We surely reach a more mature phase in the 'mobile apps' market but I believe products will gain in quality in the future and that there are still some opportunities to be seized:
- there was a tremendous amount of apps released over the last few years, it is no wonder that competition is getting fierce: products will have to adapt in terms of quality with better and more curated contents.
- there is still a lot of room for innovation in re-engagement (http://tomtunguz.com/mobile-reengagement/), deeplinks (www.urx.com) are a very good start
Aside from the fact that most apps are rubbish, the real problem is the move from the open, free, creative web to heavily-censored walled gardens controlled by giant corporations. Also, apps completely invade your privacy.
He lists the following as big innovations over the last 20 years:
TCP/IP, HTTP, the browser, search, social, mobile, and blockchains.
I know that it's got something to do with Bitcoin, but have no idea what a blockchain is. Wikipedia only references it in a link to blockchain.info, which talks about blocks but not blockchains. Nobody I've asked can explain it to me either.
If it's such a massive innovation (is it?), what is it, and why isn't it easy to discover what it is?
"Integral to Bitcoin is a sequential record of all transactions known as the block chain. There is only one block chain, and it records bitcoin ownership both present and at all points in the past. By keeping a record of all transactions, the block chain mitigates double-spending, a core design challenge of digital currency. Approximately every ten minutes a new bundle of transactions, called a block, is added to the block chain."
Computers all over the world are competing to extend the block chain by solving a problem involving cryptographic hashes. The reward for solving the problem is that a wallet controlled by the machine that does it can claim a Bitcoin reward. The reward is currently, I believe, 25btc --- but it's scheduled to drop over time; eventually to zero, at which point, miners will have to be compensated by claiming transaction fees.
The upshot is that Bitcoin has a system for maintaining a single, global log which is consistent across all connected Bitcoin clients. And while Bitcoin itself uses this as a transaction ledger, there are plenty of other things you might want to use this construct for once you have it. Namecoin, for instance, uses a Bitcoin-like block chain to manage a DNS-like naming scheme.
(There are some weaknesses to the design: most notably, if a single party has more than half the mining compute capacity, they're able to pull off all sorts of chicanery against the community as a whole...)
I realize Fred and USV is heavily invested in bitcoin startups, but the block chain as a big innovation of the past 20 years on par with TCP/IP and HTTP? Compared to DHTs, consensus protocols that enable orgs like Google and Facebook to reach operational scales that were inconceivable ten years ago, compared to deep learning and statistical ML? Seriously?
Blockchains create scarcity among bits, enforced by a distributed network. The most well-known usage is in Bitcoin, but there are many different applications. Many systems that were previously very difficult to create without a central authority/point of failure can now be built in a distributed fashion. See Namecoin [1], Ethereum [2], or Protoshares [3] for examples.
Isn't it horrendously inefficient to be copying the entire blockchain around all the time? What happens if any of those projects achieve mainstream adoption? Are we looking at potentially petabyte-sized blockchains being copied around everywhere?
You don't need to store the whole blockchain as long as some CDN is willing to serve the pieces you need. In a well-designed blockchain you can verify that pieces are legitimate without downloading the whole thing.
TCP/IP is a lot older than 20 years old. It's around 40 years old.
I'd say that JavaScript should be on that list -- not that I like JavaScript, but a scripting language in support of DOM was an important piece of work.
Then C is much more important.. it gave birth to Unix(another big contender on the list), Linux, and pretty much every piece of infrastructure in the world.. javascript will be pretty small compared to those giants..
Other trends are big data, deep learning.. i bet deep learning will me much more revolutionary.. But you know SV have a love affair with hypes
> the smartphone emerging as the platform of choice vs the desktop browser
This is repeated from blog to blog but is it really true?
Smartphones outsell desktops because you change phones every 18 months while a desktop will last maybe a decade or more; but do people really prefer to use their phone if they have a choice?
It would seem to me people who use a phone most of the time are people who don't have easy access to a desktop: young people, or people who don't have a job or whose job keeps them away from a desk (lucky them!)
When I'm around people who use a smartphone, I never see them engaged in anything more complex than listening to music, texting, or playing some super-simple game such as CandyCrush; they're never "browsing" anything, searching, writing, composing, etc.
So if you're doing social or communications, sure, mobile first makes a lot of sense, but how about other domains?
Do people use Github from mobile platforms? The Github app for Android apparently has "100,000+ downloads", which doesn't seem like a lot?
It would be interesting to know the numbers for Github (for example), of mobile vs. desktop usage.
It seems at least reasonable to try to compare smartphones to the innovation of the microcomputer. Mainframes/supercomputers have a particular purpose. When microcomputers/pcs came along, they filled a new purpose, but they didn't necessarily try to replace everything workstation and mainframes were doing for a very long time. They will never do everything that a compute cluster does. The same will likely be true for desktops for a while. I imagine that mobile phones will do much of what desktops do eventually, but it's going to take a long time to get there.
Strongly agree with your sentiment. HN users are at the extreme end of the curve, and I'd wager that the average HN regular spends a good deal more of his/her day on tasks or activities that may never be well-suited to mobile. Contrast this with a typical non-techie user, who uses Facebook, Twitter, and their weather app.
The way I've thought about this is in terms of available attention and routine.
I may spend more time staring at a computer monitor, but that time is spent on my work routine, where new tools and apps are added sporadically at best.
My phone, on the other hand, is where I spend time in a less routine way. Much of this time is up for grabs and the way I spend it changes on a much shorter cycle.
But, to your point about other domains, I think the obvious answer is that there are certainly myriad products that don't need to be mobile-first today, if mobile just doesn't tie into their users' primary workflow. But even most of those services (HipChat, say) can become far more powerful by adding mobile apps. GitHub would be silly as a mobile-only service, but there are plenty of cases where accessing from mobile could be valuable.
I think part of the confusion is that "mobile" means both phone and tablet.
Phones and tablets might run the same OS, but tablets are much more viable as a PC/laptop replacement. Maybe not yet, but soon.
I can "dock" my Nexus tablet with an external monitor, and bluetooth keyboard & mouse, and do a considerable amount on it (email, taking notes, even some development), then take just the tablet with me for review or minor changes, as well as simply looking at things with a mostly big enough screen. For that matter, adding just the b/t keyboard is pretty useful. In a pinch, I can run the same apps & content on my phone, as well, which complements the system, though the phone is a poor viewport for most content.
People might downplay the capabilities of a tablet, but the configuration mentioned above is considerably better than anything that I used to do actual work in the 80s, and the resolution, though not size, matched most of what I worked on in the 90s.
I too use my tablet and phone these days for things I used to do on a pc. The natural question to ask, then, is what's the difference? What differentiates pc from mobile? I guess it's the OS, mostly. Android uand iOS are distinctly different from windows/OSX now, mostly because they're stripped down. But if they take on the same tasks as pc OSes, they'll have to get bigger, and then will the difference still matter?
You can use the apps on mobile devices w/out the keyboard in a pinch, of course.
The way the apps are partitioned so they can't crap all over each others' DLLs and registry entries helps some as well. The single-source app store may or may not be a win for everyone, but making apps keep to themselves helps avoid fouling the whole OS install.
A cheap ($218) 8-inch Windows 8.1 tablet like the Toshiba Encore can certainly replace a desktop or laptop for many if not most purposes.... because you can use it with a full size keyboard and four screens. OK, you need a USB 3 docking station as well, but it runs Microsoft Office perfectly well.
http://www.amazon.com/Toshiba-Encore-WT8-A32-8-Inch-Tablet/d...
Cheap Win tablet w/ RT is essentially a relatively big screen phone when comparing mobile to PCs. Most people will be taken aback when they cannot load non-AppStore software onto Windows. A $1000+ Slate Pro w/ full on Windows however... now there is a mobile device for more than just consumption.
You are forgetting about emerging markets (and pretty much anywhere outside the US/Europe).
These places are completely leapfrogging desktop technology and going straight to mobile. It isn't just the case that the end user can't afford desktops: think how much infrastructure is needed (in terms of power, connectivity, etc) for a desktop device versus a smartphone or tablet.
Desktops do need better power infrastructure, though something like a NUC could be powered by a small solar panel. A Rpi or ARM-based chromebox is even lighter on the power needs. Haswell (or ARM) based laptops can do 10 hours on a charge and wouldn't even need a consistent power supply.
Not sure what you mean by connectivity -- desktops and mobile devices have the same options: wireless (3/4G, etc), and wired (via wifi for the mobiles). A desktop surely doesn't require buildout of a infrastructure-heavy wired network to have comparable connectivity to a smartphone.
While these technologies can run on this power, they simply aren't consumerised, or even in the rear view mirror of non-HN types right now. You also have to consider the use-cases: a smartphone or tablet can be used to author documents, browse the web etc (even if the experience isn't perfect), whereas a desktop computer cannot practically be carried in the pocket and used as a vital in-the-field communications device.
As far as connectivity goes: again, you're talking about a hypothetical. While there's no reason you can't create a low-bandwidth experience on desktop, the fact remains that simply opening my email transfers over .5MB. Opening my Facebook account transfers more than 1MB. Doing this on my phone uses a fraction of this data.
If it is true it isn't surprising. Mobile devices don't just outsell PCs, they are more powerful than an old PC, and people do prefer to use them. Many people have the choice of using a work PC for personal matters or using a smartphone because they can't or won't spend for both a personal smartphone and a PC, or they won't spend to update an old PC. As for writing, I have seen a lawyer compose a professional letter on an iPhone at blazing speed. Apparently, being able to do that anywhere is more important to her than the advantages of a bigger screen and keyboard. GMail on a tablet is superior to the Web interface, and I can rip through a lot of email responses on a tablet or even a phone while I'm waiting for my tires to be changed.
Many thanks for the response. It's also what I observe other mobile-centric people around me do. They don't spend a ton of time in the browser, but they do use it. It's encouraging, in a way. Sort of like a slow computing movement.
> When I'm around people who use a smartphone, I never see them engaged in anything more complex than listening to music, texting, or playing some super-simple game such as CandyCrush; they're never "browsing" anything, searching, writing, composing, etc.
The thing is, for the vast majority of people that's all they were doing with their PCs anyway. They weren't composing librettos, they were just checking email and playing Farmville. So to them it doesn't feel like they've lost anything.
That rings true, yet casual users are not the only profitable market for software. Not by a long shot. Look at companies like Microsoft, Autodesk, and Adobe. They do very well selling professional software--software that's never going to translate well to a phone-sized screen.
Meh. I'm not sure. I am on mobile constantly. I don't particularly enjoy the experience. Instagram/ Snapchat/ Twitter/ Spotify are all nice - but doing real world work, heavy email, hipchat discussions, really anything with significant amount of info going back and forth is inconvenient (for me) on mobile.
Yes, most of the world is starting with mobile and that is all they know, but my feeling is with low cost pc's/ chromebooks/ surface-type tablets - we'll see those as places where "work" happens
Its a preference, but I have a number of friends who only will use a laptop or desktop if they are watching Netflix or doing work. Even if they have a laptop inches away they will still use their phone for YouTube, Facebook, and any other browsing.
I have one friend like this who had a mishap that resulted in a blowtorch in his trunk burning a hole right through his laptop. By some miracle the laptop works. It runs like shit and looks awful, but he refuses to replace it because he has no reason to. He rather use his smartphone for the majority of his computing needs.
I can tell you from working with a company with a high SEM spend, we have seen total search volume increase, but desktop search volume is decreasing in both real and relative measures (caveat - I am only sure of this for our search terms, but anecdotally, it seems to match what I have heard).
Looking at a site with like w3schools browser stats ( http://www.w3schools.com/browsers/browsers_stats.asp ), you would assume mobile is small. If you have a consumer facing mass market web site, those numbers will look totally different. Search advertising gives you a glass window to this. Mobile is dominating the desktop, not by 4% as w3schools reports, but by 50%+ and growing.
The interesting story here, to me, is native app verse website. Which wins?
Another reason why smartphones outsell desktops by so much is that for a family of 5, there is going to be 5 phones (assuming two parents, and three kids over the age of 8). Everyone needs their own phone because they all leave the house and need it to communicate with each other. The family PC is more often a shared resource. Some of the kids may have their own laptop, but phones more of a personal item.
Let me explain, what are big networks buying?
Think Yahoo, Facebook, Google, MS, etc..
The mobile app now represents user data to buy...and that is what we are seeing in some of the acquirehires buying sprees is that the mobile app is kept alive after the buyout because the firm doing the buying is buying user data.
Thus we still will see some $1B or more home runs if we know and understand what they are buying
51 comments
[ 3.1 ms ] story [ 108 ms ] threadTCP/IP, HTTP, the browser, search, social, mobile, and blockchains.
I know that it's got something to do with Bitcoin, but have no idea what a blockchain is. Wikipedia only references it in a link to blockchain.info, which talks about blocks but not blockchains. Nobody I've asked can explain it to me either.
If it's such a massive innovation (is it?), what is it, and why isn't it easy to discover what it is?
"Integral to Bitcoin is a sequential record of all transactions known as the block chain. There is only one block chain, and it records bitcoin ownership both present and at all points in the past. By keeping a record of all transactions, the block chain mitigates double-spending, a core design challenge of digital currency. Approximately every ten minutes a new bundle of transactions, called a block, is added to the block chain."
If you need a more in depth explanation, which also covers how this relates to a famous problem in distributed systems (the Byzantine Generals Problem), see: http://expectedpayoff.com/blog/2013/03/22/bitcoin-and-the-by...
Computers all over the world are competing to extend the block chain by solving a problem involving cryptographic hashes. The reward for solving the problem is that a wallet controlled by the machine that does it can claim a Bitcoin reward. The reward is currently, I believe, 25btc --- but it's scheduled to drop over time; eventually to zero, at which point, miners will have to be compensated by claiming transaction fees.
The upshot is that Bitcoin has a system for maintaining a single, global log which is consistent across all connected Bitcoin clients. And while Bitcoin itself uses this as a transaction ledger, there are plenty of other things you might want to use this construct for once you have it. Namecoin, for instance, uses a Bitcoin-like block chain to manage a DNS-like naming scheme.
(There are some weaknesses to the design: most notably, if a single party has more than half the mining compute capacity, they're able to pull off all sorts of chicanery against the community as a whole...)
1: https://www.namecoin.org/ 2: https://www.ethereum.org/ 3: http://protoshares.net/
I'd say that JavaScript should be on that list -- not that I like JavaScript, but a scripting language in support of DOM was an important piece of work.
Other trends are big data, deep learning.. i bet deep learning will me much more revolutionary.. But you know SV have a love affair with hypes
This is repeated from blog to blog but is it really true?
Smartphones outsell desktops because you change phones every 18 months while a desktop will last maybe a decade or more; but do people really prefer to use their phone if they have a choice?
It would seem to me people who use a phone most of the time are people who don't have easy access to a desktop: young people, or people who don't have a job or whose job keeps them away from a desk (lucky them!)
When I'm around people who use a smartphone, I never see them engaged in anything more complex than listening to music, texting, or playing some super-simple game such as CandyCrush; they're never "browsing" anything, searching, writing, composing, etc.
So if you're doing social or communications, sure, mobile first makes a lot of sense, but how about other domains?
Do people use Github from mobile platforms? The Github app for Android apparently has "100,000+ downloads", which doesn't seem like a lot?
It would be interesting to know the numbers for Github (for example), of mobile vs. desktop usage.
Look at everyday of an average person, and you will notice that most are indeed spending significantly less time using PC's than few years ago.
I am scared to observe that these people use nothing beyond facebook.
I may spend more time staring at a computer monitor, but that time is spent on my work routine, where new tools and apps are added sporadically at best.
My phone, on the other hand, is where I spend time in a less routine way. Much of this time is up for grabs and the way I spend it changes on a much shorter cycle.
But, to your point about other domains, I think the obvious answer is that there are certainly myriad products that don't need to be mobile-first today, if mobile just doesn't tie into their users' primary workflow. But even most of those services (HipChat, say) can become far more powerful by adding mobile apps. GitHub would be silly as a mobile-only service, but there are plenty of cases where accessing from mobile could be valuable.
Phones and tablets might run the same OS, but tablets are much more viable as a PC/laptop replacement. Maybe not yet, but soon.
I can "dock" my Nexus tablet with an external monitor, and bluetooth keyboard & mouse, and do a considerable amount on it (email, taking notes, even some development), then take just the tablet with me for review or minor changes, as well as simply looking at things with a mostly big enough screen. For that matter, adding just the b/t keyboard is pretty useful. In a pinch, I can run the same apps & content on my phone, as well, which complements the system, though the phone is a poor viewport for most content.
People might downplay the capabilities of a tablet, but the configuration mentioned above is considerably better than anything that I used to do actual work in the 80s, and the resolution, though not size, matched most of what I worked on in the 90s.
The way the apps are partitioned so they can't crap all over each others' DLLs and registry entries helps some as well. The single-source app store may or may not be a win for everyone, but making apps keep to themselves helps avoid fouling the whole OS install.
edit: + 'mobile' in last sentence
These places are completely leapfrogging desktop technology and going straight to mobile. It isn't just the case that the end user can't afford desktops: think how much infrastructure is needed (in terms of power, connectivity, etc) for a desktop device versus a smartphone or tablet.
Not sure what you mean by connectivity -- desktops and mobile devices have the same options: wireless (3/4G, etc), and wired (via wifi for the mobiles). A desktop surely doesn't require buildout of a infrastructure-heavy wired network to have comparable connectivity to a smartphone.
As far as connectivity goes: again, you're talking about a hypothetical. While there's no reason you can't create a low-bandwidth experience on desktop, the fact remains that simply opening my email transfers over .5MB. Opening my Facebook account transfers more than 1MB. Doing this on my phone uses a fraction of this data.
> This is repeated from blog to blog but is it really true?
Just an anecdote: In our household, we have multiple tablets, laptops, and a mid-tier desktop with a huge beautiful screen.
My wife prefers 99% of the time to do everything on her iPhone 5s.
From the occasional glances, she's mostly doing one of these:
1. Playing a game
2. Browsing on online clothing shops, both mobile websites and native apps
3. Keeping up with friends and colleagues via Whatsapp
4. Pinterest
5. Facebook
So I'd say most of her time is spent in native apps.
edit: linebreaks
The thing is, for the vast majority of people that's all they were doing with their PCs anyway. They weren't composing librettos, they were just checking email and playing Farmville. So to them it doesn't feel like they've lost anything.
an here is the next multi-billion of dollars :)
Yes, most of the world is starting with mobile and that is all they know, but my feeling is with low cost pc's/ chromebooks/ surface-type tablets - we'll see those as places where "work" happens
I have one friend like this who had a mishap that resulted in a blowtorch in his trunk burning a hole right through his laptop. By some miracle the laptop works. It runs like shit and looks awful, but he refuses to replace it because he has no reason to. He rather use his smartphone for the majority of his computing needs.
Yes.
The interesting story here, to me, is native app verse website. Which wins?
Let me explain, what are big networks buying? Think Yahoo, Facebook, Google, MS, etc..
The mobile app now represents user data to buy...and that is what we are seeing in some of the acquirehires buying sprees is that the mobile app is kept alive after the buyout because the firm doing the buying is buying user data.
Thus we still will see some $1B or more home runs if we know and understand what they are buying