We are entering our era of adjustment – Stacey on IoT
This article was originally published in my weekly IoT newsletter on Friday August 18, 2023. It was my last newsletter.
I wasn’t going to write anything more in this newsletter, but I felt inspired so I decided to leave you with one last thought – and one last commitment.
During a webinar on Thursday that focused on how journalists can use productive AI, one of the panelists complained that newsroom developers don’t want to invest in building AI verification tools because the problem of detecting deepfakes is always coming up, which means tools will need to evolve. I just felt sorry for myself because for years I’ve been complaining about the maintenance I have to put into my smart home, my phone, and my other tech devices to keep them up to date.
This goes beyond implementing security updates and involves changing home automation rules when one provider changes their APIs, or finding a new workflow when the link between Zapier and one of my digital services closes. I’ll even include the moments of confusion that occur when I get into my car and find that Tesla has released a new software update and changed the location of the information on my dashboard. Living with technology means living in a state of flux.
Instinctively we know this, but functionally and mentally we are still unable to adapt to the need for constant change. Mentally realizing that a connected device is important because the feature set can be continuously expanded is one thing, but getting frustrated when the UI changes or a new recipe setting on your smart oven cooks your chicken differently is another. Most of us are not equipped to deal with constant change everything aspects of our lives, so the conflict when your car or oven works differently is surprising.
Operationally, businesses still have to adapt. Google provides an excellent example of this. Google rewards its employees for creating new tools and software, which means that if you want to get ahead you need to be innovative. This leads to a culture where employees are encouraged to innovate instead of taking care of themselves. But as users, this means that your favorite tools are in a constant state of decay or that when partners make changes, Google may not react quickly.
Google isn’t alone in valuing innovation through optimization. You can see the conflict in industrial settings where IT staff blame the engineers within the facility for creating a culture of no, refusing to add automation or new technology to the established way of doing things. But one reason those OT employees are skeptical is because op engineers have a decades-long history of building consistent and well-known processes. Adding IT to the mix adds entropy and the need for new maintenance processes that IT can sometimes resist.
But while the OT side has an established culture of maintenance appreciation, the IT side does not. And that’s what we need moving forward as we embed computing into more devices and processes. Software is corrupt. And do so quickly.
The inevitable decay of software will continue to have a major impact on our daily lives, so we need to motivate developers to care and innovate. We need to give employees time in their work weeks to adjust to new user interactions or changes to their services. We also need to leave time for them to play with new tools and developments, and see that as productive work.
Just as law firms and doctors are required to receive continuing education, any profession that constantly works with technology (which will soon become a profession) needs the same ethics that motivate and support employees as they try to adapt to constant change. This includes, but is not limited to, improvements brought about by artificial intelligence.
And yes, it will take a curious and engaged workforce, but it won’t be up to the workforce to muster that energy and enthusiasm. Maintaining resources and adapting to changing software and resources will be an economic value and will need to be managed as such.
On the home front, it may mean that consumers sign up for a product later to ensure that the company behind the said product pays the ongoing developer costs required to maintain it. Or maybe it means that the company sells a product that has a set expiration date when it plans to stop maintaining it.
If we want to add creativity to our everyday products, we can’t just focus on new features and innovation. We have to think about how to maintain those products, and how to pay for that maintenance. And as computerization allows more software and services to fit into our workflow and more jobs require the ability to embrace innovation, businesses need to invest in maintaining the skills of their workforce.
Innovation is always exhausting. And because that innovation is software-based, it tends to come in quickly. We must acknowledge the people and the time it takes to combat that entropy while ensuring that workers and consumers have room to adjust to this change.
And now, I’m off to make my own changes.
