Maeda's SIMPLICITY

Dangerous Dependencies

Ben Kerney pointed out to me that by making this blog dependent upon Flickr I run the risk of losing access to my own data in the future. Trying to connect to Flickr this morning, I am reminded of what Ben means. I guess we can say the same for gmail—another great idea when you can connect to it. The idea of access to your data ... anytime ... anywhere ... is kind of a myth in our interconnected world. What good is interconnectivity when you are not connected?

We've been thinking about this issue a bit at the SIMPLICITY consortium. 100% reliability of network services really is a kind of a faraway dream, so we have to plan and prepare for the right kind of application layer that makes us care less about the problems that occur in everyday computer usage. In the Second Law I discussed the fundamental issue of our propensity to have to wait as being an anti-driver of simplicity. We know from our experiences in high-end supermarkets that the poor experience of waiting can be made a little happier with the person handing out ice cream or cookies in line. Thus given that we will always have to wait, an important goal is to figure out how to make waiting feel better. One way we know that works is the progress bar, but we must ask the question, "Are there other ways?"

The fact that I can't connect to Flickr should be made less of a traumatic experience for me. Perhaps the browser can crack jokes. It can maybe display a popup, "I never liked Flickr anyway. Let's go visit that Kodak site that used to be called ofoto that nobody can remember the URL for ..." for instance. That reminds me of that work that was done at the Lab around a virtual exercise trainer that seemed sympathetic to the exercisee by Tim Bickmore. I never tried the system, but I could imagine the efficacy to be real. I would do it differently though. I would make the computer appear especially pathetic and funny. Maybe more like a Woody Allen take on the computer's personality. I guess I prefer humor over placation. Placation isn't real; humor usually is.

In the meantime I will hold onto my original digital photos that I place on Flickr to hedge my dangerous dependency. Who knows when Yahoo might change their name to "yahoogallery" or something like that. Those brand experts are sometimes too clever you know ...