I clearly remember that day in early 2003. Sitting in the office of T-Mobile The Netherlands, with a working demo of a ‘buddy finder app’ avant la lettre, built on a Windows smartphone. In many ways that pitch represented all the hurdles the mobile revolution still had to take to get where we are now. Fast forward to 2011: what exactly has changed and which traps remain to be avoided?
2011 will be the year of the location platform ‘wars’; and some consolidation is to be expected. Standards are needed in the areas of location, campaign and transaction. Some platforms will reposition their offering to a functional or vertical niche and some will try to strengthen their user base in order to become the category default. I think the decision for consumers and business to jump in the bandwagon will revolve more around privacy and convenience. For the latter, Geotoko is a giant leap forward.