schneiderism

Given my previous post regarding Steve Jobs being a rockstar, and anticipating the Apple product launch of last Tuesday, I found myself feeling a little bit underwhelmed after viewing Jobs’ keynote. Yes, he unveiled some very cool technology and functionality housed in typically cool Apple hardware. Yes, millions of people watching found themselves in the consumerism want cycle. Again.

I was underwhelmed for two reasons. The first is that the presentation given by Steve Jobs seemed rough. There were a couple technical glitches and he seemed unsure at times if things were going to work. It just wasn’t as tight as other keynotes I have seen by Steve, and clearly not in the rockstar league I put him in with my post. Sorry about that. The second reason is that what was unveiled had been nearly 100% anticipated by technology bloggers for nearly a year. Very little shown was unexpected. Even the form factor of the devices had been correctly speculated. For me, at least, it created a sense of having already seen it before… even though none of the products presented had been officially acknowledged by Apple until the moment Steve pulled them out of his pocket. There didn’t seen to be any surprises, any “WOW!” Maybe I am jaded, and I probably am, but I wanted more… and so did countless others.

So, I thought about this for a couple of days and in doing so realized I had missed something of huge importance. There WAS a surprise presented by Steve Jobs on Tuesday, and it had enormous WOW factor. It is, in fact, revolutionary for the world of mobile communications. I think most of us missed it as it was incredibly subtle. On Tuesday, Apple announced a partnership with Starbucks whereby customers will be able to buy Starbucks brand music from their iPod or iPhone while enjoying their coffee. At the time I was thinking… “so what?” But I had missed it. This is actually a really big deal, and not because you can now purchase that John Coltrane song playing overhead while sitting in your local neighborhood Starbucks. Here’s the deal:

• - You are sitting in a Starbucks
• - Your iPod/iPhone automatically knows this
• - A Starbucks icon automatically appears on your device interface
• - Your device syncs to your exact location, in that exact store
• - You hear the John Coltrane song, you hit the Starbucks button now on your device
• - The song is already ready to be purchased on your device, with one button click
• - The entire exercise is seamless and completely location specific and in real time

It’s the last line that is important. Location specific communications. This development could explode the entire mobile communications industry. That Apple cast this accomplishment as more about the convenience of purchasing music at Starbucks, and seemed to play up oddly so this partnership with Starbucks, distracted us from the bigger idea here. It is inspiring that your device becomes integrated with your experience, at that very moment.

All of this means that information is no longer limited to what is on the device, or to accessing a network and actively finding the information you seek. Now, information can be contextual and complimentary to what you are experiencing. It can anticipate your needs based on context. Here are some examples that I came up with:

• - Access to a building directory and directions to your destination
• - At the airport, real time access to arrivals and departures
• - In a hospital, wayfinding assistance, information access and patient support
• - What is on sale or special at the grocery store, or any store… and a recipe catalog
• - Information and background on the wines on the shelf of a wineshop
• - Card catalog access and directions to a specific book in a library
• - In your car, immediate access to traffic information specific to your route

That was about one minute’s worth of ideas, but you get the picture. Our mobile devices can begin to contextually understand our tasks, and our needs, and efficiently surface supporting information… unprompted. This is integration at a whole new level, and the partnership with Starbucks, believe me, is only the beginning of a revolution of location specific functionality that iPhones and iPods gain to take advantage of with the WiFi networks they join. An implied revolution, at least at this point.