Jack Santos175 Years ago (in 1836), Texas beat the Mexican army to become an independent state….and eventually a US state. Today, the Alamo (the battle loss that led to the war win) is a car rental agency, and a tourist attraction.
The “I don’t knows” (abbreviated phonetically in the post title) are the segment of the population that eschews modern technology. They are just discovering the internet and desktops – forget IPad, Android, and Hulu. Maybe the opposite of the creative class.
I certainly was reminded of that recently in a local event that attracted “I don’t knows” in flocks — “Historic Preservation Week” . Nary a Smartphone or laptop in sight, much less an iPad. No need for the obligatory “remember to turn your phones off” message at the start of the talk.
A while back, I wrote a free iPhone web-app (credit to Gary Hein for the web app templates!) that provided an architectural walking tour – complete with maps, audio, and pictures. Find it here (use it on a smartphone if you care). Ad proceeds go to the local non-profits. Interestingly enough, its greatest competition comes from a $5 pamphlet walking tour – from the same local non-profits. The supporting orgs are reluctant to promote the web-app for fear of losing paper sales. Chalk this one up to the “know your target audience” school of marketing. I suppose it’s my personal Alamo.
The moral of the story is that there is still a large constituency out there that isn’t technology aware – and we need to cater to them. In this case, they tend to be older – but not always. And the “I dunno” target market is dying off (bad taste). But there are always exceptions. Like the 70 year old that (on his own!) discovered Square, and is now accepting credit card payments for his church motorcycle raffle – on his Android phone! Or the Queen that got an iPad for Christmas. Sometimes revolution comes on it’s own schedule…but as for me, I’ll follow Davy Crockett’s advice: “Be always sure you’re right, then go ahead.”
All examples of consumerization that we’ll be talking about at this year’s Catalyst conference.
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Category: Applications Cloud Fun Mobility Wireless Tags: consumerization, culture, mobility, Wireless
