The dawn of the age of responsive media (Keynote abstract)

Abstract

What will be the next computing paradigm as the ubiquitous computing wave crests: autonomobiles, robots, virtual reality, internet of things, intelligent agents? While pundits search for the next big thing among a dizzying array of shiny ideas, the truth is that pervasive technologies have reached critical mass that we no longer need to ask what if and we can shift our attention to what when. One picture of that future is a recasting of how we think about designing digital experiences — rather than systems that react to user direction, we can design systems that respond dynamically to the users' attention, engagement and context: Responsive Media. The same machine learning technologies that have made speech and image recognition surprisingly accurate are also enhancing our devices' abilities to sense user activities, emotions and intentions and to deliver services and information proactively. Media experiences will be dramatically changed by the next generation of these technologies embedded into smartphones and VR goggles and robots and smart homes and autonomobiles so that they not only sense the audience's engagement in real time, but they can also predict disengagement and prevent it by dynamically shifting the content to appeal to an individual's preferences, emotion state and situation. More than just media experiences, imagine robots that can sense a child's frustration and actively assist in the homework, digital assistants that do not interrupt inappropriately, semi-autonomobiles that ensure the media is not disrupting the driver's attention demands, and more. Responsive media will be more like an engaging conversation among humans, rather than just passive consumption. What are the requirements for a conversational interaction? This talk will paint a picture and challenge the audience to identify the remaining technology barriers, architectures, business ecosystems, threats, and yes, the killer applications. I seek your input as we create the future beyond ubiquitous computing.