Abstract
People have become accustomed to changes in their environment with every new generation of technology. It is through the shift in technology that people are seeing the world through new views and paradigms. We see these paradigm shifts in phases, such as when our parents went from listening to radio to watching television. We have seen the shift in the paradigm when our generation went from stand-alone personal computers to retrieving information off the Internet (Singh, 2003). But the latest shift in paradigm is the explosive developments of the mobile devices and the applications that are constantly being expanded upon to further the potential use of these devices from everyday personal needs to strategic business processes. People today are reeling from the benefits of mobile devices through increased productivity. The people that are benefiting the most are the mobile workers, especially the executives, middle management managers, and salespeople who are not bound by a desk or specific work locations (Cozza, 2005). Mobile devices have given added levels of service to people by allowing them to stay on top of customer support through improved customer care that has increased the company return on investment (Cozza, 2005). Employees can now access their email, contacts, corporate data and up to date meeting schedules by proving invaluable asset information to the corporate employee of today.
TopIntroduction: Impact Of Mobile Devices On People
People have become accustomed to changes in their environment with every new generation of technology. It is through the shift in technology that people are seeing the world through new views and paradigms. We see these paradigm shifts in phases, such as when our parents went from listening to radio to watching television. We have seen the shift in the paradigm when our generation went from stand-alone personal computers to retrieving information off the Internet (Singh, 2003). But the latest shift in paradigm is the explosive developments of the mobile devices and the applications that are constantly being expanded upon to further the potential use of these devices from everyday personal needs to strategic business processes. People today are reeling from the benefits of mobile devices through increased productivity. The people that are benefiting the most are the mobile workers, especially the executives, middle management managers, and salespeople who are not bound by a desk or specific work locations (Cozza, 2005). Mobile devices have given added levels of service to people by allowing them to stay on top of customer support through improved customer care that has increased the company return on investment (Cozza, 2005). Employees can now access their e-mail, contacts, corporate data and up to date meeting schedules by proving invaluable asset information to the corporate employee of today.
As illustrated in Figure 1, each hype cycle model follows five stages (Shen, Pittet, Milanesi, Ingelbrecht, Hart, Nguyen et al., 2006):
Figure 1. The Hype Cycle for consumer mobile applications
- 1.
Technology trigger: The first phase of a Hype Cycle is the “technology trigger” or breakthrough, product launch, or other event that generates significant press and interest.
- 2.
Peak of inflated expectations: In the next phase, a frenzy of publicity typically generates overenthusiasm and unrealistic expectations. There may be some successful applications of a technology, but there are typically more failures.
- 3.
Trough of disillusionment: Technologies enter the “trough of disillusionment” because they fail to meet expectations and quickly become unfashionable. Consequently, the press usually abandons the topic and the technology.
- 4.
Slope of enlightenment: Although the press may have stopped covering the technology, some businesses continue through the “slope of enlightenment” and experiment to understand the benefits and practical application of the technology.
- 5.
Plateau of productivity: A technology reaches the “plateau of productivity” as the benefits of it become widely demonstrated and accepted. The technology becomes increasingly stable and evolves in second and third generations. The final height of the plateau varies according to whether the technology is broadly applicable or benefits only a niche market.
Key Terms in this Chapter
General Packet Radio Service (GPRS): An enhancement to the GSM mobile communications system that supports the transfer of data packets. GPRS enables the continuous flow of IP data packets over the network to enable applications such as Web browsing.
Enhanced Data for GSM Evolution (EDGE): An enhanced version of the GSM and TDMA networks that increases bandwidth. EDGE is often called the 2.75G network standard.
Wireless Markup Language (WML): A tag-based language similar to HTML that is used in the wireless application protocol (WAP). It is essentially a streamlined version of HTML that can be used on small-screen displays.
Global Positioning System (GPS): The satellite-based navigation system that triangulates a user’s signal via three or more satellites. The system was originally developed by the U.S. military, but is now available for commercial and private applications.
Code Division Multiple Access Networks (CDMA): A method of frequency reuse whereby many handheld phones use a shared portion of the frequency spectrum. CDMA uses spread-spectrum techniques to assign a unique code to each conversation.
Global System for Mobile Communications (GSM): A digital cellular phone technology based on TDMA. This is the predominant network in Europe, but is also used in the U.S. and around the world.
Converged Devices: These are devices that will replace the multiple devices which people carry around now for all communication, information, and entertainment needs while being compact and incorporating a mobile phone and high speed Internet as standard.