Social Applications For Social Devices

Culture

from the communication-is-everything dept

The mobile phone, by its very nature is a “social” device. It’s designed to help connect you to someone else. While most of the early efforts to create “mobile data” have come from a broadcast mindset (delivery produced content to an audience), it looks like some are finally realizing that mobile data apps need to be social to really catch on. If they’re not making use of the mobile phone for what it’s good for, then it’s unlikely to get too much attention. MIT’s Tech Review has a good overview of a variety of different “social” projects related to mobile devices, from the ever popular “Dodgeball” mobile social networking application to Fluidtime’s dorm room washing machine SMS scheduler (and negotiator, should you find out you need the machine now and someone else has it booked). These are the types of applications that really are the future of mobile phones — and not the ability to watch the latest reality TV series on your phone or to receive a marketing message from Disney.