Productizing an idea

There is a new Pranav Mistry presentation on TED talking about his Sixth Sense project. For those of you that have not heard about this project yet, it is based around a wearable device that combines real-world object and gesture recognition and mobile display of relevant information from the data network about those objects. It is an intriguing and exciting idea, but it currently exists only in the lab – and I suspect it is many years and a tremendous amount of engineering innovation and work away from manifesting in real world products.

I make this statement because my experience has painfully taught me that bringing an idea to a finished state is a deliberate, time consuming, painstakingly detailed-oriented task. This is due in large part because a finished product does much more than just its intended function – it also ensures that it does not exhibit unwanted and undesired behaviors. It is this second characteristic of finished products that remains implicit, but it is a primary reason why so many great ideas never make it to market or why so many great designs are delayed beyond their anticipated completion dates. A product may perform its intended task perfectly, but if it also includes a substantially undesirable trait – it will fail commercially.

Take for example the simple electric light bulb. Thomas Edison did not invent the light bulb, but he did improve upon it substantially enough that many people mistakenly credit him with inventing the incandescent light bulb. He claimed that he tested no fewer than 6,000 vegetable growths for the most suitable filament material. After one and a half years of testing, an incandescent lamp with a filament of carbonized sewing thread could burn for thirteen to fifteen hours. By the end of 1880, 30 years after Joseph W. Swan was using carbonized paper filaments to build a light bulb, Thomas Edison had produced a 16-watt bulb that could last for 1500 hours. His achievement was to develop an incandescent, electric light that was practical, safe, and cost effective.

However, the productized implementation of the light bulb involved a total of seven production quality system elements to make the light bulb practical enough to compete with the gas lights that were used at the time. These systems included the development of the durable light bulb, parallel circuits, an improved dynamo, the underground conductor network, devices for maintaining constant voltage, safety fuses and insulating materials, and light sockets with on-off switches. These extra systems took a great idea operating under completely controlled lab conditions, and enabled the great idea to operate within an acceptable and consistent band of behavior in the real world where environmental conditions can vary widely.

When I see the videos of the Sixth Sense project, the surrounding complementary systems to make the project work are implied and simulated as if they are completely known and implemented. Random object recognition is one of those complementary systems that the current state of the art is woefully insufficient to deliver what this project needs to perform as envisioned. As an example, just recognizing a plane ticket so that the system can display relevant information regarding the flight is complicated by the fact that there is no reason to believe all plane tickets will ever look exactly the same in layout and content.

Recognizing and resolving ambiguous gestures with timing of real-world events is another complicated system that will require much work. As an example, the digital camera snapshot example implies the system will not only know what to capture but when to capture it. Such as system will need to be able to capture a wide range of possible intentions from the user

Another implied system is the automated data query process. How does the system know what type of information the system needs to retrieve when presented with a specific object? How does the system resolve different information contexts for the same object? In the best case, the system will be able to perfectly infer our intent, but the effectiveness of contemporary automated phone answering menu systems is the more likely outcome without much more innovation and work on that one system.

These are just a few of the implied supporting systems that an idea like the Sixth Sense project might need to meet the expectations of people these presentations are being pitched to. I am not trying to tear down the Sixth Sense project, but as an engineer, I feel it is important to make clear the nature of the challenges the implied supporting systems for any ambitious project must overcome. These are exciting times for designers, and I think they are becoming even more exciting as each new capability becomes practical that did not exist the month before.