Our May Mobile guest blog series continues with George White, Principal Consultant, Technical Architect at Cantina. George gives some great insight into the many contexts in which we need to look at mobile and the many factors which now come into play as the technology develops. If you are interested in being a guest blogger please contact me at taylor [at] mitx [dot] org.

George set out to be a zoologist and now he is a fifteen year veteran with broad experience in software development and architecture. He has worked in many domains, including Web applications, mobile platforms, content management, internet-connected desktop applications, multimedia, video, networking and systems architecture. George developed a strong understanding of the technology needs of publishing companies during his time at McGraw-Hill and Thomson and consulting with Elsevier and Jones & Bartlett. George is proud of the fact that systems he designed and developed ten years ago are still going strong. Twitter handle: @stonehippo

It’s Not Mobile, Its a Sequential Connected Experience
Engagement requires balancing optimization and parity while considering contexts

It is becoming hard to talk about mobile as something separate from other digital experiences, and the numbers bear this out.

This is the time of year when we reflect on the past, and look to the future. Through the end of this month, we'll be sharing guest blog posts in our the annual Predictions & Reflections series. We asked some of our smartest guest writers to reflect on the past year and look to the upcoming year. This post is by Edward Boches. Edward has spent 35 years in the advertising business as a writer, creative director, social media enthusiast, change agent and hacker. He continues the journey today as part-time chief innovation officer at Mullen, where he’s been a partner for 30 years, and as a full-time professor of advertising at Boston University’s College of Communication. You can find him on Twitter as @edwardboches. Or at Creativity_Unbound.

Sure there are already restaurants that let us browse wine lists on an iPad. Or even order from touch screen table surfaces. And, of course, for years we've been able to make reservations from our smart phones. But alas, we're still forced to endure human contact and conversation when we arrive. Saying hello to the coat check attendee. Asking the maître d’ if our table is ready. Making small talk with the wait staff.

Thankfully, 2013 should see the opening of the first all digital, robot-run restaurant in Kendall Square. And people who prefer texting to talking will rejoice.

This is the eighth post in our mobile blog series. Throughout the month of April we'll be featuring posts from some of Boston's most expert thought leaders, answering these questions: "What's happening in mobile right now? What's coming soon?” This post is by Ash Nadkarni, MD. Ash is a physician in the specialty of Psychiatry, with a research background in the adoption of social media technologies. She is the co-founder of Appguppy, an online tool that makes it ridiculously easy to create and distribute beautiful, cross-platform mobile apps.

“It’s a mobile solution that’s cross-platform.”

“Oh… so then it’s just HTML5.”

So goes the classic scenario for more and more developers offering cross-platform mobile solutions.  The minute you broach the topic of an answer to platform fragmentation, you get accused of utilizing HTML5.  But does HTML5 really have a bad rap anymore?  And how might it offer the ability for organizations to position themselves competitively in the mobile marketing space?

This is the seventh post in our mobile blog series. Throughout the month of April we'll be featuring posts from some of Boston's most expert thought leaders, answering these questions: "What's happening in mobile right now? What's coming soon?” This post is by Jeanne Hopkins, VP of Marketing at HubSpot. HubSpot makes inbound marketing software to help your business generate more leads and manage them effectively. Jeanne is also co-author of the recently-published book, “Go Mobile," an introductory guide to starting your mobile marketing efforts.

If social media is where it’s at (and it is) and mobile is where things are headed (and they are), then, it’s that intersection of social and mobile where you—and your marketing—want to be. That’s the sweet spot. A study from Juniper Research shows that the number of socially active users on mobile devices will rise from 650 million in 2011 to 1.3 billion in 2016. Make the most of your inbound marketing by learning where the social mobile sweet spot is and using it to your advantage. Here’s how:

This is the seventh post in our mobile blog series. Throughout the month of April we'll be featuring posts from some of Boston's most expert thought leaders, answering these questions: "What's happening in mobile right now? What's coming soon?” This post is by Matt Cutler, Co-Founder and CEO, Kibits.

This is the sixth post in our mobile blog series. Throughout the month of April we'll be featuring posts from some of Boston's most expert thought leaders, answering these questions: "What's happening in mobile right now? What's coming soon?” This post is by Ken Kimmel. Ken is the co-founder and president of On The Spot® Systems, makers of the mobile survey application Survey On The Spot®. Prior to his current position, Ken held key leadership roles at Dunkin’ Brands and Baskin-Robbins, including overseeing brand and strategy development, field operations, marketing and advertising, and franchising and development.

So, I am not a technologist or engineer, but I can certainly understand the huge opportunity that has presented itself to mobile developers with the rising tide of HTML5.

You see, it starts like this: our company, On The Spot Systems, had built a business model based on utilizing mobile devices to easily collect and report data from people on the go. Our original vision was that people around the world would be clamoring to download our free iPhone app (and soon to be Android and Blackberry apps) so they could answer surveys for businesses wherever they were. The feedback would go straight to the business owner and the consumer would receive a reward. Neat. Except…

This is the fifth post in our mobile blog series. Throughout the month of April we'll be featuring posts from some of Boston's most expert thought leaders, answering these questions: "What's happening in mobile right now? What's coming soon?” This post is by Andrew Paradise, CEO and founder of AisleBuyer, the Boston-based provider of mobile checkout solutions. AisleBuyer’s mobile commerce platform not only provides a revolutionary in-store experience for consumers, but also delivers unprecedented in-store customer analytics to retailers, brand and restaurants.

We can all agree that smartphones aren’t a passing fad. According to comScore, there are more than 100 million smartphone subscribers in the United States. With this proliferation has come a boom in innovation. Who could have envisioned the Apple App Store, with more than half a million apps that have been downloaded upwards of 25 million times, a few years ago?

This is the fourth post in our mobile blog series. Throughout the month of April we'll be featuring posts from some of Boston's most expert thought leaders, answering these questions: "What's happening in mobile right now? What's coming soon?" This post is by Katelyn Stokes is a Marketing Coordinator in AMP Agency's Integrated Marketing Group. She is a digital enthusiast with a passion for exploring the opportunities arising from the evolving mobile landscape.

A few weeks ago at the MITX CES and SXSW event, Steven Brennan said, "I'm cheating on my phone with my tablet. I hope my TV doesn't find out!"

This is the first post in our mobile blog series. Throughout the month of April we'll be featuring posts from some of Boston's most expert thought leaders, answering these questions: "What's happening in mobile right now? What's coming soon?” This post is by Perry Hewitt. Perry works on digital communications and engagement at Harvard University, where she is surrounded by smart people with great ideas for mobile innovation.

One of my favorite quotes is from the science fiction writer William Gibson. He once said, “The future’s already here -- it’s just not evenly distributed.”  I first grandly predicted the Year Of Mobile in 2000. Now, finally, there’s enough of it here that I can claim to be right.

What’s happening in mobile right now is exactly what happened during the stampede to the desktop web in 1995. Organizations are trying to force-fit existing content and transactions to meet the needs of a new use case. Unfortunately, in most instances, it’s not working. There are so many mobile–appropriate and even mobile-magical opportunities left on the table.

On February 10^th, MITX will be hosting Technology and the Retail Transformation with speakers from AisleBuyer, Bain Capital Ventures, BuyWithMe, Clovr Media, CVS, and Newbury Comics. This is one of several posts on technology and retail that we will publish leading up to this exciting event.