Negroponte makes computers more human

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.