This week, Google came through on its promise. Along with a slick new skin, dual camera functionality, and Contour Display, the Nexus S establishes itself as the first Android device to sport NFC technology. It is a sign of what is to come; the Nexus S is the first of many next-gen devices that will influence everything from business to marketing and consumer behavior.
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Social shopping has been heating up over the past few years and got a big boost from Facebook's Open Graph API and Like button this year. The most exciting services in the space are taking the trend offline, letting you "like" products you see in retails stores as well as online. A new company called Nuji, launching today at Le Web in Paris, takes this approach. By combining Svpply-like curation with the social barcode-scanning aspect of Stickybits, they are hoping to build a "shopping mall curated by people whose taste you admire."
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In the 1995 film Johnny Mnemonic, the title character, played by Keanu Reeves, has a cybernetic brain implant that stores vast amounts of data. Today, we all have this capacity, but the mechanism is in our hands, not our heads. Smartphones are helping us become, well, smarter – both expanding our memories and giving us access to the web's collective knowledge.
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Littlecosm is a massively multiplayer Twitter client that is due out in January 2011. Being designed by Tokyo-based Yongfook, it promises to be an interesting mashup of real-time status updates, sentiment analysis, and dynamic gaming elements.
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Just in time for Black Friday, a 1999 Accenture research paper on "augmented commerce" has resurfaced. Pocket BargainFinder hints at the mobile barcode scanning behavior that is beginning to go mainstream a decade later.
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What is gutter tech? According to Nathan Martin and Eamae Mirkin of Deeplocal, it’s the “bridging of real and digital in unconventional ways.” It is the Internet of Things being harnessed for storytelling. For advertisers, it’s what comes after digital or “post-digital.” While those of us in the industry struggle to define this emerging practice, we should remind ourselves that for those experiencing it, it’s simply magic.
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Commerce used to be personal. Customers would talk to a retailer before being recommended a product or service. Then mass production came along. Standardization allowed for scale while effectively killing personality. That was yesterday. Today’s brands are returning to personalization, but making it possible on a mass scale.
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Mobile phones are helping people make more informed health-related decisions. Hundreds of mobile website and apps are providing reference for topics like anatomy, first-aid, and drug-related conditions. Everywhere access to these tools are saving lives. Filmmaker Dan Woolley survived the Haiti earthquake by referencing a first-aid app to treat his wounds. Chicago art instructor Tanya Gill was saved during a stroke using NPR for iPhone. WebMD puts it well, "Better information. Better health."
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It's not easy for an advertisement to stop people in their tracks these days (especially in New York City), but a new interactive installation promoting the Discovery Channel's Stormchasers is doing just that.
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On Saturday, October 9th, NYC's Museum of Modern Art will be home to a rogue augmented reality art exhibition. Visitors with Android or iPhone devices will be able to admire an unofficial showing -- with or without the museum's permission.
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