2010 was a breakout year for the Interactive portion of SXSW. Attendance was up 33% from 2009 for Interactive alone. Since Twitter’s launch there in 2007 the industry has focused on this event to launch and tout new products and services directly to the audiences that can can make or break them. As a first time attendee I was energized by the excitement around the latest topics of HTML5, CSS3, geolocation and the birth of the consumer tablet.
These new technologies and platforms will drastically change how consumers view, participate and respond to brands digitally. It will also have a dramatic impact on the agencies that are paid to develop content and strategies for clients as there are a slew of new tools available to utilize these technologies faster and more efficiently than ever before.
HTML5 and CSS3 greatly expand the ability for designers to leverage typography, video content, enhanced interaction, robust navigation and Flash-like interactions all with a few simple lines of code. Just a few years ago the approach of build it once and deploy everywhere was just a dream, but HTML5 and CSS3 are quickly making the dream a reality. Modern browsers such as Safari, Firefox and Chrome have already adopted these technologies and proven their potential. Enough so that Microsoft finally fell in line and announced that IE 9 would be Web Standards compliant just like the competitors.
Geolocation also promises a lot of potential. With the ever increasing use of smart phones and the huge array of mobile tablet devices about to ship, users will expect content to be relevant not only to the type of device they are viewing it on but where they are when they view it. Google has new services available to anyone to take advantage of this approach while at the same time social networks Gowalla and Foursquare are defining how to leverage geolocation data to influence consumer behavior through gaming-type point rewards.
The future of Flash was also a major topic of discussion as these modern browsers can replicate similar functionality without the use of the Flash plug-in via new HTML elements called Canvas and HTML5 Video. This is a serious threat to Adobe’s monopoly on rich content delivery (specifically video) via the Web. The anti-Flash movement has also gained serious momentum with help from Apple through their lack of Flash support on the iPhone and recently released iPad.
But SXSW isn’t just geeking out on topics for developers and designers. One of the most energized sessions I attended was a small but intense discussion called ER 2.0, whose topics included how social media, sms and other technologies are being used in the healthcare environment. The audience was a mix of doctors, designers, healthcare providers and advertising agencies. The session is still going on now via Twitter with a list created by @EdBennett who led the session. You can participate or just listen in on the continued discussion found at #er20 on Twitter. Just send Ed a tweet asking to be added to the list to participate or just listen in. @PatrickKing also posted a great re-cap from a designers perspective here which I found very insightful for agency folk.
How all of these new technologies will be leveraged by healthcare in the long run is a big question that we can all help answer. Pharma companies will be looking to us for guidance on where to focus their efforts and which technologies to use for effective spends of their marketing dollars. It will be our job to connect the dots between these technologies so that they match up with strategic planning and consumer or HCP expectations. Looking forward vs. leaning on our existing ideas of what digital can do is going to be critical to a successful campaign or brand launch. We are at a place in time on the Web where the new frontiers these technologies afford us have yet to be explored in detail or practicality for the health industry. No longer will the digital disciplines be able to be outsourced to a team at the production end of an idea. It’s will all need to be interwoven from the onset to create the seamless end user experience that the Web of today demands.
