Data is King in the Connected World

October 26, 2010 By

DevicesI love my Amazon Kindle and so do a lot of other people. Amazon just announced for their top 10 books, Kindle versions are outselling print editions by more than 2 to 1. One of  the reasons I love the Kindle so much turns out to be one of the best business decisions Amazon has made; Kindle software is available on a variety of platforms, including iPhones, Android phones, iPads, PC’s and Macs. Amazon has not forgotten they are first and foremost a reseller of books, and they have all the bases covered. Best yet, though, is the Kindle software keeps your books and most importantly your place in those books in sync across all your devices. Start reading a book on your Kindle and pick right up on your iPhone.

The key point here is that we are not only living in a Connected World but a device world. The world is littered with millions of devices of all kinds and more people are finding themselves with more than one. When you have multiple devices, the critical factor becomes keeping your data in sync with all of them. The Kindle happens to be one of the best examples of keeping data and state beautifully in sync. We are going to need to see this more with the other applications we use regularly.

This is why we are seeing such a push toward using the cloud, a fancy term meaning the Internet, for these kinds of services. When applications run on the Net, it’s much easier to maintain state and data across devices. Google’s Gmail is another great example of this. You can easily connect to and maintain all the read statuses wether you’re using an iPad or an Android phone.

In the Connected World it’s just as important to be connected to your data as with other people.

Filed Under: Blog, Mobile Computing Tagged With: , , , , , , , ,

A Connected World TV From Vizio

July 8, 2009 By

No, it’s not my new video podcast, but an actual hdtv from Vizio with build in wifi networking. The so-called digital convergence has been talked about for years, but here is the first product I have seen that might actually make it a reality. The Television has built in wireless networking and support for Blockbuster, Netflix, Pandora, Amazon Video and an open architecture that will allow for future upgrades and additional services. It even has a remote control with a QUERTY keyboard. Large media companies are in fits over services like Hulu and Boxee but clearly pandoras box has been opened and this kind of connectivity between the Internet and common devices like a television is where things are going. It shouldn’t matter so much to the big media companies, however, as they should realize their bread and butter is the content not the delivery mechanism. The real problem is the incredibly complex and integrated businesses and licensing model this is all based on. Like many other business models, this one is going to have to be completely deconstructed and rebuilt from scratch for the new connected world.

So the question we always want to answer here at Connected World Media, what does this mean to your business? It means the world of the big screen TV may be opening up for you. In the past there was virtually no way anybody but the largest businesses with the most money could get onto television. TV advertising is just too expensive for most businesses. But now, the TV is open to the Internet and services that nearly any business can participate in. Already there is opportunity with YouTube as Apple TV will show those videos. I can’t imagine it won’t be too long before the Vizio connected TV starts supporting YouTube and possibly other Internet video services. You could develop a Boxee application and gain access via that route. Bottom line, there are effective and inexpensive ways for your company, your brand to get onto peoples big screen TV’s. But don’t hit them with the same old garbage from your marketing department (sorry marketeers). You had better be engaging, relevant and entertaining.

Filed Under: Blog, Technology, Video Tagged With: , , , , , ,