Smartphones Becoming The Single Most Important Device Information Technology Essay

A smart phone is a mobile phone that has more sophisticated computing ability and connectivity then a modern-day basic feature phone. Most feature phone are able to run their application with the help of java ME software but a smart phone allows their user to install and run their more advanced application specific proposal like operating system, which provide a stage for application developers. It can be considered as a personal pocket computer (PPC) with features of mobile phone, because these devices are like computer but smaller than desktop computer. We will see that, what changes these smart phones has brought in to the lives of the people and what are the advantage of the smart phones and we will also discuss about the fact that, are the smart phone will be the most important device that we will have in the near future or it’s just a prediction. We have heard about how people do shopping now days, they just online and purchase whatever they want and the products get to them in no time. It is all because of Web 2.0 and E commerce. We will be discussing about how web 2.0 and ecommerce helped EBay and Amazon to increase their popularity. We will also see what changes Web 2.0 and E commerce has brought in the life of the consumers.

Objective

The objective of this paper is to discuss about the implication of the statement that the Smartphone will become the single most important digital device we own in next few year and we will also evaluate the role of E- commerce and Web 2 technologies in EBay’s and Amazon’ which has increased its popularity.

Smart phone’s future

The concept of smart phone will change dramatically in three to four years. How can we predict that? Looking the history of smart phones, there has been a tremendous progression and it’s still continuing, for example Apple I phone emerged as a cannibalizing platform, made for loading innovative apps, designed with finger-flicking ease-of-use in mind, Black berry has produced its own operating system and many others company, who are in the race of producing different types of features. Now Google has brought its own android open source operating system in its newly launched Nexus one mobile phone and that is not all, its features include transcribe voice to text, noise cancelling dual microphones, and voice guided turn by turn navigation to drivers. The device is sold unlocked which mean that it is not prohibited to a single provider, because of these features which have appeared in full force in few years have changed the market entirely. (http://gigaom.com)

PC Replacement

The primary changes that will occur in next few years will make the smart phone behave like laptops. DoComo started offering the Toshiba T-01A in Japan, a super-fast phone that uses a highly developed Qualcomm chip. Smart phones will finally run complete apps such as Adobe Photoshop with these fast processors – and not just with the limited features offered in the current Photoshop app. There are predication of other fourth coming powerful apps on the prospect as well, including tools that can grip photographic effects and process large, high-res images and videos. Recently Nokia has launched his N900, which is also called as mobile computer. Operating system which is installed in N900 is of Linux and is capable of doing multitask like Apple McBook. SMART PHONES could start eating into the global laptop market within the year, according to infrastructure software firm Citrix.  In 2015, these powerful laptop replacements will provide true multitasking where you can run spottily to stream audio, chat over an IM client, process EXIF data for a massive photo collection, and even play World of War craft all at the same time., but the background processing will be much more advanced and will allow full PC-like capabilities and these user-phones will have similar-size displays and use touch input. These all features will help the smart phones to replace laptops which are very popular in this generation, as the smart phones are smaller in size more compatible and mostly light in weight. As we have seen that smart phones will replace laptop or personal computer in future. (http://www.digitaltrends.com)

Connectivity

We have discussed about how the smart phones will replace the PC in future but what about the connectivity? As we all like to stay connected with our friends, family or to do our offices work from home, for that we have to stay connected and smart phones helps us to connect to an internet and from that we can browse, socialize or even can do business without taking too much pain. Most of the smart phone is equipped with Wi – Fi, 3G technology, multimedia like mp3 player, radio, Bluetooth, GPRS and many other things which helps the people to transfer data, via Bluetooth or internet and it also helps to find place where and when they exactly wants to go as the mart phone is fully equipped with all these features. John Jackson, a vice president of research at CCS Insight says that the phone is likely to be situation ally and contextually aware and present information to you accordingly. The smart phone in future will know your preferences in food, media communication and will also predict the next move which you want to take because of cloud-based server side intelligence which the phone has in it.  Augmented reality is that an emerging trend in 2009 will become a social-awareness instrument in the next five years as users link their phones. For example, connected devices could form into an unplanned broadcast terminal at sporting events where you can view a video provided from a guy in the second row or up in the hemorrhage seats. According to John Shen, the Lab Director at Nokia Research Center, in 2015 the smart phones will go even further and will be able to link phone together with the cluster where a group of phones provides PC-like processing capability. It is for sure that smart phone will be capable of doing anything in future, as the people are doing now with help of their PC or laptop. (http://www.digitaltrends.com) (Wall Street Journal  (Eastern Edition),  p. 1)

Storage revolution

The storage technology has out- paced the demand of smart phones with the improvement of storage density improvement created by technological advances. This was not expected from mobile phones to have such kind of storage capacity and that’s the reason there is a shift from PC to smart phones. The phones which had few mega bytes of storage capacity have gone up to 80GB. It will not be amazing to see if the phones come up with storage capacity like a laptop or PC in near future. It all shows that how the smart phones have created their market in every cities and town across the world. Now the developing countries have also started using smart phones and that also with high energy. (http://www.almaden.ibm.com)

Conclusion

I agree with the fact that in near future smart phones will be the single most important device that we will own, as I am saying this because with the above statement that I have made. Smart phones will have the own server on which they will run, we will not have to go to our offices and do work it will be done by logging through smart phones and all the work will be done. We will be able to connect to the whole world sitting at home. We will not have to find places as smart phone with the help of GPS will predict where we want to go and which place will be the right one. It will know every move that will take and will correct us. Now fourth generation smart phone has come imagine in future there will be such a kind of smart phone which we cannot imagine now. After few years what was dream will come true as smart phone will be a part of our life.

The role of e-commerce and Web 2.0 technologies in EBay’s and Amazon’s

The combination of business process, technology and principles that enables customer participation and collaboration is called Web2.0. Jake Winebaum, CEO of Business.com said, it’s the ability for users and experts to collaborate in a vertical search engine for B to B. It is much broader concept than the interface we are using. Companies such as Bit Torrent, Digg, MySpace, and Redditand Wikipedia have built engaging and useful Web experiences because Web 2.0 has exploded onto the scene on the other hand Electronic commerce or ecommerce can be term for any type of business or commercial transaction that involves transfer of information across the internet. Consumers are benefited by ecommerce as goods and services can be exchanged electronically with no barriers of time and distance. EBay and Amazon are using Web 2.0 as collaborative tools such as blogs, wikis and social networks for the advertising, product development and customer service for their product. As they host an online community, they try to interact with the customer outside the web page, listens to them and with that they create new ideas. EBay mainly deals in customer to customer that are (C to C) and Amazon deals in Business to customers that are (B to C). Ecommerce offers EBay and Amazon to provide their customers personalization, customization, convenience, and reduction of product search & price delivery costs.

Customization helps to create a product or services according to the buyers need, what they want and when.

Personalization helps to match the services, products, and advertising content with individual consumers and their preferences.

Differentiation helps to provide a product or service that is unique, and different from others product and services.

Customers get benefited as the price of the product will be cheap than any other stores shopping malls and they can find their product very easily as you just have to type the name of the product and the there will be numbers of product displayed and all the delivery is free which reduces the cost of the customers. (http://www.his.se)

EBay and Amazon are direct competitors – competing for essentially the same market segment of consume they sell their products and services that are very similar (e.g. books, music, computers and software, games and toys, electronics, tools, movies and DVDs), and they sell to the same market segment but both of them uses the same Ecommerce and Web 2.0 technology to reach every part of the world and because of this 70 per cent of the people in the world knows what is EBay and Amazons. Web 2.0 technologies have amped up these basics, becoming a driving force within today’s e-business industry. Many Ecommerce sites provide only new products but by providing a trading platform for new and second-hand goods, EBay broadened its market base. Online shopping sites have expediency advantages over conventional retail and auctions. The e-commerce sites are open 24/7/365 and easy to get to from homes, offices and other settings with a computer and Internet connection. As it is open 24 hours a day customers can buy anytime whenever they want just book the product and pay the amount, they don’t have to go according to the time and this is one of the biggest advantages that E commerce has brought. EBay refers to the current generation of Web sites that seek to turn viewers into contributors by giving those tools to write, post, comment and upload their own creative work and in turn it helps the company to know what actually their customers want. This next, global leg of the e-commerce wave already looks like it will be heavily influenced by ideas being developed in the US. (Carol Krol. (2006, November). Web 2.0)

Conclusion

From the above that we have discussed we can say that Web 2.0 and E commerce has played a major role to increased the popularity of EBay and Amazon. E commerce in EBay and Amazon provides the consumers the information over the internet and consumers can exchange their products and services with no barriers of time and distance. Customers can see the products and compare with other product which is there in the market and can bargain at what price they want. They can also sell their product at their price with the help of E commerce. Web 2.0 helps the consumers to know which products are available by advertising and promotions. Now days people go on the internet see the products and if they like it they buy it, you don’t have to go personally in the store stand in the queue and wait for your turn. E commerce and Web 2.0 has made shopping more interesting and it also saves time. It helps the customer to focus more on their other work rather than wasting time in shopping. Web 2.0 and E commerce has helped the emergence of new and better merchandising technologies, more intuitive and comprehensive product search services, and the proliferation of contextual and performance-based advertising channels, small and mid-sized merchants are able to establish rapidly growing web outlets more easily than ever before. The transaction fees charged on the internet are less than what the customer pay in an old conventional shopping. We also keep in mind that the typical merchant will have total gross margins of no more than 20-30 percent. I think these all reasons have helped the EBay and Amazon to increased its popularity in the mind of millions of customers across the world.