Recently by Simeon Spearman

The iPhone 3G has officially been released into the wild, and it's time for the most avid Apple fan here at S)T to pick apart what makes it so darned interesting and why it makes people wait in line for hours just to get one (guilty as charged).

Last year's iPhone hype was all about the hardware. The iPhone combined everything great about the iPod with a quality mobile phone complete with the best touchscreen the world has ever known.

This time around, hardware is less important (though the 3G and GPS have raised the bar). A lot of the hype is focused on software, namely the App Store, a new service that makes it simple for iPhone owners to find software that takes advantage of the hi-speed Internet access of 3G and the location-based information from the GPS. For example, Loopt has an application that combines online social networking with GPS info, so it's easier to find where one's friends are hanging out or where the cool events are happening.

With the launch of the App Store, Apple has taken a very difficult process--finding quality software for mobile phones--and made it much simpler. The App Store has already sold $55,000 worth of software within its first day.

The App Store's success seems to be driven by the innovative software developers who are contributing to the project. Apple recognized they needed to make it possible for developers to create their own applications for the iPhone, and instead of leaving that innovation to hackers, they've managed to create a successful platform that will likely continue to fuel consumer interest in mobile Internet services and, even more importantly, the mobile phone as a computing platform.

Apple has really hit another home run by giving up control over iPhone software development. And I, as a new iPhone owner, am quite thankful.

Image: velorowdy (Flickr.com)

The final day of the O'Reilly Emerging Technology Conference included two presentations that really stood out to me.

Joel Selanikio discussed the potential for Africa to be a major source of mobile phone software innovation, in sectors ranging from health to financial services. He argued that many of these innovations could make their way back to the United States and other developed countries: because mobile banking initiatives are a low priority in the US, but are a necessity in Africa, these systems can be beta tested and refined in African markets before becoming major product offerings in World 1.

Though interesting, his talk focused too much on applications that could "reverse leapfrog" back into World 1. Instead, I would have liked him to explore the implications of Africa's developing a core competency in software development aimed at bottom-of-the-pyramid consumers worldwide. African programmers could profit greatly by developing products for Worlds 2 and 3 instead of focusing on retrofitting these solutions for PC-dominated World 1 nations.

W. James Au, author of the blog "New World Notes," gave a presentation entitled "Why Won't Second Life Just Go Away Already? Understanding Web 2.0's Most Misunderstood Phenomenon." He reviewed Second Life's growth amidst its on-again/off-again relationship with the media, which tends to oscillate between finding the virtual world exciting and declaring it useless. My favorite takeaway from the session was Au's assertion that Second Life's steep learning curve for users is actually a boon, in that it guarantees a high level of user knowledge and sophistication.

Image: We Make Money Not Art (Flickr)

Wednesday's sessions at the O'Reilly Emerging Technology conference were just as exciting as Tuesday's. The sessions today focused more on technology in emerging markets, digital rights, and biology. The day began again with a cool game from Megaphone and then continued in an excellent series of sessions:

•  Quinn Norton channeled Walt Whitman to explore the implications of "body hacking" in a talk entitled "I Sing the Body Electric." She discussed topics ranging from recreational use of the drug Provigil to the cultural impact and history of the world's most popular smart drug: caffeine. Norton also critiqued the ethical issues surrounding steroids in the context of Tommy John surgery.
• In the afternoon, a group called Regional provided photos and examples of how digital technologies are producing change (and also being used to restrict freedoms) in Cuba. They painted a remarkable picture of how World 1 typically takes its version of the Internet for granted by showing the restrictive, "intranet" nature of Cuban cyberculture. The New York Times is running an article covering many of the same subjects discussed in Regional's session on Wednesday, for those wanting more information.
• Larry Lessig gave the evening keynote on Wednesday night. Lessig is a lawyer who was instrumental in the creation of the Creative Commons license and is now shifting his focus away from copyright to reform in the American political arena through his Change Congress project. He discussed the impact that technologists can have on effecting social change in the political landscape on many fronts, which could pave the way for a confrontation that some at the conference called "the [Silicon] Valley vs. the Beltway." It will be interesting to track whether his call to arms creates more political accountability technologies like the Sunlight Foundation, Maplight.org, and OpenCongress.
  

There were several other interesting talks on Wednesday:

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I'm in San Diego this week at the O'Reilly Emerging Technology Conference. I'll be providing daily updates for ChangeWaves covering the various sessions I'm attending. Here's a recap of some of the stand out sessions and ideas from today:

• Megaphone, a startup specializing in interactive digital signage, started off the morning with an interactive game that people played while waiting for the first series of talks to begin. About 20 people called in to a phone number, then moved a character around on the interactive sign using the 2, 4, 6, and 8 buttons as up, down, left and right arrows. Players could then shoot other players by pressing 5 while moving in the direction of their opponent.
• Saul Griffith was the first presenter of the morning, and his talk was entitled "Energy Literacy." He covered the statistical background of climate change and explored various steps governments and individuals need to take to address the issue. He offered a meticulous analysis of his personal energy consumption relative to global energy consumption through the lens of the "best case scenario" presented by the IPCC and Stern reports.
• Eric Rodenbeck of Stamen Design gave an intriguing presentation on data visualization as a medium. He showed various data visualization projects like the Oakland Crimespotting maps and MySociety travel time maps. Rodenbeck focused on showing how we can use data visualization to interact with information--in ways previously too difficult for widespread adoption--for both analysis and entertainment.

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There I was driving through the Atlanta suburbs on February 10 when I started seeing teenagers with handmade signs and masks. In a few seconds I came over a hill and saw around 75 people with signs and face masks standing across the street from a line of police in riot gear outside of the local Church of Scientology. Later, I discovered that I had found the local version of a worldwide anti-Scientology protest held that day, organized by a group simply calling themselves "Anonymous."

Anonymous is a group of Internet users from across the globe who are organizing a series of protests against Scientology using basic Web technologies. What began as a simple series of hacks against Scientology's websites has turned into an international movement occurring in both cyberspace and in the real world. The amazing part of this story is how easily the group has managed to organize worldwide protests without a central leader or group telling everyone what to do.

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"Location, location, location," is increasingly becoming the mantra around new media services, and 2008 seems poised to be a year of growth for hyperlocal content delivery and other location-based services.

Google recently unveiled a new feature on its Google News page--Google News Local, allowing readers to get news occurring only in their local area. Google is moving into this space at a time when GPS is making people more aware of their surroundings and driving innovations in localized content in the form of location-based services like mobile ads for local businesses. Google's local news service joins dominant localized news site Topix.net and newcomer EveryBlock in this content area, and many Internet users will benefit from having better access to news in their area.

Google isn't the only major company taking advantage of hyperlocalized content.

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Ladies, how would you feel if your admirer sent coupons to your mobile phone as a sign of his affection for you?

Apparently, South Koreans don't mind at all. SK Telecom's "Gifti-con" service lets users send coupons to each other's phones in the form of messages with bar codes that can be scanned at the point of sale. The service has seen year-over-year growth of 700% since its launch in 2006, with 300,000 users sending over $1 million worth of coupons to each other per month. Such an exchange can be quite romantic (or creepy, depending on how you look at it), according to this article:

Kim Mi-ran, a 20-year-old co-ed, smiles at a text message that she has just received on her mobile phone. It says, "Enjoy an Ice Caramel Macchiato coffee at Starbucks." It was from a male student whom she had met socially, but seldom talks to her.

"I like this way of letting her know my interest in her," grins the male student who sent the gift coupon by phone.

"I would be a little too nervous to call her and say 'hi," he adds.

The SK Telecom representative quoted in the article claims that the service was created to nurture human relationships, and I think it's great that services like this let people go beyond merely communicating to actually doing something nice for one another. Shy males are more willing to show their feelings through these gifts since they are discreet and practically effortless. The representative even provides the example of people buying more intimate gifts, such as underwear, for their lovers since the service shields them from embarrassment.

Cynics may say that this is another example of technology eroding face-to-face interaction. Personally, I'm hoping that things work out for Kim Mi-ran and her gift-coupon texting admirer.

[via textually.org] 

Image: yisris (Flickr) 

In the latest example of virtual identity and activity blending with real life, virtual worlds blog New World Notes reports that Vodafone has recently released a service in Second Life called "InsideOut" that lets users inside Second Life send and receive messages on virtual mobiles to real mobile phones outside Second Life, and vice versa. Second Life users can take their avatars to Vodafone's site inside of Second Life and get a handy virtual mobile phone that makes all this possible.

The most interesting part of the service, to me at least, is that real world mobile phones can also text message the phones in Second Life without revealing the number of the real-world phone. The text messages only display the name of the avatar who sent the message, so users are able to communicate from their real mobiles using their avatar identity--another example of the distinctions between virtual and real identities slowly but surely fading away. By making the avatar mobile, companies like Vodafone are showing that virtual identities and social interactions do not need to be tethered to a computer, making it possible for one's avatar to play an expanded role in day-to-day communications.

More details on the service can be found at Vodafone's Second Life webpage.

Image: Social Technologies 

Image: EverJean (Flickr)This month's Wired magazine features a cover story on the influence of manga (Japanese comics) in the US. Japanese cultural exports like anime (Japanese animation), and manga have been gaining global appeal for many years now, but I was particularly struck by a short article documenting new uses of manga in Western cultures. Businesses outside of Japan are creating original manga for advertising, international development, and SAT prep. Celebrities, including Avril Lavigne, are even being featured as characters in manga, while publishing houses are increasingly supporting non-Japanese manga.

The culture surrounding manga in Japan is not limited to youth in the same way it is in the West--in Japan, even bureaucrats are obsessed. Kids, teens, and businessmen can all be spotted reading comics on Tokyo's metro system, and the topics can range from giant robots and magical school girls to serious discourse on Japanese politics and history. Now it seems the West may follow in Japan's footsteps. The author of the Wired article, Daniel Pink, recently told the New York Times that he is going to be publishing his own manga oriented towards a business audience.

Perhaps manga will grow up in the West alongside its audience, and we'll all be able to read about the latest political scandal as drawn by our favorite manga-ka (manga artist). Regardless of manga's future in the US, its emergence points to continued cultural flows from Japan to the West.