Data the key to mobile apps

There are 4 major players in the "smart and getting smarter" mobile space; Apple, Google, RIM and Microsoft - you can argue about the order, but in my mind they are the only meaningful players for the next 5 years.

I'm partial to the momentum and openness of the Android OS, but everyone will decide which phone they want a different way. Key will be the availability of killer apps on multiple platforms.

The key to emerging killer apps working across phones will be the inherent data that is associated with the application, and how interoperable it can be between phones. This is pretty easily done if you are sending Twitter messages, but can get pretty complicated when you are assuming things like geospatial awareness or other complex functions that might be implemented differently on different phones.

Standards will become important, and those standards will also help drive other apps into being - kiosks will be dropping in price, the IPAD and non-Apple competitors to the IPAD will be ramping up sales dramatically, and the number of applications using standardized data will increase dramatically.

Standardizing the data will also help reduce the number of redundant applications - RSS eliminated a host of proprietary ways of transmitting simple information between websites.

You will see some very intelligent applications that get smarter based on all the information flowing through their databases and being improved by both analytics, data points from people, and data points from sensors - the cost of which is dropping rapidly.

The data sharing imperative - an irresistable force

If you deal with data in any way (and you do), get ready for the world to start sharing data at a faster rate, in much more detail, and organized where many more people can use it for a much wider set of purposes. You can help it happen, watch it happen, or later wonder "what happened?"

Standardized data vocabularies will make this all possible. I examine this topic in detail in my book "Silver Bullets - how interoperable data will revolutionize information sharing and transparency". The "plumbing" is all coming into focus, with a wide array of data formats having been developed over that last several years, and many more in the works.

Why is this an imperative? Data collection is too expensive a task for everyone to take on, and the decreasing cost of publishing and consuming data is less than doing without. Let's take a traffic example - if a manufacturer has 2 plants on each side of Chicago, and needs to route critical parts shipments back and forth - there are a variety of things that can impact the flow of materials and production.
a: actual location - easy to pinpoint and map today
b. Traffic: Many cities are starting to make traffic cameras available, and mapping packages like Microsoft Bing have a real time capability to show major thoroughfare bottlenecks.
c. Weather: NOAA and other weather providers are identifying severe weather ahead of time, and making those alerts easily consumable.
d. Events: Where did that neighborhood parade come from?

These are just some of the simple sharing items that can occur - when you combine business partner interactions, government to private sector notifications, movement of data between government layers (federal, state, local), and all the other types of shareable data, there is much to choose from.

Standardized collection of all these data types and the distribution to a wide array of mobile devices will change the fabric of our lives in 20 years. Data will be available where needed (increasingly from automated sensors in a structured form) to make better decisions. It will impact us in every aspect of our lives - especially as video becomes smarter and provides data as well as images.

Will there be negative backlash - of course? Will there be breakdowns and shortfalls? Undoubtedly. Privacy violations? Many. Will the inexorable push forward continue? Absolutely - just like the glaciers in the Ice Age.

$3 Microscope plugs into Cell Phone!

Check this MIT Technology Review story out.


http://www.technologyreview.com/biomedicine/25286/?nlid=2973&a=f


The implications for standardized, interoperable plug-ins to cell phones and other portable devices are amazing - as long as the data moving from one device to the other is interoperable, you can assemble some amazing capture and use scenarios.....

This is in a similar vein to the glasses that can be adjusted by the user in the field rather than being done by perscription - you use a pump to change the pressure of some internal fluid which changes the shape of the lens to fit the user's eyesight.

Go interoperability.

Grim Reaper: Zero (0) --- Pete O'Dell: Still playing......

Wow, what a week. While I was lying the the intensive care unit and receving what seemed like the best medical care in the world for some blocked arterties that decided to seal up/give up/collapse on April 16th, the world of interoperability kicked in and helped give me a new extension on planet Earth:

The global network: I connected with people everywhere - more globally than in my own neighborhood (going to work on this). Response and outpouring of support was incredible.

AED: These little defibulators were the lifesaver - preventing any initial damage and restoring the heart rhythm. Highly recommneded for any place that has more than a few people, and I suggest that you get a training class on them.

Prevention: would have been best - some signs, but none of the major (pain, shortness of breadth, etc). I'd been working out a lot and at a pretty intense rate - you would have thought that I would have triggered a mild event sooner. Get checked.

Stents: The docs put in 3 stents to allow flow through the bad heart atteries - no need for open heart surgery or bypass, which I think I'm very grateful for....

More to follow as I figure this all out......I'll use the interoperability as a theme to tie it all together. Today, I'm thankful to be alive, thankful to all the people who made that happen, thankful for the extended opportunity to make a difference in the world. I'm hopeful that God has it all figured out for the next couple of weeks, as my brain is still a little mushy. Any thoughts appreciated.

interoperable medicine

Just getting out a a 6 day stint in ICU - despite all good intentions, diet, working out, etc, I ended up with a genetic heart problem that laid me flat. If not for some very fast defibulation by somone who knew how to use a standard interoperable device, it might have been far worse!!! (no further blog entry type of worse).

Trying to figure out the implications later and the meaning now......powerful experience. Check for updates, and get out and get the best preventative care you can!!! Far better to avoid than try to clean up later - not much more important.

NIEM a front for the CIA?

http://www.fiercegovernmentit.com/story/blumenthat-niem-not-cia-trojan-horse/2010-04-04


This article is unbelievable. The Health guy identified rumors that NIEM was a front for the CIA because the data could move easily between agencies, and disavowed/denied any knowledge. Why the CIA would be interested in the scans of Grandma's colon cancer is quite beyond me.

While it's true that interoperable railroads allowed the Nazis to invade Eastern Europe, the idea of keeping government data completely *#$#ed up as a hedge against invasive prying has got to be way up the list - maybe we couldy bury individual time capsules in the mall that can only be dug up by court order and citizen watchdogs could oversee (but THAT watchdog could be working for the CIA!).

What do do? Standardized data would be far easier to audit, control and meter among agencies. Lets join the 21st centrury.

Transparency Camp - Washington DC

I attended Transparency Camp in Washington DC last Saturday of March (it ran all weekend, but I had a prior engagement that I would have liked to skip to attend both days).

Over 200 people from all walks of life except Fortune 500 companies - non-profits, government, small business, citizens, local and state government.

The transparency drums are beating louder, and much has been accomplished over the last year since the inaugural camp. Of note, the Sunlight Foundation is leading on a lot of fronts - both from a policy positioning standpoint, and also harnessing many of the application developer community.

I talked to a number of people about my position on interoperable data - that the government needs to work on giving the data in real time and in a free, forward leaning (XML) format. The National Information Exchange Model group in DHS/DOJ has been moving this ball forward in government, and OASIS is one of the premiere organizations driving worldwide.

Common Alerting Protocol is key for real time alerting - its flexible, multi-lingual, geospatially capable, and adaptableto many situations. There are a number of other great standards coming behind it. CAP is used by NOAA, FCC, FEMA, many commercial vendors, and a host of other groups around the world - including Sri Lanka. CAP supports many types of warning devices - from computers to sirens to emergency activated radios.

Congrats to all who made Transparency Camp happen. With all the whining, gnashing of teeth, partisan positioning, it was great to see a group of people working to make something happen!!!!!