A few weeks ago I received a mail from Jennifer Leonard asking me for a brief interview for a paper whe was writing. The interesting thins is Jennifer’s employer: the uberfamous design firm IDEO: they’re preparing a deep research on mobile future scenarios and wanted to hear the thoughts of this humble Italian guy.
So, here below all the questions and my answers; in their full form.
IDEO: When you think about the future of mobile multimedia, what comes to mind?
Matteo: I have this dream in mind. That - as Bill Gates correctly pointed out (and
this is probably the only time I’m completely agree with him) - mobile devices,
cellphones in particular, could be the main ingredient in the solution of the
digital divide. They’re cheaper, more reliable, with long lasting batteries
and with already existing wireless networks.
Thus, when I think about the future of this type of devices I see vertical multimedia application and devices capable of very few tasks at the same time, but absolutely perfect in these task accomplishment.
Even if at a very seminal stage Mobup is a perfect example of what I’m saying. Just install this less-then-40KB app on your cameraphone and you’ll transofrm it in a full featured moblogging platform. Dare I say Ubicomp?
I: What are you most excited about?
M: I’m 30, and just a few years after I was born the first personal computers
appeared. I saw their raise and the computational power becoming greater anbd
greater. Now the same thing is happening with cell phones: just 7 years ago we
had narrow-band monochromatic devices useful just for talking and sending SMS.
Now we have broadband multifunctional devices where - if you like this kind of
things - you can also receive TV programs and films, you can use them as
photocameras (I’ve choosen a Megapixel device to be used as a slim camera
always in my pocket), you can read your favourites weblogs… just as you were
in front of your computer.
If this is happened in this short time-frame, the next 7 years are going to be even more exciting!
I: Where in the world are the most interesting things happening?
M: Tough question. US have a GREAT wi-fi diffusion, but is in EU that mobile
networks are becoming mature. Thus it’s here in Europe that we’re seeing great
innovation in mobile services; but Japan (and the wider Asian area) is a
challenging competitor.
I: Any unmet needs you can think of when it comes to mobile phones?
M: Usability. Let me spell it: U-S-A-B-I-L-I-T-Y; Nokia is probably the
cellphones manufacturer who’s trying its best in following usability and ergonomy
principles when projecting its devices. But we’re light-years faraway the accomplishment of this objective; I still haven’t found the perfect device where everything is easy and quickly accessible.
I: What would be your dream mobile phone application and/or service?
M: Me and my wife had a baby last year (Francesca is in her 10th month while I’m
writing) and - since I’m often far from home I’d like a mobile who can be “awaken” when she performs or discovers something new (a new movement, a new expression, a new word learned, etc.), record it and send it to me to be viewed. That would be really lovely…
Mobup: a J2ME based photo uploader for your mobile
Java Conference
Next Wednesday, June 27 I’ve been invited to join the Java professional community at the Java Conference, main national event on Java related technologies that will be held at the Milanofiori congress hall in Milan. This is a great honour for me and a kinda strange feelings started pervading me in the last hours: I haven’t used Java - till last Semptember - since when I was at the University; but then I started the Mobup project that finally brought me to such an important stage, speaking to the cream of the crop of Java professionals in Italy.
Life is strange and always surprising.
I’ll quite oviously talk about Mobup BUT since the event is so important, I’ll provide my audience with the very last nightly build of Mobup which has
Bluetooth capabilities
Intelligent geotagging
This great step has been reached thanks to the technical effort by Thomas Landspurg, who’s the In-Fusio CTO. Tom provided the great expertise he got in Geotagging for mobile devices (he’s the mind behind J2MEMAP) to the Mobile project; we’re still in private testing but let the software become public in the very next weeks (for the moment you might want to take a look to a couple of pictures and - if you like - try to mash-upping them using apps such as GeotagIt!).
At the moment Mobup (note: not available to the public yet ) automatically geotags the photos using an external bluetooth connected GPS device but my plans are to overcome this “limit” (making it just an option) using GSM cell geodata (one of the solutions in the countries where this kind of data aren’t provided by the operator is connecting to freely available databases such as GSMcells).
I’m really excited of these last enhancements and - even though a lot of tuning is necessary before going live with the next Mobup version - this capabilities adds IMO great value to the application.
This is REALLY a tough sequence of tough tough days. But let’s say first things first,
The Interaction Frontiers has been a wonderful event packed with great speeches from bright minded speakers. I expected something like 90 people but we largerly exceeded 100s! (with a pick of 120 people in the same room during a working day!!).
We had bloggers who blogged their feedback (Italian readers might find a very nice report at Intense Minimalism) and - given this was the first time we tried such an innovative format - I’m very very VERY happy with the results. I’m really proud of being one of the conference producers (and Leandro, my partner in crime, is really proud too).
My thanks goes to all the speaker who provided such high quality content, to our sponsor Kallideas who made the event possible and - last but not least - to the University of Milano-Bicocca which confirms itself the most innovative place in Milan (even if they have creepy wi-fi policies
Just a quick note: posts are going rarefy in the next days since I’m down learning the real estate market (I’d say I’m really enjoining my first Gabetti days: a lot of cuttin edge project one after the other; and the meetings with the people deputed to make this real-estate-idiot mind become shining are simply inspiring)
Update
The national press gave us some real cool attention:
As previously pointed out today is my first day in the new role at Gabetti Property Solutions SPA, one of the biggest and most important real estate companies in Italy. My role name is “IT Planning and technologies manager” with responsibilities over the overall ongoing ICT projects.
The funny thing is that this is that it’s been a TOUGH morning plenty with new people to meet (and of whom remember the names ), new concepts to learn (I’ve planned to spend the whole summer to deeply understand real estate rules and vocabulary) and a WHOLE LOT of meetings (and counting).
I find this new opportunity really enjoiable since - after 10 years in the web business - I finally headed to the client side of the story. Beware of me web agencies, consultants, etc. etc.
Clap for me!
P.S. And I’m still on the yellow line of the underground!
