Aurora concept – the future of the web

Aurora is a set of concept videos exploring one possible future user experience for the Web, created by Adaptive Path as part of the Mozilla Labs concept series – but is there just too much in there to absorb in one sitting?

Before you watch these videos its probably worth spelling out exactly what they are, and what they are trying to do. Aurora has been produced for the Mozilla Labs Concept series. The Concept Series aims to provoke thought, facilitate discussion, and inspire future design directions for Firefox, the Mozilla project, and the Web as a whole.

Aurora (Part 4) from Adaptive Path on Vimeo. (Oh, and if you haven’t pressed play already, your internet connection isn’t going down. It was produced that way!)

I have to say when I first saw it I thought it seemed incredibly complex, and seemed to be trying introduce too many concepts to comprehend in just a few minutes. Particularly the first scenario seemed a little odd – it didn’t seem like a task that needed to be solved. It also left me a little bewildered and confused. There is just sooo much “technology” to take in.  And it seemed so complex. So many icons, options, and ways of using them.

Many of the comments on the Vimeo website reflect this with comments such as “most people want usability rather than bling.” But as I watched the third and fourth video I could start to envisage where I see this type of concept working really well. I suppose the question a lot of people would have is whether a browser could truly do all of this, or whether it is really a new operating system.

Either way I find it fascinating, and will keep an eye on the Labs concept series with great interest. I’m sure that a lot of the concepts are so new, we will all need to be introduced to them very slowly.