Augmented Reality

Augmented Reality

Augmented Reality aims to copy the world’s environment in a computer. In many cases the output of the coding of augmented reality is seen on a display. Augmented reality generates information of the real world on the user’s display. The aim of augmented reality is to increase the information available for the environment with which the user is interacting. Further Augmented reality tries to blend virtual reality with the real world thus users can’t distinguish anymore between real and virtual augmentation. Nowadays augmented reality is used in entertainment, for military training, engineering design, robotics, manufacturing and other industries.

In this blog entry I’d like to introduce new technologies within the framework of augmented reality:

World Lens (by http://questvisual.com/)

An application for the IPhone which is an instant translation app. By pointing the camera at anything which contains readable text, it translate the text imediately in the language you want.

But at the moment there is only a English-Spanish version available which costs $4.99 and I hope that the profucts available will broaden.

Here is a the youtube video of World Lens (nice music too☺)

Layar (by http://www.layar.com/)

Layar is the so-called “first application of augmented reality”, this tool uses additional information to develop a blend between reality and virtuality. The layer tool is only the basis for other tools, which want to implement their information on the main tool. Generally this tool should facilitate users information search in a city: where are restaurants, houses to buy, subway stations, …

Here is the video we have already seen during our THBA class but I still find it quite fascinating (if the bandwidth and capabilities of smartphones once make it possible to use such a tool runny).:

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Augmented reality sightseeing(by Fraunhofer institut)

What do you think about Augmented reality is it something which will develop or not?

What are the limitations of augmented reality?

Might there be a danger?

WIll you read my blog next week?:)

Till next week and thank you for reading,

cheers

Pius

First Augmented Reality T-Shirt:

Electronic Social Media Marketing

SoM Adaption by CTOs

For the last three days I’ve listened “peu-à-peu” to the presentation of Mr. Clemens Költringer, what I found very interesting about it was that this kind of presentation was an very interactive way of presenting one’s subject, further both: Clemens and his Partner seemed very encouraged.

Apart from this I think that the studies conducted seemed not really representing all CTOs since, there where only 14 destinations being asked.

Although in the end it was interesting to listen to them since they discovered interesting facts about CTOs who use SoM.

13 out of 14 destinations said about themselves that they are active in social media but 14 destinations are using face book!

12/14 Twitter and 11/14 Youtube… but on average each destination uses 5 tools of social media.

There are even destinations which use SoMs up to fourty hours a week.

It is important to mention that there are three levels of SoM users:

1^st: Experimental SoM users (up to 2hours)

2^nd: Predefined strategy (up to 10hours) with niche marketing

3^rd: Overall strategy of destination + SoM activities (more than 10 hours a week)

The Indication of Success with SoM Adoptions

To indicate success it is vital bringing in mind the following steps:

First: Define Success

Second: Define Indicators of Success

Last one: Measure and Compare Success

Critical Success Factors

What are critical Success factors? The presenter defined it through the following spheres: An objective method to do this is by the number of Likes on facebook or the umber of followers on twitter

Implementation Scenarios of CTOs

There are different Levels of Implementation Scenarios:

Level 1: (2 hours a week) Widgets on Websites, basic interactions are measured, voice of the customers, just read what user frequently write or do on facebook

Level 2: (up to 10 hours a week)Cooperations with Mobile Application Providers, Social Travel Guide interaction, contacting online marketing agencies and SoM professionals

Level 3: (more than 10 hours a week): highest level of SoM interaction of a CTO through Developing of own SoM(Applications, Communities) or Mobile Applications

Fixed part of overall strategy development and segmentation/target Grouos

BUTàAll three levels help to promote a destination; therefore it doesn’t really mather what use on which level just use it!

Social Media, what’s next?

More influence for buying decisions

Increase SoM use

More integration

Smart phones travel applications

Augmented reality (additional user experience, enhancing the current perception of reality, GPS Localization, Directly Measureable)

History of Podcast 1.1

Adam Curry - "Podfather"

Hello World,

the topic of today is the history of podcasts ( an short introduction)
First of all a video link which explains how RSS feeds work:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0klgLsSxGsU

Definition of Podcast:
“A podcast is a digital audio or video file that is episodic; downloadable; programme-driven, mainly with a host and/or theme; and convenient, usually via an automated feed with computer software.”

During the dot-com era between 1998 and 2001 the rise of podcasts begun. In the beginning big companies informed stakeholders with podcasts. This new tool got the attention of groups or individuals (in the beginning mostly nerds J), which enabled them to build a virtual community of podcasts all over the world. Adam Curry, an MTV moderator who is not the inventor of the corresponding Indian dish but the so called “Podfather”, since he is credited by coming up with the idea of the “idea to automate the delivery and syncing of textual content to portable audio players”(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Podcast on November the 9th).

The first application commonly available was iPodderX developed by two computer specialists August Trometer (Mac and IPhone developer) and Ray Slakinski (a web developer).
However the rise of Podcasts is also directly linked with the increasing capacity and speed of software and hardware.

As a consequence of the omnipresent use of the podcast, Apple introduced iTunes 4.9 with native support to make podcasts more convenient.

Bye till next week

Pius

Mobile Applications

According to webopedia.com, mobile applications are “Internet applications that run on smartphones and other mobile devices”.

In fact such applications help to make it easier using the internet on portable devices.

Examples for mobile apps are gmail for mobile, Medscape Mobile a device for professionals or Shazam a program which recognizes the song playing in a bar.

It is unforeseeable that the range of mobile devices is high, but what are the limitations of those devices especially in the tourism sector?

IPhone, Andoid, Windows Mobile,… there is variety of different os systems.

Lonley Planet a travel guide is familiar with both backpackers and business men, women and men, kids and elderly people,…

However nowadays Lonleyplanet has an mobile app covering all three big mobile platforms; nokia, android and the Iphone.

To me lonleyplanet was always something physical, a book that I had in my backpack while traveling in foreign countries, but even for me things changed;

Dependent on availability of the Internet I tried to look for spots of interest on the Internet side of lonleyplanet.com, since there lonleyplanet is fully available as in contrast to the German side of lonelyplanet.

Though if I know that I would be somewhere where Internet isn’t for sure available, I go back to the classical book.

Today there is an increasing availability of mobile apps everywhere, hence lonleyplanet started to make their own apps, available for smart phones. Those apps are interrelated with the Internet but can be also be limited accessed offline;

The maps and restaurants are available, but recent news and the spot finder, which says where you are lacks of course out.

Conclusion:

Hence I have a phone which has barely a 256 color mode, I don’t even think about such applications now, but I also found out that it might be easier

to try to adapt to the app.

Till next week

Pius

Pages I find useful:

http://petere.wordpress.com/2007/06/06/mobile-applications-for-tourism/

://mobileappsshowdown.com/

Photosynth 1st Trial

Business vs. Leisure Travelers

Tourism and Business Applications

Last session in Tourism Business Applications we spoke basically about two types of travelers:

·       The business traveler

·       The leisure traveler

The main differences between those two regarding the hotel decision is that business travelers often do not made “travel decisions” by themselves but their offices do it.

On average business travelers are better educated and can handle computers better.

Leisure travelers needed more time to use the Internet for independent traveling, but nowadays in North America and Europe the “independent leisure travel” dominates as a cause of the arousal of the increasing Internet use.

People use the Internet for Travel Planning issues;

They want to

·       Get information about destinations

·       Search for accommodiations

Interesting points:

·       Half of online travel planners are baby boomers, who take on average 10 leisure trips a year

·       Still WOM is influencing online travel planners

I think that both leisure and business travelers are aware of the increasing importance of the internet. They don’t only want to find the cheapest offers, they also looking for the best suitable offer for them.

Cheers

Till next week

Pius

Does it Matter

Summary of the article “Does it Matter?” by Nicholas Carr

This article is about the increasing importance of It technology and not.

What do I mean by that?

The author Nicholas Carr began the article with numbers of increasing spending of companies in IT after the introduction of the personal computer

1965   5%

1980s 15%

1990s 30%

2000s 50%

I have to ad at this point that 50% and even 30% of a companies’ capital expenditure is a bit high, organizations have lot of costs like wages, electricity, maintenance… that is why I think that some information is missing here.

However Mr. Carr formulated an assumption:

“IT’s potency and ubiquity have increased, so too has its strategic value”

BUT fact is that availability of information technologies increased and their costs decreased, which means nowadays computers, internet and so on is for more companies available since its cheaper.

Starting from this point the author began to question, if IT technologies are really such an advantage as we think they are; he showed us by drawing a parallel that there are similarities between the expansion of the IT and the “rollouts of earlier technologies”.

Explicitly he described the rise of railroads and electricity and the increased demand as far as those technologies became part of the “general business infrastructure”

Then Mr. Carr tried to underpin the effect if technologies are available to everyone;

“opportunities for individual advantage are largely gone” after the so-called build out phase of a technology and such completed technologies stop to influence competition, they influence an economy on a macroeconomic level, they became a standard of a country;

“What would Austria be without electricity: economical irrelevant.” by me (not proved !!!)

According to the Moore’s Law the transistors on a computer chip double every two years; or in other words; speed and memory capacity doubles.

AHS =Analytic Systems Automated Purchasing introduced in the 1976, a system that helped hospitals to purchase goods electronically, the heart of this system was a mainframe computer, which helped hospitals to order more efficiently.

After successive implementing this system for other companies, such companies using this system gained a competitive advantage.

Nowadays such systems are cumbersome in view of a competitive advantage; 

the personal computer is responsible for that.

But still companies are spending a lot of their revenue in information technologies although the 25 companies , which delivered the highest economic returns spend less in IT than the average does ( 25 best companies; on average 0,8% of revenue on IT, typical company; on average 3,7% of revenue on IT)

Hence organizations maybe rethink the importance of IT.

Till next week

Pius