Christmas is a time for giving and receiving and for me this Christmas was an opportunity to get the technology present I really, really wanted.  It is not that I covet the iPhone because it is red-hot (it is) but more that the latest version represents a huge step towards making technology for people to use naturally, rather than making people in to technologists.  And I wanted to explore the opportunities this phone and the coming plethora of copy-cat devices offers in personal and on-farm productivity.

The iPhone has become a phenomenon since its launch just five years ago. With over 100 million sold in around 90 countries, the iPhone represents a small but rapidly growing percentage of mobile phones.

In the iPhone, Apple Inc have re-defined mobile computing and most of the world’s smart phone manufacturers are now racing to catch up with its elegance and more importantly, functionality.

This race is resulting in such explosive growth in mobile internet usage that existing voice and mobile data services are suffering. Equipment manufacturer Cisco estimates there will be 788 million mobile-only Internet users by 2015 resulting in mobile data traffic increasing by a whopping 26 times over 2010.

Mobile operators have started to solve this looming issue by upgrading the current generation of mobile cell sites and by providing fibre-based networks to back-haul cell sites to the Internet.  But the real solution to over-loaded mobile networks will not be implemented until fourth generation (4G) mobile services become available in 2012/13.

The latest version of the iPhone can only accelerate this growth.  The reasons for this lie in a few new features: the Siri voice interface; the Notifications service; and most significantly, the integration with iCloud.

Siri is the voice interface and allows the device to act on naturally spoken commands.  Telling Siri to "Remind me to phone Astrid when I arrive at Primary Focus" results in an entry being made in the Reminder App that pops up when I get to Tuakau.  Ask the machine "Will I need an umbrella in Auckland tomorrow?" and it displays the current weather forecast and tells me that there is no rain in the forecast for Auckland tomorrow. 

Yes, swearing at it will elicit a response that shows the system to have a sense of humour.  On the down side, asking where the nearest coffee shop is gives a 'sorry' response and advice that Siri can only look for businesses in the US.

On the farm, I have told Siri to "remind me to replace the broken fence post at this location".  I have also used a spirit level App on the phone to level a new fence style and to measure the current wind speed.  In the near future, I will use it to record animal treatments and movements as they happen, so avoiding the need to do the paperwork later.

In business, the Notifications service displays incoming emails and reminders in a non-intrusive way.  My emails and contacts are all synchronised across each computer I use via iCloud as well as automagically making documents written on other devices available for editing and use on the iPhone.  The days of lugging my computer everywhere are over.

This new breed of smart phone is, for the first time, working the way I like to work, rather than me having to work in ways that the device requires.  Apps on it are a major step towards enabling the data driven farm and keep me in touch with my business no matter where I am.