Development Seed Blog

At any given time at SXSW, starting at 10 am and ending some time close to 2 am, there are 8 or more events happening simultaneously. It gets exhausting after 5 days, but there have been some great highlights.

Mobile conversations of all kinds have been interesting, ranging from designing applications and sites for the mobile web and mobile devices to using a single mobile phone to provide internet and telephony access to an entire village in Sub-Saharan Africa. Taken together, the “point” appears to be that the distance between mobile devices and our desktop computing is blurring, and will continue to do so. Integrated communications technologies and strategies will be the way of the future.

Some of the really neat ideas that I’ve heard discussed:

• The advent of GPS technology as a standard feature in mobile devices is near. Sprint sounds like they’re already there, and everyone else is catching up. Most clients we talk with have wanted to display data on a map for some purpose. We’ve been exploring options for displaying content to users based on their physical location as well. GPS in mobile devices will give the “contextual web” more opportunities to grow. Imagine walking down the street and—in real time—getting alerts about crime in the neighborhood, pollution in the city, or directions for where to go for a spur-of-the-moment flash mob protest. Mobile applications will soon be able to deliver helpful information that is relevant to your physical context.
• The time is quickly approaching when more people will access the web with mobile devices than via desktop (or laptop) computer. What’s that going to do to how you think of targeting your website?
• SMS has some new potential on the horizon too, especially as SMS searches become more popular—that kind of two-way interaction with SMS will lead more than just search. Also, have you heard of a voice SMS message yet? You will soon. SayNow.com is looking for willing non-profit orgs and political candidates who will take its tools seriously enough to build a campaign around them. I think it’s pretty cool.

Outside of mobile, there was a great—albeit under-attended session—today about the next billion internet users and what their technology, infrastructure, and use needs might look like, along with what some social entrepreneurs are doing about it. Rob Katz at World Resources Institute and NextBillion.net were noted for their creativity and contribution to this space. Nice work, Rob. :)

There was also an interesting panel about “people powered products.” What happens when you let users take over your website and dictate what it becomes? If you don’t end up on Nightline, you might still end up with some creative outcomes. Users on JamGlue.com thought that tagging their content had something to do with graffiti—and started tagging their content with their friends names and with other stuff that they liked. Not exactly what the creators intended, but it is what the community made of it. It’s a great lesson for groups that are considering welcoming user-generated content on their sites. If that’s scary though, know that it will also (likely) lead to more user interaction and give you some good odds for earned media.

I know in my last post, I mentioned that I’d be going to some more sessions on mapping and spam. As for mapping, I’ll say that the guys on the panel I went to were way smarter than I am. One of them used the phrase “geo-cognitively” in a sentence and meant it. There is some incredible work happening in this space, and I’ll let the work do the talking:

• http://www.biomapping.net/
• http://www.mapstraction.com/
• http://cabspotting.org/
• http://stamen.com/maps (P.S.: SayNow just hired Stamen to do their mapping)

As for spam, you just don’t want it. More on that soon.