What we can actually learn from SxSW
ProjectsI was lucky enough to go to SxSW this year. So what did I learn?
The future is going to be amazing. If we want a new gizmo or toy, we will no longer have to go to a shop to buy it, we will be able to download it from the internet and print it using a 3D printer. and if we find a toy we really like we will be able to scan it and make multiple copies. Sure this raises a heap of IP and piracy issues but let’s not think about that for now. It’s a brave new world and a revolution is coming, a maker revolution. People will be able to design and make their own products, completely eliminating the need for large chunks of manufactured products. Brands should be scared (and excited).
And these products will all be connected, because in the future everything is connected. It’s the Internet of things. My house will talk to my car which will talk to my phone which will talk to the sensors embedded in my body. Everything will become one seamlessly integrated system. A technological pantheism, if you will.
And it will all result in big data. Massive data. The hugest data you’ve ever seen. And we’ll all have access to it and it will be lovely.
The future is going to be amazing.
But that future isn’t here yet. It is easy to get carried away when you go to SxSW. Day after day we were shown incredible things. Things that are truly revolutionary, things that will change the world. And it’s exciting. But it’s also very important to be realistic about what it all actually means, especially when you’re surrounded by well educated, well paid men working in creative industries holding the best technology money can buy. Just because everyone at SxSW was talking about 3D printing doesn’t mean the average Joe on the street will be.
Yes 3D printing is becoming more and more affordable, and this means that it’s becoming more and more accessible. But let us not forget that home computing and web publishing software has been ubiquitous for almost a decade, and yet we didn’t all run to the web and create our own home pages. Yes, some of us did (in fact most of those reading probably did), and services like wordpress and more recently tumblr meant a huge amount more people now have blogs. But it’s far from being mainstream. Far more people do not have blogs than do. Just because technology enables people to become more creative doesn’t mean that people want to be more creative. Neil Perkin explores a similar theme with android users – just because you can hack the device doesn’t mean everyone wants to.
Yes everything is becoming more connected with each other, and the internet of things is becoming a reality. But very slowly. I first started reading about the Internet of things in 2009, and even then people had been talking about it for almost a decade. It will happen, and my fridge will talk to my phone. But it’s still not here yet. Nike fuel band et al are showing the possibilities, and the automotive industry are making huge in roads in the space – but we’re a long way from living in a fully connected world. For now, our best bet is to focus on mobile. It is the connecting device. The device that we know everyone has, and that everyone checks. It’s not new and shiny anymore, it’s just the way we communicate, the way we research, the way we entertain ourselves. It’s the single most important device and brands need to start thinking about it a lot more.
Perhaps the most interesting thing was the number of advertising people that turned up to SxSW. Advertising could learn a hell of a lot from start-ups. There is a huge amount of talent we could steal, ideas we can borrow and enthusiasm for trying stuff we should embrace. But, well, advertising has a bit of an image problem. We can get past it, but we need to embrace a new way of thinking and doing if we want to evolve.
What did stand out was just how much stuff there was. Digital stuff. It highlights how online the world is. Which is interesting from an advertising point of view, especially to someone who works in digital advertising. Digital is much more than banners websites email and Facebook. The world is digital, consumers don’t treat digital as a separate channel and neither should we. And I don’t mean everyone is going out to buy Google glasses. But we are using our phones whilst we are shopping, we are second screening whilst watching TV, we’re buying more and more online, streaming our films, paying for things with our mobile apps… That isn’t future gazing stuff. That’s now. There’s a whole world of opportunity for us.
All that being said, I do not want to be accused of being a pessimist. I came away from SxSW energised and enthusiastic, and very keen to do more stuff. Sure the future is a little further away than we’d all like to admit, but if we start reaching for it now, it might come just that little bit faster.
So what are my key take outs for SxSW 2013?
1. 3D printing – Target the early adopters. The creative innovators. The hackers. Let them play with your products. Make it easy to do so.
2. Mobile – Stop talking about it and do it. Seriously, it’s not hard. If your web content isn’t mobile first, go home. If you aren’t using mobile to improve your retail experience, you’re doing it wrong.
3. Do more stuff. Especially digital agencies. Online doesn’t have to be on a screen, and it certainly doesn’t have to be on Facebook.
4. Focus on the masses, but provide for the niche. It’s easier than ever for people to hack things, to break things, to make things. Even if it’s not mainstream, make sure the people that want to do it, can.
5. Get out of silos. The world is digital. The world is mobile. Stop treating them as separate channels, see them as a layer. Almost everything can be improved with a spot of digital goodness. Press, TV, Point of Sale, shop windows. Use digital to join it all up.
6. Focus on today and tomorrow. There are a lot of exciting things that will happen. But the more time you spend thinking about those, the fewer exciting things you will make happen now.
7. Everything they say about an English accent in America is true.