Vancouver 2010 Mobile Olympics

I love the Olympics. Besides the excitement of the actual events, I love the sense of camaraderie, national unity and general goodwill that the games bring with them. While it’s true that Vancouver has had its series of mishaps, including a tragic death, the overall spirit of the games can be felt radiating out of the homes and workplaces of our great country.

What’s really exciting about these games is that they mark a new era of interaction and engagement during a global sporting event. I remember only having two options as a kid during past Olympics: watch a select few live events on TV (time-zone permitting) or listen to them on the radio. The rest I would pick up on during the evening news or the next morning’s paper.

Jokes aside, the iPad is BIG news

This quick post is for all of my non gadget-geek readers that likely had no idea that Apple launched the iPad today at 1PM EST. What is the iPad? There are enough search results on Google to keep you busy for a while. But before you do that, watch this video:

My big three take-aways:

1. It leverages the existing Apple application platform. Basically, it has hit the ground running with 140,000 apps already developed for it.
2. The iBooks store. This will kill existing e-readers unless they agree on a common platform, which likely won’t happen.
3. Smart positioning. It’s not meant to replace your smartphone or your laptop. It’s a third device that effectively fills the gap in between and still manages to fit into your briefcase.

Apps for Democracy “Community Edition”

I’m heavily buried in the process of preparing my materials for the upcoming MARCOM 2009 conference, however I wanted to post this up rather than just tweet about it. Basically, Apps for Democracy , the Washington D.C crowd sourcing initiative that I often use in my presentations, has just launched a new initiative called Apps for Democracy “Community Edition”. Citizens get to submit their community improvement ideas in real-time and vote using this insights portal.

Why do I think this initiative will work? Because last time they had very little support and yet they managed to have citizens develop 47 applications in 30 days using crowd sourced government data. The estimated cost had they gone through the RFP process, would have been $2.3M, not to mention 12 years of procurement. The total cost ended up being the prize money of $50K. The ROI therefore was 4000%.

Have a look at this video if you’re confused.

Apps For Democracy Community Edition from Peter Corbett on Vimeo.