Did I mention I bought an iPod? 4,000 songs ripped from my CD collection, now all I need is one of those USB turntables to rip my record collection. Aside from changing the way we listen to music and being a cool accessory, its revolutionising the music industry and the way we access audio and video content, from college lecture distribution, to TV series, to movies. As their proliferation continues – over a million have sold worldwide – we should expect further and significant changes. Thanks to the iPod, TV and Movie industries, they are a-changin’.
Its now June and that’s when Steve Jobs said the iPhone would be released – there are already reports of iPhone browser signatures turning up on web metric reports. We’re very excited, or is that just me?
According to Job’s its “software wrapped up in extremely cool hardware”.
Software.
iPhones are already pre-selling on eBay. What if the iPhone does the same for the delivery of Web content that the iPod did and is still doing for the delivery of Audio and Video content? Remember, software is upgradeable and programmable. So if a change is gonna come, how quickly?
In his genius, Senate Commerce Committee Chairman Ted Stevens described the Internet as a “bunch of tubes”. Visionary or Imbecile? What if the Internet became a bunch of iPhones or rather iPhones became the internet? What if you could run a web server on your iPhone and the Internet became this peer to peer network in everyone’s pocket?
I have a presentation about data structures, architecture and strategy, and at one point I cunningly ask the audience to raise their hand if they think the Internet is going to be around in 5, 10, 15 or 20 years. As you might expect, hands go up for 5 years and then gradually come down as people get bored with my line of questioning – or do they know something I don’t? The punchline is, as you might have guessed, that I have no idea, but you should plan for that uncertainty and organize and manage your data independantly of its delivery platform.
We talk about the ‘Internet Explosion’, but things normally disappear faster than they appear. 5 years may be optimistic with a catalyst like the iPhone.
