Intent, Interest, Information, Interface

Facebook’s recent move to dominate advertising by expanding its audience network to non users got me thinking about its interest based approach, and in contrast Google’s intent based approach. While both approaches have their place in the scheme of consumption, it reminded me something I posted a while back on a completely different context – choices.

In this era of abundant choice, a device I use when fighting battles with myself on personal consumption is the can-want-need framework. ‘Can’ is made increasingly easier now because of convenience, ‘want’ by the choices around, and sticking to ‘need’ is a very difficult task! I read a really good post which has mirrored this in the (consumer) technology space – “How Technology Hijacks People’s Minds…“.

It has a series of ‘hijack’ explanations, but it was the first one I found most interesting – “If you control the menu, you control the choices“. The point that’s brought up in this is whether we are actually being given an ‘illusion of choice’ because most of these choices don’t really match our actual needs. In the consumption context, I immediately compared Amazon, Facebook and Google. (Apple is restricted to its device/s) From a ‘menu’ perspective, I'd say (arguably) that both Amazon and Facebook are quite restricted because ‘recommendations’ in both cases are largely based on my stated interests, conversations, social connections, and behaviour patterns of ‘people like me’. On the other hand, Google’s data has many more layers of contexts – search (including YouTube), mail, maps, Android and so on - many of them I've communicated passively, and is thus relatively less of an echo chamber I created. The ‘menu’ in Google is arguably much bigger.

In terms of information, it isn’t as though it is one versus another. Both offer relevance in different ways. Social connections, behaviour of others like me all help me in discovery. However, as choice and convenience become even more abundant, the premium will be on time, because that (at this stage) is the most finite factor. As a user, I’d seek more of the service which offers me the solution that is contextually most relevant. Simply because of the kind of data Google has on me, I think it is the best placed to offer me what I need. (not can/want)

The other way of looking at it is through interfaces. I feel that Echo, as I had already mentioned in an earlier post, is a great start by Amazon to make its way into multiple interfaces. While FB has quite the stranglehold on mobile devices, beyond VR, I am uncertain about future interfaces. Here too, I find Google very well placed - not just in terms of deep learning, but also in its ability to use its AI to provide a ‘skin’ to various interfaces – at home, in automobiles and probably in the street too. While I do see some value in ‘social’ as a context in these interfaces, I also feel that the potential of other contexts might collectively outweigh it.