Disqus
“Nokia Instant Community” is a prototype piece of software running on the Maemo 5 powered Nokia N900 that has me genuinely excited about the future. Social networks, for all they’re worth, are keeping us in small circles with people we already know. Sure, there may be some of us who have internet friends, that’s still considered cool in some countries, but when it comes to actual real live networking, and building friendships with new people, skills everyone had before the internet, many of us are not capable of not doing that today.
How convenient, and awesome, would it be to have a social network built around the people who live in your apartment building? Or the people in your school? Or the people at a rock concert? There’s a lot to be said about connecting people. It takes initiative. Walking up to someone and saying hi is still the hardest part of any meaningful social interaction. With “Nokia Instant Community” it’s much, much easier.
Now all the little things like standards and interoperability have to be worked out, but this can be one of the first steps to decentralized social networking. For the people freaking out about privacy, this is the ultimate safety guard since you own all your information, on your device, and you choose who has access to what. Operators also love this since it encourages network usage.
Will this be just another cool demo done in a lab that will never reach product status? It’s a syndrome faced by many large companies, and I’ll be said if this project catches that bug.
[Via: Nokia Conversations]
About The Author
Stefan Constantinescu
Stefan Constantinescu (@WhatTheBit on Twitter) has loved technology since as far back as he can remember. It started with computers, but in the past few years his passion has turned to mobile devices. As a mobile phone enthusiast who lives and breathes devices that connect to the internet, he knows he is not alone with this radical fascination of all things wireless. He is strongly opinionated and enjoys a good debate so leave comments in his posts and he’ll get back to you! Stefan began blogging as a hobby in the fall of 2006 and joined IntoMobile in the summer of 2007. Later he got a job at Nokia in March 2008, but as of June 2009 he has rejoined the IntoMobile team. He is currently based out of Helsinki, Finland.
