Technology continues to evolve and expand at a rapid race – and it seems that there is something new that comes out every day. In many cases, this makes the role of a PR professional quite exciting – but at the same time it is hard to keep up with every single bit of new technology that comes out. It is also a struggle to manage the various profiles as well as sites out there – so many sites so little time! 🙂 We do only have 24 hours in a day after all! 🙂
However, this next form of technology is not only where social media and new emerging technology is going – but this is just the beginning. Various circles of professionals at many different conferences – from PRSA Digital Impact to a DHS sponsored conference last year – everyone has discussed how augmented reality is the wave of the future.
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vRYBu6gSMoU[/youtube]
The question is – what apps would allow people to be able to use their mobile device to learn about other stories and share this content with their own followers? Well, as they say – there is an app for that! TagWhat is an application (available both on the iPhone and Android as well as for the iPad 2) where people are able to access information through their mobile devices and find out stories, links, videos, pictures from the past, and be able to share this with their online community. It allows information to be disseminated directly to the person based on their location.
What this growing trend shows is the power of integration across multiple social media and emerging technologies to combine a fusion platform. Meaning, just doing social media monitoring is so early 2011 – the future lies with combining these factors within digital storytelling and geolocation features.
Numerous possibilities are here for PR professionals – from education among fellow PR professionals with this technology to using this technology to gain awareness about the history of a place or location (ex. tourism / university tours) to even be useful to looking at current news and information about a place in a moment of crisis or disaster.
However, there are of course some risks and considerations that need to be looked into further with this technology. For example, what about the issue of privacy? Control of what information is presented based on location – is this about SEO or other means of influence? What about the ability to use this information in secure locations? These are just a few questions that we need to discuss as both a professional and academic community.
These are all going to be issues and trends we need to be following and researching on to help explore this phenomenon even further, as well as the best practices and implications that this technology has not only on the PR profession, but on society and businesses as well.
Hope you all are having a great day!
Best Wishes,
Karen
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