RUSSELL TOWNSEND, CLUSTA
I’m looking forward to seeing what people do with the Microsoft Kinect controller, how it will be hacked, messed around with and re-adopted to create some really interesting interactive devices.
I also look forward to seeing some more stuff using holograms.
Will we finally see virtual reality come back to the commercial market in a serious way?
And we will see HTML 5 start to be taken seriously as a contender to Flash in terms of delivering rich engaging online experiences.
GELLAN WATT, THINKING JUICE
Product placement... I’ve got my AdMan head on. It’s going to add a new spin on communications planning. At least it’s now official and we can really start to make a plan for product placement as opposed to hit and hope. On the flip of that, as a consumer, product placement is going to really annoy me. But hey, ads pay my bills.
So hello product placement, goodbye morals.
SIMON ‘SANKY’ SANKARAYYA, D&AD (ALLOFUS)
One of the things that excites me is waiting to see who is going to win the on-demand media space. Is it going to be Google TV? Is it going to be Qwiki?
Who’s going to win the contest of delivering personalised online content in more of a televisual kind of way. There’s a lot of money behind this, with all the broadcasters involved and some organisations are trying to get into that space, but it’s going be really tricky.
I’ve been to so many meetings in the last four years where people ask “Can you do what they do in Minority Report?” and I’ve had to say “No! We can’t”. Now, thanks to Microsoft’s Kinect, actually, we can. All the possibilities are there. With some technical abilities it is now possible to create these user interfaces with a lot of the work done by a product that is in the high street.
From hi- to very lo-fi, there seems to be a movement towards grass roots programmes for bringing the community or like minded people together and there’s a guy called Mike Senese who works in an ethical, environmental way.
He creates practical ways of reusing junk. He’s posted a piece on how to recreate a record with about £1 worth of stuff. It’s quite amazing. He’s like a recycling boffin and I like the fact that with more grass roots programmes communities are coming together. I think there is going to be more of these type of things, as people seem to be moving more towards the mindset of caring for the planet a bit more.
Blaise Aguera y Arcash. This is the guy who developed Seadragon for Microsoft. Whatever he is going to be doing I want to know about. Now he’s going to move into augmented reality mapping. It’s like a social community creating virtual models of our actual space. It’s gob smacking really. So watch out for anything he is going to be doing.
TONY FOGGETT, CODE COMPUTERLOVE
I guess the most obvious thing that impacts my business the most is the continued rise of apps as a key consumer touch point for clients.
Apps, including those that are developed for business, will continue to rise in acceptance and popularity due to the proliferation of mobile devices and app layers on all sorts of technologies - like TV for example.
I’m looking forward to seeing the tablet and app market really take off in 2011. Just do a search for what tablets are launching in 2011 - Dell, Samsung, Toshiba, Asus, HP (Palm), Lenovo (Louis will be pleased) - as well as mobile operators Motorola and T-Mobile.
Unconfirmed possibles are Google’s Chrome Tablet and of course the iPad 2. Most of these tablets will be on Android which will gain ground on Apple’s early dominance of this platform. By the end of 2011 it sounds like the tablet market will be a similar story to the current mobile market with Android a close second.
On the back of this I hope and pray that brands won’t make the same mistakes they did with their early websites and shop for their apps in isolation like they were some shiny thing they could buy off the shelf.
Apps need be integrated into a wider digital strategy in order to build audience and ensure consumer journeys are thought through. For some of our clients they are likely to take over from their website as the premier consumer interface so some careful planning needs to go into their design and ongoing promotion.
On a techie note I’m looking forward to the rise of HTML 5. Usage of Flash will surely go down as Google, Apple, YouTube, Vimeo et al adopt HTML 5. Don’t panic though, Flash is going nowhere.
Interesting to see that the IPTV YouView platform will be based on Flash and is another thing promised in 2011 - if the red dot boys in Manchester can recruit enough talent to fill their lovely new offices at MediaCityUK
ROB NICOL, PHD NORTH
Sharing is going to become ever more prevalent. In a recent piece PHD Global compiled it revealed some staggering facts about sharing; 3,087 images are uploaded each minute on Flickr, 30million consumer reviews of hotels can be found on Tripadvisor.com, 20 hours of video uploaded to YouTube each minute and $30million spent on virtual gifts this past holiday season in the US. Sharing is the new giving.
In the world of gaming, Kinect has been selling at a breakneck pace, with 2.5m sensors sold within its first 25 days on the market. Kinect’s creators Microsoft have no choice but to share with hackers already developing a whole range of applications for the device since it launched. 2011 will be another major leap forward into the mainstream for both gaming and the potential that this type of connectivity will release.
2011 not only sees the beginning of several BBC departments, Radio Five Live, Children’s and Sport move to MediaCityUK but I am also really excited by the news that ITV will be taking space and sharing the studios. As the region’s biggest producer of original content, it’s another powerful event in the young life of MediaCityUK that, we hope, will further enhance the Northwest’s creative standing on a national and global scale.
Lastly, Chatroulette will finally become truly mainstream - a true ‘sharing’ pioneer!
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