Tech-no remix
by Tim Nekritz

About a decade ago, we couldn't escape all the hype of the Internet reinventing the economy, saving the world and offering us a wonderful investment portfolio. This time around, the same breathless hype and hyperbole has accompanied the push for merging and converging media into portable devices.

Read the coverage of the early-January International Consumer Electronic Show in Las Vegas, and you'd want to put on a raincoat to repel all the drool and spittle coming from those heralding the long-awaited marriage between TV and the Internet. But then, Vegas weddings often prove ill-advised, and the all the flacks talking about their daring new devices showed that the crazy gamblers weren't limited to the craps table.

All the big boys are doing it: Yahoo!, Microsoft, Intel and Apple are lining up to dance with ABC, CBS, NBC, Fox and major motion picture studios. All the partners are putting together their fanciest footwork to convince you that if you're the last person on your block to download Desperate Housewives to your Palm Pilot, then you just don't have a grip on the Wave of the Future.™ After all, acquisitiveness remains as vital an advertising appeal as ever.

But a little history lesson is warranted. Those who do not remember the bomb that was mid-'90s WebTV may be bound to repeat it. The merging of content with portable technology has always created more question marks than exclamation points.

About five years ago, on the late, lamented culture criticism Webzine Suck.com, Greg Krauss offered a blunt assessment for the rollout of the wireless application protocol (WAP), which was supposed to signal the seamless integration of the Internet and cellphones:

Heralded as the Second Coming of the Internet, WAP is an unmitigated disaster — a half-finished, half-assed service enthusiastically targeted at mainstream consumers without the reliability, convenience or price that those silly mainstream consumers have foolishly come to expect.

Technology has, of course, improved immeasurably in even the past few years. But also increasing are the ferocity of the gee-whiz hype, the public taste for the next novel gadget and the depths of partnerships between technology companies and content providers. Think about that last one: What are the chances that the giddy reporter trying to tell you how cool it is to watch movies on your PDA works for a media conglomerate that wants to you to download their films?

Look, I love my iPod Mini. (I even named her Olive.) She's a great music player, but I don't think she's could do much justice to screening The Return of the King. Maybe I'm old-fashioned, but I believe 19th-century architect Louis Sullivan had a great point when he said that form should follow function.

These days, form and function are looking more divorced than Nick and Jessica. Just because we can surf the Internet -- one line of text at a time -- from a cellphone doesn't make it practical. I could clean my clothes in a dishwasher, too ... but I don't think that would make for a successful strategic partnership. I could also cook hot dogs in a toaster, but that doesn't mean I should.

Yet this annoying news consideration -- I call it, quaintly, "logic" -- is virtually invisible as tech reporters enthusiastically report the day's newest/sexiest partnership between a tech company and a media service. Even ABC sportscaster Keith Jackson, old-school though he is, did his best to sound proud when he announced during the Rose Bowl that highlight packages from all the major bowl games would be available to download to an iPod. I would have a hard enough time following the action on a 13-inch TV, so how could I possibly expect to enjoy what's happening on a screen only a couple of inches wide and not really made for that kind of broadcast?

Novelty remains, as ever, a selling point to individuals and businesses alike. If I had a dollar for every time I saw the trade press exclaim that podcasts, blogs and wikis would transform public relations ... well, I could probably afford a next-generation iPod. But while every technological innovation has potential benefits, it also brings a coterie of potential drawbacks. Most companies are loading up podcasts with content no one wants (MegaCorp's third-quarter earnings report, anyone?). Most bloggers are people wanting attention or a date, and even the best-planned PR ships are lost in the sea and viewed ironically at best. And even the grandfather of wikis -- the formidable Wikipedia -- has been revealed as fallible of late.

But what's new is always news, even if no one -- from the PR guy to the reporter to the consumer -- exactly understands what the product does. Even if someone exclaimed that the electronic emperor had no clothes, plenty of consumers still would wonder if the outfit was available at Old Navy.

This doesn't mean that some day, maybe even soon, all those smart people and millions of research and investment dollars won't hit upon some great way of streaming high-quality video that you can actually see into a portable device near you. In the mean time, don't believe the hype. Unless you also believe I have some really hot Pets.com stock to sell you.

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