A Ride... by Roger H. Silverberg

ach time I see a piece in "Business Week," "Forbes," or "The Wall Street Journal" touting some forthcoming information superhighway, or all-digital cable TV system, part of me can't help but be excited. After all, when the mainstream business media talks, it talks to hundreds of thousands--no, make that millions--of influentials.

Now, I don't lay claim to possessing uncanny powers of prediction; I'm just a fellow who runs a still-modest sized marketing communications shop building a beachhead in the new, interactive media paradigm. However, because we have been tippy-toeing our way around interactive forms of advertising since 1989, that makes me a grizzled veteran. So I feel somewhat capable of offering up some insights into why the digital/interactive future may actually be quite a bit different than the prevailing popular vision. "And," you ask, "How could I know?"

Well, just like Michael J. Fox, I've been to the future and come back and--really--it's not at all like what you probably think it is.

I entered future-world in a most habitual way. I was riding the westbound 7:58, which was pulling into Hicksville station about eight minutes late. This was turning out to be another typical July morning. Never enough seats on this train. I found myself standing wedged between a pretty 30-ish brunette and a guy in a Wall Street-type three-piece suit. The only way to travel, the Long Island Rail Road. Good thing the a-c was working, I thought. I wouldn't want to trade places with Mr. Suit on a hot day like this.

The brunette carried an intriguing leatherbound, notepad-sized device on her shoulder the likes of which I had never seen. Gazing about, I quickly noted many commuters were toting these tablets. What were they doing? Reading the morning newspaper, it turns out.

Before we reached Mineola, Mr. Suit politely taps Ms. Brunette and asks if she could check the exchange rate for Deutschmarkes against the American Dollar. I stood there amazed as I watched these two: Ms. Brunette deftly moving her fingers over a glowing flat-panel screen to a space near the top of the stock page of the July 16, 1998 Wall Street Journal, jotting a few words in the lower right corner with a pen-like device. As discretely as possible, I craned my neck to get a better view of the pad's glowing screen. A window opened in the center of the electronic page and displayed a few lines of figures.

D4.31 7/16/98 08:09:51 EDT

Ms. Brunette turned her pad towards Mr. Suit who thanked her profusely before whipping out an old-style cellular phone from his suit jacket pocket to place an obviously important call.

For a moment, I thought myself caught up in one of those AT&T "You Will" commercials. You know, the ones that show how enhanced communications services will make our lives more meaningful. But in the very next moment, I was witness to something that none of those commercials, let alone the business press, had even begun to hint at.

Ms. Brunette gave three deft taps to a bar on her pad and up popped a professionally designed full color page devoted to shoes. Let me tell you that this was far more than just some variant of "Digital Paper." This demurely attractive woman "flipped" through what appeared to be from my swaying observation point, a catalog. But not just any catalog. This one actually did take direct marketing to its oft-promised one-to-one vista.

Ms. Brunette tapped a "hot" area on her notepad and up popped her full color likeness on the screen. In the space of not more than a minute, she viewed her "self" in four different shoe styles in combination with some of her favorite business outfits. This was like electronic ColorForms, but better.

And it did get better. Ms. Brunette "changed" into a slinky little black dress right before my eyes--and called up a catalog page with high, clunky heels. And, right there, in this most public of places, she was able to admire herself from every angle. I was enjoying this just as much as her. Obviously satisfied, Ms. Brunette concluded the show by swiping her credit card through a slot on the side of her amazing fashion accessory. I'm certain her significant other would approve of the gift she just bought herself.

The whole experience of sharing this virtual fitting room with a pretty woman had me yearning to ask her for a date, but fortuitously, the train lurched into Jamaica where Ms. Brunette deftly pushed past the other standees to catch the Brooklyn train on track 3.

By the time we left Woodside, I felt like some broken-down "digital donkey," toting around a leather portfolio and my suddenly ancient, and very weighty, PowerBook pressing down on my shoulder. Then it was Penn Station where we emerged into the steamy caverns of a station that hasn't changed in--well, like forever! Oh, well... Another fine day to go and make some advertising.