23 August 2010

Nokia as Denzel Role In
Industry's Version of "The Book Of Eli"

The Socioeconomic Effects Of Industry Strategy

I was reading a controversial yet revealing post by fellow Symbian Freak illusionado, aka Jade Bryan Jardinico, titled "Ovi Store Racism". Always a fan of rants and controversial subject matter on the subject of mobility, I knew I was in for a treat. What I didn't expect was a closer intropective of the mobile consumer outside the affluent shores of the United States.

Now I'm pretty close to the pulse of the global mobile industry. Most of my Facebook list resembles a roll call of some of the top minds and avid fans of mobility, from gadget bloggers and fanboys to executives officers of major mobile manufacturers, professors, and some of the top industry consultants in the world.

But nothing can come close to the actual voice of the end user. They can only speak from their perspective, a view often obscured by Gartners reports and Strategy Analytics research papers. These are the truths that count most, in my opinion.

The blog post's title alone was enough to get my attention. Pretty eye popping, huh? My immediate mental response before I read it was pretty dismissive. I actually said to myself, "illusionado has literally lost his mind."

But Bryan is also a good friend of mine, and no dummy to say the least, so I felt I owed him the respect of at least reading it in totality. What I read cut right to my bone, because it was revealing and eye opening. This is his view from his perspective, and I totally got it.

I still didn't feel there was a racist component to Nokia's Ovi Store, but I could see how one could see it as so. I strongly suggest everyone read his article, and think of how you'd feel in his position. It points to the fact that people today, regardless of race, creed, nationality, or level of economics, feel they have a right to information access, sharing, and services. And they should, since with today's technology, there really is little reason why most can't. Its a powerful piece in that respect, and hopefully enough to open the eyes and minds of everyone to the diverse experiences of mobility in the far reaching locales across the world.

Too often we imagine the industry as we experience it in our air conditioned homes in affluent industrialized nations. We take the opinions of loud, US-centric, high-end focused blog voices as the temperature of the entire industry. The truth is that the overwhelming vast majority of this industry is not a part of that experience, but one totally different altogether, with totally different needs to address and challenges to overcome.

EMPOWERING THE MASSES

History has shown that many times, the people that control the information and knowledge have used it to exercise power, control, and financial tyranny over those without. Scores and myriads of peoples have been enslaved, controlled, even murdered by such groups. We've seen it with religion, military science, and the military industrial complex. So we know the old saying that knowledge is power certainly holds true.

The easiest way to combat such abuse and control at the hands of these elitists is to empower others with that very knowledge. This is why there were libraries far back in history, usually heavily protected and hallowed buildings used by people from far and wide. Knowledge was always power, and education and access was always a way to enable that power. The ancient Chinese knew it. The ancient Egyptians knew it. The Romans knew it. This is nothing new.

But it is rarely an easy task enabling access to information on a wide scale, often met with opposition, and usually taking alot of self sacrifice on the part of brave, selfless individuals. Like Denzel Washington's character in the highly recommended feature film, "The Book Of Eli", there almost always has to be a hero, one that accepts the calling and undertakes the mission as one of importance, with the cost having little bearing over the need to see it accomplished.

THE WAR AGAINST THAT EMPOWERMENT

Today, information isn't so easily controlled as it was in the past, thanks in large part Alexander Graham Bell. This man is one of my heroes, and for big reason. He invented the telecommunication technologies that are the foundation for today's most powerful information delivery mechanism, the internet. Every mobile gadget enthusiast should thank this consummate tinkerer, because its all because of him that we enjoy this industry and its products.

There are political factors that have bearing, bit it is no accident that the places with the most educated people, that produce the most inventions, and have the highest quality of life are also the most internet connected. Access to knowledge is a direct variable to quality of life, and there is little to dispute that fact. So the easiest way to make the world a better place is to proliferate telecommunications and internet access to as many people and places as possible. This creates a venue for sharing, refining, and consuming information, and as long as everyone can access it, you create more opportunities to learn, solve, and innovate, and less to obscure, control, and enslave.

But who is the modern day hero, the man on a mission to get the information to as many people as possible? It has changed over the years. First it was the publishers of books, then it became the media companies. Later it became the telecoms, which is ironic, since lately in the United States, they've become a big hindrance to information delivery proliferation and access.

New players have stepped in to make it easier only for a select few wealthy people to access these new web technologies, while locking out the less affluent, creating virtual web plutocracies. Others attempt to control the delivery of information in order to require that you pay a toll of privacy and personal data just to access the best parts of internet. The policies and intent of these companies and organizations, inadvertantly or not, usually favors the world's more affluent Caucasian population while adversely affecting the less affluent and peoples of color. From this viewpoint, in a roundabout way this makes these groups guilty of technological racism. I think the lower quality of life in today's emerging markets is more directly related to these types of moves than any political regime or ruler's decisions, and something that needs closer oversight, regulation, and investigation.

I won't go into the identities of these entities, but I've talked about them in depth over the years, most recently in my blog post "Why Symbian and MeeGo Are Best For Nokia". There is obviously an information war going on in the background of the information communication/access industry, and not everyone is concerned or aware its even happening.

MODERN DAY ELI

Luckily, a new hero has emerged. I say that with pride, not because I'm a firm believer in that company's strategy, or a fan of their various social programs for emerging markets, something no other company in the industry does at a similar level. I'm talkIng, of course, about Nokia.

Nokia is a publicly owned company, and they certainly intend to make profits, just like any other company. Yet they have this underlying motive, if not a selfless mission, to use technology as a catalyst to improve the quality of life for those in the world considered less fortunate, and to enable information access and sharing to as many people as possible . Not just the wealthy, educated, or peoples of a particular ethnic background. We're talking everyone, in every corner of the world, of every socioeconomic background imaginable.

While other companies chase high profit margins, seek celebrity status for their products, and cause long lines waiting just to buy their devices, Nokia takes the low profile role as a humanitarian. They've focused on bargain priced devices with built in feature sets unmatched by any competitor, regardless of price, so that more people are able to access the web and utilize the latest technology. While the long cues to buy the hip device of the day make the evening news in developed markets whenever they release a new upgrade, you don't hear about how massive crowds of less affluent consumers also cause a frenzy to buy bargain priced smartphones that might not get the attention of the media or bloggers. While one high profile company niggles about the need for Flash in its browsers, Nokia makes sure every smartphone they produce at all price points includes a Flash enabled browser to allow access with the most rich media content and applications online.

Nokia's initiatives for social change and better human relations have no equivalent anywhere else in the industry. Nokia doesn't have to do any of these things. The targeted consumers are usually the least profitable to the company's bottom line. But the Nokia mantra of "connecting people" is taken alot more seriously than their competitors. And the results speak for themselves.

MISSION ACCOMPLISHED

Its no secret that Nokia sells more mobile phones than any other company. But the hidden numbers speak of an even bigger success. More people initiate phone calls, send SMS, and access the internet from Nokia devices than any other device, even those from traditional PC makers. There are many people today that have never accessed the internet from a PC, and had their first and only web experience from a Nokia mobile device. Farmers in India and China use custom software from Nokia on their devices to improve productivity and share market data.

All of this is owed to Nokia's principles of connecting everyone, not just the rich, or a particular ethnic group, or a certain country's citizenry. They don't get much credit for doing so, either. Nokia's competitors know you don't win much by serving the little guy, and they usually only include them as a focus until the big, powerful, and rich markets have become saturated, and no significant new growth is available. Some don't care to include those emerging markets at all. The fact is most of the industrialized world doesn't really care about the poor people in emerging markets. Fortunately for them, Nokia does.