June 2011 Archives

I have talked a lot about collective group behavior and "Digital Swarms" in past blogs, but collective behavior starts with single individuals changing their own behavior which is where mobile become such a revolutionary platform.  The notion of providing people information or insights that can "nudge" their behavior must be done at the right time, in context to have the right effect.  Something only mobile can do as a communications medium, since it can reach the "last foot" wherever you are.  Feedback loops have existing for sometime (such as showing you your own driving speed in a school zone or showing you calories burned on an exercise machine), but mobile is taking this to another level of engagement (http://www.wired.com/magazine/2011/06/ff_feedbackloop/all/1) 
Whether its helping a patient take their meds when they are supposed to (a $100B+ impact to the US healthcare system), getting a consumer to curb their energy use at peak load times, getting a driver to practice safe driving habits, or getting an investor to save for retirement, every industry will be attacking the same universal problem of behavior change.   Continue Reading...

I recently ran a panel on the impact of Mobile+Social+Cloud on enterprise applications at the INNOVATE conference hosted by Global Logic in Palo Alto (http://www.innovate.globallogic.com/).  The panel itself was very diverse with representatives from SAP, SalesForce, Citrix, HP, SugarCRM, and Yammer discussing a range of issues from security and control of the cloud to changes in software development and business models.  While the group diverged on its views around the dependability of cloud services like Amazon EC2 for mission critical enterprise apps, they agreed on shrinking development cycles, the need for more “user-centered” design, and the drive towards more integrated or “stacked” applications. 

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While there have been a number of very cool Augmented Reality (AR) apps developed such as Google Goggles, Layar, Monacle, there has been little revenue to speak of produced by AR.  So until now, it has been about possibilities and cool factor.  But the recent activities by Sony show that AR may be hitting an inflection point (http://www.technologyreview.com/computing/37637/?a=f).  Sony has developed SmartAR platform to be leveraged in new games/toys.   Continue Reading...