Ericsson ConsumerLab has announced the seventh edition of its annual trend report, ‘The 10 Hot Consumer Trends for 2018 and beyond’.
The report points to a paradigm shift as consumers expect digital technology to increasingly operate on human terms.
The insights in the 10 Hot Consumer Trends for 2018 report are based on Ericsson ConsumerLab’s global research activities over more than 22 years, and draw on data from an online survey of advanced internet users in 10 influential cities across the world, performed in October 2017.
Body language, facial expression and intonation will augment voice and touch to control consumer interaction with tech devices, easing adaption in an ever-increasing pace of technological change, Ericsson says.
More than half of current users of intelligent voice assistants believe that we will use body language, expression, intonation and touch to interact with tech devices as if they were fellow humans. Two in three people believe this will happen within three years.
Meanwhile, 63 percent of consumers would like earphones that translate languages in real time, while 52 percent want to block out a family member’s snoring.
Thirty percent say new technology makes it hard to keep their skills up to date. But it also makes us instant experts. Forty-six percent say the Internet allows them to learn and forget skills faster than ever.
Social media is being overrun by traditional broadcasters. But half of consumers say AI would be useful to check facts posted on social networks.
Michael Björn, head of research, Ericsson ConsumerLab, said of the findings, “We are entering a future where devices neither have buttons and switches nor need to be controlled digitally via your smartphone. In fact, this may be a necessary change, as it would be difficult for people to learn a new user interface for every device that gets connected to the Internet of Things.
“Today, you have to know all the intricacies of the devices you use. But in the future, the devices will know you instead. For this to become a reality, devices must be able to relay complex human interaction data to cloud-based processing, and respond intuitively within milliseconds, increasing requirements on next generation connectivity.”
Advertisements may become too smart for their own good. More than half of augmented reality (AR)/virtual reality (VR) users think ads will become so realistic they will eventually replace the products themselves.
Fifty percent think not being able to tell the difference between human and machine would spook them out. Forty percent would also be spooked by a smartphone that reacts to their mood.
Thirty-two percent of students and working people do not think they need a job to develop a meaningful life. Forty percent say they would like a robot that works and earns income for them, freeing up leisure time.
Three out of four believe that in only five years they will use virtual reality to walk around in smartphone photos.
Thirty-nine percent think their city needs a road network for drones and flying vehicles. But almost as many worry that a drone would drop on their head.
