mobilemania

The biggest thing happening at the moment is not social networking. It is the shift to computing on cellphones. (intro)
At the time of the internet boom of the late nineties, there were around 200 million computers connected to the internet. Today, there are already around three and a half billion people with cellphones – half the population of the planet. The cellphone computing boom could be the biggest in history. (Chapter 1)
Unlike the last internet boom, this one is unlikely to be localized in the United States. Cellphone ownership, networks and needs are greater in other parts of the world. (Chapter 2)
To succeed in this revolution, you’ll need a paradigm-shifting insight. But such insights are hard to come by. (Chapter 3)
The successful new mobile apps will be above all simple to understand and easy to use. Most tech products fail because they are neither. (Chapter 4)
New mobile innovations will be launched into a much colder climate to that of the 1990s internet boom. Cost cutting may be an important part of them. But cost cutting can be a very creative act. (Chapter 5)
Will mobile data save the telecoms industry? It depends whether the telecoms industry sheds its ‘me too’ mentality and starts to think different. (Chapter 6)
The shape of the future will come from studying the teen society of today. It is already much more networked than that of older people in their mid 20s. (Chapter 7)
Cloud computing will be a big part of the next revolution. But will cellphones become just dumb terminals? Phones are status symbols, and there’s not much status in a dumbphone. (Chapter 8)
In the last internet boom, most people lost most of their money. You will need a cool head to keep yours this time. (Chapter 9)
As search goes mobile, it should transform from its current office orientated format to something more intuitive and less demanding on the user. (Chapter 10)
It could perhaps combine with mobile augmented reality to provide new ‘Terminator’ style vision, and perhaps the first leap forward in user interfaces since the graphical user interface appeared in the 1980s. (Chapter 11)
For marketers, the cellphone is important because so many traditional marketing media are collapsing at the moment. In certain cases, the cellphone may be the only marketing medium available in the future. (Chapter 12)
For packaged good marketers, the issues are even greater. Many of their brands were designed with big budget television an ingredient as essential to them as vegetable oil. They will continue to struggle to adjust to digital as lead medium. (Chapter 13)
The other marketing issue is that of target audiences. Brands cannot transition to digital mobile media whilst retaining a broad demographic target audience – demographics were invented in the TV era to sell airtime. (Chapter 14)
Mobile media could transform loyalty schemes into something much more powerful over the next few years. (Chapter 15)
Mobile media may also lead to the 24/7 campaign – the one that is as immersive as a video game or FarmVille. (Chapter 16)
Mobile phones bring information and data to consumers as they shop. It should force marketing into a new mood of openness with its end user. (Chapter 17)
But it will all work only if marketers shift over to better measurement of campaigns. (Chapter 18)
Cellphone based computing should revolutionize medicine, as the cellphone becomes a nerve centre for health and fitness monitoring, for people both healthy and ill. (Chapter 19)
It is already merging with the credit card, for both near field and distance payments, and transactions both large and small. For poorer people without bank accounts, mobile minutes are proving a better currency than cash. (Chapter 20)
Mobile digital marketers however should not dismiss TV thinking from the past. The web is going video. (Chapter 21)
Above all, society should think carefully about the implications of everyone sharing so openly their movements through GPS and personal details through social networking. Politicians are not using the data at the moment because they don’t get digital. Beware the politician who does. (Chapter 22)