Mating Calls, Bird Watchers, Enterprise Mobility and Mobile Apps

The mating dance of a forest bird attracts the seductive sounds of an invisible mate.

Is there no end to what mobile apps can do?  Last week, several of us sat quietly on a weathered dock extended out and over a forested pond in the foothills of SW Washington.  We watched the birds and other wildlife enjoying the spring sunshine.  Suddenly we spotted an unidentified bird dancing about the branches of a distant tree.
Google Glass for Bird Watchers

Our good friend, Candy, came equipped with a professional grade camera with a 20 pound telephoto lens, but even with that, the bird was too distant to properly identify and photograph.  My wife, however, came up with a brilliant idea and reached for her iPhone. On her iPhone was a bird watching app called ibird.  Don't stop reading yet!  It gets better and I will bring it around to enterprise mobility before we are through.

This app comes with the following SMAC (social, mobile, analytics and cloud) features:
  • Popular field guides for birds
  • Topographical maps
  • 38 Search Attributes
    The Yellow-rumped Warbler
    Credit Candy Anderson
  • Zoom-able HD Images
  • Ability to import photos and assign them to any species account
  • Social forums - App connects directly to the www.whatbird.com forum where experts are standing by to help you ID a bird you can’t find with the search engine
  • Directly links to iBird Journal app from any species page
  • 5 hours of bird songs (5,000 unique sounds) and calls from the gold standard of recordings; the Macaulay Library at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology
  • Spectrographic Audio. The display brings insight to the structure of bird songs by allowing you to view the sound’s frequency components
  • GPS integration with date and time stamp
  • Google Glass support
Now back to my story.  Using the ibird app my wife quickly narrowed her identification to a couple of candidates.  She then listened to the bird song from the tree branches above the pond, and played the songs (audio files) of the candidates.  BINGO!  We had our bird!  It was a Yellow-rumped Warbler.

A challenge remained, however, as we could not get close enough to get a good photo.  My wife again solved the problem.  She turned up the volume and held up her iPhone.  The beautiful notes skipped across the pond and the Yellow-rumped Warbler immediately cocked its head to one side and flew through the tree branches and landed right in front of us.  SNAP! Or in Candy's case, SNAP, SNAP, SNAP!

I felt sorry for the poor male Yellow-rumped Warbler.  For the next 30 minutes it searched, danced and sang for the female behind the cheerful notes emanating from the iPhone, but alas, he found no satisfaction.

What does this have to do with enterprise mobility?  This mobile app highlights digital transformation.  It takes a paper-based process of using field guides to complete a task (identify birds) and digitizes the experience using sensors, multimedia files, a unique UX, and social and cloud-based platforms to rethink the entire process.  It incorporates the use of SMAC features all in one app.  This model, and the unique data collection, querying, visualization and identification tools turns a simple library and list app into a library of multimedia content and files connected to social and cloud platforms (bird watchers worldwide eager to help you solve your bird watching problems).  There is a great deal to learn from this app, and it would be worthwhile for enterprises to study it and the problems it solves.

Watch the video here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4upoPkmvDUE


************************************************************************
Kevin Benedict
Writer, Speaker, Editor
Senior Analyst, Digital Transformation, EBA, Center for the Future of Work Cognizant
View my profile on LinkedIn
Learn about mobile strategies at MobileEnterpriseStrategies.com
Follow me on Twitter @krbenedict
Join the Linkedin Group Strategic Enterprise Mobility
Join the Google+ Community Mobile Enterprise Strategies
Recommended Strategy Book Code Halos
Recommended iPad App Code Halos for iPads

***Full Disclosure: These are my personal opinions. No company is silly enough to claim them. I am a mobility and digital transformation analyst, consultant and writer. I work with and have worked with many of the companies mentioned in my articles.

Digital Transformation and Code Halos - 12 Trends that are Impacting Banks Today

The banks of the future, will not look like the banks of today. 

I have met with the business and IT strategy teams of many banks around the world over the past 12 months.  These discussions have been some of the most interesting as there is a sense of urgency.  The banking and financial services industries are feeling tremendous pressures from both internal and external sources to respond quickly to emerging mobile and online technologies, and the changing behaviors of consumers.   

Here are 12 talking points from my latest workshops:
  1. Mobile and online technologies are transforming the way banks serve clients
  2. Mobile banking adoption rates will reach 33 percent this year, up from 20 percent in 2011. Source: Swacha
  3. Mobile payments will reach $90 billion by 2017, up from $13 billion in 2012.  Source: Forrester’s 2013 US Mobile Payments Forecast report
  4. 60% of smartphone or tablet users who switched banks in the fourth quarter said mobile banking was an important factor in the decision. Source: AlixPartners
  5. Consumer preferences are changing and a generational shift in behavior is driving to new digital channels
  6. There is a rapid adoption of digital consumer banking in both developed markets and in markets where consumers are predisposed to using mobile technology rather than bricks-and-mortar (emerging markets)
  7. Banks are being presented with new competition from non-financial firms providing financial services
  8. The ability to innovate will be a key competitive differentiator, and innovation a critical driver of growth in the future for banks
  9. Uniform experience (omni-channel) will be required across all channels, and is a prime factor in customer satisfaction
  10. There is a growing convergence of personal financial management tools and mobile banking
  11. After providing basic consumer banking services on mobile apps, the next steps are to understand individual consumer’s transactions, and the nuances of their unique investment behavior using Code Halo strategies
  12. Banks are seeking efficiencies and cost reductions.  The average cost of a mobile transaction is 10 cents, about half that of a desktop-computer transaction and far less than the $1.25 average cost of an ATM transaction. (Source: Javelin Strategy & Research).
Mobile apps are rapidly replacing branches as the preferred form of customer interactions with banks. Customers are evaluating the quality of a bank based upon their mobile banking capabilities today.  In customer service surveys, providing great mobile apps represents an important component of customer satisfaction.  As a result, you would think that budget priorities and investments in mobile technologies would be jumping up in response, but as of today, budgets for mobile apps and mobile banking services represent less than 5% of IT budgets.  



************************************************************************
Kevin Benedict
Writer, Speaker, Editor
Senior Analyst, Digital Transformation, EBA, Center for the Future of Work Cognizant
View my profile on LinkedIn
Learn about mobile strategies at MobileEnterpriseStrategies.com
Follow me on Twitter @krbenedict
Join the Linkedin Group Strategic Enterprise Mobility
Join the Google+ Community Mobile Enterprise Strategies
Recommended Strategy Book Code Halos
Recommended iPad App Code Halos for iPads

***Full Disclosure: These are my personal opinions. No company is silly enough to claim them. I am a mobility and digital transformation analyst, consultant and writer. I work with and have worked with many of the companies mentioned in my articles.

Location Based Services and RFID Help Hospitals Save Money

The words location based services (LBS) immediately brings to mind mobile marketing apps and other location based sales and marketing services based upon GPS coordinates.  If we have an enterprise IT perspective we may think of fleet management, asset management and equipment tracking.  The technologies and strategies behind these technologies, however, are not limited to rugged outdoor, blue collar environments.  They have now also moved into sterile indoor environments.  Let's review a few of these use cases documented by Caleb Benedict, Research Analyst, GIS/IoT.

The use of LBS (location based services) in the healthcare industry is growing rapidly. It is being used to save time, money, and reduce liabilities. Earlier this week an article was published by Pharmabiz.com that described how Tyco Security is providing Indian Hospitals with RFID services to track patients, medical equipment and pharmaceuticals (http://bit.ly/PAIJvP).  Along with knowing patient locations, these solutions allow hospitals to track and maintain security over expensive equipment, and to closely monitor prescription drugs to limit dangerous mistakes.

A recent report by Research and Markets predicts the healthcare RFID market will grow at a CAGR of 35 percent through 2017. As this forecast demonstrates, RFID technology continues to gain traction in the healthcare industry proving that it has moved beyond its roots tracking cargo containers and freight (http://bit.ly/PAIJvP).

LBS technologies are also on the rise.  Markets and Markets reports that the location based services market will grow at a CAGR of 25 percent annually through 2019 and the market will be valued at $39 billion. They also report that the largest portion of LBS growth will come from the healthcare asset management sector. LBS solutions help hospitals monitor patients locations and track ambulances as they respond to emergencies and deliver patients (http://bit.ly/1l7gV10).

It is our analysis, based on a review of publicly available data, that the healthcare industry will continue to adopt these technologies as they are proving to save money, reduce loss and limit liabilities. These solutions, along with GIS applications in healthcare, illustrate the huge potential the industry has in applying location and tracking technologies in everyday hospital operations.
************************************************************************
Kevin Benedict
Senior Analyst, Digital Transformation, EBA, Center for the Future of Work Cognizant
View my profile on LinkedIn
Learn about mobile strategies at MobileEnterpriseStrategies.com
Follow me on Twitter @krbenedict
Join the Linkedin Group Strategic Enterprise Mobility
Join the Google+ Community Mobile Enterprise Strategies
Recommended Strategy Book Code Halos
Recommended iPad App Code Halos for iPads

***Full Disclosure: These are my personal opinions. No company is silly enough to claim them. I am a mobility and digital transformation analyst, consultant and writer. I work with and have worked with many of the companies mentioned in my articles.

Insurance Industry Disrupted, The Quantified-Self - Wearables, Telematics, Code Halos and Digital Transformation

By Peter Abatan, Studio Thirteen, Cognizant

The New Finance Meet-up group is currently running a 6 part series over a period of 6 months to determine what could disrupt the Insurance industry. In the most recent meet-up the focus was on how the quantified-self could disrupt the insurance industry. I came away from the meet-up with the conclusion that smart insurers will begin to develop products that are more customizable to the individual needs rather than offering products desiged on demographics, i.e. where you live, your age group, family size etc.

So what is the quantified-self? The quantified-self is the data that has been accumulated on the individual’s behavior, health status, medical conditions and overall well-being by the individual themselves (We call this data Code Halos at Cognizant). In the future many experts believe that it will be the basis on which insurance products are sold to customers.

There is still a lot of controversy around ownership of data and whether once that data has been released to an insurer whether it can be withdrawn, and whether an adverse event could impact or prevent an individual from being able to buy an insurance product. However, many experts have come to the conclusion, that smart insurers would use this adverse data to help customers to manage that event better rather than use it as an opportunity to charge very high premiums.

For example if you drive more in the night you are three times more likely to have an accident than someone who drives during the day (Forbes). In this scenario, your insurance company can help with providing tools that minimize the probability of that happening instead of charging very high premiums for someone who has driven in the night for the last 20 years and never had an accident. There are no guarantees that the person would never have an accident in the future, but the tools provided can help reduce that risk to a minimum.

There were about 40 to 50 delegates that attended and attendees came from new start-ups, the technology and insurance sectors. The session started with a product feature from Francis White from AliveCor. AliveCor is a heart monitor that provides individuals with the ability to track heart health anywhere, anytime at an affordable cost, you can see more about the device at www.alivecor.com. What is great about this company is that it has a cloud strategy in which you can grant access to your ECG data. It also has alerts that will warn you of any impending dangers and therefore recommend that you contact your physician. The device is portable enough to fit onto the back of a smartphone and takes the ECG reading from both thumbs allowing you to take readings anytime and anywhere.

The second product feature was by Matt Lewis, the founder of Quantid (www.quantid.co), a start-up that is aiming to revolutionize the health industry. Quantid already does what MapMyWalk and Training Peaks already does and more. Quantid describes itself as the Facebook of quantified human data. It is a social networking platform, enabling users of personal tracking devices and apps to make profound improvements to their health, fitness and overall well-being by delivering insights and analysis of their quantified personal data. Although at the time of writing this report their website was down, I can say that the founder has some well meaning ambitions.

Quantid supports a rich set of features; the application integrates with most popular tracking products on the market, making it easy for users to access all their personal data aggregated within a single platform; it allows users to share specific datasets with friends, doctors and other practitioners; and it offers the ability to set reminders, goals and challenges. Quantid plans to amass an enormous database of quantified human data. "By leveraging the power of big data analytics we plan to develop sophisticated algorithms to identify trends and correlations, enabling our customers to generate powerful insights into their behavior, health status, medical conditions and overall well-being." The key challenge to Quantid is the matter of trust, and the guarantee that the customer’s data would never under any circumstances be sold or given to third parties.

The host for the meet-up, Eddie George, took 10 minutes describing what the quantified-self is and how wearables are key to this concept. He described it as all the vital health and other data that could affect how you are offered insurance premiums. Your health and activity data or the lack of it will, in the future, affect the premiums that you pay for health and life insurance.  It will also impact your vehicle insurance. This also led to the question as to how much of your quantified-self do you let your insurance company know about you in order to offer a fair premium.

George identified 3 challenges that face the quantified-self namely, aggregation, analysis and access. Aggregation in the sense that currently individuals are in possession of different types of data related to their health and physical training/activity, therefore it might make analysis a lot more challenging, also access to this data is highly siloed and spread across different providers.

After George’s description of quantified-self we were all split up into break out sessions where we discussed whether there is a benefit for insurance companies and the individual when it comes to this subject matter? One key outcome from my break out group was that, if insurance companies could use the quantified-self to help the individual to make better decisions, rather than punish through hefty premiums it will guarantee the survival of that organization in what is considered a very competitive landscape. Another lesson shared was that insurance companies should start to use technology and the quantified-self to bring individuals on the fringe who normally find it difficult to get insurance into the fold and make the insurance products more accessible to these group of people.

From the number of representatives from the insurance industry at the meet-up, one thing was clear, the insurance industry knows digital transformation is imminent, and they do not want to be caught unawares when this happens.  They want to approach it from a position of strength, rather than from a position of weakness by developing a closer and stronger relationship with their customers by offering better products and services that are value for money.

Peter Abatan is a project manager and a team member of Studio13, a design studio which provides product and service design to a wide variety of Cognizant’s customers in various market sectors.

************************************************************************
Kevin Benedict
Digital Curator, Writer, Speaker
Senior Analyst, Digital Transformation, EBA, Center for the Future of Work Cognizant
View my profile on LinkedIn
Learn about mobile strategies at MobileEnterpriseStrategies.com
Follow me on Twitter @krbenedict
Join the Linkedin Group Strategic Enterprise Mobility
Join the Google+ Community Mobile Enterprise Strategies
Recommended Strategy Book Code Halos
Recommended iPad App Code Halos for iPads

***Full Disclosure: These are my personal opinions. No company is silly enough to claim them. I am a mobility and digital transformation analyst, consultant and writer. I work with and have worked with many of the companies mentioned in my articles.

Real-Time GIS for Increased Visibility, Accountability and Productivity

By Caleb Benedict, Research Analyst, GIS and IoT

Companies are quickly finding new and innovative ways to recognize value by integrating real time mapping applications into their business processes. Real-time mapping is the GIS process of tracking changes on the earth’s surface and displaying that information on a computer screen. This process can include changes to company assets and resources (vehicles, cargo containers, people), and changes in physical terrain based on weather conditions, construction activity, etc.  Companies are increasingly using real-time GIS to improve workforce and project supervision, oversight and accountability.

Examples can be seen in a variety of industries:
  • When port security officials track the location of cargo containers, personnel, and ships as they travel through sea ports.
  • When disaster relief officials track the movement of floodwaters 
  • When insurance companies monitor impact areas from natural disasters allowing them to estimate monetary damages and number of claims
Recent applications of real-time mapping:

Port security officials in Los Angeles use GIS to increase their security measures by tracking people, ships, cargo containers, and vehicles in real time.  This allows them to monitor all aspects of port operations so that any abnormalities can be easily identified and investigated. (http://bit.ly/1jtqwbM)

A handful of insurance companies have also found a way to use real time mapping to estimate the impact of natural disasters to policyholders by mapping the damage areas from floods, tornados and other events that result in insurance claims. This has been helpful to insurance companies because it allows them the ability to estimate damages and prepare their staff for high volumes of new claims. (http://bit.ly/1h9iHus)

The use of GIS in real-time is another element of digital transformation.  You are using imaging sensors to digitize physical terrain, assets and resources so you can develop algorithms to help you more efficiently understand and manage your business.

Adding sensors from connected devices can also add valuable data to your maps.  Knowing the location and status of your vehicles, equipment, materials and workers can enable sophisticated algorithms that impact scheduling and resource utilization.


************************************************************************
Kevin Benedict
Senior Analyst, Digital Transformation, EBA, Center for the Future of Work Cognizant
View my profile on LinkedIn
Learn about mobile strategies at MobileEnterpriseStrategies.com
Follow me on Twitter @krbenedict
Join the Linkedin Group Strategic Enterprise Mobility
Join the Google+ Community Mobile Enterprise Strategies
Recommended Strategy Book Code Halos
Recommended iPad App Code Halos for iPads

***Full Disclosure: These are my personal opinions. No company is silly enough to claim them. I am a mobility and digital transformation analyst, consultant and writer. I work with and have worked with many of the companies mentioned in my articles.

How The Healthcare Industry is Using GIS in 2014

By Caleb Benedict, Research Analyst, GIS and IoT

GIS technology is being used in the healthcare industry today for patient care and preventative medicine among other things. Hospitals and other organizations, with GIS and big data resources now have the ability to collect geographic information from their patients and study trends in illnesses based on where the patients live now and have lived in the past.  By displaying this information on a map it allows healthcare workers to visually see trends in illnesses and predict which communities will most likely to be impacted in the future.  In addition, understanding where patients have traveled over time enables healthcare officials to predict where ground zero for viruses might be located and how the diseases may have been spread.

A recent GIS study conducted in China determined the next likely at-risk region for the H7N9 avian flu virus is located in a northern region of Vietnam. They were able to determine this information by mapping previous cases of the flu virus which created a cookie-crumb trail that helped them predict northern Vietnam.

GIS applications like the one in China can be used for a variety of healthcare trends. If hospitals start building databases using patient locations, they would be able to detect trends based on patient geography. This could allow hospitals to stock medical inventory based on predictive analytics, train their staff in advance of diseases, and forecast the number of patients that will be affected.


Not only can GIS help predict future at-risk areas, but GIS applications can also help hospitals reduce expenses and improve patient care. A recent study in Maryland compared the use of life flight helicopters to ambulances. The study determined that in 31% of cases when a life flight was used, an ambulance would have been a better choice.  Knowing when an ambulance is a better choice could save a lot of money.

The use of GIS technology and big data analytics in healthcare is an emerging area worth watching. Here are some of the use cases referenced above:

A study by the University of Cincinnati uses GIS to compare the use of life flight helicopters and ambulances. (http://bit.ly/1noQnoQ)

GIS is used to study how pollution levels in different regions of the U.S. affect residents. (http://bit.ly/1jIHGoz)

A recent study in China uses GIS to predict the next impact area for the H7N9 avian flu virus. (http://bit.ly/1fU8yBI)

Join Kevin Benedict at the M6 Mobility Exchange in San Diego!
Click to Learn More!
************************************************************************
Kevin Benedict
Senior Analyst, Digital Transformation, EBA, Center for the Future of Work Cognizant
View my profile on LinkedIn
Learn about mobile strategies at MobileEnterpriseStrategies.com
Follow me on Twitter @krbenedict
Join the Linkedin Group Strategic Enterprise Mobility
Join the Google+ Community Mobile Enterprise Strategies
Recommended Strategy Book Code Halos
Recommended iPad App Code Halos for iPads

***Full Disclosure: These are my personal opinions. No company is silly enough to claim them. I am a mobility and digital transformation analyst, consultant and writer. I work with and have worked with many of the companies mentioned in my articles.

IoT Devices and Apps for both Industry and Consumers

By Caleb Benedict, Research Analyst, GIS/IoT


Recently Google acquired the home automation company Nest. Nest is a company that sells IoT (Internet of Things) enabled devices that allow homeowners to control the temperature of their homes through their smartphones, plus it sends notifications if it detects dangerous levels of smoke or carbon monoxide. This company is a great example of how IoT is expanding beyond its industrial roots.

Why would Google get involved in home automation systems?  Because their real goal is to collect, analyze and utilize data to provide more personalized online and mobile experiences. Cognizant calls this strategy "Code Halos" strategies.  Nest will provide Google with a much deeper understanding of consumers' "patterns of life."

In the next few years we will see widespread adoption of IoT technologies for consumers. This will include a range of applications such as smartphone controlled appliances, home irrigation systems, alarm systems, home automation systems, smart-watches that monitor vital signs, Internet connected vehicles and new applications that we haven't even heard of yet. There is and will be massive expansion of the IoT for personal use.

IoT is growing quickly and is expanding into new industries. IoT strategies are currently being used in vehicle fleets, home automation and management, healthcare, manufacturing, smart grids, ATMs and much more. Not only are IoT applications being embraced by industry, but also by consumers.  In 2014 we are seeing many new Internet connected devices such as Google Glass, smart watches and smart appliances appear.

Some examples of IoT applications today:

Tracking vehicle fleets for increased accountability
Monitoring vehicle performance to maximize efficiency and reduce operating costs
Viewing electricity usage through smart meters
Managing production lines through M2M sensors
Internet connected-alarm systems
Monitoring vitals for hospital patients
Home management-systems that control thermostats, appliances, irrigation systems, etc.

Recent IoT market forecasts:

IDTechEx research has found that the wireless sensor market will grow to $1.8 billion by 2024. (http://bit.ly/1i5Q29P)

Gartner predicts the “internet of things” will hit 26 billion devices by 2020, up from 900 million five years ago, and this will increase the amount of information available to supply chain professionals, as well as exposure to cyber risks. (http://bit.ly/1e57GG6)

According to a recent report from Navigant Research, cumulative utility spending on IT systems for the smart grid will total $139.3 billion from 2014 through 2022. (http://bit.ly/1ka16DL)

************************************************************************
Kevin Benedict
Senior Analyst, Digital Transformation, EBA, Center for the Future of Work Cognizant
View my profile on LinkedIn
Learn about mobile strategies at MobileEnterpriseStrategies.com
Follow me on Twitter @krbenedict
Join the Linkedin Group Strategic Enterprise Mobility
Join the Google+ Community Mobile Enterprise Strategies
Recommended Strategy Book Code Halos
Recommended iPad App Code Halos for iPads

***Full Disclosure: These are my personal opinions. No company is silly enough to claim them. I am a mobility and digital transformation analyst, consultant and writer. I work with and have worked with many of the companies mentioned in my articles.

Digital and Innovation Expert Interview: Sean Middleton

Something new, this way comes!  Over the past couple of years, in increasing frequency, companies I am working with on digital and mobile strategies are asking advice on how to set-up an environment that encourages internal innovation.  Some have set-up innovation contests (think Someplace has Talent for those that can't sing), and others teach internal workshops.  Why bother?  Often the people closest to problems are those on the frontlines with innovative ideas, but no obvious path or budget to implement them.  These innovative ideas may be the right formulas for competitive advantages and success!

With this subject in mind, I arranged to interview digital and innovation expert, Sean Middleton, COO of the EBA (Emerging Business Accelerators), at Cognizant.  He runs the EBA which is the venture arm of Cognizant.  A place where innovative ideas receive an audience, get peer reviewed, funded and matured.  Enjoy!

Video Link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ltSXl84_z5U&list=UUGizQCw2Zbs3eTLwp7icoqw&feature=share

************************************************************************
Kevin Benedict
Senior Analyst, Digital Transformation, EBA, Center for the Future of Work Cognizant
View my profile on LinkedIn
Learn about mobile strategies at MobileEnterpriseStrategies.com
Follow me on Twitter @krbenedict
Join the Linkedin Group Strategic Enterprise Mobility
Join the Google+ Community Mobile Enterprise Strategies
Recommended Strategy Book Code Halos
Recommended iPad App Code Halos for iPads

***Full Disclosure: These are my personal opinions. No company is silly enough to claim them. I am a mobility and digital transformation analyst, consultant and writer. I work with and have worked with many of the companies mentioned in my articles.

Could Mobile Devices and the Internet have Prevented the Rwandan Genocide?

This week marks the tragic 20-year anniversary of the Rwandan Genocide.  On April 7, 1994, the Hutu majority, which was in power at the time, began an organized effort to wipe out the minority Tutsis living in Rwanda and other neighboring countries.  During an approximate 100-day period nearly 800,000 Tutsis and sympathizers were massacred, most by machete.

The genocide was only stopped when an exiled Tutsi rebel group marched into Rwanda and overthrew the Hutu government.  No outside international forces intervened to stop this massacre.  The UN peacekeeping soldiers, lacking authorization to intervene and protect, stood by as the massacres happened within sight of their forces.  This was and is to this day a great international shame.

In Boise, Idaho we have a fast growing Congolese and Rwandan population of refugees that were forever impacted by this event.  Many have spent the last 15 years living under plastic tarps on mud floors in refugee camps.  The tragedy of these events is personal to me.  It hits home nearly every day as our home is often filled with newly arrived Rwandan refugee families and friends.  Many of my close friends suffer nightmares to this day from the mental and physical scars of these events.

I often wonder if mobile devices with broadband Internet could have prevented or limited the Rwandan Genocide.  In 1994 letters were sent through the postal service from fearful Tutsi families and churches begging for protection.  Here is an excerpt from just one letter sent by a pastor to his church leadership, “We wish to inform you that tomorrow we will be killed with our families.”  Tragically, the pastor’s words went silent and his predictions came true.  His entire family and congregation was massacred.  These letters were sent through the postal service.  The world was not aware, informed or alerted in a manner that rose above the noise.  These letters are now archived for us to read, remember and learn from.

There was no instantaneous access to social media sites, online forums, blogs, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, or places where citizen journalists with iPhones and broadband Internet could upload photos, videos and articles.  There was no YouTube or widely used public news websites to spark immediate worldwide outrage.

In 1994 the news of the massacres leaked out slowly and the rumors were too horrific to be believed.  Facts were hard to come by. The scope and scale of the tragedy was difficult to measure.  News crews found it dangerous to venture out into remote areas.  It took weeks for the world to begin to learn the full scale of the violence and genocide and by then the tragedy had nearly run its course.

I ask again, could mobile devices with cameras, broadband Internet connectivity and access to social media sites have stopped or limited this tragedy? In 1994, the world had limited news, limited understanding of events, limited perspective of the scale and scope of this tragedy, and limited interest.  These challenges limited international outrage and prevented UN intervention and humanitarian responses.

In the absence of news crews and photojournalists, the Hutu government, militia and instigators of violence felt immune from personal accountability, scrutiny and retribution.  They gave into a mad, uncontrollable and unexplainable bloodlust.  The violence continued unabated for 100 days.

In 1994, the ruling Hutu party controlled most of the radio stations and newspapers in Rwanda. Propaganda ruled the airwaves calling for violence against the Tutsis.  Many of the Rwandan news agencies and broadcasters themselves were later found by International courts to have been guilty of instigating and organizing the violence.

I hope and pray that the ubiquity of mobile devices would make keeping genocide a secret far more difficult today.  Every person with a mobile phone has the potential to be a citizen journalist.  Every act of violence has the potential of being documented and the location and perpetrators identified.

There are models today that demonstrate how mobile devices can be used to help prevent future genocides.  In Kenya, a small group of volunteer programmers have developed a website and mapping solution called Ushahidi, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ushahidi, where people with mobile phones can report violence and document the location of incidences on a map.  This information is instantly projected to a map on a website for the world to visualize, study and understand.

Today, freedom of speech and the ability to widely communicate news, knowledge and ideas has the opportunity to transform societies and peoples as never before.  Evil does not like the exposure and light of public scrutiny and debate.

In some circles, it is popular to cast disparaging remarks at technology, mobile devices, the Internet and social media, but I for one appreciate the value of information transparency afforded by these technological advancements.  I will celebrate the opportunity and freedom to know, and pray for the strength and courage to react with immediacy.

*************************************************************
Kevin Benedict
Senior Analyst, Digital Transformation Cognizant
View my profile on LinkedIn
Learn about mobile strategies at MobileEnterpriseStrategies.com
Follow me on Twitter @krbenedict
Join the Linkedin Group Strategic Enterprise Mobility
Join the Google+ Community Mobile Enterprise Strategies

***Full Disclosure: These are my personal opinions. No company is silly enough to claim them. I am a mobility and digital transformation analyst, consultant and writer. I work with and have worked with many of the companies mentioned in my articles.

Mobile Expert Interview: Dave Akka on Mobile Platform Strategies

I had the privilege today of interviewing mobility expert and Managing Director for Magic Software UK, Dave Akka.  In this interview we dig deep into mobile platform and mobile app development strategies.  Enjoy!

Video Link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jwm5ig7ARc4&feature=share&list=UUGizQCw2Zbs3eTLwp7icoqw



Read the article by Dave Akka, In Defense of Mobile Platforms for Enterprise Mobility.

Code Halos (the data that surrounds people, organizations and objects) are important to us as individuals - most of us generate and share digital information every day. What's critical is that Code Halos are also vital to future business success. Research conducted by the Center for the Future of Work reveals that companies that understand how important this data is and how to find business meaning from it are best positioned to win their markets.

My colleagues at Cognizant's Center for the Future of Work have just published a new book that is now available everywhere on this subject, http://www.unevenlydistributed.com/codehalos.  This is a very important topic as it defines a strategy for utilizing big data and everyday data to beat your competition.

*************************************************************
Kevin Benedict
Senior Analyst, Digital Transformation Cognizant
View my profile on LinkedIn
Learn about mobile strategies at MobileEnterpriseStrategies.com
Follow me on Twitter @krbenedict
Join the Linkedin Group Strategic Enterprise Mobility
Join the Google+ Community Mobile Enterprise Strategies

***Full Disclosure: These are my personal opinions. No company is silly enough to claim them. I am a mobility and digital transformation analyst, consultant and writer. I work with and have worked with many of the companies mentioned in my articles.

Featured Post

Leadership Advice from a Futurist - A Reading

Leadership is hard.  So for all the leaders and want-to-be leaders out there, here is some advice that I hope you will find useful. ***...