It wasn't originally a planned migration to make my household i-Everything. My i-Mania isn't really an issue at all, especially when family members talk to friends and co-workers and discover that i-Stuff is pretty cool. Consumer and even SMB attitudes about spending more money for quality that delivers better experience does change. Maybe it's the marketing that helps soften attitudes or loosens consumers' grip on their cash, but both consumers' and businesses' willingness to spend more on Apple products is growing. Most of Apple's success, I believe, hinges on the experience.
Since confession is good for the soul, I will state that I caved in this past holiday season--my wife and I now sport an iPhone 4s. Not so secretly, I am glad to have a new and improved model that actually lives up to the expectation of "smartphone."
iCal delivers a shared calendar to all of our i-devices, namely our desktops, iPhones and daughter’s iPod Touch. This eliminates an information gap in the family circle. We also use the e-vites to work out scheduling conflicts.
Facetime proves to be a parent trap for their kids. My wife and I hit the theater without our daughter only to find the seats sold out. We opted for some i-Accessory shopping and a stop at a local ice cream parlor. While there, we decided to use Facetime and the store's WiFi to connect to our daughter’s iPod Touch. Our first joint videoconference did little to appease our prying eyes and more to annoy our daughter, who texted us (iMessage), "You are weird" after we held up our treat to the camera to tease our daughter.
While shopping for i-Accessories, we met three different store employees--all younger people, 19-23 year olds. Each offered their unsolicited opinions about Apple and why they purchased nothing but Apple computers or devices "even though they are more expensive." Their reasoning repeated what's been said many times before. What’s interesting is not only did they express why they purchased Apple products for their personal use, they demonstrated why, on the gear we reviewed.
The "Notes" app is an old iPhone app that is helpful since it shows notes in Mail on the desktops. What you can't do is forward a Note to someone else using Mail, even though the option is shown. Reminders is just another app on the iPhone; it seems redundant when using iCal but once my wife and daughter discover its intended use, my life will change.
It didn't take long for my wife to go shopping on iTunes, especially with an encouraging daughter. She's also discovered "apps" and now asks questions about apps that I've never heard of, and she is seemingly vested in the idea that she can do a lot of different things with her i-devices.
Now that my wife and daughter both have plans in place for iPads and other i-Gear we haven't yet procured, I can see a new line item surfacing in our budget--i-Expenses. My fears of uncontrollable data usage have taken a back seat to uncontrollable spending by my wife and daughter. Within days of having a new iPhone, my wife's data usage was nearly eight times greater than mine. After poring over the settings and reviewing the details of each phone, side by side, I decided my efforts were in vain. I'll call it pent up demand, for lack of knowing what else to attribute my wife's data usage.
Everyone has a take on the effect that consumerization has on enterprise. Of course I have budget concerns and how to control or anticipate damage control if data usage gets, as many users report, "unbelievable." I will install the DataMan app on both phones to at least track and understand data usage. The positive effects that I do see besides keeping a communicative household synched up are the tools available to all of us. My wife is a teacher and uses her iPhone for school. She also has access to files in iCloud that makes it much easier than lugging around a laptop.
Apple has clearly chiseled away at the barriers between personal and business lives. This is a lesson that enterprise needs to reconnoiter before deploying UC. UC--in whatever form or shape fits for your organization--must cross the invisible line from business to personal spaces. This invisible barrier is quietly and slowly eroding and our lives are getting closer to always on, always accessible and I still believe people will ultimately need a DND button to halt all electronic communications.
But the underlying success of Apple's delivery of user experience comes from what I believe to be empowerment. The Apple products in our family deliver quality and experience, but the total sum of the effect must include the tools that liberate users and free them from dependence upon IT. This is what I think is going to be IT's ongoing struggle. For consumers, it will become increasingly difficult to accept the idea that they must either wait or adopt something that IT has in mind.
