Friday 11 April 2014

Avatar: The Future Device

In the near future, I imagine mobile phones will be like PC - a DIY customizable gadget that replaces the need to buy certain model from certain maker. You can pick and choose what to put in the system according to your needs and budget. CPU, RAM, storage size, screen size, camera, gfx engine, modular casing, and finally OS of your choice.

Zoom further into the future, I also imagine the phone/device being integrated with the whole living space. Imagine a wall painted with nanobot paint that is reactive. Project your vacation video on the wall. Even playback the scenery onto the windows to change the outside view to that of your vacation.

A video call can be made and received all over the walls, mirror, etc. Closet door can project your image with a preview of clothes option you wanted to wear (onto your mapped avatar), all the while a friend can comment, suggest, annotate. Even upload their inventory to your closet for your previewing.

Electrical appliances also get connected with your phone/device. The fridge could warn you of your calory intake - by proactively consulting your Health app and remind you of how good you look if you loose a few kg. The fridge can portray the thinner you by accessing countless photos of you from the cloud storage.

Let's call this device Avatar.

With Avatar in your pocket (or palm, integrated on a glove-like wearables), the room's wall can light up to illuminate you. The ceiling has no light fixtures too, since the nano-paint can act as light panels. It can even sync with whatever you are viewing on the Avatar. Say you are browsing photos of your last vacation, the ceiling will use it's Skylight system to light the room as in the photo. With sound.

And since the whole living space is reactive & proactive,  you can never lose an item anymore - you can simply say "Avatar, locate my wallet" and a beacon and wayfinder arrows lights up on the floor/walls.

The Avatar can also act as security device. Its an IDer. Use to unlock door, start car engine, login to the virtual world. What if the device is stolen you say? No problem, it'll be of no use to others. It records your behaviour pattern - voice, body language, touches/tactile behaviour, heart rate and other bodily monitoring to identify it is YOU carrying the device. So no more movie scene of cutting one's thumb or eyeball to open a sealed door. By the way, on topic of security, the whole house can act as security camera, alarm, and witness in court.

Another area of interest is the emergence of 3D printers. Currently it is coarse and simplistic. In the future these machines can replicate a lot more things with a lot more precicion and using all sort of materials - not just plastic. This will make buying physical devices obsolete. So, companies like Samsung, etc won't be selling physical devices anymore. They will sell downloadable schematic. Software recipe to cook your device out of the 3D printers.

Central to all these, ofcourse, will be your Avatar  device, where your money also resides. The downloaded and printed Samsung Pasta Maker 3000 will only turn on if you are there physically.

In this future world, robbery and theft are petty and stupid. You can't benefit from stealing other's 'ID-locked' properties. But the most heinous act would be identity stealing. Digitally scanned personality of you. Uploaded and multiplied on the cloud storage and downloaded to perpetrator's Avatar. You will have multiple twins, probably called X-Avatar025.

Hackers would be king.


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