Monday, December 19, 2011

Deloitte's Tech Trends for 2012

Deloitte Consulting LLP recently released a list of what it feels will be the ten emerging technology trends with the greatest potential for impacting business innovation and how people access and use information.  There seem to be five driving forces behind these: Mobility, Social Networking, Cloud Services, Analytics and "Cyber".  They feel each of these offers the opportunity for further innovation and the potential to create new value for users and businesses.  Here's the list of the top 10 trends, along with some comments on the applicability within media and journalism.

  1. Geo-Spatial Visualization takes advantage of the explosion of geographical, location-aware data.  Combining the GPS tagging of mobile with the ability of Social Networking to tag and connect, the Cloud to store and access, and new visualization techniques that allow info to be overlaid live camera feeds, this trend encompasses a wide range of new uses, from sharing recommendations to locating friends, to advertising targeted to user and location, to sending news (traffic, weather) updates or warnings to those in affected areas.
  2. Digital Identities follows an effort to create unique identifiers that can follow users across the multiple devices we use.  Digital identities would benefit e-commerce and online advertising, and provide a single access point for restricted content subscriptions and services.
  3. Data Goes to Work reflects the increasing ability to analyze and use the huge amounts of data generated online.  This is a trend that journalism can really benefit from, from data-based reporting, to better understanding of what online readers want, to what formatting and layout options work best.  Unlike past media measurement options, analytics can be used in real-time, and can use all responses rather than a sample.  As media continue to become more competitive, both advertisers and media firms need to pay more and better attention to audiences, and one way is to track how they actually use media.
  4. Measured Innovation reflects the idea that analytics can also help focus and target your efforts to innovate, showing where the best potential for creating value lies.
  5. Outside-In Architecture reflects the idea that our need to know is colliding with our need to share. Deloitte sees this in a transition from siloed, enterprise-out design to operating in rapidly evolving ecosystems.  Traditional media epitomize the siloed, enterprise-out design of the media firm delivering what they choose to a medium-specific market.  As this trend continues, media need to abandon that model and the idea that they control content and its use - they need to welcome and utilize what others create and want to share, and to be willing to share themselves.
  6. Social Business.  Deloitte sees 2012 as the year that social moves from media to the business.  That's more than using social marketing - it's embracing social as a way of getting things done, leading to a fundamental reshaping of business operations.  Some news organizations are taking baby steps in this direction, soliciting contributions from readers and viewers (a very small step in that direction).
  7. Hyper-Hybrid Cloud.  As Cloud applications continue to evolve, they enable a degree of integration across devices, enhance the value of mobile, and offer access to data, content, and programs to an unprecedented degree.  They also have the potential to help reshape how people view content and usage - in particular, in shifting focus from the value laying in the ownership of content, to the value coming from the ability to access content.  It also ties in well with the increased emphasis on sharing.  As this shift occurs, it will have significant implications for how content is marketed and for how intellectual property rights are framed.
  8. Enterprise Mobility Unleashed - Mobility is helping many firms rethink their operations.  From a general business perspective, this means organizations "should make sure solutions are enterprise class - secure, reliable, maintainable and integrated."  For media, mobility reflects the continuing disaggregation of the mass audience - and the idea that there may be more value in allowing audiences more choice and control in their media use, than in maintaining control over a consistent media use experience.
  9. Gamification - Not only are games a growing market, but aspects of gaming (simulations, game mechanics like tracking achievement, and skill-based learning) are increasingly recognized as having value in business processes.  Advertising and PR has learned the value of gaming as a means of attracting users, and as a medium for messages.  Media can also find better ways to use aspects of social networking and gaming to find new ways to engage users.
  10. User empowerment - the primary source for added value these days is in consumerization, and in the customization of consumption.  In media and journalism, technology is giving users greater choice and control over what, where, how, and when media content is consumed.  Technology continues to enable new forms of competition and new sources of news, entertainment, and information.  Not only is there added value in providing consumers greater choice and control, but if media organizations can find ways to actively encourage interaction and engagement, they can build up brand image and reliance among users.  And in this new media environment, it's not just the numbers of the audience, but the level of their engagement and commitment that has value for the media organization.  Empowered users are more valuable users.
So, technology is likely to continue shaping the world generally, and I look for more significant shifts coming to media and journalism in the short term.  Many will be disruptive, but will also offer significant opportunities to those media and news organizations that try to embrace and exploit them.  At the very least, media need to be open to new ways of doing business in order to exploit the potential opportunities for value and revenues.


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