Category: Unlocking Users

HSPA Hand Homeless Helping Hand

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62. Hand Hungry Homeless Helping Hand - 1610 edited

Life for homeless persons in the city is not getting easier and funding of their basic needs has gone beyond the capabilities of tax-driven efforts. A perspective that has perhaps not been explored as much is what role smartphones and mobile applications can play in assisting homeless people in urban areas?

Homeless people lack a mail address and their ability to be reached is connected to their mobile phone. Their mobile phone is used as their primary connection point and serves as a valuable tool for staying in touch with providers of temporary shelter, meals and activity centers. With the evolution of marketing and payment applications, their mobile phone could now become even more valuable.

Targeted coupons can be offered in exchange for free meals or free food purchases. The funding can come from participating stores or direct from ‘cityzens’ who want to support the homeless in their city. A digital contribution chain could reduce administration costs and increase the value of contributions reaching the people who need it most.

Proactive monitoring is a high-priority healthcare innovation for the growing elderly population. This technology can be adapted to support remote monitoring of health status for homeless as a step towards enhancing basic care. This is another area where tax-subsidized efforts are unlikely to be sufficient and where crowd-funding through targeted social responsibility campaigns can be created.

Staying social and active is vital for the homeless population. Having universal access to the billboard at the activity center might trigger the extra visit to the workshop, drama, painting, music or meeting opportunity being offered.

Here are my predictions for the importance of smartphones for homeless people in the cities:

– Access to a personal smartphone, and support for keeping it charged, is a vital enabler of a better life for homeless persons in the city.
– Targeted applications supporting the homeless and the poor have become a growing focus for private and company-sponsored social responsibility efforts in cities.
– The platform created by smartphones and mobile applications will mean small but important improvements for vulnerable social groups in cities.

Power-up Performance @ Public Places

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59. Power-up Performance at Public Places - 1610 edited

Modern “cityzens” expect mobile coverage and capacity wherever they go. Providing infrastructure for good mobile-data coverage and capacity is as important as public transportation, electricity, water and sewage. The question I want to address in this post is: how do operators leverage the capabilities of small cells to power-up performance in public spaces?

“Cityzens” spend more time travelling to and from work than their rural peers. It’s of great interest to them to turn this time into valuable professional or private time. This is an opportunity to catch up on their mailboxes and is prime time for social media interactions. This is driving demand for an increase in network capacity in the places where we spend time outside of home and work, for example at bus, train and subway stops and along major road and rail routes.
“Cityzens” who spend a significant amount of time in high-rise offices, multi-dwelling homes or hotel buildings are ofter above the normal mobile/cellular coverage levels. These users still expect that their mobile voice, data and video services will work just as well in these locations as on the ground level. To secure coverage in these places, special indoor solutions are needed to bring a vertical coverage dimension into play.

In addition to using time efficiently, “cityzens” are also keen to have coverage and capacity in their favorite relaxation spots. They want to watch a video clip or parts of a drama series or read an e-book in their favorite outdoor plaza; enjoy a relaxing moment under a tree or by a bench in the park together with their device or simply take a stroll through popular part of town. The scenarios are numerous and well known to all of us.

Finally, security and safety of “cityzens” – a priority for city governments – is dependent on high coverage and capacity city wide. Dedicated networks will inevitably fall short on the coverage and capacity expectations or will shoot budgets to exceptionally high levels prompting city administrators to leverage highly-dense mobile data networks.

My predictions of the future of network performance in public city spaces are:

– Mobile “app coverage” and capacity to meet citizen demand is the most import infrastructure development for cities in the near-term.
– “Cityzens” will leverage a mix of 3G/4G/Wi-Fi access to get their needs satisfied, provided there is a common business model across all three technologies.
– Coverage and capacity in public places will distinguish powered-up cities from those that are struggling to meet expectations.
– Access modernization will be done through a combination of macro-grid densification, small-cell introduction and Distributed Antenna System deployments in a variety of deployment scenarios.

Location & LTE Lubricate Lively Lifestyle

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© Peter Linder 2014 – All rights reserved
© Peter Linder 2014 – All rights reserved

Widespread availability of location capabilities has enabled a range of new applications showing where we are. We also have applications allowing us to show which of our friends are in the neighborhood right now, without connecting in advance. The ability to share where we are and letting technology keep track of suggestions on who to connect with in real life here and now is transforming social patterns in the city.

We plan less in advance on what to do and when to do it. We let opportunities and the moment guide what we decide to do. These shorter decision cycles also raise expectations on instant appreciation for what we decide to do. If it is not good, we always have the option to shift to a new place or activity nearby. These social patterns represent a significant new factor for many businesses labeled as social meeting places, such as restaurants, cafes, bars, museums, stores and arenas.

A new lifestyle is emerging around applications that allow us to meet new people based on proximity of interests and locations. Who around me shares my interests and would be an interesting person to meet? Is anyone interested in sharing travel memories over a cup of coffee? Is there anyone else in this hotel who prefers company rather than eating alone tonight? This may not be adopted quickly by the middle-aged population, but it could become a new factor in the social life in the city for the younger generations.

Here are my predictions for the location/phone-enabled social life in the city:

– The planning horizon for social meetings will continue to shrink.
– Spontaneous meetings based on location, interest and mood will continue to grow in importance.
– Connecting first with a URL to meet soon ‘IRL’ will become an increasingly relevant scenario for how to make new social connections.
– Cityzens will be faced by more challenging privacy decisions on how much of their life to expose.

Daily Device Dependency Drive Digital Detox Demand

Peter LinderLeave a comment
©Peter Linder 2013 – All rights reserved
© Peter Linder 2013 – All rights reserved

Are you among the users dependent on four or five networked devices on a daily basis? These devices provide endless opportunities and can also create addictive behaviors. Nevertheless, some of us might benefit from a bit of “digital detox” during our vacation as we recharge for the fall.

A survival question for application developers is to offer their applications on a variety of platforms, such as smartphones, tablets, laptops, PCs and TVs. It is also about the seamless transition between them and to allow for dual-screen use cases. This creates an application availability opportunity for users to take advantage of or to use excessively.

Many users have adopted a multiscreen and multi-social media lifestyle without putting boundaries for when their URL life should stand back for their IRL experiences. Both business communications and excessive social media use could become a stress factor to wind down from during the vacation.

The digital detox industry is growing quickly and offers everything from initial seminars to advanced programs. All with the purpose of finding your own well-being during a period without or with reduced device access. It is not about dropping the devices but finding the right balance between your networked and your physical/mental life. Both are an essential part of life in the Networked Society in the same way as a great meal requires both food and drinks in order to be well-balanced.

My suggestions for vacations this summer:

– Reflect on your personal usage patterns and decide which screen and app combination makes you relax and enjoy life, without causing stress.
– If you are a heavy user of both business communication and social media, consider dropping one of them during your vacation this year.
– Elaborate with shifting content consumption patterns to a new media/device combination allowing you to free up time. For example, stop reading full books and shift to audio summaries of the same book.
– Determine which stimuli reactions, for example, responding, pinning, liking, re-tweeting you see as adding value to your important life accomplishments.

Digital Device Dependency Drive Digital Detox Demand

Peter LinderLeave a comment

digital-detox-img_4948

Are you among the users dependent on four or five networked devices on a daily basis? These devices provide endless opportunities and can also create addictive behaviors. Nevertheless, some of us might benefit from a bit of “digital detox” during our vacation as we recharge for the fall.

A survival question for application developers is to offer their applications on a variety of platforms, such as smartphones, tablets, laptops, PCs and TVs. It is also about the seamless transition between them and to allow for dual-screen use cases. This creates an application availability opportunity for users to take advantage of or to use excessively.

Many users have adopted a multiscreen and multi-social media lifestyle without putting boundaries for when their URL life should stand back for their IRL life experiences. Both business communications and excessive social media use could become a stress factor to wind down from during the vacation.

The digital detox industry is growing quickly and offers everything from initial seminars to advanced programs. All with the purpose of finding your own wellbeing during a period without or with reduced device access. It is not about dropping the devices but finding the right balance between your networked and your physical/mental life. Both are an essential part of life in the Networked Society in the same way as a great meal requires both food and drinks in order to be well-balanced.

My suggestions for vacations this summer:

* Reflect on your personal usage patterns and decide which screen and app combination makes you relax and enjoy life, without causing stress.

* If you are a heavy user of both business communication and social media, consider dropping one of them during your vacation this year.

* Elaborate with shifting content consumption patterns to a new media/device combination allowing you to free up time. For example, stop reading full books and shift to audio summaries of the same book.

* Determine which stimuli reactions, for example, responding, pinning, liking, re-tweeting you see as adding value to your important life accomplishments.

Little Ladies Love Laptops & LTE

Peter LinderLeave a comment

38. Little ladies love laptops and LTE

This is the first generation of children who are growing up with tablets. Some young children have used these devices and the apps on them for close to three years, but up until now most of that use has been restricted to broadband in Wi-Fi enabled homes. So what will Generation Z and the Pluralist generation dream of for the future?

Last year, an 8 year old sent a wish-list sent to Santa Claus that consisted of just 6 letters: ‘Laptop’. After a deeper investigation it became clear this 8-year old considered tablets to be for kids who did not know the alphabet yet nor difference between left and right mouse clicks. But for someone like this 8-year old, who had both these skills, the obvious choice was to trade-up and become a laptop-enabled citizen.

Just upping the game on the device itself may not be enough. Most kids have figured out by now that the tablet is broken in many ways. It doesn’t work outside their home, not in the car, nor on planes. They see their parents being on the phone everywhere and they wonder why the bigger tablet don’t work in the same locations. Integrated 3G and 4G connectivity is demanded first, in some cases, by the youngest members of the family.

These trends tie into young children’s transition from pure content consumers, in the form of apps and games, to content creators. As they start the journey of creating content on their own, they will experience the same connectivity limitations with tablets that adults experience. And since they have grown up with tablets they might instead skip laptops altogether and go straight to an ultra-book as long as they can get the mouse and keyboard they are looking for.

My predictions of the future for the youngest Networked Society members are:

• Tablets will remain their first computer with a starting age of around year 2 or 3.
• Their demand for an environment enabling content creation will arise when they learn how to read and write.
• Handwriting skills will be impacted, as children adopt laptops and ultra-books very early on in their lives.
• Full-fledged connectivity is relevant to very young people who don’t have preconceived notions about how to connect to the network. They prefer to stay connected all the time.