This week's Pew report on Internet, broadband and wireless demographics has some interesting news regarding Internet and wireless users. Of those aged 20-29, 80 percent have accessed the web wirelessly. Morover, Pew's survey continues to show that wireless is key to bridging the Digital Divide, as African-Americans and Hispanics are using wireless at rates between 7 and 10 percentage points higher that the rate for whites. For more about this, click here.
Ever see a pothole or a tree that's fallen in the road and think, "Someone ought to fix that"?
Well, if you're in Washington, DC, you're in luck. All you need to do is snap a photo with your PDA and using the city's DC 311 mobile app, pair it with a GPS location. You then upload it into a local government database. This also works for graffiti, broken parking meters and any other public nuisance.
Other cities from New York to San Francisco have also moved to harness the power of mobile consumers. The practical result, as CNN reports is that:
[T]ech geeks transform banal local government spreadsheets about train schedules, complaint systems, potholes, street lamp repairs and city garbage into useful applications for mobile phones and the Web. The aim is to let citizens report problems to their governments more easily and accurately; and to put public information, which otherwise may be buried in file cabinets and Excel files, at the fingertips of taxpayers.
San Francisco and other cities are trying to develop a national standard for municipal government data. That way, a mobile app that tracks, say, bus service in San Francisco could also be used in any other city. That could enable cities that cannot afford to develop their own mobile apps to benefit.
The Duluth News Tribune in Minnesota recently published an op-ed piece by Mobile Future Advisor Diane Smith. The piece details Diane’s success as an entrepreneur in rural America, and the many ways that technology helps small business and promotes economic opportunity.
The wireless sector employs nearly 2.7 million Americans - from applications developers to retail store workers to network engineers - and contributes $100 billion annually to our nation's economy. In the last year alone, wireless companies have invested more than $20 billion in networks that are expanding opportunities for the next generation of connected businesses.
Eric Savitz writes the Technology Week column for Barron's and his business perspective on technology's changes is always refreshing. Case in point, his predictions for the Consumer Electronics Show, which begins January 7th:
[M]obile devices should be the big story. New phones are likely to be unveiled by Palm, Motorola and others. There will be a host of new e-book readers; keep your eye on the QUE from start-up Plastic Logic. The netbook surge rolls on, aided by variants known as smartbooks -- generally Linux-based, with non-Intel processors, and offering handy features like instant on. Even now-mundane devices like cameras and camcorders will offer wireless connectivity. Also expect a host of new tablet-based PCs, taking advantage of special features in still-nascent Windows 7.
Incidentally, we're offering Savitz' insights solely for their own merits and not to help convince our bosses to approve our last-minute CES travel request.
With the exception of
reducing the Digital Divide, probably the greatest social benefit from wireless
technology is its potential to improve access to more affordable
healthcare. We've blogged a lot about
this (see here, here and here) and nowthanks to Venuri Siriwardane at the Newark Star-Ledger, there's
even more evidence.
As
an example, Siriwardane cites fuzzy bedroom slippers with pressure sensors in
the soles which wirelessly transmit movement data, including information that
the wearer may be more likely to fall.
Of
greater potential benefit, researchers are pouring research funding into the
development of cost-effective wireless audio and video consultation services so
doctors may interact remotely with patients in real time.
The
reason for this is not hard to discern:
Remote
patient monitoring alone can generate between 20 percent to 40 percent in
savings, said Chris Wasden, managing director of health industries strategy and
innovation at PricewaterhouseCoopers....
Wasden [explained] that telehealth is much more common in developing
countries such as India, where cell phones enable people to receive health care
in remote areas that once lacked access to modern medicine. "They've already
developed the ability to deliver mobile health care to their people, but we're
behind the times on that."
Better
healthcare. More affordable access. That's the mobile future.
The Mobile Future Coalition is live-tweeting the Progress & Freedom Foundation's panel, "Let's Make a Deal: Broadcasters, Mobile Broadband, and a Market in Spectrum."
Follow along on @mobilefuture - and if you haven't already follow our twitter feed to stay up to date on the latest news in wireless innovation.
If you're looking to brush up on a little reading, you don't need to carry around a stack of books or even buy an e-reading device. You've already got them with you.
A recent article in the New York Times describes how phones are gaining an edge over e-readers like Kindle. Many people are finding that there is no reason to spend $300 on a new device when they've already got access to thousands of books in their pocket. This trend has caught on with application designers:
Over the last eight months, Amazon, Barnes & Noble and a range of smaller companies have released book-reading software for the iPhone and other mobile devices. One out of every five new applications introduced for the iPhone last month was a book, according to Flurry, a research firm that studies mobile trends.
Many new reading applications feature videos, music and other multimedia features, in addition to colorful screens that can't be found on the Kindle. The fact that smart phones go with us everywhere, take up less space and can perform more functions make them an easy choice for e-reading.
In recent years, we've grown accustomed to using our phones to make dinner reservations, buy movie tickets, find our way around town and stay connected to our friends on our favorite social networking sites.
Sending a text, downloading a new app or playing a game are ways that we use our phones everyday to improve our lives, and the U.S. State Department has taken notice. The State Department is now using this technology as a tool to promote its mission of fostering diplomacy around the globe.
A recent article on the Washington Post's Post Tech details the efforts being taken by the State Department:
In Congo, e-mails and text messages are being used to warn women and children of attacking rebels nearby. In sub-Saharan Africa, text messages are instructing people how to take HIV medications. In Iran, an online video from President Obama to Iranians on their new year went viral.
The State Department is taking the technology we use to stay connected to discourage violence, promote mobile banking and build bridges among nations. And though this is an innovative approach, they've also had help.
Ali Reza Manouchehri's company Metro Star Systems was contracted by the State Department to craft mobile phone programs to better inform citizens around the world about America.
Manouchehri said the choice of the mobile phone was only natural thanks to its ubiquity, which includes less-developed countries. Even in a poor household, a family might share a common mobile phone for family use, he said. The hope, Manouchehri says, is to form "spontaneous communities" of people having fun and learning about America, connected around the world via a cellular network.
By using simple technologies like games and text messages, Manouchehri and other creative minds are helping connect cultures and promote better understanding among nations.
Everyday our phones make our lives better - it's exciting to see how they can make our world better.
Back in August, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC)
approved three Notice of Inquiries (NOI) covering issues on innovation and
investment in wireless; competition in the wireless industry; and consumer
protection and access to information about communications services. Mobile
Future took the opportunity to respond to the FCC's investigations with reply
comments filed on behalf of the coalition. The reply comments focused on the recent paper
sponsored by Mobile Future, "Why the iPhone Won't Last Forever and What the
Government Should Do to Promote Its Successor." You can read Mobile Future's
comments here.
Ever wondered what the place where you are standing looked like 200 years ago? Ever wonder what a far away object looks like up-close?
In just a couple of years our smartphones may be able to answer these questions for us. Technologists are developing "augmented reality" applications that can take visual information from the web and infer what our surroundings looked like in the past or give us more detailed views of distant objects.
Experts say smartphones of the near future may physically resemble the smartphones of today, but their capabilities will better resemble our computers. Designers and technologists predict that many phones will have foldable screens similar to e-readers of today. Researchers are even experimenting with virtual keyboards, which will allow users to type over an imaginary keyboard while sensors pick up the keystrokes.
Today's smartphones can do almost anything a PC could do in 2007, but in a couple of years smartphones may have enough computing power to enable much more sophisticated applications that truly take advantage of the device's portability.
This is good news for smartphone users. If you love your phone, but prefer your laptop keyboard and all its capabilities, it may not be too long before you've got the best of both worlds in one portable device.
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Tags: Mobile Broadband, National Broadband Plan, Wireless Broadband, Wireless Innovation, Digital Divide, Mobile Broadband Growth