« The best interface is no interface »

You think that today, social media are running the new media world ? It’s not : messaging applications are. Users are sick of complex interfaces, accounts and profiles, and some french startups heard that voice : say welcome to new interactive services without any interface, just by messaging.

Messenger, What’s app, weChat, Skype, Viber...There are 2,5 billiard of messaging users in the world, that is to say 500 billions more than on social media. Each country has is favorite one, and every app is investing in new features and privacy policies, just like What’s app few months ago. Some french start-ups decided to get benefits from this clear trend to develop services through messaging and especially one : Jam. Jam is a « student caretaker » created by students, in order to help young people to deal easily with daily issues such as finding a flat, a pub to hang out, a cheap flight to Spain and so on. It’s easy : you just text or message Jam on messenger and ask your question. Jam replies to you with 35 % of artificial intelligence and 65 % of real human. The AI is based on aggregators, databases, pre-written messages and so on. It extracts metadata, findq similar previous requests, and if it can not answer on it own, then human part arrived. It’s a AI with human supervision.

Stop get complex, start get intuitive 

Before being a messaging caretaker, Jam tried different platforms : website, forum, social media...nothing worked because everything was just one more place to go, one more clicks-path to follow, one more interface to get use to. « The user doesn’t have to adapt to the interface but the interface has to adapt to the user » said Jam « We want to be where users are, and not ask them to find us » . Indeed, digital actors because they swim in the digital sea for years, often forgot that internet and its uses is not so easy for random people. To purchase something for instance, the user has to find the website, to understand the structure, to look for the product, to get how to order, to pay… It’s a complex and sometimes long path. That’s why Jam wants to develop services with already-registered paiement info and contacts. Imagine if we could just text to some big central “Hi,  I want a Uber to go to the airport” or “Hey can you order 25 € of flowers for my girlfriend, adress : XX”. Bonus : when Jam replies to your request, he’s funny, friendly and takes care of you. He can send you messages after few days and ask you how was this concert you asked about. Everything would be easier, faster, and even more : customized, isn’t it ? Perfect world. In theory.

The end of networking and communities : say Hi to the individual world 

The excessive customization and the development of one-to-one services and relations as Jam proposed will lead to the end of networks and communities, or in other words, the beauty of the open world of Internet. As the new media expert Zittrain said, everyone still wants to network and exchange with other people. Inclusive and individual applications like Jam are a going back to kind of proprietary network instead of the open-world of Internet. These apps make me think about (friendly) information appliances of “before” : they are less generative than open devices that we know today. With the spread of such new media, I’m afraid that the collaborative spirit could disappear.

So what should we retain from this trend ? 

Definitely the idea of simplify interfaces. « The most beautiful technology should be seamless, friendly, and intuitive » according to Jam. Re-thinking the relationship between interfaces and users or customers as well. Forgot the idea of a sexy platform to be catchy : only the service and its accessibility must be sexy. In other words : going back to the early Internet with simple and fluid architecture, and leave the place for users to use.