digital

There are 2 posts tagged digital (this is page 1 of 1).

When “Free” eventually turns into subscriptions: tado and reMarkable

On October 13, 2021, reMarkable announced that the previously free cloud service would now be limited, and the truly exciting features would become paid for new users. I had suspected this earlier, just as I had with tado. tado had announced a subscription in August 2018, but they backtracked for the first customers. While I had to purchase the new app for about 20 euros to use the new features, at least I don’t have to pay any subscription fees.

With both companies, I wasn’t sure why they didn’t include a subscription model from the start. Because in both cases, it was clear that costs would increase as more users accessed the servers. For reMarkable, the costs would be even higher since they offer 8 GB of cloud storage. It should have been obvious from the beginning that at some point, a subscription would have to be introduced to offset the growing costs associated with the increasing number of users. Did both companies avoid the subscription model because they thought it might deter buyers? Aren’t the first customers usually early adopters who are less price-sensitive?

I sold my reMarkable a few months ago, not because of the impending subscription model, but because I simply want fewer gadgets, and it didn’t fit into my workflow. At the end of the day, reMarkable is a niche product, because the desire for focus in a time when distraction is either sought or found by distraction is only present in a small number of users. Even though I think it’s a great product, I don’t believe it will ever be widely adopted by the masses.

From man-machine becomes man against machine

Roman Pletter writes in the 29/2014 issue of ZEIT about the potential loss of highly qualified jobs due to ever-improving algorithms. In the so-called second machine revolution, machines can learn on their own (I already did something like this at Ask.com in 2006, on a very small scale…), but now it’s enough for more than winning in chess.

Which doctor can have read all the studies on a topic? Does a lawyer really know all the verdicts? Can a banker really take all the factors into account for a business? The computers could. We are already seeing harbingers of this development in online advertising: Instead of an advertising banner being placed on a website in a global galactic manner, an algorithm decides which user sees which banner in a fraction of a second using statistical methods. Based on data, algorithms can also learn which personality profiles are particularly suitable for certain tasks, so that personnel selection could be taken over by machines in the future.

The consequence of all these developments? What happens if the so-called middle class loses its jobs? The author of the ZEIT quotes an MIT economist: “Brynjolfsson pleads for states to rethink the old idea of granting their citizens a basic income in order to allow them to participate in the productivity gains.” I’m not sure if this has really been thought through to the end. Looking at the news, I have great doubts that anyone in the world is actually willing to agree on a new economic system. And what about all the countries on earth that are still far from advancing such a level of automation that their populations can no longer work? Or that are already dependent on the work of other countries anyway?

At the same time, you have to keep one thing in mind: We haven’t even reached the peak of the hype cycle yet, perhaps because the empty promises of the New Economy were not so long ago and people are no longer so gullible. Yes, the development will be exponential. But it won’t be as easy as you think.