TECH SPECIAL .....................How to Survive Tech Extinction

How to Survive Tech Extinction 
 

Be promiscuous. Never overcommit to any one giant

Don’t mock the beleaguered Nook owner. That could have been you. Five years ago, when US’s largest chain of bookstores released an ereader that it promised would best Amazon’s Kindle, could you blame the poor souls who bought in to Barnes & Noble’s vision of the future? Things haven’t played out well since. If you own a Nook, the fate of your books may now be up in the air. Sorry, you bet on the wrong horse. How do you avoid it? By following a simple strategy, you can get the most out of the digital world while reducing the chance you’ll be burned by a single wrong move. The key is promiscuity. When you decide what to use, you’ve got to play every tech giant against the other, to make every tech decision as if you were a cad — sample every firm’s best features and never overcommit to any one. This sounds difficult. It isn’t. Here’s the game plan:

BUY APPLE’S HARDWARE

Apple’s phones, tablets and PCs are the best-designed and bestmade computers on the market. They are also the easiest to learn to use and the most durable. And if you’re kind to them, they’ll carry a far higher resale value than rival devices. I say this after having tried just about every competitor to Apple’s machines. Some non-Apple phones and tablets are nearly as nice as the iPhone and iPad (Google’s Nexus line is quite good), but I haven’t found any that beat it, and none that are as pleasurable to use. But the best thing about Apple’s hardware is that it maximises your ability to be promiscuous with software. Apple’s App Store is home to more programs than any other app marketplace. What’s more, the most innovative start-up firms often create apps for Apple’s platform before they bother with Android. Since software is the soul of a machine, the source of all our devices’ advancing powers, you’re best off getting the gadgets that can run the widest range of software.

USE GOOGLE’S SERVICES

My phone and tablet carry Apple’s logo, but almost everything I do with them is routed through the search company’s servers. There’s Google’s Gmail app for email, Google’s Calendar to manage your day, Google Maps to tell you where to go, Chrome to browse the Web and even the otherwise useless Google Plus social network to back up your photos. Throwing your data at Google is a good idea for two reasons: First, the company is incredibly good at managing it; it lets you have access to stuff on pretty much any device, anywhere in the world, all the time. Its services almost never go down, its data is extremely accurate and, barring intrusion by the NSA, it offers solid security (like two-factor authentication). I also love the handy tricks Google adds as it learns more and more about me (yes, I’m aware I sound like a POW praising my jailers — but count my blinks, it’s true). For instance, its Google Now feature shows you relevant information like traffic directions and boarding passes just when you need them. It even enhances your photos, making your pretty face even prettier. Wait a second, though — aren’t you committing to Google by giving it all your stuff? Nope, because here’s the best thing: Unlike many of its rivals, Google allows you to download your personal data from most of its services so you can move to some other pusher.

BUY MEDIA FROM AMAZON

This one is a no-brainer. If you’re looking to buy a movie on your Windows laptop today, shouldn’t you get one that will also work on an Android tablet you buy tomorrow? If you buy a book to read on

your iPad, shouldn’t you also make sure it works on the Kindle you’re planning to get for Christmas? Different media providers offer different levels of such interoperability, but books, music and movies from Amazon are the most widely viewable. You can watch and read Amazon’s media on Apple devices, Google devices, Amazon’s own Kindle line. In contrast, a book from Apple’s iBookstore is probably never going to work on an Android phone, because Apple really doesn’t want you to buy an Android phone. So why bother with iBooks?

BET ON CONNECTORS

In our multidevice world, Amazon’s media store functions as what I like to call a “connector” — it bridges the chasm between otherwise foreign technologies. This gets to the most important principle for dealing with an uncertain future: invest your time and money in connectors. For instance, store your important documents on the cloud-storage service Dropbox, because its business model depends on it working everywhere. And it does. Similarly, when someone hands you a business card, you can snap a photo of it on Evernote, which also functions as a connector, letting you get at your scribbles regardless of which machine you move to. And in a cloudy future, who knows what that could be?

    Farhad Manjoo The New York Times ET140214