Smart, connected things and lots and lots of data make for a powerful mix. Tech blogger and start-up advisor Robert Scoble (Rackspace) knows a lot about wearable computers in our clothes, phones, wristbands. As they become increasingly context-aware, we will see many visions that sound like science fiction today, become reality. Google Glass is the best example for this development. The first glasses are currently being delivered to their lucky early explorers. Robert Scoble, being one of them, will be wearing his Google Glass during the Context Session at NEXT13. There, attendees have the chance to see one of the first glasses in action and to experience, what might influence our everyday life in the near future in a way not yet to be foreseen. We spoke to Robert about the dragons in sight:

Which digital innovations will impact our economy?

I believe we are heading into an age of context. One where sensors, wearable computers, big data, social network data, and location data will combine to make our products more personalized and predictive. The Google Glass is the product I’m most interested in, but that kind of wearable computer probably won’t have a huge impact until 2016. That said, it’ll be the one that causes the most words to be written over the next year.

Which challenges do we face?

As the number of sensors around us and on us increase we’ll struggle to build infrastructure to deal with the dataflows. We’ll also struggle to build noise reduction systems to make sure that we can see patterns in all this data that really matter to us.

Who are your favorite digital innovators?

The people I look to the most are those who are building contextual systems. Mostly nameless so far because they haven’t succeeded. If I had to pick one Sebastian Thrun, who runs Google’s Self-Driving Car effort, would be my favorite.

What’s your topic?
“The Age of Context: first reports from the world of sensors and wearable computers.” What we’ve learned by interviewing execs and innovators from Toyota, Oakley, Qualcomm, Google, Facebook, Aspen SnowMass, and many others.

We thank you for the interview and are very much looking forward to your talk in the Context Session at NEXT Berlin.

Robert Scoble will host the session on the second day (2 p.m.) and will welcome high profile context experts on stage: Facebook’s Managing Director for Northern Europe Martin Ott will talk about the mobile activities of the world’s leading social network. And Tal Dagan of PrimeSense will show how technology is giving devices a 3D view of the world, creating a synchronized depth image, so they can see, understand and interact with their environment in a completely new way.