A Fresh Look at What’sHappening in the High-Tech

and Social Media World

by Patricio O’Gorman | @patoguru

# 001 | January 2011

We live in a very confusing world, plagued with data but poor in actionable information and knowledge. So much so, in fact, that we get used to reading hundreds of emails, blogs, FB updates, tweets, and we seldom recall what it is if asked …

We live in a world of scarce attention and countless sources of potential distractions. We think we know, but in reality we don’t know because we “browse”. Browsing is good for some things, but certainly not for learning and working. Browsing is fast and enables us to ignore bits and pieces which could be critical to understanding the whole under other circumstances.

The era of PC domination, exponential growth of internet access and simple html/xml programming has turned everyone into a potential contributor – and FB has done its best to assure we do contribute. However, this can be a double-edged sword. Are we all fit to contribute on the same level? Do we have something valuable to share? Or are we just re-transmitting someone else’s truth? Answers to these questions reach to the very essence of collaborative networks and are only part of the real issues.

As we move into a mobile era, where smart-phones and tablets will start to dominate the access to the internet (thus Chris Anderson’s much-criticized tirade in Wired, stating “the web is dead”), the landscape changes. Having a blog will assure you a voice in this world but certainly not attention. Competition is tough, as everyone else wants to be the next successful social media creator. Stakes are high, since an enormous investment of time is needed to generate a social digital footprint. Worst of all, measurements of influence and attention are still works in progress and marketing experts look to the internet still in awe. Knowing they have to be there but not knowing exactly what to do.

Truth is objective, but opinions, subjective. We don’t seek to reveal divine truths in this space, but rather to help in the difficult task of understanding what this is about or where we should be focusing our attention. We will develop proprietary content but also rely on existing sources of information to help us navigate the mess. At the end on the day, this will hopefully be more than a drop of water in the ocean of technology indigestion ….

Technology InDIGESTion @patoguru #001 | January 2011

Technology InDIGESTion @patoguru #001 | January 2011

watch

talk | listen

write

play

read

size of shapeindicates user base

LEGEND

USER BEHAVIOR

passive | media consumption active| media production

DEVICE MOBILITY

mobile

fixed

smart-phones

tabletshandheldconsoles

Personal Computer

netbooks

TV

movie theather

books

ebooks

radio

videogameconsoles

cordlessphone

mp3|4 player

Technology InDIGESTion @patoguru #001 | January 2011

consumption production

mobile

fixed

Some time ago, Apple called itself a

“mobility company”, a dub which 10 years ago might have been discarded as offensive. If the trend shown in the previous page and outlined in this small diagram is even close to real, we are seeing a general shift from “fixed consumption” (watching a movie) to “mobile production” (facebook updates, tweets) and two minor trends: from fixed to mobile (physical book to Kindle or Nook) and from consumption to production (reading blogs to tweeting). More than even, everyone wants a voice and companies making devices which accompany consumers will win. Here’s a detailed look:

- watching a movie or a tv show is not what it used to be. Even though the home-theater, LED and 3D home TV markets are booming, there seems to be a trend for people to want to time-shift (using TiVo or DVRs) and space-shift (watch on iPod while commuting on train) much of what previously was “couch potato” activity. Moviegoing is still strong, specially when aided by 3D effects and iMax type experiences, which offer a clear advantage over mobility.

- talk | listen – moving around the phone at home – although a liberating experience 25 years ago - is not enough anymore. Cell phone ownership and usage is at an all-time high, with current smart-phones becoming unifying technologies for computers, radios, portable consoles, TVs and VCRs.

- playing has become mainstream once again. The once innovative GameBoy seems from the industrial age compared to the mobile gaming available on smart-phones and tablets. The home videogame market is currently hot with innovation (PS3 Move, XBOX Kinect) trying to capture the Wii´s magic, but everyone is keeping an eye on mobility and its impact on potential audiences worldwide, now faced with accessible, cheap and “low on investment” gaming.

- writing is still more easily done on a laptop computer than on a tablet or smart-phones. It is no coincidence, then, that the fastest growing social media services of all time involve short sentences (FB updaes) or 140-characters tweeting.

- reading is still at a crossroads, even though, due to the cheaper, higher quality e-readers and the rise of the tablets, e-reading is slowly – and finally - catching on.

Technology InDIGESTion @patoguru #001 | January 2011

Concluding on a topic as hot as this is at the very least ambitious, if surely not

controversial. The detailed graph shown in page 3 has estimated sizes because there is no single base for comparison for these devices; but what is undeniable is that a big shift is happening and the mobile trend is here to stay. As microprocessors and transistors get smaller, as bandwidth becomes cheaper, people tend to be ever more connected and a wide array of innovative services seem to appear from nowhere to satisfy unimagined demands.

Apple certainly did grasp the essence of this shift with the launch of the now famous iPod – iPhone – iPad trilogy. One after the other, their products became enormous successes and put the company at the heart of consumer preferences. What’s more, Apple products all seem … unfinished, yet powerfully designed and very addictive, so much so in fact that people wait for hours to get their hands on their latest products. Steve Jobs’ company has become the rival to beat for the industry, and has yet to be dethroned as the most successful innovator.

Mobility has already started changing the way we interact with one another; the runaway success of SMS as a modern communication tool and the social media frenzy has accelerated a transition into the “immediate communication market” that was started over 15 years ago by instant messengers (anyone remember ICQ?). Netbooks started the transition from Notebooks to “something else” but they did not become that “something else”. As smart-phones grew smarter and tablets were launched, it appears that the missing link on the road to a mobile world might in fact be a cross between a tablet and a smart-phone, coupled with display technology we might not have seen just yet.

I look forward to hearing your comments at technology.indigestion@gmail.com and get the conversation started. That means criticizing what you read here, proposing future studies or just joining this open conversation. We can also pick up via twitter @patoguru.

Meanwhile, I hope this has helped you partially digest this wonderful world of technology.

Next Issue: A look at Social Media, and a categorization and comparison of the main rivals in that arena.