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I THOUGHT ABOUT THAT A LOT
‘I thought about that a lot’ is a collection of 24 essays by 24 contributors. In 2024 I was one of them.
LONDON STRATEGY UNIT
I wrote a few blog posts during a very short stint at the London Strategy Unit (I decided I wanted to be a copywriter) a long time ago. Here are a couple of them:
Rising Robotics
February 15, 2015
We are familiar with robotics on factory lines and even in restaurants - China's first Robot Restaurant opened last week. But AI that is smart or (shudders) smarter than the human brain will soon overtake those jobs we have traditionally thought of as irreplaceably human.
What will we do if our jobs are obsolete?
For one thing, the human race may need counselling. Enter SimSensei - a robotic psychiatrist that listens to you and uses facial recognition to alter its responses accordingly. Perhaps in our extended leisure time, we will turn to the arts. But even those will be robotically transformed. Graffiti artist Katsu is using Drones to reach spaces he has never been able to before. Artworks created are a collaboration between him and the Drone.
Robots doing it for themselves - take BNJMN, a robot that’s an artist in control of himself - he even signs his own work. In the case of health care in particular robots can help us abolish human error. A Doctor or Surgeon that’s having a bad day can end in catastrophe for the patient. According to the Japan Robotic Association, medical care will be one of the largest markets for robots in 2025.
What about relationships?
This is where it gets tricky (isn’t it always) when it comes to compassion, empathy, wit - can robots live up to these complicated human emotions? Combine the smart and responsive OS’s of the robot therapist with lifelike sexbots like Roxxxy - which are already on the market, and the question of ‘what is love’ gets even more complicated.
As the sci-fi movie Her projected, these ‘devices’ may replace human-to-human relationships. Or maybe relationships will actually be more successful, as robots fulfil every desire that can’t be satisfied within the constraints of longer term relationships?
These aren’t flights of fancy - Robots are here, and they’re much much more than a labour or time saving device. Kismet is a social robot that has been developed to build a more open ended learning system - instead of pre-programming a robot to perform a particular task, the aim with Kismet is to create a system that learns in the same way as an infant child.
Robotics is still in its infancy, this technology isn’t perfect, but it doesn’t need to be. It can still make a difference, disrupt the labour workforce and even human relationships.
Google TFL
February 15, 2015
What if Google were put in charge of the London Underground? How would it look? What are the principles of a digital business that would transform a very physical one?
Democracy works
First of all, the tube would be free. Why? The more people use a system, the better it gets. Therefore removing barriers to use is the biggest priority for a post-digital company – above profiting from those users. Google would offer free transport as well as free Wi-Fi in stations. Access to user data – travel and web access – would allow them to identify untapped revenue and advertising opportunities.
Focus on the user – all else will follow
Even Google would have limited impact on making trains faster – there are only so many trains the network can run. But they can make the experience of getting from A to B better by focusing on the user (not the trains).
Getting from A to B is more complicated than going from tube to tube. So Google would use a time lapse of your route to help you visually navigate once at your destination. For those late-night post-pub journeys, they could use your existing travel data (see principle 1) to wake you up just before your stop. And using live data, LED signage on platforms would show which train carriages were most crowded – guiding people’s choices about where to board.
Fast is better than slow
Valuing users’ time is an important principle of developing a valued service. Importantly this involves doing more than just making the trains quicker, but again, thinking about time from the user’s perspective.
Self driving cars at major stations would replace taxi ranks – pre-programmed to get you where you’re going. No waiting – just seamless travel.
This wouldn’t just be a convenient service: the dwell time in the car is an opportunity for Google to surface highly targeted ads, collate engaging content and make commercial offers that are highly targeted to the individual and where they’re going. For example, on your way to meet a professional contact the user would be shown articles that contact has recently clicked on to offer conversation-starters.
These are just 3 of Google’s principles – they demonstrate that these kind of companies don’t only disrupt things because they are in digital technology. Their behaviours and culture are transformative for any business – even the world’s oldest public transit system.