The Social Mobile Device Concept
If I am to ask you ‘Which handset on the market has the best set of features’, you would probably go for an iPhone, an Android phone, Windows Mobile or perhaps Palm’s recently announced WebOS platform? Each of these has it’s own unique set of features and flaws, but do they make a great social device? While you may be able to use your Google Calendar and Mail on most of them, you would still have to install applications for Twitter, Flickr, Facebook and anything else you are using on-line. It is cumbersome to deal with several background programs running at the same time. Your information is not organised into a single place, rather each service keeps its own copy which is disconnected from the rest… Meet the social mobile device.
The Contacts List: Your friends and family on Facebook are aggregated into groups. Names, addresses, telephone information, avatars are downloaded to your social device. No longer the need to keep an up-to-date information for everyone, updates on-line are propagated instantly.
Messaging: Twitter is a great service and a lot of people are using it. I do tweet regularly, but on the other hand I don’t recall the last time I sent someone a message through my phone. The social device replaces the SMS interface with Twitter. Your text messages become direct messages while you still keep the option to update your public timeline.
Photos: Most handsets nowadays come with at least a 3 mega-pixels camera. Your social device will upload every photo to Flickr and auto-tag it with your current location. Friends and family can subscribe to your stream and will receive updates immediately. Photos can also be shared through Twitpic and replace today’s MMS interface.
Video: Recordings you make with the social device are uploaded to YouTube and where appropriate protected so only a handful of your Contacts can watch them.
Mail and Calendar: Let’s face it - in today’s fast paced World you need to keep track of your schedule. Your social device will integrate seamlessly with Google. You can add personal events, send invitations and subscribe to public and friends’ calendars. Mail will be synchronised instantly so you can keep an eye on that very important Customer wherever you are.
Documents: Text, spreadsheets and presentations live on Google Docs. Any changes you make on-line are reflected on the social device.
Files: everything you collect or download on your social device is uploaded to the Cloud. Music, movies, programs they all live on-line while a local copy is kept where appropriate to improve performance. A BitTorrent client is provided for larger downloads.
Multimedia: Streaming TV with a thousand of free channels is available through Livestation and radio through Last.fm.
News: Newspapers are a thing of the past. The social device aggregates content from the hundreds of free sources available on-line. Breaking news, sports and the weather forecast can be accessed at any time. RSS is integrated with Google Reader and updated regularly.
Extensions: What made Firefox a great browser are the free extensions available for download. You can customise almost every aspect of the interface and add new features. Extensions will also make a great add-on for your social device.
Open: Built on top of open and dynamic technologies is a must-do.
These are just a handful of the services the social device might support. Seamless integration is provided throughout the interface. Think about using Mail to forward a presentation to your colleagues and watch their reactions.
The best part? Your contacts, messages, photos, video, mail, calendar, documents and files all live on-line. Even if you have to replace the device itself, you will not lose any data.
The social mobile device is just a concept, but it sure makes you think about how old and disconnect the technology we use today is. It’s all about staying connected and sharing.
There is no delight in owning anything unshared.