The Second Act

Hello from Austin- 85 degrees today- HOT- kind of snuck up on us. Christian is now getting back from a well deserved holiday. His Dad (came from Norway) and he went on a trip to the Grand Canyon last week. He seemed very relaxed this week so I guess the fresh air and scenery did him well.

Other news- we added a new person to the US Sales team- his name is Peter Kelly and he is going to be working out of San Diego and helping us with the mobile and home media side of the business. Opera US continues to grow!!

Well, I have been thinking about something very deeply lately...

This past week, I spent over 30 hours online- meaning eyes glued to my browser (and email client). Many weeks I have been online more than this but I think I can call this a weekly average.

That's alot of time online indeed and when I am not worrying about my posture, my eyes or my wrists, I worry about how productive I am at the end of the day and what I have to show for all that time looking at my browser.

A couple years back, when I was looking after Opera's desktop business in Oslo, I put in place some initiatives through our product groups to make Opera and the Opera browsing experience, one that allows the user to be more productive and better leverage the time spent online.

Some features that came out of this and others initiatives were "Integrated search"- featuring Google and other services, "Notes" and "hotclicks". Further back, other Opera first innovations that greatly optimized productivity, were keyboard shortcuts and tabbed browsing. About a year back, came mouse gestures and pop-up blocking. All of these features together and more helps make Opera the best browser for users wishing to get the most out of their Internet experience. I think that the importance and need for these types of features is validated by the fact that other browser makers like Moz and IE, swiftly copied and included them in their own products.

But is it really enough? Are we even scratching the surface here??

I tend to think not. I believe that we have alot of blue sky when it comes to browser innovations that make us more productive on the web.

Let's quickly think about what we all do with browsers today.
A short list--

~search
~buy & sell stuff/ transactions
~read the news, sports, weather, etc.
~learn and research
~communicate
~be entertained
~download and transfer files
~perform our jobs
~banking
~ etc. etc.

all wonderful ways to spend our time that very often results in more free time to do other things we love to do- like travel to the Grand Canyon....

In an average year, myself and many many others are going to spend some odd 1500 hours or more online!! Much of this is career related, but still there is a major opportunity cost there for all of us so it's vital that we take something *permanent* and *lasting* away from our browsing time- do you follow?

But, we as users are not all built the same... Some users have great memories and are able to retain more knowledge than others. Others just turn off their brain altogther when they use their browsers. Ok so the need to be more productive online is not a universal problem because there are some users that view the web strictly as an outlet for entertainment. In addition, the Internet, in it's current fabric and color can be somewhat limited by the quality and quantity of the content that is available today.

Some great minds are trying to solve these limitations. Tim Berners Lee and others are hard at work developing the next generation of the Web called The Semantic Web. If you have not read about this yet, I recommend that you do as it's fascinating (albeit a bit theoretical still).

here is a pretty good link:

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?articleID=00048144-10D2-1C70-84A9809EC588EF21&catID=2

It's all about automating the tasks that will ultimately make us more productive, efficient and effective. It means fully harnessing the power of your computer and the software on it and exercising the web- even when you are not physically looking at it through yout browser.

I am excited about this because it finally means we at Opera may truly deliver what is missing from today's web experience and the real value of browsers, computers and Internet devices.

I hope for a day when Opera is *working for the user* 24 hours a day, 7 days a week handling all of your web needs from any device and most of all retaining *every bit* of data and information that results from that work and exposing it in a way that is 100% useful to the user.

Remember Maslow's hierarchy of needs?

1. Biological and Physiological needs - air, food, drink, shelter, warmth, sex, sleep, etc.
2. Safety needs - protection from elements, security, order, law, limits, stability, etc.
3. Belongingness and Love needs - work group, family, affection, relationships, etc.
4. Esteem needs - self-esteem, achievement, mastery, independence, status, dominance, prestige, managerial responsibility, etc.
5. Self-Actualisation needs - realising personal potential, self-fulfillment, seeking personal growth and peak experiences.

Nothing much about computers and the web in there... Then again, it was not exactly a the beacon of light in the late 40's that it is today.

Well, it's the year 2004 and on the web, we as browser user's have core needs as well since it is such a vital part of our lives now:

We need to always get smarter and healthier
We need to be successful in all ways possible
We need to help the world be a safer, peaceful, cleaner place
We need information delivered to our brains and be at our fingertips
We need our computers to do the work we don't want to do

We want to enjoy all the good things that life has to offer and at the same time don't want to miss a thing in this short life.

And I hope that Opera is how we all achieve these needs.

More to come on this subject.

Good weekend all- I am off to Dallas tomorrow to see my beloved Red Sox play (decimate) the Texas Rangers. Pedro is on the mound an it should be a great contest between two division leaders.

Regards,
OperaSinger