the blog

It’s Only a Matter of Time Before Your Mobile Device Knows Your Every Want and Need

Posted by Oren Frank on 05.25.10 @ 05:14 PM

Oren Frank

Let’s look a minute at the most recent hype we all follow: “The next network is mobile” or “the internet just became location-aware.” Both are true, but oh so very 2009, and they miss the point.

The current phase of the “mobile” discussion focuses on location as the next platform. The growth of Foursquare and Gowalla serves as evidence and as a great demonstration of Metcalfe’s law on the mobile net, and tiny players such as Google, Twitter and Facebook have recently rushed to add location features to their platforms.

But, when looking through the POV of the consumer, location isn’t quite enough. Mobile technology is now theoretically capable of providing us with real-time contextualized and personalized services and information. The full potential of what this technology can provide should be seen through the aggregated filters of our location, our timeline, our social graph, what we did just before and what we’re expected to want or do later on. All of the above (and not just the location), completely change our needs as consumers.

If I’m going scuba diving in Florida with a group of nerds on a Friday afternoon, I have one set of contextual needs. If I’m taking my daughter to school on a snowy New York Monday morning, it’s a very different set. The best way to understand the potential of this technology is to realize that it is sort of “aware.” Your device kind of “knows” (through GPS/3G/Wi-Fi/accelerometer data, etc.) where you are in the physical and social time and space. It is also “aware” because it holds a complete record of your past actions and habits and of your future intentions — where you are heading and who you will meet (via calendar entries, contacts, web/search history etc.).

So, one could argue that your device is “you-aware.” At that moment we’re leaving the realm of the “mobile network” and moving into a new territory where there is only one network — the network of you. Your new personalized contextual device will actively assist you — and in being active lies the huge potential leap compared to current technology. I have no doubt that very soon context-based technology will actually predict our needs and desires.

Here are few scenarios that, at the moment, may seem a tad science fictional, but the required technology to realize them already exists. What’s missing is a software-based solution that will tie up the loose data ends:

• My context device “knows” it’s noon. It also knows (via accelerometer data) that I haven’t moved from my desk for the last couple of hours. Because it “knows” I have a TBD lunch scheduled for 12:30 (it reads my tagged calendar entries), it will remind me I should leave. As soon as I move the device, it displays the list of places where I had lunch the last couple of weeks. Since most were Italian restaurants, it suggests Chinese or falafel and generates the latest consumer rating of the restaurants offered. At the same time, it also highlights restaurants located within walking distance that will allow me to be back in time for my scheduled 2 p.m. meeting.
• I am on a business trip to Madrid, have just finished my meetings and have three hours until my flight back to New York. My device “senses” I started moving and “knows” my schedule, therefore it asks me if I prefer to get a taxi to the airport, or if I prefer to stay in the city since the drive to the airport takes about 15 minutes. I choose the second option, slide the “ambient media streams” all the way from “privacy please” to “hit me with everything you’ve got,” and the device offers me all the tourist attractions around me, even a nearby coffee shop that has received exceptionally high ratings (I love coffee). I choose the coffee shop, and as I am drinking my second cup, the device alerts me that my flight has been delayed by an hour and will board through gate E32. I drink another cup of coffee and read from my device the history of Madrid until the next alert updates me that I should call a taxi — immediately providing me with an application that directly books one.
• I leave my office to interview someone at a nearby bar. My device “knows” it is a job interview (tagged in my calendar), therefore it automatically Googles the applicant, uploads his resume and image, and then provides me with a summary of the available information found about him from HR, the web and other social sources. As I approach the bar, my device turns itself into “meeting” mode, in which I can view a map that displays two dots approaching each other. As we meet, the device asks me if I would like to record the conversation and send it to HR.

And the list goes on. Once we’ve learned to connect location and time with personalized social/behavioral data, there are endless scenarios. Using not-too-complex algorithms, the context device can continuously study our lives, making ever-improving “guesses” to actively help us.

So, goodbye, app phone; hello, predictive context device. On one hand, the scope of personal information that a device like this will collect about our behavior and preferences is straight-forwardly scary. On the other, whether we like it or not, most of this information is already being collected today. Wise usage and leveraging of our personal information will allow context-driven technology to provide us with services that will turn the next generation of mobile devices into smart and efficient personal assistants that will continue to improve our quality of life.

For marketers, this is the ultimate wet dream of the marketing world since day one: a target audience of one. You.

The original and often forgotten purpose of marketing was to add value to consumers’ lives, what MRM Worldwide defines as Customer Utility. Marketing that is context-based — the kind that provides tangible value in real-time with the professed permission of the consumer — is an excellent basis for a new type of relationship between marketers and consumers, one that is finally based on win-win.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Oren Frank is global chief creative officer at MRM Worldwide. During his career, Frank has worked with such brands as Honda, Volvo, Microsoft, Yoplait, Heineken, Axe and McDonalds.

“You aware” … yep, straight forwardly scary… but very cool.

Posted by Robert Scoble. 5/18/2010

Here’s a talk I gave a week ago in Tel Aviv, Israel, to the Techonomy conference where I talk about some of the things that’s changing in my world.

But last night I spoke to a bunch of parents at a private school in San Francisco.

The two audiences couldn’t be more different.

One understands Twitter and Facebook and Google Buzz in depth. One is someone afraid of it. One guy stood up last night and asked “do I need to be on Facebook to understand what my kids are doing on it?”

William Gibson wrote “the future is here, it’s just not evenly distributed.”

There have been only a few times in my lifetime where I could see just what Gibson meant and we are living in this time right now.

It’s also interesting that today Microsoft Office came out with a new version. I’ll probably buy it but I’m using Office less and less. Something that I noticed in talking with the entrepreneurs in Israel too. When I fly, though, I see most business people are still using Windows XP with Office 2000 or Office 2003. Mostly PowerPoint or Excel is what I’m seeing on planes. While most of the people I hang out with at TED or other conferences have moved onto using things like Zoho’s spreadsheets, Google Spreadsheets, or Prezi’s or SlideRocket’s presentation tools.

Folks used to make fun of those of us who were from the future as “inside Silicon Valley’s bubble.” But notice that this bubble from the future no longer is tied to a place. Tel Aviv has lots of “future” practitioners, when I visited the best Tel Aviv restaurant there was someone already using an iPad there and they don’t even have an Apple store. Sure, Silicon Valley has more than its fair share, but I’ve met people all over the world who would rather use Prezi than PowerPoint. Would rather have an iPad than a Windows 7 netbook. That would rather have a smartphone than a Series 60 Nokia phone. That would rather use Facebook than email. That would rather write a tweet than do a press release. Etc etc.

Are you from the future? Here’s some ways you might tell you are:

1. Have you copied some Javascript code for your blog? IE, do you know what it’s like to embed YouTube videos into something else, like I did with this post? If you have, you are from the future.
2. Have you written some filters on Gmail to filter your emails? Then you are from the future. (That is the single most productive thing I’ve done this year, by the way, I’ve written hundreds of filters to clean my inbox of noise which has made my email usable again).
3. Have you shared something that used to be private, like your health information, your credit card information, your drunken college photos, your baby’s birth, your sexual orientation, or something else that used to be taboo? Then you are from the future. Extra points if something like that has gotten redistributed in Techcrunch and you kept your job.
4. Have you gotten your cable upgraded or fixed just by Tweeting @comcastcares ? Then you are from the future. Extra points if your company is using tools like UserVoice, Spigit, GetSatisfaction, or Zendesk.
5. Have you started up a new Linux or Windows server from an iPad or iPhone or Android phone using a cloud service on Rackspace Cloud or other cloud hosting provider? Then you are from the future.
6. If a streaming news system like SkyGrid, My6Sense, Genieo, etc to get your news instead of looking at a news brand like the New York Times, then you are from the future.
7. If you have a Sprint 4G modem in your pocket, then you are from the future.
8. If you use a VNC app to call into your home computer from your iPhone or iPad or, even, your old-school Windows 7 netbook (I use LogMeIn on my iPad), then you are from the future.
9. If you watch TV online, then you are from the future. Extra points if you are using Boxee.
10. If you discover music on Spotify or Pandora from your Facebook friends, then you are from the future.
11. If you check in on Yelp, Foursquare, Gowalla, Loopt, Brightkite, Whrrl, Fiddme, or use Google Latitude with your friends then you are from the future.
12. If you use Salesforce Chatter, SocialText, Jive, SocialCast, Box.net, or Yammer at work with your coworkers, then you are from the future.
13. If you use Skype more than you use standard old cell phone service for your voice calls, then you are from the future.
14. If you no longer are bothered by the penises on Chatroulette, then you are from the future. Extra points if you already have come up with a way to do business on it.
15. If you sign up for conferences but only go for the lunch-time networking (I’m watching the SmashSummit on Ustream right now) then you are from the future.
16. If you read Techcrunch in at least three different places (I read it on Techcruch, TechMeme, Washington Post, Twitter, Facebook, and Google Buzz) then you are from the future.
17. If you know how Techmeme selects news, then you are from the future. Extra points if you can pick founder Gabe Rivera out of a crowd.
18. If you have deleted your Facebook account, then you are from the future. Or, if you, like me, have gotten over Mark Zuckerberg’s throwing privacy under the bus and have just marked all your accounts as totally public because that way you know you’ll never be disappointed by something leaking into public view that you weren’t expecting to, then you are also from the future.
19. If you have hosted a live video stream on Ustream, Qik, or Justin.tv then you are from the future.
20. If you can tell at least three reasons why the New York Times iPad app sucks then you are from the future (or Steve Jobs, and we all know he’s from the future). BTW: it sucks because it’s not streaming, not complete, not easy to share, not easy to participate in.
21. If you share your vehicle’s location on Waze instead of using Google Maps, then you are from the future.
22. If you have more than five Twitter lists then you are from the future. You are even more from the future if you have listed yourself on both Listorious and Tlists.
23. If you have a Google Profile that’s filled out then you are from the future. Extra points if you have more links to more things than my Google Profile has.
24. If you have augmented your Gmail with something like Gist, Rapportive, or eTacts, then you are from the future.
25. If you feel dirty when you save a file to your local file system, then you are from the future. You are even more from the future if you are using a device, like the iPad, that makes it hard to, if not impossible, to save to the local file system. Extra points if you already think DropBox is your file system and JungleDisk is your new hard drive.
26. If you know that the number of followers on @Twitter really doesn’t mean anything, then you are from the future. Extra points if you already have implemented Twitter’s @anywhere feature on your blog.
27. If you know the difference between uploading a photo to Flickr, SmugMug, Picasa, or Facebook, and why you would use one vs. another, then you are from the future. Extra points if you pay for an account on at least two of these services.
28. If you are having discussions with your friends about how Facebook will take away Google’s air supply then you are from the future.
29. If you are already planning to buy Xbox Natal for your Christmas gift to yourself, then you are from the future. Extra points if you are going to stand in line for new Halo Reach coming too. Master Chief is definitely from the future.
30. If you think WordPress is old school and Tumblr or Posterous is the way to blog now, then you are from the future. Extra points if you can articulate what the difference between WordPress.org and WordPress.com are.
31. If you manage your conference schedule in Plancast, then you are from the future.
32. If you have hooked your Plancast up to Tungle.me which is managing your Google Calendar, then you really are from the future.
33. If someone has gotten mad at you because you take three minutes at the beginning of a meal to Foursquare, Gowalla, Fiddme, Tweet, or do something else on your iPhone or Android phone, then you are from the future.
34. If you know two things that are best on iPhone, RIM, Android, Palm, or Nokia, and two things that suck on each of those systems, then you are from the future. Extra points if you have one of each in your pocket.
35. If you manage multiple Twitter accounts, then you are from the future. Extra points if you can explain the differences between Hootsuite and CoTweet.
36. If you have a monitor that only displays Tweetdeck or Seesmic, then you are from the future. Extra points if you have an iPad that only displays social media apps.
37. If you use iPads to DJ your parties, then you are from the future.
38. If you already have Facebook like buttons on everything you build online, you are from the future. Extra points if you don’t, but can articulate why.

How do you know you are from the future? What are you doing that all your “normal” friends want to smack you upside the head for? If you are already living in a future I’m not, please let us know what apps you’re using.

According to a survey of 35,000 people around the world, access to communication technology was a main factor in increasing happiness.

We all need a few basic things in our life in order to be happy: access to clean water and food, shelter, health care, and relationships with friends and family. But once the necessities are met, what do people most desire?

Access to communication devices, according to a new study of 35,000 people around the world by BCS, the Chartered Institute for IT.

Most people in the study gave similar answers, but the potential happiness increase that technology could bring about was particularly significant in women and in people with low incomes or levels of education—even in developing countries.

While farmers in rural Africa aren’t likely to pick up the latest shiny toys from Apple, even a simple cell phone can serve as a valuable happiness-increasing tool, allowing the expansion and maintenance of social networks beyond the community.

“Whether young or old, we’re all social beings, we all have a need for the things IT access facilitates,” researcher Paul Flatters told BBC News.
In rural communities, access to communication technology such as cell phones and computers is limited, but expanding, thanks to groups like One Laptop Per Child, which supplies children in developing countries with basic laptops that will allow them to research school projects and connect with others all over the world. Other groups, like the UK’s Computer Aid, are helping rural villagers get wired with the help of portable cyber cafes that allow locals to log online to send emails and perform work-related research.

And back at home, it seems from the results that slick tech gadgets like the iPhone really can increase your happiness—provided you use it to talk with and send messages, photos, and videos to friends and family to help strengthen your social networks, rather than simply playing Angry Birds.