Do you agree that AirPods is Apple’s new chess piece in its Internet of Things layout?

Perhaps the biggest complaint about the new generation of iPhones is the removal of the 35mm headphone jack, which has led to a lot of criticism of Apple's new wireless headphones, AirPods. But don't think of AirPods as just a pair of headphones, an accessory for the iPhone. In fact, Apple has found a new position for AirPods, and its competitors here are not various Bluetooth wireless headphone manufacturers, but Amazon and Google.　

AirPods Market Positioning

If you have carefully read the report of Internet Queen Meeker in June this year, I believe you are familiar with the following picture:

The picture above is the evolution of human-computer interaction. Entering the computer age, the "machine" of human-computer interaction has evolved from mainframes, desktop computers, and laptops to smartphones, which everyone has one or even two. In terms of interaction mode, humans use mice and keyboards to interact with PCs, and touch screens to interact with smartphones and tablets. The next interaction mode is voice.

As Meeker showed in his review of the history of human-computer interaction, millions of years ago, humans started interacting with voice, and the invention of writing allowed the interaction to shift from voice to text, and various interactive tools for dealing with text emerged. Even so, 90% of human communication is still done through voice.

However, voice interaction is not limited to the question-and-answer stage. The service integration behind it is the key. It is not difficult to understand why Amazon can quickly occupy this market with Echo. Amazon’s rich e-commerce resources are an important reason for its success.

Amazon released Echo in December 2014, but it did not enter the mass market until the summer of the following year. As a personal home virtual assistant with voice features, Echo has gradually become an important product for Amazon's layout of home Internet of Things.

Google followed suit, and it is rumored that Google will use Project Aura, an upgraded version of Google Glass, to achieve similar functions as mentioned above. In short, it is a pair of glasses that can only interact with voice.

(Project Aura)

The voice interaction product launched by Microsoft for female users is called "Clip". This handset product allows users to interact directly with Microsoft Cortana when their hands are unable to control the phone.

Sony is expected to launch Xperia Ear in the next two months . This product is positioned as a virtual assistant that can read news and weather forecasts to users and help you update your social media status. It is understood that Sony has not only designed voice interaction for it, but also allows you to directly nod or shake your head when answering "yes or no".

(Xperia Ear)

Apple launched Homekit at the 2015 WWDC conference, with the goal of controlling home lighting, thermostats, and various home appliances that can be connected to the Internet through the iPhone. Apple wrote on its official website:

With HomeKit, you can use your iOS device to control all the accessories in your home that are marked "Works with Apple HomeKit."

In the upcoming iOS 10, Apple has officially integrated a new app, Home, into the system. This app allows users to complete a series of home appliance control operations through Siri. According to Cook's statement at this year's WWDC conference, iPhone, iPad, iTouch, and Apple Watch all support this app, and now, a new product, AirPods, is being added.　

Advantages of AirPods

At the press conference, Apple executives intentionally or unintentionally used AirPods as a solution to the iPhone 7's removal of the 35mm headphone jack, making many people think that this wireless headset can only be used on the iPhone 7. But in fact, AirPods was not born for the iPhone 7, but is an independent new category. The American technology media BI has made an inventory of the functions of AirPods, and here are a few of them:

AirPodss comes with a magnetic box, and there is a Lightning port at the bottom of the box for charging. The box itself is also equipped with a battery, which can be used to charge AirPodss. Apple officials said that AirPodss can be used for up to 5 hours on a single charge, and the battery integrated in the box will extend the use time of AirPodss to 24 hours. AirPods can be used with any device equipped with iOS 10, macOS Sierra, and watchOS 3. In other words, you can use AirPods on multiple old devices, provided that the system is updated. AirPods can also be connected to any standard Bluetooth music player, which also means that you can use AirPods without an Apple device.

Imagine that if you previously had to hold your iPhone and wear your Apple Watch and shout "Hey, Siri, turn on the light", you may only need to activate Siri through the AirPods on your ears in the future. Although this does not seem to be a very cool scene, after all, you already have an Echo in your living room, and you don't have to wear another device to complete voice interaction, but from the perspective of the Internet of Everything, Apple's advantage in the positioning of AirPods is also very obvious.

First of all, AirPods are a natural wearable device. Over the past decade, the best-selling wearable device on the planet is actually Apple's wired headphones - earbuds. This headphone, which originated in the iPod era, once became a symbol of the Apple brand and continued into the iPhone era. The picture below is an Apple advertisement design from 2003.

AirPods is also a wearable device that you can use to control home appliances or in the office. Considering that this headset can be used for up to 24 hours, it is enough for ordinary users.

Secondly, Apple's more complete hardware ecosystem will allow AirPods to have more application scenarios. In the past few years, while Apple has been cautiously developing its product line, it has unified the experience at the device interaction level through Siri. Now, all Apple products, from players (iPod touch) to Apple TV, can be controlled by Siri, which also provides more application scenarios for AirPods. In the future, you may only need to use the headphones on your ears to let Siri complete many scenarios, such as checking the weather, checking the calendar, replying to emails, updating Twitter, etc.

A little goal for the future

As the most natural mode of human-computer interaction, voice interaction first requires machines to understand human language. Automatic speech recognition (ASR) is the ability of a machine to recognize human-speaking words. For a long time, ASR could not match human recognition in terms of accuracy. However, in 2010, ASR reached a turning point in recognition accuracy.

From the changes in the above figure, we can see that the accuracy of ASR has been greatly improved in the five years from 2010 to 2015, which is more than the change in the past 30 to 40 years. In fact, we are now approaching a moment when machines are about to surpass humans in speech recognition.

If the interaction of mouse and keyboard gave birth to a series of PC applications, the emergence of touch screen interaction has brought application interaction into a new stage. Will the suppression of voice interaction by giants including Apple also change the form of hardware and software? It may be a good idea to treat AirPods and Sony's Xpeira Ear as a new computer with exclusive voice-controlled applications. This may be the future of the Internet of Things and the best destination for these wearable devices.

As a winner of Toutiao's Qingyun Plan and Baijiahao's Bai+ Plan, the 2019 Baidu Digital Author of the Year, the Baijiahao's Most Popular Author in the Technology Field, the 2019 Sogou Technology and Culture Author, and the 2021 Baijiahao Quarterly Influential Creator, he has won many awards, including the 2013 Sohu Best Industry Media Person, the 2015 China New Media Entrepreneurship Competition Beijing Third Place, the 2015 Guangmang Experience Award, the 2015 China New Media Entrepreneurship Competition Finals Third Place, and the 2018 Baidu Dynamic Annual Powerful Celebrity.