Apps (applications on the iPhone and iPad), are about to change the way we access information on the internet. During a presentation on the new iPhone OS4, Steve Jobs discussed this transition, during his introduction to iAd, their new mobile computing advertising platform. It is worth listening to his talk. It begins at 44 minutes into the video.
This is not a minor change, and will soon move us away from the use of search engines such as Google. Google has had a relative monopoly on search up until now. I would envision Apple will soon have a new interface for organizing and accessing Apps, (beyond putting them in directories). Once this is done they will have replaced a large portion of the need for a traditional search engine.
In the App model, the user creates a network of interests as a collection of Apps. The vendors, (stores, game publishers, television networks, etc), create custom portals or Apps, which are downloaded and added to a users collection. Access to content will be dependent on Apps written for the Apple iPhone and iPad operating system; this creates proprietary control over accessing content. Where before users were relatively separate from the links to content that interested them on the internet, they will now carry their collection of links through their iPhone/iPad profile in the cloud, Apple’s data warehouse of servers. By associating their links with their Apple profile, their access to content can now be mediated and monetized by Apple.
It was very smart of Apple to name portal links “Apps”, making the user, and other software companies just think they were similar to “applications” in the old PC world, when in fact they were challenges to the entire search paradigm, as we have known it.
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