December 23, 2003
What to look out for in 2004
Rounding up Textually's Year in Review, this last and 10th entry focuses on six technologies or trends that emerged this year, and that should take hold in 2004.
What to look out for in 2004
Printers for picture phones are starting to appear and should proliferate in 2004, coming in many shapes and forms, developped by companies such as HewlettePackard, Eastmann Kodak, Matsushita Electric Industrial, Bandai and Fuji. Portable printers such PrintBrush from Print Dreams, weighing only 350 grams will fit in a shirt pocket, or small devices such as Fuji's Camera Phone Mobile Printer connecting via Infra-Red or Bandai's small printer, will allow users to print out photos within a few seconds. And due-it-yourself printing kiosks will continue to appear in public places and retail chains in Korea, Japan, Australia and America.
And here too we will see business applications developped for these camera phone printers, such as the Hyundai Marine and Fire Insurance company which deployed a service for its insurance agents, enabling them to print insurance contract applications on the spot.
Mobile Pricing issues in Europe
I think we will see more of a consumer backlash at European mobile operators for their unfairly high level tarifs. With operators having held SMS rates up to maximize revenues and with so many people using it, political pressure on regulators to intervene should be coming soon.
Handset manufacturers are rushing to produce cell phones with push-to-talk technology and the phones will continue to roll out next year. PTT technology enables a mobile phone to function as a walkie-talkie, opening up a new dimension in communication. The use can just press down a key and say something, and within seconds the other user or users in the session hears the message.
Mentioned previously in a post on How people are using camera phones, professional use of photoblogs is sure to go mainstram, documenting events and conferences. We can expect on a wider scale, that the online press routinely set up photoblogs to document the news contributed either by professional journalists or citizens turned into camera phone reporters.
Businesses too will be looking for tools to set up their own photoblogs in-house to be used in ways we have yet to even imagine (for instance a retailer's displays in different department stores could be photographed by the reps and forwarded onto a webpage for viewing by the sales manager - ensuring a record in chronological order).
Ring back tones, the extremely popular service launched in to South Korea in April 2002 will be rolling out in North America and Europe in 2004.
A ring back tone allows the mobile user to personalize the ringing sound that your caller hears when dialling your cell phone number. Sure to appeal to the youth market, ring tones should interest business as well, for corporate branding, promotional and sale activities. Politicians could be taking a closer look too, for playing out a campaign slogan, or for fund raisers, to make an appeal before someone even picks up the phone and pays for the call.
SMS and MMS Marketing Campaigns
This year I reported on both a retailer and a non profit organization which came up with clever campaigns involving SMS and camera phone pictures and what was most remarkable about these campaigns, was that they paid for themselves, as the customer downloading the pictures from a website, or opting in for an SMS, was actually the one footing the bill. So I would expect to see more of such clever ideas in 2004. As a reminder, here are the two campaigns I'm referring too.
The Toni&Guy chain of upmarket hair salons offered their customers the option to download pictures of hairstyles from a large gallery of photos online, onto their mobile phone. In order to discuss their potential new look with family and friends before visiting a hairsalon. At a charge of 50p per message (at the customer's expense), 10p was be donated to the King's Variety Club Children's Hospital (a nice touch).
In the Netherlands, Amnesty International used SMS as an action tool - Participants in their campaigns, opt-in by signing up online and giving their mobile number. They then receive an "action" SMS every two weeks, which is then invoiced directly to their phone bill at a premium rate of $ 0,28 (25 eurocents). The campaign not only pays for itself but is also a clever and personalized way of keeping its members informed of their efforts and allows them to be active participants in a cause they believe in.
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