Since at least the 1990s, when personal computers first became commonplace, public policy experts have worried the ill effects of a Digital Divide. That is, a learning, socialization and economic gap across socio-economic status, race and gender caused by unequal access to computing resources.

No need. The Digital Divide has now been bridged by smartphones - the most advanced personal computing devices ever. While personal computers were disproportionally used by the rich, the white and the male, smartphones are more likely to be used by Blacks and Hispanics than Whites, and by girls as equally as boys.

Whites Trail In Smartphone Ownership

According to a Pew research survey conducted last year, 49% of Hispanics and 47% of Blacks own a smartphone, compared to only 42% of Whites. The survey also revealed than men and women were about evenly split (46% to 45%, respectively) in smartphone ownership, as were suburban and urban residents (49% to 48%, respectively).

Only The Income Gap Remains

Mobile computing is a fast-moving revolution that is spreading online access to all who welcome it. In fact, the majority of adult Americans and more than a third of teens now own a smartphone. That said, household income remains a differentiator - there is still a clear gap in smartphone ownership between rich and poor.

Expect this too to disappear very soon as prices continue to fall.

Android smartphones and the latest Nokia Asha devices, for example, are available for less than $100 (no contract needed) all around the world. In the U.S., many smartphones now come free with a carrier voice and data plan. Prices for devices and services will almost certainly continue to drop.

In an interview with Bloomberg last month, venture capitalist Marc Andreessen noted that "$50 Android smartphones" would be available this year.  Carriers that demand fees that millions cannot afford are likely to be routed around - by Google fiber as likely as legislation. Fewer and fewer people, particularly in the United States and other rich countries, will be denied always-on, any-place connectivity to the global Web.

The Smartphone Is The Computer

Naysayers like to retort that smartphones don't fully erase the Digital Divide because, even more than tablets,they are primarily "consumption" devices. While "real" computers, the argument goes, can be used to create things and do real work, smartphones are all about downloading content and chatting on Facebook. 

Work is changing, however, in many cases to take advantage of the spread of smartphones.  Such changes may, in fact, disproportionately favor minorities. A separate Pew study last year revealed that Blacks and Hispanics are more likely to use their mobile devices for a wider range of activities than do Whites. 

(See also Teenagers & Smartphones: How They're Already Changing The World.)

Further, some have called the notion that smartphones are not designed for "real work" an elitist view: 

To discount identity performance, socialization and other activities on social media as not productive, not educational, not meaningful, pure entertainment and a waste of time offensively reduces less privileged folks as “an other,” less worthy and less human.

Productivity Divide?

If smartphones connect an increasing number of Americans to knowledge resources, job opportunities and cultural amenities, are they  delivering a clear and calculable economic benefit equivalent to that provided by PCs? 

It seems that economic analysis has simply not yet caught up with the impact smartphones are having on work and the economy. The Wall Street Journal reported recently that already today's smartphones possess the computing power of a "desktop" in 2005 and that "at heart [smartphones] are like all computers before them. They are efficiency engines, a means of saving time, bridging distance, reducing cost."

Nonetheless, the Journal acknowledges that proving smartphones' aggregate economic value remains difficult: 

Yet there's something bizarre going on. Even as an estimated 130 million smartphones roam the U.S. streets, economists can't quite find them.

Still, as the Journal also states: "Can you find an area of life and business not being affected by the devices?" 

Global Phenomenon

The situation may be even clearer overseas. Already, 89% of the developing world has a mobile device. It's a solid assumption that these mobile phone users will soon transition to smartphones. Indeed, smartphone sales now eclipse traditional mobile phone sales. According to the International Telecommunication Union, "mobile broadband" subscriptions have grown from 278 million in 2007 - when the iPhone was first introduced - to 2.1 billion this year.

These numbers continue to grow - and researchers say the trend is already making a big difference:

• Bridging The Digital Divide In Developing Nations Through Mobile Phone Transaction Systems - University of West Georgia
• Mobile Finance Options Changing Lives In Developing Countries - Bankless Times
• Mobile Technology's Role In Combating Global Poverty And Enabling Entrepreneurship - Brookings Institution
• Alleviating Poverty: Mobile Communications, Microfinance And Small Business Development Around The World - Brookings Institution

As smartphones continue to spread to every demographic group in every corner of the world, there's just no more room for the Digital Divide. That's a big deal, and likely to bring significant economic, social and cultural effects over the coming months, years and decades.

(See also The Numbers Are Clear: Mobile is Taking Over the World.) 

Lead image courtesy of Shutterstock.

As the world goes mobile, businesses around the world are rushing to build app they hope will take center stage on your smartphone home screen. Most are not worth the bother. This seems especially true for apps from non-tech companies, too many of which seem to be poorly designed attempts to create intrusive commercials.

But not every app from non-tech companies fit that description. It turns out that you don't have to be an Amazon or a Google to deliver a great app experience. 

Each of the six apps profiled below fully delivers on the company's core business - making me want to remain (or become) a customer. Beyond that, they are all surprisingly intuitive and helpful. The key characteristic they share? An overriding concern for the user: 

1. CVS Pharmacy: Primary Needs

The CVS app makes great use of multiple smartphone functions. You can easily find a nearby store, use digital coupons to save money, then collect points for additional savings - all within the app.

Scan your prescription's barcode with your smartphone camera to have your medications refilled. If you want a picture from your smartphone's camera printed out, that's easy, too.

The CVS app is simple to use and packed with helpful customer-facing features. If my parents used a smartphone, I would get them this app. The iPhone version of the app has 4.5 stars and nearly 16,000 reviews. 

[iPhone] [Android]

2. In-N-Out Burger: Loyal Following

Not being from California, I am at a loss to explain the cult-like popularity of this burger chain. But, the app is as as good as a Double-Double. Basic, well-made, and exactly what the user wants.

The In-N-Out app offers turn-by-turn navigation to the nearest In-N-Out outlet. Users can store their gift points in the app. For the faithful, the app includes a full menu (including the not-so-secret menu; Animal Style anyone?), downloadable content and the "history of..." In-N-Out. Well done.

[iPhone] [Android]

3. Chase: Personal Service

Perhaps nobody likes dealing with their bank. Though I think this app is great, with more than 71,000 reviews in iTunes alone, it scores only a 3.5 rating. Frankly, I wish my regular bank's app was this good. 

In fact, for what this app allows me to do, and for how easy it is to operate, it not only outdoes other bank apps, it's far more handy than many mainstream tech apps.With the Chase Mobile app, you can scan and deposit checks into your account. It's easy to set automated text alerts - such as for being notified via SMS when you have low balance. You can pay bills through the app, get a complete overview of all your Chase accounts, transfer money, review your transaction history, find a nearby ATM, click-to-call a Chase representative - all very easily, in my opinion.

[iPhone] [Android] 

4. MLB.com: Content-Rich

If you're not a baseball fan you may not care about the MLB's "At Bat" app. This is wrong.

At Bat app's ease of use, it's incredibly dense feature set, and its simple, well-crafted design offering various additional levels of content, all billed through the app, are a thing of beauty. App developers for all content-rich sites should study At Bat.

With this app, users get the latest scores, the latest news, can track their home team, and favorite players. Set notifications for team and players - and know instantly if your favorite pitcher is chasing a no-hitter, then tune-in.  

Want more than animated game graphics? For very reasonable fees, At Bat offers options to listen to any game (home and away feeds). Pay a bit more and you can watch nearly any game, live. Games are also archived and condensed for later viewing. 

At Bat is simple to use, understands its fan base - and their varying levels of fanaticism - and offers greater content depth for each level of user. I suggest every sports league in the world just copy MLB.com's At Bat app. 

[iPhone] [Android] 

5. Grainger: Servicing Core Customers

Grainger sells all manner of industrial supplies, power tools and equipment for builders and contractors. It's been in business since 1927 - but the company obviously understands the importance of technology to support its mission, as its app is great. 

Looking for a highly specific product among thousands of options? Type it or speak it into the search box. You can have the product shipped to you or a nearby store, and track its progress in real-time. You can even get product reviews from other contractors. 

Your shopping cart and data are synched across your computer and smartphone. That's important for contractors who may need to access Grainger from a job site or back at the office. Plus you click-to-call for help, tap for the nearest location,and share purchase/needs lists with co-workers. This app knows what the company's customers need and works hard to fulfill them.

[iPhone] [Android] 

6. Lululemon: A Sense Of Community

Lululemon sells clothes and accessories, primarily for yoga, primarily for women. Its app, Om Finder, is not a shopping app, however. Instead, it focuses on helping users find the nearest and/or best yoga studio, yoga teacher or yoga class. 

The Om Finder app is simple and purposeful. It's all about helping the customer be their best at the thing Lululemon's clothing is best suited for.Users can share tips about a facility or teacher, connect with others through the app and maintain a schedule of their yoga sessions.

Sure, it's not all altruism. Many people who practice yoga are likely to purchase (still more) clothing from Lululemon. This is a smart way for the company to support its business, help its customers and foster a sense of community, all with a single, simple app. Other businesses - not just retailers - should follow Lululemon's lead.

[iPhone only] 

Great Apps Are Everywhere

The shelf life of most apps is not long. The apps listed above, however, all make my life easier, better, happier or more productive - without annoying me, intruding upon my personal space or bombarding me with junk.  

While very different, all these apps offer important lessons in how companies of all types can use mobile applications to please customers, extend their mission and leverage the power of community.

In front of a packed house at the Marriott World Resort in Orlando, BlackBerry President and CEO Thorsten Heins proudly showed off the company's newest devices, including the low-end Q5 designed for developing markets, talked-up the company's updated BB10 platform (10.1) and announced that BBM (BlackBerry Messenger) was going cross-platform. 

Heins was generally upbeat, declaring this year the company's "best launch year ever," all the while gleefully taking swipes at the competition. The market will decide, of course, though this morning's celebratory keynote was clearly designed to ensure all that BlackBerry has emerged from the last few years of painful market declines and is eager to take on the competition.

Z10. Q10. BB10.1.

Heins took some of his shots at Apple and Microsoft, mocking those who suggest that "people want the desktop experience" on a tablet or smartphone. "Really," he mocked. "It simply doesn't work. That's why we built BB10 specifically for a pure mobile experience. We don't serve the desktop market. We are mobile first - the original mobile first." 

Heins then showed off the Z10, which he described as "Perfect for people who want the all-touch experience."

Heins also briefly channeled Steve Jobs: "One more thing: the famous BlackBerry keyboard," he said as he introduced the Q10. "The best physical keyboard on the market today. No one makes keyboards better than BlackBerry." (The Q10 is expected to go on sale in the U.S. by June.)

After showing off the company's two new flagship devices, Heins made the case for why BlackBerry remains relevant in the mobile world. In last four months, he noted, apps for BB10 have increased from 70,000 to "over 120,000" and one third of all developers are now targeting BlackBerry as "their prime platform," Heins claimed.

Heins also took the opportunity to introduce "BlackBerry Channels," a media-rich social messaging service. He also reminded the audience of the scope of the company's messaging service. "BlackBerry Messenger (BBM) has more than 60 million users. More than 10 billion messages are sent every day. Twice the number of any other messaging service."  Another audience wow: BBM is now "cross platform."

BlackBerry Goes Global With Q5

One surprise of the keynote was Heins' introduction of a completely new "BlackBerry device at a global price range." He held up the small, colorful Q5 - "our latest Qwerty device, specifically designed for emerging markets. I know it's going to be a big hit."

Though he did not provide much detail regarding the Q5, it appears to be a direct competitor to Nokia's popular Asha line.

BlackBerry On The Offensive

Throughout his presentation, Heins was delivering the smack downs - alluding that Apple's iOS, Google's Android and Microsoft's Windows Phone each had fundamental weaknesses - and that only BlackBerry was "mobile first." Heins suggested that BlackBerry's pure mobile focus could lead the company and its new BB10 platform to a global resurgence.

"We are working to win back our traditional customers," Heins said, "BlackBerry 10, as a platform, is entirely new. This is not an update to an old BlackBerry OS."

This will not be easy. BlackBerry (formerly RIM), finished 2012 with a 8% global smartphone market share - a significant drop from the previous year. Worse, these numbers are almost entirely based on the company's once-dominant user base of BB7-based devices. By the first quarter of this year, the company failed to even place in the top 5 of all smartphone vendors. For all Hein's positive talk, he provided little in the way of actual sales or distribution data.

Despite the many positive proclamations of BlackBerry's CEO, as the company shifts to a new touch-based and app-centric smartphone operating system its future remains in doubt. Android, iPhone or even Windows Phone may leave little opportunity for the Canadian company to move forward.

Take a moment to think about it. The mobile market - hardware, software, apps, services, infrastructure - is expanding to just about every corner of the wold. And as mobile connects the entire planet - linking billions of people in real-time from almost any place you can imagine - it is re-constructing how people everywhere engage in shopping, banking, entertainment, work, healthcare and learning. 

Mobile Is Everywhere

This isn't news, of course, mobile's momentum has been building for years. But when you consider some of the data released this year - and give it time to really sink in - the implications are staggering.

Figures published earlier this year from the UN's International Telecommunication Union (ITU), for example, reveal the amazing spread of mobile connectivity. According to the ITU's "facts and figures" publication, mobile penetration rates (pdf) are now about equal to the global population - including an 89% penetration rate in "developing countries," which currently have the highest mobile growth rates.

In other words, nearly everyone on the planet has a mobile phone - or will have one soon enough.

The ITU report also notes that "mobile broadband" subscriptions have grown from 278 million in 2007 - when the iPhone was first introduced - to 2.1 billion in 2013 - an annual growth rate of 40%. 

While larger still in the developed world, since 2010, mobile broadband adoption has grown fastest in developing countries - with rates hitting 82% in Africa and 55% in the Arab states.

Cost Still Matters

One stumbling block to universal mobile penetration, of course, remains cost - at least with respect to data connectivity. The price of the phones and smartphones have dropped in price significantly. Consider that Nokia releases its Asha 501 next month - for $99 or less (without being subsidized by a contract). The Asha 501's specs are surprisingly robust, although the device is initially designed only for 2G networks.

Android smartphone prices could go even lower. There are already numerous Android phones available in the developing world for less than $100 (off-contract). And venture capitalist Marc Andreessen recently told Bloomberg, expect $50 Android smartphones to be available this year.

Mobile broadband, though, is still relatively expensive in the developing world. As the ITU notes, whereas an "entry level mobile broadband plan" represents approximately 1-2% of per capita income in developed nations, in developing nations  the cost ranges from 11-25% of per capita income." That said, mobile broadband is often cheaper than wired-broadband in developing countries. 

Mary Meeker's Metrics

If the ITU's numbers aren't enough to convince you that mobile is eating the world, look back just a bit farther.

At the end of 2012, Mary Meeker, an analyst with Kleiner Perkins Caufield and Byers, offered data on global Internet trends and the stunning rise of mobile was plain. There are already, she noted, more than 1 billion smartphone subscribers worldwide. In addition, since the fourth quarter of 2010, smartphone and tablet sales have exceeded PC sales - and the growth trends continue to favor these newer devices. Mobile devices now account for 13% of global Internet traffic - and rising. 

If this keeps up, and all indications are that it's not going to stop any time soon, the global trend toward mobile will reach every corner of the globe and affect just about every aspect of our lives. 

Image courtesy of Shutterstock.

Science fiction movies should help illuminate our path forward - and lay bare the implications of present-day technologies, good and bad. All too often, however, sci-fi movies get the future all wrong. This includes some of our most cherished favorites.

Consider all the flicks featuring flying cars, poorly conceived time travel escapades, sex with aliens or heroes that are either willfully ignorant of present-day technology or savant-like in their ability to manipulate it into doing things it most certainly could never do. How then to select the 10 most worthy of this dubious honor?

Let me defer to popular cyber-punk author William Gibson, who famously stated: "The future is already here — it's just not very evenly distributed." This may be the single most misguided statement about the future ever made. Over and over again the future takes its sweet time arriving, but when it does come it changes everything in unanticipated ways.

Therefore, I'm zeroing in on movies that predicted our scary-glorious future would arrive soon fairly soon, but which instead got everything spectacularly confused. As these 10 glorious misses prove, that's easy enough to do.

On to the show:  

1. Blade Runner

Please forgive me. I love Blade Runner. But it's comically wrong, pretty much about everything. Replicants? Androids on the cusp of being indistinguishable from humans? Memory implants? Colonies on Mars? A "city of 106 million people." A one-world culture that appears to be dominated by Japan but looks like Hong Kong. Crappy phones? Oh, and what's the deal with all that rain in California? Wrong, wrong, wrong.

2. Jurassic Park

If you can get past the cheesy acting and pap dialogue, Jurassic Park is good Spielbergian fun. But it's so off target. A rich man spends figures out how to recreate extinct species and the best application he can come up with a dinosaur theme park? Let's get this straight: this will never happen, not in any future.

Yes, I know... there's no Superman, either. Problem is, this film spends an inordinate amount of time trying to justify its science - and gets it wrong.

3. Brazil 

Terrorists. Excessive cosmetic surgery. Police state. Too many damn tubes and wires? The brilliant Brazil got much right - but was wrong on so many core elements. Ours is not a dystopian world where we are all faceless numbers, easily lost by an overarching, all-encompassing bureaucracy. Just the opposite, in fact. Increasingly, the world is an all-out competition for attention amongst billions of people striving to transcend anonymity. Everything about Brazil is backwards-looking. Worse, it completely missed how everything is going digital.

4. Videodrome

After watching Videodrome many times, I'm still not entirely sure what it's about. Here's my best guess: Cable television tells us what to watch, and as we watch we become changed - emotionally and physically. Um, perhaps. But it seems to me that the Internet is putting us more in control of what we watch, not the other way around.

With all our "second screens" - smartphones and tablets - plus YouTube, the Web and social media, there is never a shortage of personalized content. And most of it won't kill you, at least not right away. Ironically, television has become far less important to us than Videodrome would have ever thought possible.

5. Soylent Green

Spoiler alert: Soylent Green is people!

The world is so over-populated, resources so scarce, that what choice does poor Soylent Industries have but to make its foodstuff from humans? Except, that's not what happened. So far, the future has brought relative abundance - which has its own set of problems. 

6. 2001: A Space Odyssey

If you manage to stay awake through 2001 - no small feat in 2013 - you come to realize how wrong it is about everything. Alien contact, stately flights to the moon and a super-intelligence that is a... mainframe.

Sadly, 2001 spawned far too many copycat films with its silly singular view: Humans are not in charge of their past nor their future. The fact that the women are stewardesses and anyone who can do anything is a white male merely reveals just how clueless this film really was. On the plus side, it still looks and sounds awesome.

7. Fahrenheit 451

There is much good to say about Julie Christie and Francois Truffaut. But you cannot say this movie understood the future. In Fahrenheit 451, a firefighter burns books. This is his duty - because the "government" cannot allow books as they may foster an independent-minded populace.

Whenever this movie comes on, I download one of the thousands of free books that are instantly available to me via Kindle.

8. Inception

Infiltrating someone's unconscious mind. Stealing another's dreams. Controlling what others do by getting inside their head, all Bene Gesserit like? Inception may be cool, and it's certainly frustrating. But we are nowhere close to accomplishing what the film suggests. We can't even cure Alzheimer's. 

9. Logan's Run

In Logan's Run, life is perfect. And then you die. At the ripe old age of 30.

It may not be fair to include this film on the list. After all, it's set 250 years from now. Who knows what will happen in that time? However, given the fact that humanity continues to live longer, spends billions of dollars on extending life, and brilliant scientists such as Ray Kurzweil are actively pursuing a sort-of human-technological immortality through the singularity, I am going to go out on a limb and predict that Logan's Run will always be wrong.

10. Frankenstein

We can now keep people alive by putting inside them the organs of a dead person(s) - or an animal. Does that make the recipient a monster? Frankenstein warned what could happen when we attempt to bring the dead to life, or create a life from the dead. Whether or not we figure out how to do that - it isn't going to play out like Frankenstein.

Those are my choices, and I'll stand behind every one. But these 10 misfires are far from the only movies that completely whiffed on predicting the future. What films would you add to the list? Leave your comments below.

According to a report from Bloomberg this morning, Facebook may be close to acquiring Waze, whose navigation app relies on alerts from users to deliver real-time traffic data. The deal is rumored to be 50% in cash and 50% Facebook stock. Waze, available for iPhone and Android, has been considered a likely acquisition target by Apple and possibly Google.

When asked about the acquisition, a Facebook spokesperson told me: "We don't comment on rumor or speculation."

The Israel-based Waze claims 30 million users and bills itself as the world's "fastest-growing community-based traffic and navigation app." Waze users allow the app to send their driving details to others in the area - for example, how long their commute is taking. Users can also provide additional details on their commute, report accidents and offer driver tips. 

Waze users can share their driving activity with Facebook friends from within the app. Waze has long utilized Facebook to help promote its service - though users do not require a Facebook account.

Waze is considered a direct competitor to Google Maps, whose service also offers real-time traffic data. If Apple does not acquire Waze, it could be due to Waze's insistence, according to Bloomberg, that its ongoing development remain in Israel and that its brand be maintained.

This is less likely a concern for Facebook. When Facebook acquired the popular photo sharing app, Instagram, last year, it allowed the start-up to maintain its identity and has for the most part let it take charge of its development and user base. While many initially questioned that $1 billion purchase, Instagram has continued to grow - and remains popular with younger users.  That said, Facebook has moved development of two other Israeli companies it acquired to the U.S. 

Waze claims that by tapping its community of users, it can provide the best real-time traffic data, road conditions data and even provide users with alerts - based on social sharing - of the cheapest gas prices and quickest routes for a group to take to a particular destination.

Facebook, which has recently adopted a "mobile first" strategy, can certainly dramatically increase the Waze user base. Its recent earnings report revealed 189 million mobile-only users and 751 million "mobile monthly active users." 

In addition to its users, Waze relies upon a community of designated "map editors" to improve its overall value, map detail and real-time routing service.  It is not known how this aspect of the service will be impacted by a Facebook acquisition. 

(See also OpenStreetMap: The Maps In Your Apps Are About To Get A Lot Better) 

According to Forbes, Waze and Facebook have signed a term sheet and a deal is expected for between $800 million - $1 billion. Apple is unlikely to counter because, according to Waze CEO Noam Bardin, it has built a mapping service that is too dependent upon its "GPS partners" and less inclined to tap the Waze community. While some Waze data has been used in Apple Maps, Apple primarily relies upon traditional mapping companies, such as TomTom, for its data. 

To date, Waze has received $67 million in VC funding. If purchased, it will likely be viewed as a major win for the budding SoLoMo (social-local-mobile) ecosystem. For more on Waze, here is a helpful video.

Would you trust the "wisdom of the crowd" over your own doctor? CrowdMed thinks you might. The San Francisco start-up has an audacious plan to use crowdsourcing techniques to tap the "collective wisdom" of strangers to help diagnose patients - particularly those who've bounced from doctor to doctor for years trying to understand uncommon symptoms. 

While many may worry that healthcare is too important to trust to strangers, I think this is awesome. 

After all, crowdsourcing is already used to help find missing persons, track down terrorists, answer life's vexing questions, pick stocks - and to select our President. SETI uses crowdsourcing to search for extraterrestrial life. Why not employ crowdsourcing to help our multi-trillion-dollar healthcare industry? 

CrowdMed recently received $1.1 million in seed financing from some of Silicon Valley's top venture capital firms, including NEA, Greylock Partners, Y Combinator and Andreessen Horowitz. 

Ask Your Doctor? No. Ask the Crowd.

CrowdMed works like this: Patients pay a $199 fee to list their case on CrowdMed. They fill out a "patient questionnaire" that details their symptoms, case history and personal information. Though CrowdMed founder Jared Heyman declined to say exactly how many patients have enrolled so far, he claimed that there has been "pretty strong demand." Without the fee, Heyman explained, the site would be overwhelmed with patients who might not get diagnosed.

Once a case is posted, the crowd, what CrowdMed somewhat coyly terms "MDs" - for "medical detectives" - can review the patient's information and offer up what they believe is the correct - or most likely - diagnosis. 

According to Heyman, "close to 3,000 people have signed up as medical detectives." He said CrowdMed's "MDs" include doctors, residents and "regular people that like solving medical mysteries." Why sign up to be a medical detective? First, there's the chance to help patients. Second, CrowdMed awards its detectives "points" for the diagnoses they correctly predict. 

CrowdMed utilizes a so-called prediction market methodology to help glean the correct diagnosis. For example, when a detective selects a case to review, they use up some of their points. They use up still more when they suggest a diagnosis or vote up (or down) other suggested diagnoses. Essentially, it "costs" to play. The more accurate their predictions, however, the more points they are ultimately awarded. 

Points do not have any cash value, however. For now, they can be exchanged only for donations to Watsi, an organization that helps fund medical treatments in the developing world. Heyman did not say how much CrowdMed is donating.

While it's true that CrowdMed's detectives may not always correctly diagnose a particular patient, if they can narrow the likelihood of someone's illness to, say, two or three likely options - those that garner the most points, for example - that could speed up decision making and help point to which tests should be perfomed. 

In Crowd We Trust?

The obvious question: Can a crowd of strangers with unknown amounts of medical expertise be trusted to safely and correctly diagnose baffling medical problems? CrowdMed claims that after "four years of development" it possess a patented "unique technology" specifically designed to optimize group intelligence for medical diagnostic purposes. From its site:

Groups hold far more knowledge collectively than any individual member, no matter how brilliant. With hundreds of minds working in parallel, groups can process information much faster than individuals.

Heyman told me that his sister suffered for three years from a rare disease. Once it was finally correctly diagnosed, doctors were able to significantly ease her symptoms. CrowdMed used her case to help validate its model - Heyman says it accurately diagnosed her within days. 

What Do Real MDs Think?

The first rule of medicine is primum non nocere, Latin for "first, do no harm." It does not necessarily apply to the crowd. Not surprisingly, the CrowdMed approach bothers many real doctors.

Dr. Hubert Chen, the Associate Medical Director for biotech pioneer Genentech, said, "I want to be enthusiastic, but I have concerns about it." Dr. Chen's primary concern was the potential for numerous "false positives" that CrowdMed's "detectives" might generate: "I've seen many patients misled by the Web. Doctors often have to un-educate them."

Dr. Aaron Roland, wo runs a family practice in northern California and is an associate clinical professor at UC San Francisco, had different concerns. "I wouldn't pay $200," Rolan said. He also wondered whether CrowdMed could attract the scale it needs. "Crowdsourcing is good when there's a lot of people in the crowd," he said, "but until you get that crowd, I'm suspicious."

Industry Connections

To help attract the required crowd, Heyman recruited Clare Martorana, the long-time editor of WebMD, to help support CrowdMed's outreach efforts. 

Not surprisingly, Martorana was very positive about the concept. There are many "experts," she said, not necessarily doctors, who may have suffered from a particular disease, or have a family member who has suffered, and whom can now contribute to the site.

She hopes to "reach out" to staffers - not just doctors - at medical research, counseling and support organizations that concentrate on specific issues - think, autism, for example, or Parkinson's dioease - and encourage them to participate in CrowdMed.

Martorana also suggested crowdsourcing diagnoses could be a boon for health insurance companies: "If you are insured and going to multiple specialists, but not getting relief, that costs a lot of money - you, your employer, your insurer all must bear those costs. At some point, there probably will be a pretty significant revenue stream for CrowdMed coming from insurance companies. Right now, their cost numbers are staggering."

Staggering Potential

The relatively paltry $1.1 million CrowdMed has raised so far suggest that investors remain unsure of the idea's potential risks and rewards. But connecting patients with chronic medical symptoms to experts, regardless of their titles, clearly holds massive disruptive potential. CrowdMed's ambitious, even inspiring idea is to use connectivity, collaboration and collective intelligence to help people avoid needless suffering. Despite the risks, it seems like it's a worth a try to me.

See also

• Social Revolution: Crowdsourcing For Change
• The Problem With Crowdsourcing Crime Reporting In The Mexican Drug War
• The Key To Crowdsourcing: Smarter Crowds

Lead image courtesy of Shutterstock. Images of Jared Heyman and Carly Heyman courtesy of CrowdMed. Image of Clare Martorana via LinkedIn.

In a CNBC interview interview aired on Monday, Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates suggests that Windows 8 and Microsoft's Surface tablet line could ultimately dethrone Apple's iPad from its global tablet crown because iPad "users are frustrated." 

Yikes! I guess Gates has access to the really good stuff.

Office Should Be Everywhere

Last month, I took Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer to task for delaying the arrival of Microsoft Office productivity suite on devices running Apple's iOS and Google's Android operating system. I was hoping Gates would set Ballmer straight. Unfortunately, Gates appears as confused as Ballmer - and equally tied to the contracting PC ecosystem over which Microsoft has long ruled.

(See also Ballmer's Latest Blunder: No Office For iOS And Android Till 2014)

It's great that Gates cares so much about user frustration. Only, in this case he gets it exactly wrong:

A lot of (iPad) users are frustrated. They can't type. They can't create documents. So we're providing them something with the benefits they've seen that has made that a big category but without giving up what they expect in a PC. If you have Surface or Surface Pro, you have the portability of the tablet but the richness in terms of the keyboard (and) Microsoft Office of the PC.

Wrong, wrong, wrong.

Users are not clamoring for iPad to be more like a PC. If anything, users want their PCs to be more like the iPad. So far at least, the market makes that pretty darn clear: In the most recent quarter, Apple sold 19.5 million iPads - compared to 11.8 million in the same quarter last year. The Surface? Not so much.

According to IDC tablet sales data, of the 49.2 million tablets that shipped this past quarter, the Surface accounted for a paltry 0.9 million - 1.8% of the market. In other words, the Surface barely rises above a rounding error. Worse, it's not just the Surface. As IDC notes: "(All) Windows 8 and Windows RT tablets continued to struggle to gain traction in the market." The combined total of Windows 8 and Windows RT sales across all vendors hits a still-minuscule 1.8 million units.

That's about what Apple's iPad line sells in a week.

Gates Doubles Down On Ballmer's Mobile Strategy

Earlier this year, Gates surprised analysts when he publicly stated that Microsoft's mobile strategy was "clearly a mistake." Many observers believed we would soon witness a rapid turnaround in the company's mobile strategy - including the Surface and Windows Phone. 

No such luck. Today's Bill Gates is completely on-message with Steve Ballmer:

Windows 8 is revolutionary in that it takes the benefits of the tablet and the benefits of the PC (so) if you have Surface and Surface Pro you've got that portability of the tablet but the richness in terms of the keyboard and Microsoft Office of the PC.

Gates is looking in the rear view mirror. While the global Windows user base of 1.25 billion is indeed massive, the PC market is no longer growing. Apple's iOS - iPhone and iPad - are poised to surpass Windows. And Apple's iOS is going to be only the second most popular personal computing platform - after Android.

(See also Windows Phone, Still An Underdog, Comes Out Swinging.)

Rather than touting the add-on Surface keyboard and the tablet's support of Office, Microsoft should be focused on porting Office to what will soon be the world's two most popular personal computing platforms - iOS and Android. As I said last month, "There was a time when Apple needed Office to be on the Mac. That time is past. Now, Microsoft needs Office to be on Apple's iOS and Google's Android."

The numbers don't lie: For  the past quarter, the tablet market - which includes Surface - grew 142%. In stark contrast, the PC market fell 13.9%.  

(See also The Real Reason Windows Phone Is Failing.)

Inexplicably, Gates and Ballmer don't seem to see what everyone else is looking at. The market has spoken, and the market does not want to be tied to the PC. Microsoft has an opportunity to leverage its strengths in productivity software to the leading platforms, but is too stubborn to let go of its dreams of Windows dominating the mobile space. Clinging to the proverbial 'stay the course' message is exactly the wrong thing for Microsoft to say and do.

Image of Bill Gates courtesy of Shutterstock. 

Worried about your longevity as a worker in the fast-moving tech industry? What you need is some inspiration from John Sloan.

Who's John Sloan? He's the man pictured in a photo I used in a recent post on 10 Technology Skills That Will No Longer Help You Get A Job. (See that photo below - or on the iPad in the photo above.) While Sloan may look like a symbol of outdated technology in the older photo, he's actually the polar opposite. As, in fact, the newer photo of him above should lead you to believe.

Sloan, aka Chip Overclock, has not only participated in the many amazing, globe-spanning, nano-shrinking changes in computer tech over the past four decades, he has stayed current with the changes - and kept himself gainfully employed - by taking full responsibility for his own career and professional development.

Pictures Tell The Story

The picture below shows Sloan at Wright State University, Ohio, circa 1976. He would soon go on to earn his B.S. in computer science, and later his master's degree. He's seated next to an IBM System/360 Model 65.

Sloan, now 56, lives in Denver. Several of his friends saw my story and noticed the photo, and forwarded it to him, which prompted him to contact me. Sloan describes his current career as a "freelance product developer specializing in real-time and highly concurrent systems." The photo at the top of this post shows Sloan next to his Mac Mini with Cinema Display. That's a first-generation iPad he's holding - displaying the original picture, no less.

Why John Sloan's Story Matters

Talking to John Sloan made it clear that long-term survival in the tech industry was about much more than just mastering a specific set of skills. Instead, it's all about taking personal responsibility for learning and adapting over the years and decades:

ReadWrite: Getting a computer science degree in 1976 was an awfully forward-thinking move.

John Sloan: It was the closest I could get to living in the kind of science fictional universe that I was reading about and watching on television. I still remember today watching the very first episode of the original Star Trek.

ReadWrite: Are you currently employed?  

John Sloan: I'm a self-employed, offering consulting and contracting through my one-man company, Digital Aggregates, and have been since 2006.

ReadWrite: How do you stay connected to all the changes in the computer industry?

John Sloan: I spend almost all my time (when not working with clients) on professional development. I read, I attend conferences, I learn new skills. This is the kind of professional development that companies simply no longer offer anymore to their regular employees. My company exists not just to service my clients, but to keep me current and employable.

Favorite Tech And Tools

ReadWrite: What technologies have you worked on over the years?

John Sloan: I've had a lot of career success, almost all in the systems area, much of it working low in the software stack, close to bare metal. I've worked on IBM mainframes, PDP-11 minicomputers. Cray supercomputers [all the way] to huge distributed Linux systems. My current gig is developing a tiny PBX with Iridium transceivers that will allow flyers in business jets to make phone calls from anywhere in the world.

John Sloan: My iPhone 5. I have no idea how I'd live without it.

ReadWrite: One of the big tech shifts has been the move to open source. How have you tackled this change?

John Sloan: Open source has been very good to me. For several years now a lot of my income has come from hacking open source software ranging from various portions of the Apache software stack written in Java to the Linux kernel and various portions of the GNU software stack in C.

The economics of open source is the most interesting part about it. Back in the mainframe days, you bought the hardware, and got the software and support for free. Now the hardware is almost free, the software is mostly free, and the support is how a lot of companies book revenue.  

ReadWrite: What about the shift from desktop to mobile?

John Sloan: Every time I pick up my iPhone 5 or my iPad, I feel like I'm in a science fiction movie. Same goes for the Android mobiles. I also have a Samsung Galaxy tablet. It's astounding.

Tech Advice For Young And Old

ReadWrite: Do you have any advice for workers who have been in the industry a long time?

John Sloan: Do not trust your career and professional development to your employer. You absolutely must take charge of this yourself.

ReadWrite: What about advice for those just starting out?

John Sloan: No matter what technologies is being taught when a freshman enters university, they will almost certainly not be the ones being taught when that senior graduates. And whatever technologies that student learns will not be what he ends up needing expertise in when he enters the workforce. Continuous, life-long learning isn't a buzzword, it's a requirement.

People who grasp specific technologies but can't quickly learn new ones on their own are the ones who are going to be laid off or whose jobs are going to be outsourced.

ReadWrite: Anything else you want to add?

John Sloan: Hardly a day goes by in which my wife of nearly 30 years and I don't remark on how lucky we've been. Just the other day one of my friends and former Bell Labs colleagues remarked that she was surprised that she still got paid good money to do what she loves to do. I feel the same way.

Lead image courtesy of Flickr.

Mystery Science Theater 3000 - affectionately known as MST3K to its legion of fans - is a "cult television comedy series" that mocked forgotten science fiction films from 1988-1999. Its heart still beats, as three long-time writers and stars for the show - Michael J. Nelson, Bill Corbett and Kevin Murphy - continue to serve up hilarious "riffs" on B-movies online at their site RiffTrax. 

Now the trio want to take on Hollywood - with your help - and mock big-budget blockbusters, such as Twilight and The Hunger Games, in front of a live audience. They also want to help everyone create their own riffs on movies and TV shows.

Movie Rights Are Not Cheap

The tagline for RiffTrax is: "We don't make movies, we make fun of them." But Hollywood doesn't want its movies made fun of, so the RiffTrax crew can currently do their thing only for films that are either in the public domain or whose rights come very cheap. (Owners of really bad movies, not surprisingly, let their works go for very little.)

For flicks like Birdemic or Kingdom of the Spiders (William Shatner's finest performance of 1977), RiffTrax customers download a single file (available in numerous formats), typically for $10, and watch on an iPad or laptop, or burn it onto a DVD. But that won't work for popular films, like Thor or The Avengers, or the Patrick Swayze classic, Roadhouse, whose licensing costs are too high.

For blockbusters, the RiffTrax group records its audio commentary in MP3 format. Users download the file, typically for a $4 fee, then play the MP3 on a laptop or iPod, for example, while watching the movie on a television screen. It's certainly not an elegant solution, so the crew is trying raise enough cash to license more high-profile films.

A highly successful Kickstarter campaign seeking to secure the rights to broadcast Twilight - just so it can be made fun of - netted $265,000 against an original goal of $55,000. The hope, according to Bill Corbett, is that by "backing up the money truck" to Hollywood, RiffTrax can secure the rights to the movies that need mocking most.

Once a deal is signed - it's currently in negotiations - the trio plan to riff the film live and stream the performance (also live) to "hundreds" of other theaters. They also hope to offer a copy of the performance as a DVD or download - film and riff embedded together.

The Riffmasters

To get the inside scoop, I spoke with "riffmaster" Michael J. Nelson:

ReadWrite: Describe RiffTrax to the uninitiated.

Mike Nelson: It's like sitting down to watch a movie with your funniest friends. 

ReadWrite: Why are there no puppets like on MST3K? 

Mike Nelson: RiffTrax is a different animal. We don't own the copyright to the MST3K puppets. Plus, it just wouldn't work for synching commentary tracks to the popular movies." 

ReadWrite: Why start the Kickstarter campaign with Twilight?

Mike Nelson: Twilight's been our single most popular [downloadable] riff to date. We want to do a live riff of the film and stream that to hundreds of other theaters.

ReadWrite: What's the process for choosing a movie to riff?

Mike Nelson: It's hard to make fun of a film that's trying to be funny but fails. It has to be either unintentionally bad or taking itself too seriously. When I first watched Birdemic, for example, I assumed the director had to be joking. He wasn't - that makes all the difference. 

ReadWrite: Do fans help you decide which movies to riff on?

Mike Nelson: Definitely. On Twitter and Facebook, or the user forum on our site. We have a backlog so can't always get to their choice right away, but we listen.   

ReadWrite: Tell me about iRiffs.

Mike Nelson: iRiffs is the section on our site where anyone can upload their movie commentaries. We have minimal requirements - as long as the content isn't deeply offensive, you can offer your riff through the site.

ReadWrite: And you split the revenues with the individual?

MN: Correct. I would like to say that anyone who uploads their riff to our site, please use a halfway decent USB microphone. Too many poor mics have killed some otherwise great performances.

ReadWrite: There were several other people involved in writing and performing for Mystery Science Theater. Why only you, Kevin and Bill for RiffTrax?

Mike Nelson: Kevin, Bill and I were the last in-theater performers when MST3K ended. We all lived near one another in Minnesota, and were doing a lot of projects together. We fell into an easy rapport, so when I started RiffTrax in 2006 it was easy to bring those two onboard. Joel [Hodgson - the original host] wanted to get Cinematic Titanic up and running so it never worked out for everyone to be together." [Cinematic Titanic includes several MST3K performers who similarly offer film riff performances of B movies. The group has said that this will be its final year working together.] 

Finally, I asked riffmaster Bill Corbett if the crew had any plans to make it's own deliberately bad movie:

None. I think it would be surprisingly hard to recreate the magic of an unintentionally bad movie. It would wind up too self-conscious. We've seen a lot of attempts to do that, and they never capture the exquisite fun and weirdness of someone trying in earnest to make a serious movie, and just making a mess of it.

Lead image from Mystery Science Theater 3000 Presents Laserblast.

Picture of the RiffTrax team, from left to right: Bill Corbett, Kevin Murphy, Michael J. Nelson.

Twitter's Vine could be the killer app for Google Glass. They (should) go together like strawberries and chocolate.

Yes, Google Glass needs a killer app. Beyond the breathless hype by white guys in Silicon Valley, what exactly is the mass market supposed to do with Google Glass? The most talked-about Glass uses, like augmented reality and instant data presentation, don't have obvious appeal outside of the early adopter community. 

(See also 10 Compelling Ways People Plan To Use Google Glass.)

Vine on Glass, however, could be something almost everyone could get into. Vine on Glass would let all your followers - and potentially the whole world - see what you see, almost as soon as you see it, in an easily digestible form. While you could do much of this with a smartphone, when you see something you want to record, you need to pull out your phone and power up the video camera. Not so with Glass, which promises an almost frictionless experience. If you are wearing Glass, you could Vine, effortlessly.  

This has never been possible before. 

Making The Vine-On-Glass Match

The six-second limit on Vine videos also means that Glass wearers don't need to constantly stream everything they see, allowing Glass users to maintain full control and ownership over what they record, and what they share. Six seconds is long enough to capture the moment - the feel of an event or experience - in a way that is powerful, easy to record and share, but not so long that viewers get bored or creeped out. And Vine videos don't require the kind of editing and composition skills that it takes to make watchable longer form movies.

I suspect both Twitter and Google are already working on a partnership - though neither responded to my request for comment. Venture capitalist John Doerr has hinted that Twitter is already working on a Twitter - Glass app. First stop tweet, next stop picture, then... Vine: Hands-free, real-time, short videos, shot instantly with Glass, distributed instantly to the world via Twitter. And the companies are hardly strangers: Google used Twitter to help choose who would be first to own Glass with its #ifihadglass promotion.

Sure, Google would rather users share their videos on Google+. But Twitter has proven that no one does real-time sharing better, and the short, bursty Vine format combines the best of Twitter and Glass. 

How Would It Work?

Admittedly, there are some issues with creating Vine videos on Glass. Do you move your head? Stand still? How many taps to initiate recording and/or uploading? Based on the latest Project Glass "how to" video, however, even those minor barriers appear to be falling. 

Vine On Glass Use Cases

Unless and until we actually get Vine on Glass, we won't know how the combo would be used. But here are some likely scenarios:

• Ask your followers if the awesome shoes you are trying on are right for you.
• Impress followers with your amazing view of the San Francisco skyline - or just tease them with what you see in real, physical space.
• Show them how the guy three persons ahead of you in line is being a total jerk.
• Let them cry with you as you hold your newborn for the first time, or coo with you when you take your new puppy home - all while your hands remain completely free and in the moment. 
• You witness a traffic accident and immediately report all details, including video and audio of the aftermath. 
• POV video from sports events - as a spectator or even a participant.

The Vines embedded below offer more examples of Vines that would work even better if they had been recorded with Google Glass instead of an iPhone:

Mark Zuckerberg likes to say that Facebook is now a "mobile first, mobile best" company - and the company's earnings report for the quarter ended March 31, 2013 actually backs him up, in both usage rates and revenue:

Mobile ad revenue for the quarter ending March 31, 2013 was $375 million, accounted for 30% of the company's total ad revenues. That is up from 23% in the last quarter of 2012.

COO Sheryl Sandberg claimed that Facebook ads helped drive "25 million" app downloads. (Essentially, developers pay to promote their app inside a user's Newsfeed. Click on the ad and go straight to Google Play or Apple's App Store.) Zuckerberg added that, "I think it’s clear now that we can create a lot of value for [developers] by providing identity. We’re starting to see real revenue from mobile app installs.” The company said 40% of top-grossing iOS and Android apps were promoted on Facebook.

Facebook boasted 751 million mobile "monthly active users" - a 54% increase over the same quarter last year and 71 million more than it registered in the fourth quarter of 2012.

In fact, the now company claims 189 million mobile-only monthly active users, up from just 83 million a year ago and 157 million in the last quarter of 2012

The first quarter also saw the debut of the Facebook Home launcher. So far, though, Facebook Home has fewer than a million downloads and only a 2 (out of 5) rating. Sales of the HTC First smartphone, which has Home embedded, have been rumored to be minimal. On the earnings call, Zuckerberg described both Home and the company's new Graph Search as "long-term investments." 

Facebook did not break out mobile usage by geography or platform (e.g. iPhone vs. Android), nor did it  separate user data by age or other demographics. Sanderberg, however, did say that the company's mobile ad business was doing particularly well in Asia. 

Do Kids Still Like Facebook?

Overall, Facebook brought in $1.46 billion for the quarter, generally in line with Wall Street expectations - and a 38% increase year-over-year. Revenue from advertising hit $1.25 billion, a 43% increase year-over-year. Advertising accounted for 85% of Facebook's total quarterly revenues, with payments and fees delivering the remainder.

Revenue aside, many of the rumors circulating around Facebook concerned worries that the world's largest social network was beginning to lose members, particularly young users in the U.S. and other developed countries, and that existing users were becoming less engaged. On the conference call, CFO David Ebersman was asked if "kids still like Facebook." He responded by stating that "Facebook is awesome for everyone, regardless of age. And, yes, kids still like Facebook." Ebersman also claimed that, "Younger users are more active and engaged than other users... as for competitors, this is not a zero sum game."

While Facebook did not fully address these questions, overall the Facebook user numbers looked relatively healthy:

• 665 million "daily active users" on average for March 2013 - a slight increase over Q4 2012's 618 million, and a 26% increase year-over-year
• Monthly active users were 1.11 billion as of March 31, 2013 - a 23% increase year-over-year and up slightly from 1.056 billion in the fourth quarter of 2012.
• Instagram had 100 million monthly active users during the quarter

See also Facebook earnings summary and earnings slides (pdf).  

Update: Want to know what happend to the engineer in the 1976 photo above? Click here to find out how he he managed to stay relevant for almost 40 years: How To Thrive In The Tech Industry For Decades.

If you want to know the most in-demand tech skills, that info is readily available. Want to learn the programming skills most coveted by employers? Done. But what are the skills and specialties that no one wants any more? What core competencies raise red flags instead of call backs? 

(See also the Top 7 Most In Demand Tech Skills For 2013 and 15 Programming Skills Most Coveted By Employers.)

A survey of 1,100 tech-hiring professionals by Dice, a job firm for tech professionals, offers some insight. Combining the Dice survey and other research, including an off-the-record conversation with an engineering VP who participates in hiring decisions, here are some of the outdated tech skills and withering technologies to be wary of putting on your resume:  

1. Windows XP Admin/Help Desk

Many IT professionals, from engineers to help desk support workers to system administrators, have significant XP experience. Unfortunately, this may no longer be a useful attribute. Windows XP still holds the #2 spot for desktop operating market share (just behind Windows 7), but its fate is sealed. Microsoft ended XP license sales more than two years ago and plans to cease supporting it in less than a year. 

(See also Microsoft Is Trying To Sell Windows 8 To Enterprises, But Most Want Windows 7 Instead.)

2. Adobe Flash Developer/Designer

Web developers, app developers and designers have long relied on Adobe Flash to create interactive features. Yet Flash's future, particularly on mobile - is quickly drying up. It's now been three years since Steve Jobs created a stir when he posted his Thoughts on Flash memo outlining the reasons why Flash would not be part of Apple's iOS. At the time, Flash was considered so dominant that many analysts wondered if Jobs' decision would crush iPhone sales.

It did not.

Just over a year after the Jobs memo, Adobe announced it would stop developing Flash for mobile devices. Today, Adobe's former CTO, Kevin Lynch, works for Apple. The future belongs to HTML5. Learn, write and build accordingly.

3. Software Support

The transformation of computing from desktop to mobile, and especially the transition of software and services into the cloud is limiting opportunities for traditional/packaged software support. Today, you need to know how to manage software services and software configurations in the cloud. 

(See also Legacy IT Vendors Shoot The Sales Messenger.)

4. SEO Specialist

Google no longer has a Search group. It's now called "Knowledge." That should be a telling warning for all the search engine optimization (SEO) gurus and ninjas looking for work. Expect SEO work to be de-valued going forward. The explosion of smartphones, apps and real-time location information - and especially social media recommendation - is diminishing the importance of search results. Eventually, information may be delivered to us even before we search for it as our integrated, connected systems anticipate our needs.

5. Quality Assurance Specialist and Managers

Hiring professionals in the Dice survey placed Quality Assurance (QA) on the "low priority" side of the ledger. Do not expect this to change. These days, the tech industry seems to be following Google's lead and turning everyone into beta testers. Users are the ultimate quality assurance staff - and they don't get paid!

6. - 9. Mainframes, Voice Telephony, PC Support, COBOL

According to a recent story in the Austin Post, tech recruiters "recommended (that) a 40-year-old still working in COBOL reevaluate why they're a coder." Pretty harsh. But the fact is, technology continues to move forward with no time spared for sentiment.

If you are gainfully employed as a PC repair tech, a COBOL coder, or are working on any of several older technologies, such as voice telephony or as a PBX technician, say, good for you. But don't count on keeping that job for the long-term, or being able to find another one like it. 

10. Something That Seems Secure Today

The TIOBE Programming Community Index lists C, Java, C++ and Objective-C as the programming skills most in demand right now. But here's the thing. In 2009, Objective-C was barely in use. The rapid success of the iPhone and iPad vaulted the language's popularity. Now, however, just over three years later, its popularity is already stabilizing.

In today's superheated technology environment, even the most popular, most secure seeming technology skills can suddenly become obsolete. That's just the way it is. No matter how in-demand your current skill set, you can never rest on your resume. 

Learning Is The Key

Will highlighting the wrong skill set to a recruiter brand you as out of touch - or too expensive to hire? Perhaps. But don't expect anyone to tell you that's what going on. More likely, they may just won't return your call, or let your resume vanish into the ether. (There will probably always be a few legacy jobs in all these areas, but that's about it.)

The only solution is to keep learning - and keep showing that you can learn. While the pace of skills disruption may well be increasing, learning new skills has never been easier. That includes formal schooling as well as free and low-cost resources like Khan Academy and CodeAcademy, for example. 

Here's the bottom line: Since so much technology is fairly new to everyone, why should a company invest in experienced candidates - rather than someone just starting out? Writing for The Wall Street Journal, business professor and entrepreneur Vivek Wadhwa, was brutally direct:

It may be wrong, but look at this from the point of view of the employer. Why would any company pay a computer programmer with out-of-date skills a salary of say $150,000, when it can hire a fresh graduate — who has no skills — for around $60,000? Even if it spends a month training the younger worker, the company is still far ahead. 

(See also Vivek Wadwha in How A $20 Tablet Will Change The World [Video].)

It's not just about the money, of course. To justify any salary, it's not only about what you know - now - but what you can learn going forward. The key to a long career in Silicon Valley, or anywhere in the tech world, is showing that you can learn and adapt - and master - constant change.

Good luck!

Lead image courtesy of Flickr.

A new survey of IT decision makers by SAP and Harris Interactive reithat the rise of machine to machine (M2M) communications - more commonly referred to as the "Internet of Things" - is on the cusp of transforming our homes, our cities and how business is conducted.

How, you ask?

• By leveraging Big Data and real-time analytics to improve parking and traffic flow, which could reduce pollution and traffic accidents as well.
• By managing all the gadgets in our homes, from lights, computers and smartphones down to our coffeemaker and garage door. Wake up, the coffee is brewing, the house is heated, the car already knows the best route to work and the news we need is showing on the screen of our choice - prioritized, obviously.
• Connected cars, roads and smartphones will guide us to the nearest open parking spot - and bill us automatically.

This Internet of Things will also let businesses increase "efficiency, productivity and collaboration," as it delivers real-time data and insight when and where it's most needed, including to a widely dispersed, highly mobile workforce.

Buried within the survey results are such nuggets as:

• Mobile devices will outnumber humans this year. 
• 90% of consumer-connected devices will have access to some personal cloud in 2013.
• 24 billion devices will be connected to the Internet by 2020.
• 66% of IT professionals surveyed believe business and consumer technology will converge within 3-5 years - great news for consumer tech leaders like Apple, Samsung and Google.
• At least 4 billion terabytes of data will be generated this year alone.
• The trend toward BYOD (Bring Your Own Device) has clear and present business repercussions: 75% of the surveyed IT professionals believe that employees' personal use of mobile devices impacts how the business itself uses the cloud. 
• 65% think the Internet of Things' biggest challent in managing and analyzing the resulting real-time data.

(Note: SAP and Harris have also prepared an infographic of the survey results, visible here.)

Global Phenomenon

The business-funded survey of 751 IT "decision makers" was generally upbeat about the Internet of Things. A statement released with the survey suggested connecting data from CRM systems, social media and billions of devices, all in real time, will result in "the ultimate social media collaboration of man and machine." 

That said, it is somewhat surprising that IT decision makers in developing countries - China, India and Brazil - appear more eager eager for the M2M revolution. Consider the response percentages to specific statements regarding the Internet of Things:

• Gives companies greater insight into their business: China (96%), India (88%), Brazil (86%), Germany (79%), U.S. (74%) and UK (61%)
• Enables businesses to respond to real world events: China (92%), India (86%), Brazil (82 %), Germany (82%), U.S. (78%) and UK (73%)
• Increases business efficiency:  Brazil (54%), UK (53%) and U..S (49%)
• Increases productivity for employees:  China (69 percent) - significantly higher than any other countries surveyed

Nearly all decision makers (89%) across all surveyed countries agreed, however, that widespread availability of LTE/4G infrastructure was vital for the success of the Internet of Things. This will likely not come cheap, however. A recent statement by Cambridge Wireless noted that today's mobile networks are "lacking ubiquitous coverage" and suggested that "service tariffs are too high to support" the full potential of the Internet of Things.

(See also Futurist's Cheat Sheet: Internet of Things)

The hope of the Internet of Things is that greater connectivity, vastly more data, improved data analysis - and response - will make our lives better in ways we can scarcely predict, at home, on the road, at work; everywhere.

Note: Per SAP, "the survey was conducted online by Harris Interactive on behalf of SAP among 751 IT decision makers in Brazil (n=126), China (n=125), Germany (n=125), India (n=125), the United Kingdom (n=125) and the United States (n=125) between January 15 and February 1, 2013."

Windows Phone got some good news and some bad news today from the consumer research firm Kantar. The bad: Microsoft's smartphone OS accounted for a meager 5.6% of all U.S. smartphone sales in the first quarter. The comparable number for Android was 49%; for iOS, 44%.

The good: Windows Phone's showing was a significant improvement, up a full 1.9 percentage points over a year earlier. By contrast, Blackberry — which is rolling out its new operating system, BlackBerry 10 — saw its U.S. share crater in the quarter to less than 1% from 3.7% a year ago. 

In a statement, Kantar analyst Mary-Ann Paralto noted that Windows Phone is "now at its highest sales share figure" ever in the U.S. 

Possibly in anticipation of the good news, Microsoft has just released a new Windows Phone commercial. It doesn't show off the platform nor offer any reason why Windows Phone is a better choice than its rivals. Rather, it takes a page from Samsung and mocks both iPhone and Android users.

When you're far behind in the market, casting yourself as a viable alternative to the market leaders — while simultaneously mocking said leaders — can be a winning strategy. Or, you know, it can smack of desperation.

In this case, however, the ad is so over-the-top, and Microsoft appears to be having so much fun making fun of iPhone and Android users, that it works. Android users are silly hipsters. iPhone users are old. Siri doesn't work. Samsung devices are ridiculously large.

Will the ad help Microsoft sell more Windows Phone phones? Doubtful.

The problem is that the ad is focused on the wrong audience: current iPhone and Android users. Even at the end, Microsoft says, "don't fight, switch." Only, those existing users aren't Microsoft's logical target. Microsoft needs to target folks who haven't yet chosen a side — that is, owners of non-smartphones (what the industry, for its own unfathomable reasons, calls "feature phones"). The Kantar survey noted as much (emphasis added): 

Windows strength appears to be the ability to attract first time smartphone buyers, upgrading from a featurephone. Of those who changed their phone over the last year to a Windows smartphone, 52% had previously owned a featurephone.  

Building market share based on getting iPhone and Android users to switch is likely not a winning strategy, at least not yet. An analysis of U.S. smartphone owners, for example, found that 91% of current iPhone owners planned to stay with the platform — and the majority of those who were likely to switch planned to switch to Android. A smaller, though still sizable 76% of Android users planned to stay with the platform. Most of those likely to switch intend to get an iPhone, not Windows Phone.

But there's no reason to expect the rational from Microsoft — not when it's so far behind. With the new mocking ad, and the large gap between Windows Phone and leaders iPhone and Android, expect Microsoft's marketing to become even more aggressive and in-your-face.

Earlier this year, founder Bill Gates publicly stated he was not pleased with Microsoft's mobile device sales and he characterized the company's smartphone strategy as a "mistake." That no doubt lit a fire under Steve Ballmer and company. Who knows, maybe the scenes inside Microsoft's Redmond headquarters are as acrimonious as those in its newest commercial. 

Along with the U.S., Kantar tracks smartphone sales data in 9 countries, including China, Australia, Japan, France and Great Britain. Now that Symbian has been effectively deprecated, Windows Phone appears set to take third place — a very distant third place — in all of them, with the possible exception of Japan.  

Lead image from Windows Phone video

College students are understood to be incredibly savvy at social networking - 90% regularly use Facebook, for example. Yet too many students fail to leverage readily available professional social networking platforms, such as LinkedIn, to help launch or accelerate their careers. In my first post on this phenomenon, I was struck by two seemingly opposing facts:

1. More than half of recent graduates are either unemployed or underemployed.
2. Nearly half of current college students "have never used LinkedIn - typically thought of as the social network for job seekers." Even among those that do, LinkedIn is not typically a priority in their job search. 

Are students blissfully naive? Certain that they will land that perfect job upon graduation based solely on personal relationships? Are colleges not doing enough to promote the value of professional networking? What about LinkedIn itself ? Could it do more to appeal to students?

Turns out, there is plenty of blame to spread around.

(See also Why Aren't College Students Using LinkedIn To find Jobs?)

Fear Uncertainty And Doubt

A common theme across commenters and tweeters of my first post was that students need help in their employment search and aren't sure how to get it despite the many online services available to them. Students aren't convinced their schools are doing enough to guide them, and many simply do not believe LinkedIn, for example, offers much help for students just starting out in the professional world. A sampling of comments:

LinkedIn contains useless job listings:

Companies that rely on LinkedIn for recruiting are generally doing so because they don't want to pay for any other means of finding good people—and that pretty much tells you all you need to know.

Colleges are not helping:

I just spent 2 hours with my Intern (who is a Senior at our local University) learning Linkedin. She said that her University "tells" the Seniors that they need and should have a profile on Linkedin but don't tell them "how" to do it. That generation is very computer savvy, however, [they] don't know what to put onto Linkedin.

Students fail to understand LinkedIn's potential:

Several years ago I founded a LinkedIn discussion group, Girls Who Print, for women in the printing industry, which has grown into a worldwide "virtual" sorority. Each year, I find more college students join in order to begin making connections within the industry.  

LinkedIn is of no use to a student:

As a college student with little/no experience and one of millions looking for internships, do you think a 'Connect With Me on LinkedIn' will set a candidate apart? No. This will be made on campus, through networking events or through their specific on campus organizations. 

LinkedIn Needs To Do More For Students

Nicole Williams, a career expert who consults on behalf of LinkedIn, was surprised by students' general lack of acceptance of LinkedIn, given how "social media savvy" they're assumed to be. "There is a lag, and we're working hard to rectify that lag," Williams said.

LinkedIn employs Williams, among others, to speak at schools and other events college-age students are likely to attend. Williams says she urges students to understand what LinkedIn can offer even students just beginning a career. "You have to be searchable. Students need a strategic professional brand online that they control."  

"LinkedIn is committed to helping college students utilize the platform," Williams noted. That's not only about finding connections or job listings, she added. "The power of LinkedIn is that you can find someone online, know where they graduated from, learn the trajectory of their career, track their experience and replicate that if you want your career to look like that."

Students Have Professional Networking Choices

Despite LinkedIn's outreach, the fact that many college students are not fully leveraging the site creates opportunities for competitors. Eyal Grayevsky, CEO of FirstJob, a service that specializes in entry level jobs for college students and recent grads, was well aware of the meager number of college students using LinkedIn. "From our point of view, LinkedIn has seen low engagement from the younger demographic because its core focus is professional networking, something that doesn’t appeal to someone who has little-to-no professional experience."

But Grayevsky added that college students typically underestimate the "wealth of company connections" available to them. These may be from alumni networks, volunteer work and other connections, for example.

It's easy to blame supposedly social-savvy students for not fully promoting their online "brand" and not availing themselves of all possible professional social networking opportunities.

But maybe there's also a big difference between the kinds of friends-and-family social networking skills possessed by many young adults and what they need to know to network for professional purposes. Being a whiz at creating interesting Facebook posts, sharing slick Instagram pictures and composing pithy tweets may not easily translate into job-search skills. 

Lead image courtesy of Shutterstock.

Playing Snap, Snap, Go, a new iPhone-only app, is kind of like eating at a fast food restaurant. It's wonderful - at first. But the fun fades much too quickly. And then you're consumed with a sense of regret and shame because even though you just had sort of a pleasurable experience, you know it can't possibly be good for you.

If Snap, Snap, Go - which describes itself as "a picture game for awful people" - turns out to be as popular as fast food, it may mark the end of civilization's progress. Because that would mean smartphones - the most advanced personal computing and communications devices ever created - are really all about making us giggle. Which certainly isn't "awful," but still a vast comedown from the awesome, life-changing uses promised for our amazing mobile computers.

Snap Battle

Tellingly, Snap, Snap, Go's positioning isn't quite right. It's really for "awful people," it's for the awful person in all of us. 

Here's how it works: After downloading the app, you sign in using your Facebook account. For beginners, the game presents a series of meme-like questions, such as: "Eat Just One," and asks you to vote for which of the of two pictures it shows you best corresponds to the question. Your choices might be a bowl of jelly beans versus chili cheese fries, for example. 

There are also plenty of "awful" battles. Such as: "I lie to get __," "Donald Trump could wear it as a toupee," or "Ron Jeremy owns 10 of these." These are distressingly hard to resist. 

The real "fun" begins when you challenge your Facebook friends - or random opponents. (None of my friends use the app, which I'm sure means something, so I challenged random people.) Again, the app presents you with a series of meme-like questions. For example, "Why is my phone sticky?" (Yes, I know.) You then snap and post a picture that you think best answers the question - as do your opponents. If you don't have an, er, provocative picture of your own, the game lets you cheat and grab a photo from Flickr. Then others get to vote on whose photo they like best. (That's where the pictures come from in the beginner's example above.)

If your opponents don't respond quickly, the game lets you "nudge" them. Beyond that, there's not much else you can do. Another problem is that the game doesn't immediately provide you with results - who won, who lost, how many people voted for one picture over another. I often got bored waiting and moved on to a new snap battle. The game does make it easy, however, to encourage your friends and followers on Facebook and Twitter to join in on the action.

Like fatty, salty, fast food or that silly new pop song you can't stop listening to, the app does its best to keep you hooked. Who could resist responding when asked to come up with a picture for what "always gets you laid?" 

The free app is rated 12+, despite "mild mature" themes. The app does make it easy to report inappropriate pictures, which is a good thing. While playing for less than a day, I encountered one picture that I thought was borderline inappropriate.

"Wisdom" Of The Crowd?

The game's developer states that "witty or funny responses often win, the more awful, the better you do, but it all depends on the wisdom of the crowd."

Wisdom of the crowd is a bit of a stretch. This game is about stealing a few moments of amusement - the app equivalent of Lolcats.  

Somewhere on the Internet sits a very well-constructed research paper discussing the psycho-social reasons why we humans love silly pictures and random, mindless contests with strangers, and further outlines the implications of such behavior. That's great, and a huge validation of the enduring value of the Interent.  On the other hand, I have already spent far more time playing Snap, Snap, Go than I ever will reading that paper. 

Most people would agree that Amazon has turned itself into a pretty amazing company. It has turned itself from an e-commerce bookseller into one of the most dynamic companies in the world, providing content for the masses, infrastructure for the Internet and a manufacturer of an array of tablets and e-readers that have helped change the way we read books.

Yet, there is one battle where Amazon has little chance of winning. The battle for App Supremacy.

The Amazon Appstore for Android expanded its global footprint this week, spreading its reach to 200 countries. One might think that Amazon, considering its acumen at selling content like books, movies and music, would be a perfect fit to dominate the app space. But, if Amazon is going to climb to king of App Mountain, it has a long, hard way to go.

(See also Do We Really Need Amazon TV? No, But Amazon Does.)

Appstore Gaining Traction

Amazon's value proposition for its Appstore is pretty clear: if you own a Kindle Fire, you get a curated set of apps that work specifically with your tablet. It is when Amazon tries to extend beyond its own gadgets is where potential is stifled. Amazon Appstore for Android can be downloaded to just about any Android device, but as we have seen with other secondary app stores (Samsung or Verizon), being the second app store is not a recipe for success. 

Despite not being readily available on most Android devices, Appstore continues to gain traction. A new report from app analytics firm Distmo reveals that in the U.S., at least, the "Amazon Appstore is rapidly becoming more and more competitive with Google Play" especially for paid apps.

For raw numbers, Google Play has about 800,000 apps. Apple's' App Store is about the same. The Amazon Appstore? 75,000. Yet, app volume is a bit of an inconsequential argument. Downloads are what matter. In that area, Amazon is not fairing poorly. For example, Distmo found that Google Play is "ten times" bigger than Amazon's Appstore in terms of total app downloads. The graph below shows the large gap in free downloads between Play and Appstore:

In paid downloads, however, Google Play is only twice as big as the Appstore. 

The gap is even narrower when comparing revenues. "The top 200 paid applications in Google Play in the U.S. made $5.2 million in March 2013. This makes Google Play 1.7 times bigger Amazon Appstore."

Amazon is also continuing to expand the Appstore's reach. In 2012, Amazon launched Appstore in the UK, France, Germany, Spain, Italy and Japan. Earlier in April, Amazon announced it was expanding Appstore to 200 countries.  

Does that mean Amazon's Appstore could someday unseat Google Play? Not likely.

Amazon's Reality Check

Apps and developer relations are not a core competency for Amazon. The first year of the Appstore was marred by controversy and setbacks with developers, especially concerning the "free app of the day" promotion that gives the Appstore its biggest value bet for consumers.

Update: Amazon refutes the claim that developer relations are not a core competency. Through Amazon Web Services, the company does have significant developer relations in its corporate blood.  Yet, when it comes to developer relations in regards to the Appstore, that has not always been the case. 

From Amazon communications, Rena Lunak: "Amazon has very deep experience and success with developers via Amazon Web Services, specifically.  In fact, the web scale computing services that Amazon Web Services offers today are based on Amazon’s own back-end technology infrastructure which we’ve spent over a decade building into one of the world’s most reliable, scalable, and cost-efficient web infrastructures.  TinyCo, EA, Halfbrick (makers of Fruit Ninja), Red 5 Studios (makers of FireFall), are just a few well-known app and game developers using AWS to ensure they can scale quickly and cost-effectively to meet customer demand."

Developers are still wary of the Amazon Appstore. Greg Raiz, founder of Raizlabs, an independent app studio in Boston, said that his firm has "experimented with the Amazon store and found minimal traction with apps that are deployed there. 

Consumers don't feel they need an alternate store so they don't actively install it. Amazon did get some consumers to install their store experience by offering a "free app a day" promotion. This had some novelty but hasn't impacted developer mindshare in any significant way.

Only Amazon's Kindle Fire tablet line comes pre-loaded with Appstore. For everyone else, Amazon's Appstore requires users follow the company's "detailed instructions" to determine if their specific Android device can even support Appstore, then to download and install it.

Just as important, mainstream Android apps require additional coding to ensure compatibility with Amazon's forked version of the Android operating system for Kindle Fire, and integration with Amazon's store and payments services. It shouldn't come as surprise that a recent survey of 1,500 app developers by app analytics firm App Annie, found that only 22.5% of respondents were publishing to the Appstore. 

Google's Android Strategy Works

Amazon has done well to create a market for its Kindle Fire tablets and, by extension, its own Appstore. Yet, a limited market share makes for limited potential. At the same time, Amazon faces stiff competition from the likes of Samsung and other Android manufacturers for consumer mindshare. The most used Android tablets are not made by Amazon. They are made by Samsung.

Amazon is a digital content powerhouse, particularly in the U.S. In its official earnings statement this week, the company noted its extensive content creation and distribution prowess - in theory, apps shouldn't be any different - it's all just digital content to be packaged, sold and delivered. But Google's Android strategy - giving away the operating system pre-packaged with Google services like Search, Maps - and Play - gives the search giant a level of scalability and device compatibility that Amazon simply cannot match.

Lead image courtesy App Annie 

What is a geek, anyway? Someone who loves math and science and computers? Sure, but that's only part of it. As counter-terrorism expert Richard Clark once told Stephen Colbert (around the 3:40 mark): "Geeks get it done." 

That nails it. 

Geeks Get It Done - GGID. Geeks imagine, then build. Geeks envision, then destroy. Geeks remake the old world and create new worlds. Sometimes just for fun, sometimes because the fate of all humanity hangs in the balance.

That's why geeks get inspired by movies that remind them to revel in their obsessiveness - because it ultimately leads to the way you "get it done." 

Which movies do the best job of providing that awesome inspiration? You can't go wrong with these 10 classics: 

1. The Matrix

You are your code.

The Matrix is so good that the hot, leather-clad love interest who snaps necks and knows how to handle a semi-automatic doesn't even make it into the top 5 best things about this movie. 

2. Star Wars

You already know. There's nothing more to add.  

3. Iron Man

Wealthy industrialist, playboy, inventor, badass. It's like if Bill Gates were as cool as he is rich. 

4. Tron

More than 30 years ago, Disney put a hacker inside a computer. Mad props. 

5. Weird Science

Two high school boys "feed" their computer with as much real-world data as they could obtain during the Reagan era. The result: their idea of the perfect woman.

6. Minority Report

The "PreCrime" police force uses "precogs" to stop murderers before they kill. What's that? Why, yes, it is based on a Philip K. Dick story.

7. Akira

Katsuhiro Otomo. Neo-Tokyo. Biker gangs. Psions. Enjoy.

8. Star Trek

This Star Trek reboot took us back to the future - to the early days of James T. Kirk, Spock, and the Enterprise. Think of just how awesome it will be if the new Star Wars films are as successful as this Star Trek reboot. 

"I dare you to do better."

9. Galaxy Quest

The obsessive Star Trek-fanboy parody done right. When it comes on television, you can't not watch it. Why? Because it inspires you to never stop believing.

10. The Goonies

For a generation of geeks and would-be geeks, The Goonies inspired their sense of adventure. It's message was clear: never stop being a pirate.

Do you agree with our list? Are there any you think don't belong in the top 10? What geek classics did we leave out? Have at it in the comments.

Lead image courtesy of s_bukley / Shutterstock.

In my day, boys and girls, we downloaded songs onto our desktop computer. For free. Often illegally. Then we burned them onto CDs late into the night.

iTunes changed all that. iTunes required that we actually pay for our music. It corralled us into accepting copyright-restricted digital content, while doing its best to force us onto pricey Apple hardware. It foolishly mashed together audio library management tools with a music download service with online payments and computer/mobile device synching - only to somehow grow even more bloated as the years went by. Yet here it is, ten years later, and iTunes towers above all its competitors.

No surprise, then, that Apple is formally celebrating "A Decade of iTunes" with an interactive timeline that is equal parts sales promotion and rare look back.

With the possible exception of Windows Vista, probably no software application from a large company has incurred such vigorous and ongoing public scorn as iTunes. Unlike Vista, however, iTunes continues to grow, evolve and continue its semi-secret though highly successful mission of transforming Apple from anemic, also-ran PC maker to its current position as the world's largest technology and media company.

It was (technically) on April 28, 2003, when Apple launched the iTunes Music Store. The store contained 200,000 songs, all priced at $.99 each. On that same day, Apple announced its third-generation iPod, weighing less than "two CDs" and able to hold 7,500 songs. From those meager beginnings, content delivery, the music, film and software industries - and Apple's fortunes - were all soon to be profoundly changed.

Ten years ago, Apple's share price was $6.66. Today it hovers around $400 (down from more than $700, but still). Recall, if you can, the many Borders and Blockbuster Video stores that dotted the American landscape. iTunes essentially enabled us to buy easily digital content for the first time, and taught us that digital content could be worth paying for.

iTunes Begat iPhone

iTunes helped make Apple relevant once again. It enabled the expansion of Steve Jobs' "digital hub" strategy, guiding Apple from failing computer maker to consumer electronics behemoth. That much is generally accepted. Just as importantly, however, iTunes enabled the iPhone. 

The single biggest reason for Apple's meteoric rise over the last decade is the iPhone. Realizing that the rise of "cell phones" could harm Apple's portable iTunes media players (the iPod), Apple teamed with Motorola to create the much derided Rokr E1 phone in 2005. The hardware was disappointing  and users complained that the device could hold just 100 iTunes songs.

Two years later, however, Apple introduced its own device. The iPhone was the shocking evolution of iTunes and iPod, and Apple's work with Motorola. The point is, no iTunes, likely no iPhone and no iPad - the products that currently contribute more than 60% of Apple's valuation.

Yet even the much-improved iTunes 11 still collects scorn, even from the Apple faithful.

This represents a misunderstanding of the platform's roles. At the initial launch of the iPhone, Steve Jobs noted the importance of  iTunes to the "revolutionary" new device:

The (iPhone) automatically syncs to your PC or Mac right through iTunes.
 And iTunes is gonna sync all of your media onto your iPhone: Your music, your audio books, podcasts, movies, TV shows, music videos. 
But it also syncs a ton of data: Your contacts, your calendars and your photos, which you can get on your iPod today, your notes, your bookmarks from your Web browser, your email accounts, your whole email set-up. All that stuff can be moved over to your iPhone completely automatically. 
It’s really nice.
 And we do it through iTunes. Again, you go to iTunes and you set it up. Just like you’d set up an iPod or an Apple TV. And you set up what you want synced to your iPhone. And it’s just like an iPod. Charge and sync. So sync with iTunes.

Apple Loves iTunes - Even If You Don't

iTunes simultaneously serves as Apple's payments platform, media library app, and digital media storefront - for music, books, apps, podcasts and video. It powers the popular App Store. It is an app for purchasing content on the iPhone and iPad - though not for playing that content. On the Mac, iTunes is (still) both music and video library management layer, music player - though not video player - payments provider and media storefront.

No wonder even long-time Apple users complain of feature bloat and a confusing user interface.

Apple's interactive iTunes timeline, meanwhile, focuses almost exclusively on music. Maybe Apple isn't ready to accept that iTunes has transformed the company from computer hardware maker to a global digital media concern. But consider these numbers:

• 40 billion apps downloaded
• 25 billion songs sold 
• More than 15,000 songs downloaded every minute
• 1 billion courses downloaded on iTunes U
• More than 100 million books on the connected iBookstore
• Available in more than 115 countries
• 45% of the video on demand market in the U.S.

iTunes has also delivered tremendous value to content owners, publishers and app developers. According to Apple analyst Horace Dediu, iTunes generated more than $24 billion in revenues for content owners (media and app developers) in the past five years.

No matter what you may think of it personally, iTunes has been essential to Apple's success. Expect it to continue to pushing the company forward, in all its messy, bloated glory.

Images courtesy of Apple.