These slides are from my Technology and Products course, a one day seminar on technology and how technology changes and evolves. Why do some product make it in the market when others just as good don’t make it? What are the forces that drive technology change? The presentation discusses what technology actually is – and it is more than you think, and how how innovations takes place.
One of the current trends is the rise of cloud computing. Although the term is overhyped and lacking clear definition, the trend is that people are storing personal information at remote sites more than ever before. These remote sites are proprietary services operated by private companies. So why are people not concerned with leaving their precious private data in the hands of someone else? It turns out that people are trading privacy for convenience.
Consider the famous image site Flickr. People can easily upload all their photos to this site and store them there. And when the disk space on their computers runs out, they just remove them locally since they already have the pictures safely on Flickr. Now the family album, intimate pictures mind you, is stored somewhere, and it is not clear where in the world the disk with all these photos is located, or who has access to them or how the security is. Now I’m sure the folks at Flickr are fine and decent people just trying to run their business as well as they can, but this should actually sound scary.
There are three main drivers for the rise of the cloud as data store. First, online services are becoming better with more functionality and greater interactivity. Simply, they are easy to use. Many people like Flickr, YouTube, SlideShare, Prezi, Google Docs, Picasa and so on.
Second is the community. Other people are also using the service and sharing and interacting is easy. One rule that I have is to always think about the community. If you can find a “social” angle to the technology it is worth exploring. Usually this is where the trend goes. It is also the community that establishes trust. Everybody is using Flickr or YouTube or whatever – so I’m save.
Thirdly, people are using multiple devices. We have our home computer, then our laptop, possible a separate work computer and mobile phone. Now add netbooks and e-book readers. It is not practical to store anything important locally. It doesn’t work. It’s too limited.
Whatever the meaning of cloud computing the trend is clear. It is much more convenient to have a service available at all times to keep the content. The access is simple, easy and everywhere. My argument is that it is this convenience that people want, and they are willing to trade their privacy and security to someone else and store their stuff on a disk they have no idea where in the world is. It could be in Iceland, for you all know.
Mobile? What! How can mobile be the next big thing? Mobile is old. There are over 3,8 billion mobile subscriptions in the world already. For sure it must be big by now. Then think again. The majority of phones are voice and messaging devices. Only about 5% are “smart phones”. The real mobile revolution has not happened yet.
Mobile “smart phones” are phones loaded with features and have some web browsing functionality. You can access the Internet over the phone air interface, usually 3G technologies such as CDMA. But now we are seeing the rise of “super smart phones” which are smart phones but much smarter than smart. Using terms such as smart is of course vague and lacks definition. So let me define the super in “smart”.
First, these phones have real web browsers. Not some “wap” or “mobile web” solutions but simply web. The same web as on your laptop. And it looks good. The first device to show us that real browsing was possible on a mobile phone was the iPhone. This device, and now joined by competitors, provides an excellent way to browse the web.
Secondly, these devices have WiFi. The first WiFi revolution was when WiFi became built into laptops. Now they are built into mobile devices.What does that mean? You can use your home network, or work network, but most importantly it means bandwidth increase. WiFi connections are usually faster and more reliable than current cellular technologies, so you get fast access to the Internet.
Thirdly, these devices are only used by a fraction of the current market in the world. Most penetration is in the business communities of the developed world, who already have Internet access. This leaves the rest of the world still using simpler version of cellular phones. Think when we start to see real adoption around the globe. For many countries this will be people’s main access to the Internet.
It is common for technologies to follow exponential growth. For a long time the incremental increases are small and far between. But over time they start to count and become significant as they cross the knee of the curve, the tipping point, and start to have real impact. I believe that the next mobile revolution is starting.
