a “big leap” when it’s really just tinkering with the old design. Despite the new features, it in no way represents a radical innovation worthy of ecstatic celebration. The whoops of delight at its launch were followed by voices of disappointment online.

It is primarily for commercial reasons that Apple has institutionalised incremental innovation and tried to convince us all it is radical. iPhones and iPads are brilliantly designed things. Incremental innovation requires expertise and excellence in design and improvement. Phones and tablets play a major part in millions of peoples' lives. But continued innovation happens at a slow pace designed to suit the supplier not the user, who is nonetheless pushed to pay significant amounts of money each year for minor changes.

When they said the new iPad was bigger they weren’t kidding. Beck Diefenbach/Reuters

Fear of failure may have also contributed to the disappearance of radical innovation. The struggles of more unusual designs such as that of the Amazon Fire phone may have made innovators more cautious, delaying and lengthening product development and rollout to compensate. Perhaps it isn’t surprising that virtually none of the radical (labelled “crazy” at the time) concept phones of 2010 have never appeared on the market.

We may have also reached a point where phone design is so good that truly impressive change has become much harder to achieve. So we continue to buy similar looking products, putting them to our ears (just as we did with landlines), snapping cameras with slightly better picture clarity, and getting slightly more intelligent answers from Siri. Same game, tiny changes, price hike.

A smartphone revolution

At the same time, major new challenges are emerging for smartphone makers, from evidence that current phone designs may be fuelling unhappiness and reducing productivity to the worrying environmental impact of manufacturing them. Radical innovation is needed so that phones fully serve customer interests in a sustainable way.

But for the time being, more radical products, such as the Yotaphone 2, (which offers a dual screen), or the Runcible (round, beautiful and rather different), will be at best seen as quirky and niche. The existing market leaders will only change their tortoise-speed approach to radical innovation if a major new player genuinely disrupts the market with fast, penetrative changes.

For example, Chinese company Xiaomi is creating a range of products for the home (from TVs to air purifiers) that automatically link with their smartphones in a single, integrated system. This is the kind of radical idea that could shock Apple into becoming more radical and adventurous.

We could eventually see mobile computing move away from hand-held, screen-based devices towards seamless interaction across different devices and platforms such as wearable technology and projected holograms.

For the foreseeable future, however, innovation in the mobile and wearable space is going to be dominated by incremental and fairly mediocre approaches to innovation. Radical thinking will be consigned to concepts for the future and the iPhone 7 will probably look a lot like the iPhone 3. But the launch will be offered as another revolution.

Virtual reality tech may make 'going shopping' in real life a thing of the past

'Too much Call of Duty, not enough shopping'. pestoverde, CC BY-SA

High street shops are well-established online these days and provide new opportunities for interaction between shop and shopper. Consumers have become accustomed to shopping using a range of devices and the immense popularity of smartphones and mobile devices has led to the rise of mobile or m-retailing, with new communication and distribution channels created with these in mind. Perhaps this mix of the real and online worlds are helpful precursors for what may be the “next big thing”: virtual reality shopping.

Virtual reality (VR) experiences are typically provided through wearable headgear or goggles that block out the real world and immerse the user in a virtual one. This is distinguished from augmented reality (AR), where layers of digital content can be overlayed on the real world, providing access to both. For example, the digital information displayed on the visor of Google Glass.

Apps can provide ‘live’ augmented reality to try on superimposed accessories and clothes. Eawentling, CC BY-NC-SA

While AR can work with mobile devices and is already included in some apps, for VR to succeed the headgear needs to be comfortable, stylish and powered by sufficiently capable software so that the immersive visual effects are credible – and useful. It’s possible to add deeper engagement with the virtual world by incorporating other senses, for example tactile hand controls for handling and manipulating objects.

In-store tech

Magic mirrors, where how you’d like to look is projected onto your actual appearance. Intel, CC BY-SA

However, the use of technology by retailers in-store has been patchy. The availability of in-store Wi-Fi has increased, and some stores offer touchscreens and tablets for customers to browse and search for items and look up information. More common are video screens displaying fashion collections, often connected to apps offering inspirational looks. However more cutting edge tech, such as magic mirrors that overlay the image of the shopper with the clothes they’ve selected, allowing them to switch style and colour options, are less widespread. Sometimes they’re also less than reliable.

In any case, shoppers tend to appreciate functionality over more playful or whimsical means of interacting with the retailer. New additions are welcome when they are informative and save the shopper time, helping them locate products in the store or at another. Not surprisingly consumers would rather not pay for these services, and prefer to be engaged rather than marketed to. Young fashion shoppers simply use their phones to share photos of potential purchases through Snapchat and Instagram. Image is everything, with the retailer providing the backdrop.

Present trends point to the expansion of interactive shop window displays and in-store communication that uses a combination of GPS, transmitters such as the Apple’s iBeacon and other devices using Bluetooth transmissions to interact with shopper’s smartphones. These will take personalisation and micro-marketing to a new level with real-time offers and information dispatched to their phone as they pass near product displays.

To support their brand, retailers will increasingly look at their customer relationships, so stories, images, videos and news – fashion and cosmetic blogs have been particularly successful – is where many new opportunities will arise. However, while creative and technologically novel, these are all at best examples of augmented rather than virtual reality.

Making a (virtual) impression

Where does this leave the use of virtual reality? We can expect to see trials as retailers become more comfortable offering content through them. New VR headsets such as from Oculus Rift and Sony will offer more and more realistic immersive environments. Sony, drawing on its Playstation expertise aims to to add movement to the user experience. Some brands have already piloted virtual stores, where VR-equipped shoppers could one day have the same experience of browsing through racks and shelves waiting for something to catch their eye – without needing to leave their home.

VR will provide an opportunity to re-visit and experience retailers' and desigers’ fashion shows of the past, events and exhibitions. For example, Top Shop recently transmitted London Fashion week as it happened through Oculus Rift headsets to customers in its Oxford Street store. It may also provide a means for retailer to extend the lifespan of certain promotions to individual customers.

Immersion is particularly promising in the creation or re-creation of 3D environments, which could be especially helpful for those buying furniture, furnishings, paint and decoration for their homes to envisage how it would look. The recently developed Virtuix virtual reality platform provides a motion controller that translates the users physical movements into equivalents in the virtual environment – a means to, literally, walk around a virtual world.

However, any major step forward will need to make the retailer’s investment worthwhile, and as neither the technology nor shoppers' complete acceptance of VR is where it needs to be today, there’s some way to go before VR becomes the next big thing in shopping.

When it comes to information overload, we're like frogs in boiling water

It's like this: you have to eat the frog. frog by Dirk Ercken/shutterstock.com

To consider how being constantly connected through computers and mobile devices has encroached on our working lives, consider the experiment about the frog in a pan of boiling water.

A frog in a pan of cold water that is gently heated will not realise it’s boiling to death if the change is sufficiently gradual. In the same way, the web has affected our attention span and so our productivity – slowly but surely the heat of distraction has increased as decades of internet evolution has added email, websites, instant messaging, forums, social media and video.

Striving to manage technology better or wean ourselves off from distractions such as social media updates or emails can be very hard, if not virtually impossible for some. It requires serious willpower.

Lock-down

What’s the answer for today’s organisations – lock-down and block, and risk restricting access to genuinely useful content and services? Blocking and locking-off parts of the web can only hinder progress and innovation, or by reacting to slow to change and innovation as seen in the NHS can have a negative impact on technology uptake, especially now the internet is now made up of things.

If we are to advance knowledge, it’s essential to have access to the full gamut of content online. Whether that’s to study the effects of pornography on society or for a student’s private consumption, we have to be mature about this, there is some content on the Web that will always be demanded. In fact the government’s efforts to deal with online pornography has led to the over-zealous use of internet filters. Dumb filters performing keyword filtering inevitably led to legitimate sex education websites being blocked.

Procrastination is not new and there will always find new and inventive ways of putting-off work. But there are means to help tackle that distraction, if only for some rather than all of the time.

And yet, despite the volume, it doesn’t slake your thirst. SparkCBC, CC BY-SA

Eat that frog

The problem with digital distraction is often starts from the first moment we sit down at our desks, or even before we’ve got there. Once we open our email we are drawn into conversations, questions and broadcasts. The more emails appear, the more we feel compelled to deal with them.

A useful solution involves that frog again: we all have tasks we ignore and delay, nagging away at the back of our minds. We have to complete these tasks, so why not start your day by doing just that and eating that frog: instead of checking frivolous updates and emails, tackle an important task that’s hanging around first thing in the morning.

The Pomodoro Technique

The popular Pomodoro Technique, which suggests using 30 minute time slots for a single task, followed by a break, can be helpful in dedicating time to specific projects. Another way to reign in distraction is to create lists or use time management apps like 30:30 or Wunderlist. These help set up a structured pattern to the working day, which is especially useful if you need to use social media professionally but also need to carve out time to get other things done.

Meditate

Meditation and mindfulness has gained much attention in the last couple of years, such as Andy Puddicombe’s popular Headspace imprint. In a busy office this offers a sensible solution to problem of losing focus. Just five minutes meditation could help quiet the mind and return focus to completing the current task. Various studies have highlighted the benefits of meditation and mindfulness on a digital worker’s productivity, and general happiness too.

Create an alternative productivity calendar

Paper diaries are still often used, if less so with the modern proliferation of electronic alternatives. These often dictate the modern worker’s routine, so much so that they fill in the spaces with fractured and incomplete tasks. Another solution is to create a personal online calendar to overlay a work calendar. By scheduling everything, from checking social media and emails to family time and free periods, it’s possible to make better use of the time you have.

One of many in the armoury. lemasney, CC BY-SA

Self-management starts with you

There comes a time to cut back on things that aren’t good for you, whether that’s food, drink, or social media. We realise that seeking distraction from our daily tasks is not healthy, especially if we can minimise it.

Professor Steve Peters has helped many high-profile sports stars control this impulsive, emotional part of the brain – something he calls the “chimp brain”. The easiest way to do so is not to feed it, for example, by not opening email. But finding a happy medium between restriction and necessary use is not easy.

Some have tried to constrain email and its effects on the workforce by turning it off for set periods. In Germany there have been calls to prevent companies from contacting employees out of hours. While this is fine for those working the nine-to-five, this no longer applies to many for a variety of reasons, some personal, some due to the nature of the work.

Self-management tools are a better option. For Google users there is an app called Inbox Pause which does just that, preventing new email distraction. There’s also restrictions for email on mobile devices that only updates when connected to known work or home networks – which means less chance of compulsively checking while out and about or on holiday.

But all of these require commitment, and like any lifestyle modification there has to be a willingness to change. Technology will continue to embed itself within our lives at home and at work, especially the use of smartphones. So if we feel the need to reign-in the distractions, whatever app or technique we choose to help us, it hinges on our own self-discipline.