Hollywood's blind spot

Hollywood executives are probably correct in that AI will have a significant effect on the movie industry.

Hollywood executives are probably underestimating the effect that AI will have on the movie industry.

AI, right now, can create images. Given some prompting text, an AI engine can form an image that matches the description in the text. The text can be simple, such as "a zombie walking in an open field", or it can be more complex.

It won't be long before AI can make not a single image but a video. A video is nothing more than a collection of images, each different from the previous in minor ways. When played back at 24 frames per second, the human mind perceives the images not as individual images but as motion. (This is how movies on film work, and how movies on video tape work.) I'm sure people are working on "video from AI" right now -- and they may already have it.

A movie is, essentially, a collection of short videos. If AI can compose a single video, then AI can compose a collection of videos. The prompting text for a movie might resemble a traditional movie script -- with some formatting changes and additional information about costumes, camera angles, and lighting.

Thus, with enough computing power, AI can start with an enhanced, detailed script and render a movie. Let's call this a "script renderer".

A script renderer makes the process of moviemaking cheap and fast. It is the word processor of the twenty-first century. And just as word processors upended the office jobs of the twentieth century, the script renderer will upend the movie jobs of this century. Word processors (the software on commonplace computers) replaced people and equipment: secretaries, proofreaders, typewriters, carbon paper, copy machines, and Wite-out erasing fluid.

Script renderers (okay, that's a clumsy term and we'll probably invent something better) will do similar things for movies. If an AI can make a movie from a script, then movie makers don't need equipment (cameras, lights, costumes, sets, props, microphones) and the people who handle that equipment. It may be possible for a single individual to write a script, send it through a renderer, and get a movie. What's more, just as word processors let one print a document, review it, make changes, and print it again, a script renderer will let one render a movie, view it, make changes, and render it again -- perhaps all in a few hours.

Hollywood executives, if they have seen this far ahead, may be thinking that their studios will be much more profitable. They won't need to pay actors, or camera operators, or build sets, or ... lots of other things. All of those expenses disappear, but the revenue from the movies remain.

But here's what they don't see: Making a movie will simply be a matter of computing power. Anyone with a computer and access to a sufficiently powerful AI will be able to convert a script into a movie.

Today, anyone can start a newsletter. Or print invitations to a party. Or their own business cards.

Tomorrow, anyone will be able to make a movie. It won't be easy; one still needs a script with the right details, and one should have a compelling story and good dialog. But it will be much easier than it is today.

And create movies they will. Not just movies, but TV episodes, mini series, and perhaps even short videos like the old Flash Gordon serials.

I suspect that the first wave of "civilian movies" will be built on existing materials. Fans of old "Star Trek" shows will create new episodes with new stories but using the likenesses of the original actors. The studios will sue, of course, but it won't be a simple case of copyright infringement. The owners of the old shows will have to build a case on different grounds. (They will probably prevail, if only because the amateurs cannot pay the court costs.)

The second wave will be different. It will be new material, away from the copyrighted and trademarked properties. But it will still be amateurish, with poor dialog and awkward pacing.

The third wave of non-studio movies will be better, and will be the real threat to today's movie studios. These movies will have higher quality, and will obtain some degree of popularity. That will get the attention of Hollywood executives, because now these "civilian" movies will compete with "real" movies.

Essentially, AI removes the moat around movie studios. That moat is the equipment, sound stages, and people needed to make a movie today. When the moat is gone, lots of people will be able to make movies. And lots will.

Chromebooks

Google has the Chromebook, a lightweight laptop that runs Chrome (and nothing else).

Why is Google the only supplier of Chromebooks? Or more specifically, why is it that only Chrome has this arrangement? Why is there no lightweight laptop for Windows that runs only Edge (and perhaps Remote Desktop and Powershell and nothing else)? Why is there no lightweight laptop that runs Apple's Safari browser (and nothing else)? Why is there no lightweight laptop that runs Firefox (and nothing else)? I recognize that hardware manufacturers, in coordination with Google, provide the Chromebook. Therefore, technically, Lenovo and Dell and Samsung (and others) are suppliers of the Chromebook. But you know what I mean.

Competitors to the Chromebook need three things: the browser, the operating system, and the hardware. None are trivial. All must work together.

Google has succeeded in building the complete stack (hardware, operating system, and browser) and also  provides web-based applications. Users of Chromebooks have the tools and they have destinations.

Can Microsoft build an equivalent stack? The apparent answer is "no". Microsoft tried first with the original Surface tablet (the "Surface RT"), second with "Windows S mode", and third with "Windows 10X". (All were not quite equivalent to the Chromebook, as they ran more than just the browser, but they did run a subset of Windows applications.) The first two were rejected by customers; the last was killed before it was released. Windows 11, with its requirements for powerful processors, will not be available for an inexpensive, lightweight, browser-centric experience. I doubt that Microsoft will introduce a new operating system (or maintain a slimmed version of Windows 10) for a low-margin market.

Can Apple build a lightweight laptop that runs only a browser? I think the strict answer is "yes". Apple has the technical talent to build such a stack. I'm not sure that Apple could convince users to switch from their current hardware to a lightweight laptop (a "SafariBook"?). I am confident that Apple makes more money by selling the current hardware (and apps to run on that hardware), so they have no incentive to switch customers to a Chromebook-like laptop. So while Apple could build and sell a "SafariBook", they won't. There is more profit in heavyweight laptops.

Mozilla is in a poor position to design and sell a browser-oriented laptop (a "MozillaBook"?). They have the brower, but not the operating system or the hardware. They need manufacturers such as Dell or Samsung to build the hardware, and those manufacturers may decline, fearing Google's wrath. They may be able to leverage Linux for an operating system, much as Google did, but it would be a significant (read that as "expensive") effort.

The makers of other browsers face a harder challenge than Mozilla faces. Not only do they need the operating system and the hardware, their browsers have tiny market share. Assuming that the expected customer base for a boutique-browser laptop would be their current user base, the development costs for a laptop would be difficult to amortize over the units sold. Laptops with the Opera browser, for example, would be more expensive that the typical Chromebook.

Amazon has done impressive things with its Kindle book readers and Fire tablets, but has not introduced a Chromebook-like laptop. Probably because its book readers and tablets lock users into the Amazon system for purchases of books and music, and that is not possible with a browser.

So my conclusion is that we're stuck with Google Chromebooks, with no hope for a competing product. Our choice is a Chromebook or a laptop with a full-sized operating system. My depressing forecast is that we will never see a competitor to the Chromebook.

I would be happy to be proven wrong.

The future of Firefox

Use of Mozilla's Firefox browser is declining (at least as a percentage of market share), and people are concerned.

Some are concerned that we will lose an option in the browser market. Others are concerned that the demise of Firefox signals a forthcoming decline of open-source software. Mozilla, of course, is concerned about its business.

I'm not sure what Mozilla should do in this situation. I do have some observations:

First, people select browsers (and other things) for one of two reasons.

1) They want to use the specific product (in this case, the Firefox browser)

2) They don't want to use the alternatives (in this case, Internet Explorer, Edge, Chrome, Safari, etc.)

To improve its market share, Mozilla will have to either provide a product or service that people want to use, or be an alternative to a product that people don't want to use. Mozilla must either make a better browser, one that people look at and think to themselves "yeah!", or wait for people to dislike the other browsers on the market.

When Chrome appeared on the market, people used it, I think, for the latter reason. At the time, Internet Explorer (IE) was the most commonly used browser (sometimes by corporate dictat) and people did not like it. Chrome was not Internet Explorer, and by using Chrome, one could "poke Microsoft in the eye".

But that was then. Now, people use Chrome because they want to. People might have chosen Chrome after using Gmail, and may have had favorable opinions of Google due to the 1GB space for mailboxes, which was quite large at the time. And Gmail was free!

Whatever the reasons, people like Chrome. Mozilla does not have the tailwind of people disliking their current browser.

Waiting for potential customers to dislike their current product is not a viable strategy. People may be unhappy with some of Google's practices, and that may drive some away from Chrome (and some of those to Firefox) and Mozilla has been advertising along those lines.

But dislike of Google is probably not enough. Mozilla needs "a better mousetrap".

And I'm not sure how they can build one.

Microsoft's last "we do it all" project

Today's Microsoft is different from the "evil empire" of yesteryear. Today, Microsoft embraces open source and supports non-Microsoft operating systems, languages, databases, and tools.

But it wasn't always that way.

In an earlier age, Microsoft was the empire. They were big, but the reason people considered them an empire was their attitude. Microsoft had answers for all of your computing needs. Operating system. Utilities. Office suite, including e-mail. Database. Development tools. Accounting packages. Project Management. Browser. The goal was for Microsoft to be the sole source for your computing needs.

Microsoft ensured this by making its tools more capable, more performant (is that a word?), more reliable, and more integrated with other Microsoft technologies than the competition's offerings.

One weakness was the command-line shell, CMD.exe or as it was known early on, the "DOS box". CMD.exe was a direct clone of the command-line interface from MS-DOS, which was initially a clone of the CP/M command line interface (itself a copy of DEC's command line interfaces). Microsoft extended the MS-DOS interface over the years, and even added feature in the Windows version.

But Microsoft had to stay compatible with earlier versions, and features had to be inserted into the shell "language", often resulting in a clunky syntax. The decision in MS-DOS to allow the slash character as an option specifier meant that directories had to be separated by backslash. That meant that backslashes could not be used as escape characters (until they could, but only for the double-quote character). Variable names had to be signified with a percent sign, as a dollar sign was allowed as part of a file name (that, too, dated back to CP/M). The compromises cascaded over the years, and the result was a lot of complaints to Microsoft, mostly from developers. (Microsoft gave weight to the opinions of developers, as it knew they were important for future applications.)

Microsoft needed an answer to the complaints. As an empire, Microsoft needed to provide a better shell. They had to provide the best, a product better than the competition. To meet that need, they invented PowerShell.

PowerShell was Microsoft's bigger, better, comprehensive shell. It would fix the problems of CMD and it would offer all needed capabilities. You would not need a competing shell. It had everything, and it was better than all other shells. Its commands were descriptive, not cryptic. Options to commands were consistent. It could run scripts. It had variables (with the 'proper' syntax of dollar signs). It had multiple scopes for variables (something lacking in other shells). It allowed for "pipelining" of commands, and it could pass not just text streams but full .NET objects in the pipeline. It allowed for hooks into the .NET framework.

PowerShell was a shell "done right", with everything you could possibly need.

And it was the last product of Microsoft's "we do it all" strategy.

The problem for Microsoft (and any empire) is that no matter how large you get, the world is always bigger. And since the world is bigger, you cannot provide everything for everyone. No matter how fast or powerful you make your products, someone will want something else, perhaps something small and light. All-encompassing empires are expensive to build and expensive to maintain. Microsoft has come to terms with that concept, and changed its product offerings. Microsoft Azure allows for non-Microsoft technologies such as Linux and Python and PHP. Windows now includes a WSL (Windows Subsytem for Linux) component that runs bash, a popular shell for Linux.

I think this change is good for Microsoft, good for its customers, and good for the industry. For Microsoft, they no longer have to build (and maintain and support) products for everything -- they can focus on their strengths and deliver well-designed and well-supported products without being distracted. Microsoft's customers have a little more work to do, analyzing non-Microsoft products as part of their technology stack. (They can choose to remain with all Microsoft products, but they may miss out on some opportunities.)

The industry, too, benefits. For too long, Microsoft's strategy of supplying everything intimidated people from entering the market. Why invest time and money in a new product for Windows only to see modest success be met with tough competition from Microsoft? I believe that many folks left the Microsoft ecosystem for that reason.

Of course, now Microsoft can concentrate its efforts on its key products and services -- which may change over time. Microsoft may move into markets; don't think that they will ignore opportunities. But they will enter as a competitor, not as "the evil empire".

The Bully in the Sandbox

Can competitive behavior be too effective?

Microsoft, over the years, competed aggressively in the Windows market. Microsoft products became dominant in Windows: Word, Excel, Access, PowerPoint, Project, Visual Studio, Internet Explorer...

Microsoft built a reputation as the bully of the Windows sandbox. They made it clear that competitors could exist in the Windows market only at Microsoft's sufferance. When a competitor built a product that made too much profit, or introduced a technology that threatened Microsoft's dominance, Microsoft built its own version of the product (or technology) and out-competed the challenger.

In the short term, this strategy gave Microsoft dominance (and profits) in the Windows market. In the long term, I suspect that the unfriendly Windows market spurred the development of other technologies and spaces. I imagine that some people created products for Apple computers, to avoid the Windows market. Others built web applications. These platforms were less risky than competing in the Windows space.

Microsoft has had little success with its phones and tablets. Oh, the Surface Pro tablets sell well enough, but mostly because they are small, portable Windows PCs running full desktop applications. Windows-based phones have not sold well. The market for Windows mobile apps (especially when compared to Apple's and Google's) is anemic.

I cannot help but think that Microsoft's previous behavior with Windows has made people reluctant to enter the Windows mobile market. Analysts claim that Microsoft was "too late" to enter the mobile market, and they may be right. Yet some part of the failure, I believe, is due to the threat of Microsoft resuming its former practices.

Which leaves Microsoft in a difficult position. It wants people to accept its mobile devices. For that, it needs apps, and it needs apps from other people and companies. Microsoft needs a thriving market to compete with Apple and Google. How to build interest in the market for Windows mobile?

The one strategy that Microsoft should avoid is filling their app store with Microsoft-built apps. A Microsoft-run store with only (or mostly) Microsoft-built apps will reinforce the notion that Microsoft is still a bully. People will avoid the Windows platform, thinking that they have no chance to exist for any length of time.

So perhaps there can be such a thing as "too competitive".

Apple and Microsoft do not compete

The tech press has been building the case that Apple is "going for the enterprise market" and that Microsoft is "responding". I'm not convinced of this argument.

The evidence is thin. Exhibit A for Apple is the new iPad Pro, which has a larger screen, a faster processor, and an optional keyboard. The thinking is that this new iPad Pro competes with Microsoft's Surface tablet -- which it does -- and therefore Apple is in direct competition with Microsoft.

Exhibit B is Microsoft's partnership with Dell to sell computers to enterprises. Here, the thinking is (apparently) that Microsoft would only make such an agreement if it felt threatened by Apple.

Such competition may make for good news, but it makes little sense. Apple and Microsoft are in two different markets. Apple sells hardware that happens to come with some software; Microsoft sells software that happens to run on hardware. Its true that Microsoft is moving from the single-sale model to a subscription model, but they are still selling software. (Primarily. Microsoft does sell the Surface tablets. They are a tiny portion of Microsoft's sales.)

Microsoft and Apple are building a synergistic system, one which sees Apple selling hardware and Microsoft selling software. Enterprises may wish to purchase iPads and iPhones for their employees and still use Microsoft apps on those devices. Enterprises have a long history with Microsoft and lots of documents and spreadsheets in Word and Excel. Apple may have Pages and Numbers (its competing word processor and spreadsheet), but they are not the same as Microsoft's Word and Excel. The future (for enterprises) may very well be Microsoft apps running on Apple hardware.

One might assume that Apple has the upper hand in such a hardware/software combination. I disagree. While apps run in the iOS ecosystem at Apple's whim -- Apple can revoke any app at any time -- such a move would not benefit Apple. Enterprises are bound to their data first, their software second, and their hardware last. Apple could "pull the plug" on Microsoft apps, hoping that enterprises would switch to Apple's products, but I think the reaction would be different. Enterprise managers would be angry, and the target of their anger would be Apple. They would view Apple as selfish and dangerous -- and purchases of Apple equipment would drop to near zero.

Such a situation does not mean that Microsoft can be a bully. They have improved their reputation by expanding Microsoft software offerings to the iOS and Android platforms and maintaining a long relationship with the Mac OSX platform. They cannot arbitrarily "pull the plug" on their iOS apps. Such a move would be frowned upon. (They could, however, discontinue their support of iOS in response to arbitrary moves by Apple, such as a change in iTunes charges.)

Apple and Microsoft are not in direct competition. (Despite competing hardware and software products.) They stand to gain much more by civilized behavior.

Why the Microsoft tablet for Windows 8 is significant

This past week Microsoft  announced a tablet for Windows 8.

Microsoft has a checkered history of hardware. Their successful devices include the Kinect, the XBOX, the "melted" keyboard, and the Microsoft Mouse. Failures include the Zune and the Kin, and possibly the Surface. Many people want to know: will the tablet be a success or a failure?

This is the wrong question.

Microsoft had to release a tablet. The market is changing, and the rules of the new market dictate that vendors provide hardware and software.

Microsoft must succeed with the tablet. Perhaps not this particular tablet, but they must succeed with *a* tablet, and probably several tablets.

The old PC market had a model that separated hardware, operating systems, and applications. Various vendors built PCs, Microsoft supplied the operating system, and multiple (non-hardware) vendors supplied application programs. In the early days, one purchased an IBM PC and PC-DOS (supplied to IBM by Microsoft), and Lotus 1-2-3 and WordPerfect. Once manufacturers figured out ways of (legally) building PC clones, one could buy a PC made by IBM, or Compaq, or Dell, or a host of other companies, but the operating system was supplied by Microsoft.

People who are knowledgeable of the history of computing will recognize that the separation of hardware and software originates in an anti-trust lawsuit against IBM, for mainframe software of all things. Yet that decision influenced the marketing arrangements for the original IBM PC, and those arrangements (software separate from hardware) influenced the entire PC market. (To be fair, the pre-IBM PC market had similar arrangements: Radio Shack TRS-80 computers, Apple II computers, and others let you add software -- any compatible software -- to the computer.)

That model endures with today's desktop and laptop PCs. We buy the PC, an operating system (usually Windows) is included, and we add our separately-acquired software. That software may come from any source, be it another company or our internal development shop. We are responsible for configuration and upkeep, and for problems due to incompatible software.

Apple, with the iPhone and iPad, uses a different model: they supply the hardware and the operating system, and while other vendors supply the applications, Apple limits the freedom of users to select application providers. With iTunes, only those apps approved by Apple can get onto an iPhone or iPad. Users cannot select any application, or any provider, or even have them custom-written. They must go through iTunes (and therefore Apple).

The phrase for this arrangement is "walled garden". The environment is a pretty place, but one cannot leave easily. The vendor has erected a wall around the garden, and occupants must remain within the constructed garden.

Walled gardens, especially in tech, have a downside. When leaving one garden for another, one often loses content. You can buy a dozen books for your Kindle. Buy a replacement Kindle and your books are available. Buy instead a Nook, and your books are not available. Barnes and Noble knows nothing about your purchases with Amazon.com, and Amazon.com has no incentive to make it easy (or even possible) to transfer your purchases to another device. While we can leave the garden, we do so only by  leaving things behind.

This walled garden model is used by game consoles. Games are made specific to consoles; the XBOX version of "Diablo 3" will run only on XBOX systems, not on Playstations. If you purchased an XBOX and lots of games, and then you decide to switch to the Playstation console, you don't get all the games available in their Playstation form.

We are entering an age of walled gardens. Apple has their iPhone/iPad garden, Amazon.com has theirs, Barnes and Noble is building theirs. With the introduction of the Microsoft tablet, we can see that Microsoft is building theirs. Google has built some infrastructure with Google Docs and the Chromebook laptop/browser.

This new age of walled gardens, of separate kingdoms, requires developers, users, and companies to make choices.

Developers must select the platforms to support. They can focus their efforts onto a limited number of platforms, or they can develop for all of them. But development for each platform requires tools, skills, and time. A large company can invest in multi-platform efforts; a small company with limited resources must choose a subset, possibly forgoing revenue from the omitted market segment.

Users must select their platforms carefully. The cost of changing is high, much higher than changing from a Dell PC to an Asus PC, or changing from a Ford to a Chevy.

Companies must select their platform. They have done so in the past, usually picking Microsoft, the safe choice. (How many times have you heard the phrase "we're a Microsoft shop"?) But now the choice is riskier; there is no safe choice, no one dominant provider (and no one provider that appears ready to become dominant). A company's success will depend not only on its talent and ability to execute business plans, but also upon the success of its platform. A company may do well in its market, yet fail when its technology provider fails.

These are difficult decisions, and they must be made. One cannot defer the selection of platforms; others in the world are moving to new platforms.

To wait is to be left behind.