Hi-tech Indians

A German friend of ours was clicking pictures all along the route from Delhi to Agra.

A German friend of ours was clicking pictures all along the route from Delhi to Agra. It was his first trip here and everything fascinated him. At one point he expressed concern that his digital camera was running out of memory. I ribbed him saying that if only he had an old-fashioned camera he would have found loads of urchins trying to sell him film at the Taj. Indeed, as soon as we alighted, about 10 8220;salesmen8221; descended upon us selling replicas of the Taj, key-chains and, to my surprise, memory sticks for digital cameras!

I am always intrigued by the speed with which we adopt technology. The proliferation of mobile phones is just one example. Whenever a cheap and easy-to-use technology is available, people take to it. Photographers at the Taj now routinely use digital cameras and can email pictures to you. Their prints are not processed in a photolab but usually on a regular desktop printer. Hawkers use microwave ovens to heat burgers. Vegetable sellers use electronic scales so that larger amounts of goods can be sold. Contrary to general belief, the adoption of technology has little to do with literacy or economic status. If a consumer finds technology easy to use, affordable and effective, it will be quickly adopted.

Technology forecasters have models for predicting growth. The growth curve is typically 8216;S8217; shaped: initial acceptance is low, followed by a period of growth and then a plateau of saturation. This model doesn8217;t take into account disruptive technologies. The pager is an example. It died an untimely death when the cheap mobile arrived. In any case, it was never as popular as a mobile because it was not as easy to use. Even mobiles took time to be adopted. It was only with cheap mobiles and talk-time that demand boomed.

On the topic of technology adoption, my favorite story is from the mid-8217;80s. While shopping for some jewellery in Delhi8217;s Chandni Chowk, we went into a small shop where the ground floor functioned as the shop and the upper floors as the store. The owner would sign a chit when he wanted something from the store and send it upstairs. The chit, now countersigned by the storekeeper, would come back with the required jewellery item. The shopkeeper exhibited several pieces for us and after we had finished took the chits he had accumulated and put them through a portable paper shredder.

All this happened in a modest establishment 20 years ago. The shopkeeper had found an effective way of preventing the misuse of these chits. The gain far outweighed the expense of a shredder!