MLOVE Video Release: A Lifestyle of Mobility
The Future of Mobile is full of Opportunities and Disruption
MLOVE ConFestival Europe in the summer of 2012 was the backdrop to a series of interviews that are featured in a “shortumentary” – a short video documentary about the Future of Mobile.
‘A Lifestyle of Mobility’ is bringing together voices from the mobile industry that are sharing an optimistic vision for the future of Mobile.
Mobile pioneers and thought leaders are sharing their insights about the change that Mobile is bringing to the world. If you stop for a second and not indulge in a new app you just downloaded for fun, you notice something profound is happening around us. People are glued to their smartphones 24/7 and we need to put up street signs to remind people to look up from their busy connected lives.
Disruption
While disruption is running rampant in all industries touched by mobile devices, citizens demand faster and leaner services from governments as well as brands. Fjord’s Louisa Heinrich and Ben Jones of AKQA are pushing service design and design thinking in their agency practices to help brands leads their mobile strategy. “It is about here, now and about impulse” explains Ben Jones – will this finally bring out new formats for mobile advertising that go beyond the banner ads?
The automobile industry is probably next to embed smart mobile technologies and sensors to become an “experience hub” – as PCH co-founder Stefan Liske calls it. What was called telematics and connected cars before is now probably at the forefront of innovation in “empathic environments” (Liske) but also the last mile to conquer for media companies. Or are car makers the new media companies?
While we are busy pushing apps to market there is a bigger picture to consider: can we use Mobile to make the world a better place or use our collective conscience to help advance emerging markets and their life and health conditions to leapfrog into the third millennium? It is unquestioned that the biggest growth of connected people and devices is still ahead of us, and driving this ultra connected world are the people of Africa, Brazil, India and last not least China.
Mobile payment and other services are gaining traction at unprecedented speed and some are already more advanced than in the western world explains Chris Locke of the GSMA. Can Mobile be the new means to level the playing field?
Even incumbent mobile operators are in a fragile state, by leading with new services and bringing smart phones to the masses, are they in fact helping breed a new set of challengers in form of apps and new business models that thrive to squeeze them out of the equation? Bjoern Woltermann of Deutsche Telekom is wondering whether we have already the right business model for all new services out there.
The “Internet of Things” is another term coined to bring understanding to the speed of change that is happening around us. Mobile is a catalyst for change and with connected sensors and “things” will become the new computing hub or intelligence source that will become the remote control to our lives.
Jessi Baker of TBWA/ Being is on the forefront of exploring how brands can reinvent services and branded messages in the new realm of interactive out-of-home and uber-connected crowds. Experience design with simple touch and less buttons is also what is driving Stefanie Hoffman and her team at Gabi. Nicolas Roope of Poke London concedes that “everything we touch and conceive can’t be seen anymore as a desktop-only experience” and it effects on how he consults clients on the opportunities and effects of Mobile.
Mobile is changing all aspects of our lives, all industries and the society around us. This creates massive change, disruption and opportunities at the same time.
Mobile and sensors also open up the art world – often a front runner of new interface designs or pushing the envelope of how society sees and understands change and conflicts as well as beauty and a soul in objects. Mobile and new technologies are “changing how we interact with our world on an emotional level” and this opens a whole new field of designing new experiences according to Martin Inderbitzin, a co-founder of Swiss art collective Projektil.
Big opportunities ahead
“Opportunity is in every single category” added Ben Jones, AKQA – mobile still has a lot of empty spaces and still is a white canvas. “in a couple of years it will be totally different – faster and slower. The question is who will be the players then” asked Michael Breidenbruecker, CEO of RJDJ and a co-founder of Last.fm.
“It’s about time” for change also in the hardware industry – whether in cars or beyond, “because hardware has been so patient” says Stefan Liske, PCH. His partner Axel Nolte added: “we are seeing completely new business models, completely new partnerships and completely new ways of thinking and exploring physical and mental spaces. Most of the innovation we see in the next 10 years will somehow be linked to the mobile part”
A Catalyst of Empowerment and Understanding
Yuri van Geest (Dutch Ambassador of Singularity University) is certain about process through Mobile especially in the Southern hemisphere: “empowerment” and life-changing services like mobile health or vital farming news are a reality today and create hope for the future. “As a society, we should think even more about what things do rather than what things are” and possibly use Mobile as a catalyst to help make the world a better place and “stop killing each other” urges Jonathan MacDonald of this fluid world.
Mobile is certainly a catalyst for great change ahead: for society, individuals, tribes and local communities – but also for brands, agencies and incumbent industry leaders.
While we enter into a Lifestyle of Mobility, collectively we have the chance to capitalize on the huge opportunities but at the same time help empower new generations and parts of society that have been less fortunate to this point in time.
Enjoy the short film and share your point of view in the comments below.
For a full list of speakers and credits please refer here.
Passion. Inspiration. Future of Mobile.
Please check back for full reports from MLOVE ConFestival Europe 2012. Over the next days and weeks, we will release videos of the speaker presentations and on-camera interviews. You will find out what you missed and discover more about MLOVE and why it is a “tech conference unlike any other”.
Attend MLOVE ConFestival Japan 2012
If you could not join us in Berlin or Monterey, there is still time to join us at the upcoming MLOVE ConFestival Japan 2012 from November 14 to 16.
Read more about MLOVE ConFestivals:
- VentureBeat – MLOVE conference marries mobile tech, drum circles, and Maslow
- AllThingsD – Driving Home a Better Future in the Connected Car
- TechCrunch: The Future of Mobile, the universe and everything
- Contagious Magazine: “TED for Mobile”
- MLOVE – Inspiration: Find it everywhere
- MLOVE – First MLOVE USA captures West Coast spirit
- MLOVE – Celebrating a Lifestyle of Mobility
