Digital Discourse / Archives for Mobility

FTC: Don’t Confuse Mobile with Personal

February 1, 2013 By

SIIA is supportive of the FTC’s effort to provide guidance for the multistakeholder approach to mobile privacy protection being led by the NTIA.

Today’s mobile guidance report from the FTC provides some useful input to that end. However, SIIA continues to strongly disagree with some of the high-level conclusions reached by the Commission. Particularly, SIIA strongly disagrees with the FTC’s conclusion that “[m]ore than other types of technology, mobile devices are typically personal to an individual, almost always on, and with the user.”

While this may be true when applied to smartphones and the model for their use today, SIIA strongly believes that this vision misses the mark for tablets, and it most certainly inaccurately portrays the evolving nature of Internet-based technology and new-age devices. On the contrary, SIIA is confident that the larger trend in technology with products and services offered seamlessly across a wide range of platforms and devices, coupled with the increasing saturation of Internet-powered devices reflects the shift to an environment where devices are less “personal” and less linked to a particular individual than personal computers.

For instance, just several years after the introduction of the tablet computer, and less than a decade after the introduction of the the modern smartphone, it is not uncommon for a household to have a wide range of internet-connected devices, with perhaps the majority of those devices being mobile devices shared by numerous users.

SIIA believes that the FTC’s fundamental misunderstanding about the increasing personalization of devices sets an inappropriate basis on which to build a foundation of privacy practices, either voluntary or mandatory. In order to develop an effective privacy framework for rapidly evolving technology, it is critical that we fully understand how this evolution is taking place, and all the opportunities that this innovation brings.

David LeDuc is Senior Director, Public Policy at SIIA. He focuses on e-commerce, privacy, cyber security, cloud computing, open standards, e-government and information policy. Follow the SIIA public policy team on Twitter at @SIIAPubPolicy.

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Filed Under: Policy, Policy - Privacy Tagged With: , ,

All About the Cloud Program Committee: Russell Hertzberg, SoftServe

February 1, 2013 By

I recently sat down with AATC Platinum Sponsor and Program Committee member Russell Hertzberg, Vice President Technology Solutions for SoftServe, Inc. to discuss AATC 2013, their goals for the conference and what we hope to see from the program and our industry in the coming year.

Rhianna:Why was it important to you to be a part of the AATC Program Committee?

Russ: Being a part of the Program Committee helps SoftServe give input into the shape, structure, and content of the event agenda, while staying abreast of the latest developments with respect to the event plan.

Rhianna: What are your goals for the conference this year?

Russ: As always, to get some strong new ISV leads, or to further nurture existing prospects. We do this through networking, speaker presentations, and the sponsorship.

Rhianna: What is unique about AATC that makes it so valuable to ISVs?

Russ: AATC is the premier event for ISVs who are just entering or already leading in various segments of the Cloud Computing market. This event has it all: thought leaders, great panels, practical education, and how to content.

Rhianna: What are some of the topics you are excited to see in the program this year?

Russ: Mobile + cloud monetization strategies, the evolution of PaaS technology, a report card on Azure, and the role that Big Data platforms are playing in various SaaS offerings.

Rhianna: What are your industry predictions for what’s in store for 2013-2014?

Russ: 1. SaaS. Large ISVs are in an adaptive race to both build and buy SaaS capability. In this race, the course of 2013 will show increasing gaps between executing leaders and confused or denying followers. This race is the single most important determinant of the future value of the 100 largest ISV providers. The leaders will not simply make more SaaS acquisitions. They will also create hybrid solutions for current install bases. They will deliver new SaaS offerings in the SMB market by refactoring current on-premises technology. And they will adapt channel, sales and marketing models to the economics of the SaaS business.

2. DevOps. Cloud computing is changing the skill set and composition requirements of technical teams. Designing and developing software is now the front end for the long-run challenge: service delivery management and continuous application enhancement. Development operations (DevOps) are one of the critical disciplines for the new technical team. The skill set of a DevOps tech lead includes systems programming, build management, configurations management, service monitoring, security, backup, recovery and more. Over time, the technical team composition for a large SaaS deployment will trend towards an equal number of software engineers and DevOps engineers.

3. PaaS. PaaS remains a clever software technology for rapid application development or refactoring rather than a specific market. Small PaaS players can survive by deploying their technology primarily to create conventional and nimble SaaS solutions in established markets. PaaS technology will be combined with Big Data platforms to create new services and sites in several business and consumer markets.

4. Health Information Exchanges. The firmer establishment and acceptance of The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act of 2009 (“Obamacare”) resulting from the re-election of Obama is driving acceleration in construction and deployment of Healthcare Information Exchanges and Health Insurance Exchanges. HIE construction and operation is attracting large hardware/software providers and major systems integrators. The cloud-based security and data integration requirements for HIEs will introduce new software and security technology like JSON and Oauth into the healthcare IT market. Other industry-specific community clouds may begin to develop in public education, finance, retail and manufacturing.

5. Social media. The technology behind the massive horizontal scalability of major social and search platforms is driving into the smaller-scale footprints of independent colocation facilities, hosters, ISPs, and enterprise data centers. Enterprises will refactor and redeploy more and more applications into hybrid and private cloud deployments, taking advantage of virtualization, multi-tenancy and horizontal scalability to become more competitive with public cloud-computing metrics and price points.

6. Mobile. Scalable back-end cloud services continue to be the anchor for mobile business and consumer applications. Mobility and cloud computing enjoy a virtuous synergy that can be seen in the rich native mobile applications for popular social networks, the hugely successful online store models for application purchase and delivery from Google/Apple/Amazon, and the overall growth in mobile device traffic on popular cloud-based sites and services.

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Filed Under: All About the Cloud, Software Tagged With: , , , ,

Webinar – Critical Success Factors for an Enterprise Mobile Strategy

December 12, 2012 By

Webinar Description

Organizations must fully develop an enterprise mobile strategy that considers both employee and customer facing aspects of today’s continually expanding use of mobile technologies. It is important to consider the customer experience as they launch new products, services, and applications. Grant Thornton LLP brings the perspective of working with both ISVs and the consumers of their products in a business advisory capacity. This recorded webcast focuses on several key aspects of an enterprise strategy:

  • Key criteria for an Enterprise Mobile Strategy
  • Application architecture- Is it ready for mobile
  • Planning for BYOD within the enterprise
  • Deployment interface
  • Importance of security

Click here to download the slides.

Presenters
Tony Hernandez, Principal, Business Advisory Services, Grant Thornton LLP
Mike Barba, Manager, Business Advisory Services, Grant Thornton LLP

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Filed Under: All About the Cloud, Mobility, Software Tagged With: , ,

Mobile Privacy: Congress Should Give Multistakeholder Discussions More time

December 6, 2012 By

Today,  the Senate Judiciary Committee is scheduled to consider legislation sponsored by Senator Al Franken (D-MN), the Location Privacy Protection Act of 2011 (S.1223), that would require app providers to seek affirmative “opt-in” consent from consumers before using their location information.

As with all consumer privacy issues, users trust in mobile app privacy is absolutely critical.  Without consumer trust, demand stalls, innovations is stifled and neither businesses nor users interests are served.  Straight-up, a lack of trust is a lose-lose. However, multistakeholder discussions have been ongoing since June of this year, engaging a wide range of industry and civil society in an effort, led by the Department of Commerce NTIA, to develop a voluntary code of conduct for mobile app transparency in information collecting.

This flexible, consensus process is also better able to ensure that policies are not technology or platform specific.  That is, at a time of increasing convergence, where “applications” are seamlessly offered across a wide range of devices, fixed laws such as this would stifle technological evolution by creating a distinct privacy regime based on a specific type of device.

SIIA is very supportive of the effort and confident that it can succeed if given time.  Consumers and businesses are in this together, dependent on each other as this new mobile ecosystem continues to evolve.  With the right consensus-driven framework, mobile app privacy can be a win-win for users and businesses.

Rather than considering rigid legislative mandates on the mobile app industry, Congress should continue to explore how to support this industry.  The House Energy and Commerce Committee did just that earlier this year by holding a hearing focused on this innovative industry and how it can spur economic and job growth.

Recommendations are good.  Consumer self-help is good.  But the world is looking to us to show that self-regulation can work as a viable alternative to government mandates.  To allow the multistakeholder efforts on mobile transparency to falter now would confirm their belief that only the government can set the rules of the road in this area.  It is time for the industry to step up and make progress on setting its own rules of the road. If we don’t we have only ourselves to blame if state, national or international governments feel compelled to step in to protect the public.

David LeDuc is Senior Director, Public Policy at SIIA. He focuses on e-commerce, privacy, cyber security, cloud computing, open standards, e-government and information policy.

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Filed Under: Policy, Policy - Privacy Tagged With: ,

Mobile Privacy: Time for Collaboration, Not Legislation

September 12, 2012 By

Representative Ed Markey’s proposed mobile legislation, scheduled to be introduced today, is the wrong way to go. It would impose rigid privacy rules on the mobile industry that can only lead to stagnation and a loss of innovative dynamism.

And what a loss that would be for such a dynamic, growing industry. According to a recent study, there were over 44,000 app-related positions open in the U.S. in the last quarter of 2011, and overall, there were 45 percent more open app positions than in the previous year. Based on this number, the study found the app economy firms represented 311,000 jobs. Using a standard multiplier, this number grew to nearly a half a million jobs created by the app economy in both direct and indirect jobs since 2007.

Rather than overregulating an industry that holds such potential for economic growth, Congress should be following the House Energy and Commerce Committee’s lead in supporting the industry. The Committee is holding a hearing today focused on apps and where the jobs are.

So if legislation isn’t the answer, what should be done?  Over the summer, the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) launched an effort to nudge stakeholders into adopting codes of conduct for mobile transparency.  SIIA was supportive of this effort and remains so.  But after several meetings it appears that things may be starting to drift. Some scheduled meetings have been postponed. Fortunately, discussions between various industry stakeholders, as well as discussion between industry and consumer watchdogs, are ongoing.

The industry needs to get the substantive mobile transparency discussion moving again, if not through NTIA action then separately.

It’s also important to remember that consumers are not passive victims.  If they think they are being abused, they have a healthy capacity for self-defense. As the New York Times wrote last week “many consumers seem to be already taking steps to guard their personal information from data-grabbing apps. A study by the Pew Research Center, released Wednesday, found that among Americans adults who use smartphone apps, half had decided not to install applications on their mobile phones because they demanded too much personal information. Nearly a third uninstalled an application after learning that it was collecting personal information “they didn’t wish to share.” And one in five turned off location tracking “because they were concerned that other individuals or companies could access that information.”

This is good.  In the absence of government mandates, and industry codes of conduct, consumers are doing some sensible things to protect themselves.  But the lack of consumer trust is troubling and can only inhibit growth in the market.  If consumers just say no, the whole industry suffers.

The FTC is trying to help with some guidance.  Last week it published its recommendations for mobile application developers, suggesting that companies seek “express agreement” for consumer data they collect and share.  Nothing is binding on companies, however, and there is no indication that these recommendations are forming the core of industry codes of conduct or best practice.

Recommendations are good.  Consumer self-help is good.  But the world is looking to us to show that self-regulation can work as a viable alternative to government mandates.  To allow the multi-stakeholder efforts on mobile transparency to falter now would confirm their belief that only the government can set the rules of the road in this area.  It is time for the industry to step up and make progress on setting its own rules of the road.

Mark MacCarthy, Vice President, Public Policy at SIIA, directs SIIA’s public policy initiatives in the areas of intellectual property enforcement, information privacy, cybersecurity, cloud computing and the promotion of educational technology. Follow the SIIA Public Policy team on Twitter at @SIIAPolicy

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Filed Under: Mobility, Policy, Policy - Privacy, Software Tagged With: , ,

The questions that didn’t make it into Vision from the Top

May 29, 2012 By

Each year SIIA sets out to pick the minds of individuals who are shaping and growing our industry. Just a couple of weeks ago we released the 2012 Vision from the Top publication that features interviews with these business leaders providing thoughts on trends, M&A activity, and the future of our industry.

While we went through the interview process we asked the contributing executives some questions that you won’t find answered in the publication which I thought I would share with you. We asked the member executives to look at Forrester’s 2012 Cloud Predictions and tell us which one would have the most significant impact in 2012. The majority of contributors said “The cloud market will grow beyond $60 billion in 2012”. What does that say about cloud computing? It is not just a trend, it is the way in which we compute today and if you are not providing or consuming cloud services you will be at a disadvantage in the marketplace. HOWEVER, we also asked which of Forresters’ predictions will be the biggest challenge in 2012 and the majority also selected “The cloud market will grow beyond $60 Billion in 2012”. Clearly the consensus is that the cloud market will grow but will continue to face challenges, likely around security, integrations, etc.

Another popular response was that “Large enterprises will take the lead in cloud markets in 2012”. I found this one surprising since the enterprises have made a much slower move to the cloud than the SMBs. However, what I am hearing from the members is that 2012 will be the year. We have certainly seen a significant investment being made by the enterprises with all the recent M&A activity. Every day I wake up and wonder which one of the SIIA members will be acquired today!

If you read Vision from the Top you will see that the contributors are either CEOs or large business unit leaders of enterprises. We wanted to get an idea of their personal technology choices so we asked some personal questions (at least in the technology world these would be considered personal). Not surprising an overwhelming majority of contributing executives use an iPhone as their smartphone of choice. And an overwhelming number said they also carry a tablet of some kind, no more lugging around those heavy laptops.

Next we invaded the social space of the contributing authors. We asked how many of them actively used Facebook and approximately 60% said yes. At first I thought that number was low until I saw the answers to the next question, do you activity use LinkedIn? An overwhelming majority actively use LinkedIn. That should not be a surprise given the business nature of the application. Now here is an interesting one, the majority of respondents do not, yes DO NOT, actively use twitter. A little surprising but I suppose these executives leave Twitter to their marketing departments.

 

Rhianna Collier is VP for the Software Division at SIIA.

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Filed Under: All About the Cloud, Cloud Computing, Mobility, Social Media, Software Tagged With: , , ,

SIIA Survey: Publishers Prioritizing Multiple Platforms as they Develop Content Distribution Strategies

March 20, 2012 By

SIIA’s Content Division today announced results from a survey that shows the challenges and opportunities content creators have in aligning their organizations to keep up with fast-evolving platforms.

Most of the 85 publishing executives surveyed said their companies are thinking about how to publish their content across multiple platforms.When respondents were asked to name the “high priority” platforms they plan to focus on during 2012, the answers were extremely varied.

According to the results of the SIIA Content Platforms survey:

• About 60 percent of respondents classify tablet publishing, mobile publishing and/or launching new web-based products as a high priority;
• Forty-two percent prioritize licensing and syndication; • Nineteen percent prioritize video;
• Business-to-business (B2B) companies tend to prioritize new web-based products slightly above mobile and tablet publishing, whereas business-to-consumer (B2C) companies prioritize tablet publishing above all else;
• B2B companies are twice as likely to prioritize licensing and syndication versus their B2C counterparts;
• 50 percent of director-level individuals prioritize tablet publishing, versus 69 percent of C- and VP-level managers and their manager-level counterparts;
• Only 25 percent of individuals in sales roles prioritize tablet publishing, versus 70 percent of their marketing counterparts;
• 75 percent of individuals in sales roles prioritize web-based publishing—the highest of any group—versus 50 percent of their marketing counterparts.

The content platforms on which companies are currently publishing also vary. Overall, and by a fairly wide margin, companies are leveraging Apple platforms – the iPad and the iPhone. The survey found that 68 percent are currently publishing on the iPad and 58 percent on the iPhone. Meanwhile, 38 percent are publishing on Android-based phones, and 35 percent are publishing on Android-based tablets. Just 17 percent are leveraging Facebook (Open Graph), and 16 percent are publishing on the Kindle.

Large enterprise information and digital content companies are deploying more products and services on Apple, Android, Kindle and even Facebook than their SMB counterparts. And when it comes to developing apps for mobile and other platforms, B2C companies and large enterprise content companies are more likely to outsource than their B2B and SMB counterparts.

We conducted the survey to gain a greater understanding of publishers’ needs in advance of Content VIA Platforms, an all-new conference to help publishing, media and information companies design effective distribution strategies for mobile, social and other content distribution platforms. Full results of the survey will be released at Content Via Platforms, held May 9-10 in San Francisco.

Kathy Greenler Sexton is Vice President and General Manager for the SIIA Content Division.

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Filed Under: Content, Content Events, Content VIA Platforms, Events, Uncategorized Tagged With: , , , , , , , , ,
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