Negroponte makes computers more human

By Dean Carignan

JAKARTA (JP): When will we begin to speak to our computers instead of typing on them? When will they help us make decisions -- or perhaps make decisions of their own? These are the questions that occupy the mind of Nicholas Negroponte.

For over 10 years Negroponte has explored the intricate relationship between computers and people (the human-computer interface, as he dubs it) through his post as director of the Media Lab at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

As one of America's leading research institutes, the Media Lab is dedicated to probing the boundaries of the human-computer interface and seeking ways for man and machine to cooperate more effectively.

This seemingly arcane research is more than idle speculation. Major corporations worldwide scramble to get a glimpse of the Lab's -- and Negroponte's -- insights. The lab, which celebrated its 10th anniversary last year, now commands a yearly budget of some US$25 million, most of it contributed by admiring corporate sponsors. Negroponte himself travels some 300,000 miles a year, being wined and dined by CEOs and other decision-makers who want to hear his advice.

So why all the fuss over how computers and people get along? The answers is summarized in Negroponte's pithy expression "Computer's aren't just about computing any more. They're about living." Negroponte explored this concept in his 1994 bestseller Being Digital, which examines the expanding role of computers in human society. To be "digital", the book explains, means to incorporate computer technology into one's life whenever and wherever possible. In the future, Negroponte argues, being digital will be as essential to personal professional success as, say, being literate is today.

This growing influence of computers in our lives is driven by two trends. The first is the declining price and rising capacity of computer microchips. Microchips generally double in computing power every 18 months, while their cost drops by half during the same period. The lowering price has already allowed chips to appear in a range of non-computers items, from toasters to automobiles. As these chips become more powerful, they will invest even the most everyday items with a certain level of intelligence. Refrigerators, for example, will notice we're out of milk and will e-mail the corner grocer to send more. Radios will learn our listening tastes and recommend specific programs and stations.

The second trend is the extraordinary impact of computers on human communication. Traditionally, Negroponte explains, communications could be divided into three distinct realms: the Information World consisting of books, newspaper, and magazines; the Entertainment World of films, television and video; and the Interactive World; the domain of computers.

Each of these realms enjoyed a unique strength lacked by the others. The printed materials of the Information World, for example, offered immense depth of knowledge. The Entertainment World enjoyed tremendous audio-visual richness -- the ability to excite and captivate. And the Interactive world of computers allows the viewer to control, modify and interact with the information being viewed (e.g. spreadsheets, data bases, etc.)

These three realms are presently converging into a single, increasingly commonplace appliance: the multimedia PC Computer. Thanks to the wealth of data available on the Internet and on CD- ROMs, a multimedia PC now has access to the depth of information once found only in printed documents. At the same time, the increased display capacity of PC's is allowing them to offer the audio-visual richness of the Entertainment World. High-end PC's now run video and audio at almost the same quality as television sets and video recorders.

Finally, the interactivity of computers leaves the user in control of the information he viewing. He can view it whenever he wants; save the relevant bits on his hard disk, and discard the rest.

An excellent example of this multimedia convergence is the growing use of CD-ROMs in the corporate world. While company spokesmen used to travel miles to meetings, toting bags of company reports and reels of corporate video, many are now opting to send out a single CD-ROM. The CD-ROM can hold 10 years of annual reports, over an hour of video, and an audio recording of what the spokesman would have said had he been present.

It is this striking commercial value of multimedia -- only now being glimpsed -- that keeps the corporate dollars flowing into the Media Lab's coffers. Indeed, such strengths have already built multimedia into a billion dollar a year industry, with no slowdown in sight. Negroponte even envisions a day -- quite soon -- when the multimedia PC will challenge such central elements of human society as the television set. Why, he asks, should families cut their dinner short and rush to the living room to catch an 8 p.m. program? Much better to have a PC -- equipped with a high-resolution, wide-screen monitor -- download your favorite programs from the Internet and play them back at your convenience. Video, after all, already cruises the circuits of the Internet. And those wide-screen monitors top the list of priorities at many R & D labs.

But what of the dangers posed by the growing role of computers? Will not computer technology take people's jobs? And as people communicate more by e-mail and less in person, will not the connection between human beings suffer. Nonsense, Negroponte responds. Computers can never fill those tasks that are most uniquely human. They are not -- and never will be -- creative; they will never invent a new product, conceive a company logo, or write a poem. They can, of course, help tremendously in bringing any of those inspirations to fruition -- engineering the new product, digitally designing the logo, publishing the poem. But they cannot replicate the uniquely human imagination that gives rise to each process.

Being digital, Negroponte is quick to point out, does not mean using computers always and everywhere. Rather this term refers to using the machines where they truly advantage human capability, where they are a complement and not a competitor to flesh-and-blood people.

If anything, computers make us more human by handling mundane tasks and letting us focus on more challenging, stimulating endeavors -- just as word processors, by making the typing of a letter easier, allow us to concentrate more on the message.

And the Internet? Aren't all those E-mail and chat rooms supplanting human company? The response is that Internet technology allows people to communicate regardless of geographic or political separation. Thanks to the Internet, two philosophy professors in, say, Russia and Venezuela can discuss daily the intricacies of Hegel's writing. Is something lost in the lack of physical presence? Yes. Is something more valuable gained in the digital linking up of people who would otherwise never have met? Almost certainly.

Today, Negroponte will lead a seminar in Jakarta called Being Digital in Asia. The title itself is a bit ironic. "Being digital" is not about being in Asia or any other region. It is about being human, and the unavoidable consequence of being human, dealing with computers. Thanks to Negroponte's writings we now have a better glimpse into the exciting future that people and computers will share.

The writer works for International Communications Associates, a Multimedia communications firm based in Jakarta.