The unique title ‘Disruptive Futurist’ must be one of the most unusual in the IT industry, but that’s what global network services provider BT bestows upon Ian Neild.
In the Asia Pacific, BT Global Services employs more than 27,000 people across 17 countries specialising in wireless, routing and switching, unified communications, and security.
MIS Asia editor Ross O. Storey asked Ian Neild to explain his job.
What exactly is a ‘leading Disruptive Futurist’, how did the role come about and what exactly does such a person do with BT? What is the BT Technology Timeline (any background)?
I am a ‘Disruptive Futurist’ for BT, a futurist looks at where technology and social trends are going and looks for the impacts these will have. I’m classed as ‘leading’ by some through the technology timeline that I write and the talks I give around the world. I have gotten here by learning how to listen, read, see and think.
The technology timeline (latest version at www.btplc.com/Innovation/News/timeline/TechnologyTimeline.pdf) is a list of technological changes along with their impacts in various fields. The document is redone about every four years. I co-edited the 2001 version and edited the 2005 version; the 2009 version is being released around March 09. The 1993 version of the timeline listed 200 predictions that would be here by 2020; many of these have already arrived and a selection of the predictions that have already happened are listed below. At the time, many were seen as far-fetched and fanciful ideas.
• Engineered organisms for production of chemicals for use in applications such as waste disposal
• Many new forms of plants
• Blue semiconductor lasers
• Life long learning is the normal
• Distance learning widespread and virtual universities
• Real time language translation for print and voice
• Broadband networked electronic libraries
• Solar cells with efficiency > 30 %
• Common use of solar cells for residential power supply
• Colour video displays with > 2000 by 2000 pixels
• Large wall hung high definition displays > 100 inch
• Electronic notebook with contrast equivalent of paper even when powered off
• Many people sharing a virtual space
• Speech dialling
• Atomic customization of material
You have to remember the landscape for 1993, the idea of processing, displays, storage and communication, was totally different to what we have today and what we will have in 2020.
Please explain further how you expect that: “over the next 60 years we can expect the existence of living, genetically-engineered teddy bears, emotional jewellery and even electronic brain implants brought about by nanotechnology”.
If you consider the advances being made in technology today, which of course is not just about electronics, but includes biology, chemistry and the manipulation of material at the atomic level, then, potentially, humankind has the ability to create the ‘items’ listed above. The timeline doesn’t necessarily condone or approve of the concepts in the predictions, but simply raises their possibility. A genetically modified creature could be created that would act like a living teddy bear, items we wear as jewellery could react to our own or others’ emotions, and we may be using brain implants to either repair brain disorders or improve our own brains. The questions for the future are: do you think this is reasonable in this time frame and if not, is it too soon or too late; will it be a scientific, legal or cultural barrier to adoption that will prevent this; and what are the effects it may have?
What other futuristic devices/directions do you expect IT to take in the next half century?
Fifty years is a very long time; if you consider what we classed as high technology in 1958 to what we do today, there is a huge difference. If you had talked about laptop computers in 1958 at a time when computers were more like buildings, then few would have taken it seriously. The famous predictions from the CIO equivalents of the time were about computers weighing less than 1 tonne and the world market for computers being only five machines. To be fair, these predictions were partly correct in that many computers do weigh less than 1 tonne and the worldwide market for data/ processing centres may indeed be 5 or maybe a few more. These may well be owned and run by Google, Amazon, BT etc.
Considering that advances in many sciences are rapidly increasing and how much processing, storage and communications we are likely to have in the future, I would predict that augmented reality (mixing computer generated graphics with real life) and location will play a larger part in our lives. A growing concern for much of the world is that the populations are ageing and we are going to have to use new medical technologies to change the way healthcare is delivered.
How do you think IT pundits from 50 years hence will look back at 2008/09 and what historical milestones will they be talking about from this time? What 2008/09 devices will be in the museums of 2050?
The great futurist and science fiction writer Arthur C Clarke predicted the communication satellite. He knew how many devices (valves) would be needed and how unreliable these were and so each satellite would need to be large enough to hold all these devices plus a technician to live on the satellite to repair them. Of course, the transistor and integrated circuit (IC) replaced the valve, which reduced the prices and size dramatically. We didn’t need a live-in-space technician to fix the satellites. Suddenly, processing power and memory became cheap and could be used in ways unimaginable a few years before. In the 1970’s, one Mbyte of RAM for a supercomputer could have cost about 1 Million dollars; if you had told people that in 30 years time, children would be using hundreds or thousands of Mbytes (or 100’s M$ worth of memory) to store music, you would not have been believed. So, in thinking about the future, you can’t just be blinkered by what is happening today; you have to start thinking about technology trends, what other research is making possible and what people want, which drives development.
So, in the future, I think they will look back at our desktop PCs, our mobile phones with their fixed small screens, the DVD, plasma and LCD displays and wonder how we were able to live with them. The games experience in the future will be much more immersive; think about how the original computer games like ‘Pong’ look today compared to the life-like games that children nowadays take for granted and then think how will that difference be in 10 years. Some museums already show technology from just 30 years ago and it can look ancient today, so I’d expect to see even the modern technology from today appear in museums in around 10 years.
What dangers are there in people perceiving technology as ‘magic’?
Being perceived as magic is probably good as a lot of new technology suffers from stigma and has to prove it does not harm us, which can be very hard to do if there is nothing tangible to show. Most people aren’t interested in technology, they simply want a service, for example, they don’t care if the call is over GSM or 3G or WiFi or over a pair of copper wires or a fibre. They care about where they can make that call, the quality and the cost, which is rapidly approaching zero and therefore not so important. Ideally, the service provided should be under the customers’ terms in that it does what they want, when they want it and at a price they consider fair.
There is a greater danger with over-hyped technology; customers may suffer expectation shock when the technology fails to deliver or the service offering fails. People forget how poor mobile communications used to be in terms of coverage and capacity. It took time for networks to roll out sufficient infrastructure to cater for the explosive demand, but now most built-up areas have mobile coverage. It would be inconceivable to bring out a new mobile device tomorrow using some new technology that was not able to use the existing network, as it would not have the same coverage as the system it was replacing; hence 3G phones can use GSM networks. A big problem for the modern company is that many services rolled out can reach a lot of customers very fast and so scalability issues can become a problem very quickly, service quality can suffer and the service offering then fail due to demand.
How do you think future technology will change politics and society overall?
The last American election has shown the world the power of current technology and it will drive every election from now on, as, increasingly, generation NET becomes a larger part of society and the new technology becomes the old. Shopping and informatisation online is becoming the normal but online is moving from a computer at work or in the home to being something we carry with us. Imagine that the technology we carry is going to mix the real and virtual worlds; we will have ubiquitous access to information on products and services, reviews from others at our fingertips or whispered in our ears. What did the last 10 customers to leave that restaurant think of the food and the service? Where can I find a product that does what I want that I can collect today, will work with what I already have, is made by a company that matches my ethical beliefs?
Is there anything else you would like to add that you think could be included in the article?
For all new technologies, you can ask a few basic questions:
• Who will use it?
• What does this enhance / destroy?
• What does it do that has already been done?
• What happens if it takes off?
During the last industrial revolution, the person who controlled the mechanical power was very important; if the steam power or water wheel failed then the wheels stopped turning. Gradually, power became a commodity as electrical engines / electricity grids brought power on demand.
So, as the person in charge of power, how would you have viewed these new electric engines and the prospect of an electrical grid? Would you have seen them as a threat or as an opportunity to your business? Today, the role of the CIO is relatively new and during the current industrial revolution (or informatisation), information is very important but increasingly information management may soon become the commodity. We are seeing the rise of a great number of potential new engines emerging, are these threats or opportunities for the CIO?
So, my question back to you is, how do you see the role of the CIO changing over the next 10 years?
We live in interesting times, the world is still speeding up and change is the only constant, with mass informatisation of the customer who has never had so much access to information, wherever they may be. The need for us all to understand our customer, our business and our customers’ business has never been greater and our main focus is to be on serving the needs of our customers today and tomorrow. My company’s strategy is to enable our customers to thrive in an ever changing world.
My name is Ian Neild, I am a Disruptive Futurist for BT.
