I imagine a lot of you can say that social media has improved your relationships among your friends, family and colleagues. Who knew 5 years ago that it was a viable threat to people to say “I’ll unfriend you” or that it would be ethical to “poke” co-workers after hours. Social media is overhauling how we communicate with one another. I know many people stay away from it for fears of identity issues, but these fears also existed when people began getting on the internet and when society started shopping online. “giving my credit card over the internet is dangerous.”

Where will we be in the next 5 years

Let’s start with the hot topic in technology right now

The Cloud

Cloud computing will be one of the most significant changes in our society. Cloud computing is when applications are provided and managed by the cloud server and data is also stored remotely in the cloud configuration. An easy example of this is Facebook. Your “profile”, your pictures, your information, your videos are all stored remotely on a server somewhere and you can access it whether you are on your laptop, your ipad or your mobile phone. Another example that I can personally relate to is putting your family photos in the cloud. I did this because I was concerned of what I would do if my hard drive crashed. Lets face it, we don’t have negatives any more to fall back on. So I backed up all our photos on an external HD to put in a firesafe but also put all our images on Flickr.com and made them only accessible to me. 60gb of family photos, backed up in the cloud and accessible from any computer, and tablet and any phone. Pretty cool huh? Now, a month ago Apple announced iCloud. This is helping people image what the cloud is. With iCloud you can have all of your documents, images and music all in the cloud and accessible from any Apple device. Sick days aren’t sick days anymore!

How will the Cloud impact your business?

Zaarly

How many of you have ever thought or said “I’d pay $50 for somebody to come mulch my house today”. Zaarly makes that happen. Zaarly allows you to request a service or some offer to anyone in your area. While being less than a month old and being founded overnight during a 54 hour cram session at LA Startup weekend, Zaarly is making fast tracks in our digital world. Here is some background on it.

• Post what you’re looking for, how much you’re willing to pay for it and how soon you need it on Zaarly. Zaarly immediately shares your request in the local community through the Zaarly platform, and also allows you to get help from your friends and contacts to find what you’re looking for via social channels like Facebook and Twitter
• People or businesses nearby see what you want and connect to fulfill your request
• Zaarly allows buyers and sellers to anonymously message and talk on the phone to facilitate the logistics of a
• transaction, enabling an in-person or virtual meeting to complete the transaction
• You can use cash or Zaarly’s integrated credit card payment system to pay for the transaction, all within a
• safe and secure platform
• Zaarly is available on the iPhone, Android, and all Web-enabled mobile phones via your mobile Web browser, as well as through the Web and Facebook on your desktop computer. The integrated Zaarly platform allows buyers and sellers to connect while they are on-the-go or from the convenience of home or office

Square

Ultra High Speed Internet

Earlier this year Verizon announced the launch of its 4G LTE Wireless Data system. This amazing communications vessel boasts download speeds of 28 mbps and uploads speeds of 10 mbps. You say big deal, and I say it is. This is much faster than the average home cable internet speeds, even at work where we have TWC Business Class I only get download speeds of 7mbps and uploads of 1.5 mbps. Why does this matter? Imagine a workforce that has no centralized location. Imagine a workforce where people can work wherever, whenever as or even more efficient that they would in the office. As a graphic and web designer, I can design a lot better with headphones on a coffee shop than I can behind a desk being interuptted by phone calls, email and people stopping in for autographs. How this effects us in the next 5 years is mobile devices are now the primary information source for consumers. People have begun to stream video live from wherever they are to the masses. The website ustream.tv has excisted for a while as an internet streaming source, but did you know that you can stream from your phone? Imagine video from a presidential inauguration being crowdsourced from everyones cell phone.

Imagine getting to witness your child’s sporting events while you are stuck in a lecture or my favorite, imagine getting to talk to other people, face to face while you are not in the same room. No longer will you have to talk to your 4 year old on the phone and say “Stop picking on your sister” instead you can easily video chat with him and tell him “stop picking on your sister” while giving him the evil eye.

Video conferencing has a new meaning, so does the importance of looking your best EVERY morning. High speed internet will change the way all of us do business in one way or another. In 2016 the number one source for music, books, tv, movies, live events and business, will be the Internet. Get excited about this, if your going to go out and buy a smart phone, be sure its 4G or it will be very old and slow within the year. I’ve been holding out for the iPhone 5, if it doesn’t have 4G in it, I’m sticking with Android.

Digital Banking

Earlier I talked about the Square card reader and what we can consumers can use it for. Square is only the tip of the iceberg. Since 2010 we have slowly seen the emergency of e-banking through your mobile phone. With certain banks right now you can pay all your bills from your mobile device and even deposit checks. Last Saturday I had my first experience in depositing a check from my phone. I used the Paypal app and snapped a photo of both the front and the back as instructed and it imported into their system. Right now the deposit turn around is 6 days but many banks are doing it much better, Chase and PNC Bank for example. Another way banking is changing is with the embedding of NFC technology in devices. Now, when I say NFC what do you think of? Thats right, the football conference that always seems to cheat the Detroit Lions. Trust me, in 2016 the Lions still stink.

In the fall of 2011, Google is releasing some smartphones with NFC chips in them, Apple will get on board later after this comes out, as usual. This allows the users to wave their phone over a specific area and have their phone react accordingly. So for example you can wave phone on a poster at a trade convention and instantly get the company’s contact information or coupon savings. Now, lets take this another step further. NFC also allows for you to use your phone as a wallet. A couple months ago Google announced “Google Wallet” which is a venture between them, Citi, Mastercard and some other partners. This allows users to have their credit card information stored in their mobile phone and they can pay for items wherever they say a paypass or NFC terminal. Mastercard already has these in many stores, you may have seen them. This allows users to take their credit card on the machine to process their transaction. Now everyone fears the “what if my phone is lost or stolen”. I understand that, but I ask you this, would you rather lose your wallet or your cell phone? Your cell phone you can have a password to access, your cell phone can be deactivated remotely and with a cell phone you can call it so it rings in order to locate it. Wallets don’t do that, even in 2016. Another quick little example, Coke is going to start distrubuting coke machines that you text to pay. So you text a specific code and the coke machine spits out a Coca Cola and your Verizon account is docked $1.00 for your soda. Crazy huh.

Alright, lets wrap this up. We have come a long way in the last 5 years and in the next 5 years, things will grow even faster. Technology, Media and Communications will be the three headed monster will solve a lot of problems and bring a lot of our fantasies to real life. I ask though that you have an open mind to new technologies and do not fear change. 2016 is a great year and I can’t wait for you to see it, Columbus is crazy since Ohio State won back to back national titles.

Stay Nerdy My Friends

Jay