2004 Information Format Trends: Content, Not Containers

Now that I've introduced myself in the previous post, I wanted to comment on one of last week's readings. It's interesting to see how many of the predictions in this article have come true in the five years or so since it's been published. While I don't have the statistics handy, E-mail, cellular phones, blogs, iPods and now iPhones and the Blackberry have, if anything, come into even greater prominence not just here in the U.S. and in other Western countries, but in fast-growing economies like India as well. It'll also be interesting to see if e-books really do infiltrate the classroom and what will happen with devices like Amazon's Kindle, which of course enable users to read a book, magazine or newspaper on a portable device the size of an iPod.

As I skim through this article again, I'm reminded of an article I read yesterday for another class. That article is the definitively-titled "Content is Not King" by Andrew Odlyzko. I'm reminded of this article because it seems to be either a complement to "Content, Not Containers" or an article that directly contradicts it. Its main point is that throughout history, communication, functionality and convenience (all labeled under the guise of "connectivity")have been more important than content and that this is especially relevant in predicting what individual consumers and businesses are willing to pay for. For instance, there's a section of "Content, Not Containers" which describes how in 2004 cell phone companies were gearing up to include all sorts of new features on cell phones like internet usage, ringtones and what not. I would conclude that other than for those with iPhones and Blackberry devices, most of those who use cell phones don't use them to go online or to listen to music (this isn't necessarily true in Asia, for example, but that's another post). Text messaging services, however, have flourished since then, with many (myself included) now paying a flat fee in addition to a monthly usage charge for phone service in exchange for being able to compose and receive an unlimited number of text messages per month. So far, though, this is the exception and not the rule.