In the Guardian’s Media section, Vint Cerf, chief evangelist at Google asked some of his peers, “What’s the future?” He got some so-so answers back from MySpace, YouTube and Google – good to put in a PowerPoint deck for something you’re selling, but not that helpful really:
In a not very future forward statement, Scott De Wolf of MySpace thinks that social networks will go mobile and that folk will collaborate on digital concepts:
We expect aspects of all socially-based sites to become increasingly portable. In terms of mobile, we expect to have relationships with every carrier and device-maker in the world and we expect that half of our future traffic will come from non-PC users.
Social activity is happening everywhere and we expect applications and features to be more fluid, based on the online population that want content where they want it, when they want it, and how they want it. Social activity should be portable and we expect the industry will continue to move in that direction.
Lastly, online social destinations work best when creativity and development are collaborative concepts. From personal profiles, to the widget economy, to the OpenSocial standard – the future of the social web will harness the savvy of the masses to produce more relevant and meaningful social experiences, ultimately pushing the larger industry to be more innovative and progressive.
And Chad Hurley of YouTube doesn’t think that far ahead either: we’ll be watching YouTube on the phone or your home:
Our goal is to allow every person on the planet to participate by making the upload process as simple as placing a phone call. This new video content will be available on any screen – in your living room or in your pocket – and will bring together all the diverse media which matters to you, from videos of family and friends to news, music, sports, cooking and more.In the next five years, users will be at the centre of their video experience, you will have more access to more information, and the world will be a smaller place.
Peter Norvid, Head of Research, at Google says that the freedom of information will give us tools and ideas we could never have imagined:
Edison could see that this would be useful, but could not foresee the range of appliances, from food processors to mp3 players, that this availability would enable. So too will information flow freely to us in the future, and be transformed by as-yet-unforeseen information appliances.
Steve Hunter (Research associate, University of Oregon Network Startup Resource Center) and Adiel Akpolgan (CEO, Regional Registry for Internet Number Resources for Africa) says that the mobile phone will continue to change Africa:
The explosion in mobile telephony that has turned Africa into the fastest-growing market in the world, at more than twice the international average growth in subscriber numbers, will continue to drive locally-fuelled innovations. A number of SMS and voice-enabled applications are already in use in numerous African markets, providing financial, agricultural, health, and other information services. Network services via mobile devices will accelerate as mobile operators upgrade infrastructure, and cheaper and more sophisticated handsets lower the bar for innovation.
The rise of a youthful, entrepreneurial and well-educated vanguard of Africans will lead this overhaul of the continent’s communications services. Countries that are embracing information technology today and harnessing the power of wireless networks, mobile telephony and low-cost technology for the end-user, along with establishing regulatory environments to foster entrepreneurship, will evolve rapidly over the next five years.
And Maurice Levy, the head fella at the Publicis ad-agency network, says thank goodness for all those folk with mobile phones. We can advertise to them on them in, erm, ‘genuine and honest’ ways:
Linear media is fast giving way to liquid media, where you can move seamlessly in and out of different settings. Prescribed time – the 7 o’clock news, the Friday night out at the cinema, etc – is now becoming multitasking time. People are no longer willing to put up with interruptions for a commercial break during their entertainment experience, and so we have to find incredibly creative solutions to interact with them and engage them in genuine and honest ways. This implies a brave new world of engagement and involvement between marketers and consumers and will also mean co-production between marketers and media owners. Scale will be critical: in five years’ time, around 2 billion people will be constant internet users and mobile internet computing will be ubiquitous. What a great time to be in the business!
Tell me the future | Media | The Guardian
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