My Early Prediction of I-Phone’s Latest Innovation

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When I saw this story,

Now it’s headsets: spending on wireless headsets overtook wired ones last year, says Steven LeBoeuf, founder of Valencell, a developer of biometric sensor technology for wearable devices.

I was reminded that back in 2001 I wrote,

I can imagine a world in which everyone spends several hours a day wearing a headset. There will be a software industry devoted to building applications for the headset platform, which consists of earphones, a microphone, and something that I call a “tuner.”

It is an amusing essay to read–wrong in many respects, but actually quite prescient in others.

3 thoughts on “My Early Prediction of I-Phone’s Latest Innovation”

  1. Do you still think the heart of education, at least at the high school level, is feedback? If so, may I push back–it’s engagement. Without engagement, you can’t even get the kids to learn what they are capable of learning, which is often not as much as the policy folk expect.

    Of course, there’s a whole group of people who think engagement is all it takes, but no. It’s necessary, but not sufficient.

  2. I suspect that Voice Writer (Speech to Text) will soon be losing to Thought Writer — where sensors plus smartphone AI allow thoughts to command the smartphone or write out an SMS/ email.

    The headsets for audible input will remain in use for longer due to the need to use sound and sight for most human comprehension.

    Arnold, it’s too bad you didn’t use a mobile telephone as the the “tuner”.

    In my own predictions, I recall thinking about stereo microphones on collars or as brooches or necklace for women.

    I also soon expect, like thought writer, to hear about Computer Aided Telepathy — Thought writer to text, sent to recipient’s smartphone and “said” in the thinker’s voice to recipient in the ear buds.

    They don’t need to be wireless for this — and I expect some future security issues to insist on wired devices and extensive encryption between s-fones.

    Too bad Ender’s Game wasn’t a bigger hit movie — it sort of predicted the “net” influences and its book sequel, Speaker For The Dead, had vocal semi-telepathy between Ender and an AI “Jane” thru a “jewel” earbud. But since Orson Scott Card’s a mormon, there were many folk against the movie for just that reason.

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