Sunday, February 6, 2011

Android gaining as enterprises ramp up mobile app development across platforms and business models

It's a post-PC world, and mobile development is the name of the game. According to a report from Appcelerator and IDC, businesses and developers are racing to define a winning mobile strategy, while keeping an eye on platforms and business models.

The first-quarter report, garnered from a survey of 2,235 Appcelerator Titanium developers, shows that while the iPhone and iPad are still the leaders of the pack, Android smartphones and tablets are gaining large amounts of developer interest. Google has nearly caught up to Apple in smartphones and is closing the gap on tablets.

Businesses are increasingly taking a multi-platform approach. On average, respondents said they plan to deploy apps on at least four different devices.



The report also shows that for enterprises the days of mobile app exploration are drawing to a close and companies are moving, or have moved, into an acceleration phase, with an eye toward greater innovation. This year, developers and businesses expect to triple their app development efforts, and the average developer is now building for four different devices.


In addition, there is a dramatic increase in the integration of geo-location, social, and cloud connectivity services, along with increased plans to integrate advertising and in-app purchase business models.

With the growth in the market, Appcelerator and IDC have developed a "Mobile Maturity Model" to describe the three phases of mobility adoption -- exploration, acceleration, and innovation.

Last year, most respondents (44 percent) said they were in the exploration phase of their mobile strategy. A simple app or two -- typically on iPhone -- and a focus on free brand-affinity apps was standard practice. This year, 55 percent of respondents said they are now shifting into the ‘acceleration’ phase.

Summary of findings

Other findings from the report:
  • On average, each respondent said they plan to develop 6.5 apps this year, up 183 percent over last year.

  • Businesses are increasingly taking a multi-platform approach. On average, respondents said they plan to deploy apps on at least four different devices (iPhone, iPad, Android Phone, Android Tablet) this year, up two-fold over 2010.

  • Ubiquitous cloud-connectivity: 87 percent of developers said their apps will connect to a public or private cloud this year, up from only 64 percent deploying cloud-connected apps last year.

    In addition to cloud services, integration of social and location services will explode in 2011 and will define the majority of mobile experiences this year.



  • Always connected, personal, and contextual: in addition to cloud services, integration of social and location services will explode in 2011 and will define the majority of mobile experiences this year. Interest in commerce apps is also on the rise, with PayPal beating Apple as the most preferred method for payments.

  • Business models are evolving along with these more engaging mobile app experiences. Developers are shifting away from free brand affinity apps and becoming less reliant on 99-cent app sales. Increasingly, the focus is on user engagement models such as in-app purchasing and advertising, with mobile commerce on the horizon.

  • Outsource goes in-house: the enterprise takes control of its mobile destiny. 81 percent of respondents said they insource their development, with the majority saying they have an integrated in-house web and mobile team.
A mobile strategy

What do Appcelerator and IDC recommend for business trying to develop a mobile strategy? It's a four pronged approach:
  • Platforms: Cross-platform is mandatory, as is deploying to multiple form factors like tablets. In the third innovation phase, a business is thinking about possibilities across all major platforms and devices.

  • Customer: This perspective considers the shift away from simple content-based apps that inform or entertain to more complex and engaging applications that make use of location, social, and cloud services to transactional applications such as mobile commerce. As the customer experience evolves, so does application sophistication, customer expectations, business transformation opportunities, and the underlying business models. Free branded apps and a reliance on purely app store sales give way to advertising, in-application purchasing, and mobile commerce.

    What starts as a tactical outsourcing of development “to get an app done fast” quickly turns into a more strategic discussion.



  • People: There is an increasing shift from outsourcing to in-house development. What starts as a tactical outsourcing of development “to get an app done fast” quickly turns into a more strategic discussion around competitive advantage, control over a sustainable long-term mobile strategy, and rapid time-to-market considerations.

  • Technology: In order to meet the demand for more apps, new devices, frequent updates, and deeper customer engagement, a business needs to drive down costs, time-to-market, and complexity by developing and leveraging reusable components. Ultimately, this results in the need for a cross-platform, fully integrated mobile architecture that spans a company’s entire app portfolio.
A copy of the full report is available from the Appcelerator site.

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Wednesday, February 2, 2011

Open Group conference next week focuses on role and impact of enterprise architecture amid shifting sands for IT and business

Next week's The Open Group conference in San Diego comes at an important time in the evolution of IT and business. And it's not too late to attend the conference, especially if you're looking for an escape from the snow and ice.

From Feb. 7 through 9 at the Marriott San Diego Mission Valley, the 2011 conference is organized around three key themes: architecting cyber security, enterprise architecture (EA) and business transformation, and the business and financial impact of cloud computing. CloudCamp San Diego will be held in conjunction with the conference on Wednesday, Feb. 9. [Disclosure: The Open Group is a sponsor of BriefingsDirect podcasts.]

Registration is open to both members and non-members of The Open Group. For more information, or to register for the conference in San Diego please visit: http://www.opengroup.org/sandiego2011/register.htm. Registration is free for members of the press and industry analysts.

The Open Group is a vendor- and technology-neutral consortium, whose vision of Boundaryless Information Flow™ will enable access to integrated information within and between enterprises based on open standards and global interoperability.

I've found these conferences over the past five years an invaluable venue for meeting and collaborating with CIOs, enterprise architects, standards stewards and thought leaders on enterprise issues. It's one of the few times when the mix of technology, governance and business interests mingle well for mutual benefit.

The Security Practitioners Conference, being held on Feb. 7, provides guidelines on how to build trusted solutions; take into account government and legal considerations; and connects architecture and information security management. Confirmed speakers include James Stikeleather, chief innovation officer, Dell Services; Bruce McConnell, cybersecurity counselor, National Protection and Programs Directorate, U.S. Department of Homeland Security; and Ben Calloni, Lockheed Martin Fellow, Software Security, Lockheed Martin Corp.

Change management processes requiring an advanced, dynamic and resilient EA structure will be discussed in detail during The Enterprise Architecture Practitioners Conference on Feb. 8. The Cloud Computing track, on Feb. 9, includes sessions on the business and financial impact of cloud computing; cloud security; and how to architect for the cloud -- with confirmed speakers Steve Else, CEO, EA Principals; Pete Joodi, distinguished engineer, IBM; and Paul Simmonds, security consultant, the Jericho Forum.

General conference keynote presentation speakers include Dawn Meyerriecks, assistant director of National Intelligence for Acquisition, Technology and Facilities, Office of the Director of National Intelligence; David Mihelcic, CTO, the U.S. Defense Information Systems Agency; and Jeff Scott, senior analyst, Forrester Research.

I'll be moderating an on-stage panel on Wednesday on the considerations that must be made when choosing a cloud solution -- custom or "shrink-wrapped" -- and whether different forms of cloud computing are appropriate for different industry sectors. The tension between plain cloud offerings and enterprise demands for customization is bound to build, and we'll work to find a better path to resolution.

I'll also be hosting and producing a set of BriefingsDirect podcasts at the conference, on such topics as the future of EA groups, EA maturity and future roles, security risk management, and on the new Trusted Technology Forum (TTF) established in December. Look for those podcasts, blog summaries and transcripts here over the next few days and weeks.

For the first time, The Open Group Photo Contest will encourage the members and attendees to socialize, collaborate and share during Open Group conferences, as well as document and share their favorite experiences. Categories include best photo on the conference floor, best photo of San Diego, and best photo of the conference outing (dinner aboard the USS Midway in San Diego Harbor). The winner of each category will receive a $25 Amazon gift card. The winners will be announced on Monday, Feb. 14 via social media communities.

It's not too late to join in, or to plan to look for the events and presentations online. Registration is open to both members and non-members of The Open Group. For more information, or to register for the conference in San Diego please visit: http://www.opengroup.org/sandiego2011/register.htm. Registration is free for members of the press and industry analysts.

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Tuesday, January 25, 2011

HP enters public cloud market, puts muscle behind hybrid computing value and management for enterprises

HP today fully threw its hat into the public cloud-computing ring, joining the likes of Amazon Web Services (AWS) and IBM, to provide a full range of infrastructure as a service (IaaS) offerings hosted on HP data centers.

Targeting enterprises, independent software vendors (ISVs), service providers, and the global HP channel and partner ecosystem, the new HP Enterprise Cloud Services-Compute (ECS-Compute) bundles server, storage, network and security resources for consumption as pure services.

ECS-Compute is an HP-hosted compute fabric that's governed via policies for service, performance, security, and privacy requirements. The fabric is available next month via bursting with elasticity provisioning that rapidly adjusts infrastructure capacity, as enterprise demands shift and change, said HP. [Disclosure: HP is a sponsor of BriefingsDirect podcasts.]

HP CloudSystem, a new private-hybrid cloud enablement offering that automates private cloud provisioning, uses HP Cloud Service Automation (CSA) solutions and HP Converged Infrastructure physical assets so that enterprises, governments, and service providers can better build, manage, and consume hybrid cloud services, said HP.

This is a hybrid services delivery capability, and you can manage it all as a service.



HP CloudSystem supports a broad spectrum of applications while speeding and simplifying the buying, deployment and support of cloud environments, said HP. CloudSystem brings "cloud maps" to play so that more applications can be quick-start "ported" to a cloud or hybrid environment.

The ECS-Compute and CloudSystem announcements much more fully deepen HP's cloud strategy, building on earlier announcements around CSA and Cloud Assure offerings. HP, however, is coming to the public cloud space from a hosting and multi-tenancy heritage, in large part through its EDS acquisition. That, HP expects, will make its cloud models more appealing to large businesses, governments and applications providers. HP is also emphasizing the security and management capabilities of these offerings.

As a new public cloud provider, HP is competing more directly with IBM, Rackspace, AWS, and Microsoft, and very likely over time, with private and hybrid cloud products from EMC/VMware, Oracle, Cisco, Red Hat, TIBCO and Google. There will be more overlap with burgeoning software-as-a-service (SaaS) providers like Salesforce.com, as they seek to provide more cloud-based infrastructure services.

Yet even among that wide field, HP is seeking to differentiate itself with a strong emphasis on hybrid computing over assemblages or components of plain vanilla public cloud services. HP sees a governance path for computing resources and services from a variety of sources and models (including legacy IT) that add up to IT as a service as its long-term strategic value.

"This is a hybrid services delivery capability, and you can manage it all as a service," said Rebecca Lawson, director of cloud initiatives at HP. The services are designed to help organizations "grow and manage the applications," regardless of the applications' heritage, production model, or technology, said Lawson.

"We're now saying, 'welcome to our data center' ... but we're ecumenical and agnostic on platform and applications," she said.

Also part of the Jan. 25 news, HP Hybrid Delivery will help businesses and governments build, manage, and consume services using a combination of traditional, outsourced and cloud services best suited to them. It consists of HP Hybrid Delivery Strategy Service, to provide a structured understanding of the programs, projects, and main activities required to move to a hybrid delivery model; and HP Hybrid Delivery Workload Analysis Service, to analyze enterprise workloads to determine the best fits for hybrid environments.

Professional services

HP sees these as enabling a "journey" to cloud and hybrid computing, with a strong emphasis on the professional services component of learning how to efficiently leverage cloud models.

HP's vision for the cloud -- part of its solution set for the demands of the "Instant-On Enterprise" -- clearly emphasizes openness and neutrality when it comes to operating systems, platforms, middleware, virtual machines, cloud stacks, SaaS providers, and applications, said Lawson. HP will support all major workloads and platforms from its new cloud hosting services, and help to govern and manage across them via HP's hybrid computing and private cloud capabilities as well, said Lawson.

The achievement of the instant-on enterprise, said Sandeep Johri, vice president of strategy and industry solutions at HP, comes from an increasing ability to automate, orchestrate, secure and broker services -- regardless of their origins: traditional IT, or public or private clouds.

HP therefore has a rare opportunity to appeal to many organizations and governments that fear cloud lock-in.



In other words, hybrid computing (perhaps even more than cloud itself) will become a key enabling core competency for enterprises for the foreseeable future. HP is banking on that, expecting that the platform and lock-in wars will push customers to an alternative lower-risk partner that emphasizes inclusion and open standards over singular cloud stacks.

HP therefore has a rare opportunity to appeal to many organizations and governments that fear cloud lock-in, as well as the costs and complexity of following a SaaS or software platform vendor's isolated path to cloud, which may come from a heritage of on-premises platform or proprietary stack lock-in, rather than from a support of heterogeneity and of a heritage of a myriad of hosted services.

Whereas some vendors such as VMware, Oracle, Microsoft, Cisco, Red Hat and Citrix are cobbling together so-called integrated cloud stacks -- and then building a set of hosting services that will most likely favor their stacks and installed bases, HP is working to focus at the higher abstraction of management and governance across many stacks and models. Hence the emphasis on hybrid capabilities. And, where some SaaS and business applications vendors are working to bring cloud infrastructure services and/or SaaS delivery to their applications, HP is working to help its users provide an open cloud home and/or hybrid support for all their applications, inclusive of those hosted anywhere.

HP's cloud strategy, then, closely follows (for now) its on-premises data center infrastructure strategy, with many options on software and stack, and an emphasis on overall and holistic management and cost-efficiency.

Less complex path

Some analysts I've heard recently, say that HP is coming late to public cloud. But, coming from a hosting and single- and multi-tenancy applications support services heritage may very well mean that HP already has a lot of cloud and hosted services DNA, and that the transition from global hosting for Fortune 500 enterprises to a full cloud offerings is a less tortured and complex path than those from other vendors, such as traditional on-premises OS, platform, middleware, and infrastructure license providers, as well as SaaS-to-cloud providers.

HP may be able to effectively position itself as more IT transformation-capable and mission-critical support-ready -- and stack-neutral and applications-inclusive -- to provide a spectrum of hybrid cloud services at global scale with enterprise-calibre response, security and reliability. And because HP does not have a proprietary middleware stack of its own to protect, it can support the requirements of more of its customers across more global regions.

Enterprise mature from the get-go, not late to the cloud-hype party, might be a better way to describe HP's timing on cloud sourcing and support services. The value HP seems to be eyeing comes from agility and total costs reduction for IT -- not on a technology, license or skills lock-in basis.

By allowing a large spectrum of applications support -- and the ability to pick and choose (and change) the sourcing for the applications over time -- the risk of lock-in, and for unwillingly paying high IT prices, goes down. Hybrid, says HP, offers the best long-term IT value and overall cost-efficiencies. Hybrid, says HP, can save 30-40 percent of the cost of traditional IT, though not offering too many specifics on how long such savings would take.

"You can now run mission-critical applications with the economics of cloud," said Patrick Harr, vice president of cloud strategy and solutions at HP. "It's a hybrid world."

HP is also thinking hybrid when it comes to go-to-market strategies. It expects to appeal to ISVs, resellers, and system integrators/outsourcers with the newest cloud offerings. By being hybrid-focused and open and agnostic to underlying platforms, more channel partners will look to HP with less strategic angst and the potential for later direct competition as they might with an Oracle or Microsoft.

I can easily see where a choice of tool/framework and openness too in terms of workload and operations environments joined to a coordinated, managed services and hybrid hosting spectrum would be very appealing.



And, HP is putting a lot of consulting and professional services around the hybrid push, including HP Cloud Discovery Workshops that help enterprises develop a holistic cloud strategy, with a focus on cloud economics, applications and cloud security.

HP ECS-Compute will be available in the US and EMEA countries in February, and in Asia-Pacific countries in June.

“To create an Instant-On Enterprise, organizations need to close the gap between what customers and citizens expect and what the enterprise can deliver,” said Ann Livermore, executive vice president, HP Enterprise Business. “With HP’s cloud solutions, clients can determine the right service delivery models to deliver the right results, in the right time frame, at the right price.”

These new offerings will not be a last chapter in HP's cloud and IT transformation drive. Looking back to last month's ALM 11 announcements, and HP's long heritage of SaaS test and dev services, one can easily envision a more end-to-end applications lifecycle and hybrid cloud operations capabilities set. Think of it as a coordinated, hybrid services approach to applications definition, build, test, deploy and brokering -- all as an open managed lifecycle.

That means joining PasS and hybrid computing on an automated and managed continuum, for ISVs, service providers, governments and enterprises. I can easily see where a choice of tool/framework and openness too in terms of workload and operations environments joined to a coordinated, managed services and hybrid hosting spectrum would be very appealing.

Such a flexible cloud support horizon -- from cradle to grave of applications and data -- could really impact the total cost of IT downward, while reducing complexity, and allowing businesses to focus on their core processes, innovation and customer value, rather than on an ongoing litany of never-ceasing IT headaches.

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Platform ISF 2.1 improves use, breadth of private cloud management, sets stage for use of public cloud efficiencies

Platform Computing on Tuesday released Platform ISF 2.1, which improves ease of use and automation for building and managing enterprise private clouds.

Platform's cloud management software helps enterprises transition from internal IT to more productive and efficient private cloud infrastructure services that support multi-tier applications.

New in Platform ISF 2.1 is a dynamic “single cloud pane” for cloud administration; expanded definitions for support of multi-tier application environments such as Hadoop, Jboss, Tomcat and WebSphere; and enhanced business policy-driven automation that spans across multiple data centers. [Disclosure: Platform Computing is a sponsor of BriefingsDirect podcasts.]

Enterprises looking to take advantage of the cloud do so for many reasons but one of the key ones is to enhance their agility in response to changing business dynamics.



By automating delivery of complex enterprise infrastructure and production applications across heterogeneous virtual, physical and public cloud resources, Platform ISF also helps reduce electricity and cooling requirements while freeing up capacity in data centers. The management layer provides improved monitoring, policy management, and workload management across multiple and heterogenous cloud and traditional IT stacks. By capturing corporate standards and business policies within the automation engine, companies can improve both compliance and security, said Platform Computing.

Via the single-pane administration capabilities, what Toronto-based Platform calls a "cloud cockpit," users can self-select approved services to support a wide variety of applications. Enhanced end-user portals are also new, including drag-and-drop portlet-based dashboards and customizable application instantiation pages.

What's more, the applications be can monitored from both private and public clouds, such as Amazon Web Services (AWS). The degree of management allows for future planning and capacity management, to help exploit hybrid computing benefits and cut the total overall costs of supporting applications.

Enhancing agility

“Enterprises looking to take advantage of the cloud do so for many reasons but one of the key ones is to enhance their agility in response to changing business dynamics,” said Cameron Haight, Research Vice President, Gartner, in a release. “This means that the technology used to manage cloud environments should be similarly agile and act to facilitate and not impede this industry movement. IT organizations should look for tools that can address the various cloud usage scenarios without demanding excessive investments in management infrastructure or staff support.”

Key capabilities in Platform ISF 2.1 include: self-service and chargeback, policy-based automated provisioning of applications, dynamic scaling of applications to meet service level agreements (SLAs) and unification of distributed and mixed-vendor resource pools for sharing. A unique “Active-Active” multiple data center supports higher availability and scalability by leveraging Oracle GoldenGate.

The goal is to manage the heterogeneous applications lifecycle, not just multiple cloud instances.



Ease of use benefits in the new release, which is available now, include account management and delegation based on applications or business processes. Such delegation can occur for such cloud-supported functions as platform as a service (PaaS), infrastructure as a service (IaaS), and hierarchical applications and their supporting components and services. Also included is self-service hierarchical account and resource management (including Active Directory for 10,000+ users) supporting an unlimited number of organizational tiers.

Business benefits include less downtime for applications, even as they are supported by hybrid resources, SLA-driven shared services, less need for specialized administrators, higher availability and creation of richer applications services catalogs. Use of Platform ISF 2.1 for private cloud activities clearly puts the users in a better position to use, exploit and manage public clouds, and to move quickly to the hybrid computing model. The goal is to manage the heterogeneous applications lifecycle, not just multiple cloud instances, said Jay Muelhoefer, VP Enterprise Marketing, Platform Computing.

A free 30-day trial of Platform ISF 2.1 can be downloaded at www.platform.com/privatecloud. Platform Computing is also hosting a webinar, “Building A Private Cloud Strategy – Best Practices” on Feb. 16. For more information about Platform ISF or the webinar, visit www.platform.com/privatecloud.

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Tuesday, January 18, 2011

Mobile access and social collaboration form a cloud catalyst for enterprises

Back in the mid-1990s, then Microsoft CEO Bill Gates offered a prophetic observation. The impact of the web, he wrote, would be greater than most people thought, but would take longer to happen than was commonly supposed.

Turns out, happily for Microsoft, that he was right.

Yet now, perhaps not so pleasantly for Redmond, the confluence of mobile computing, social online interactions and cloud computing are together supporting a wave of change that will both be more impactful than many think -- and also happen a lot quicker than is expected.

More evidence of this appeared this week, building on momentum that capped a very dynamic 2010. Start-up Bitzer Mobile Inc. this week announced its Enterprise Virtualized Mobility solution (EVM), which makes a strong case for an ecumenical yet native apps approach to mobile computing for enterprises.

Bitzer Mobile is banking on the urgency that enterprise IT departments are feeling to deliver apps and data to mobile devices -- from Blackberries to iOS, Android, and WebOS. But knowing the enterprise, they also know that adoption of such sweeping change needs to be future-proofed and architected for enterprise requirements. More on EVM later.

Another hastening development in the market is Salesforce.com's pending release the first week of February of the Spring '11 release of its flagship CRM SaaS applications. The upgrade includes deeper integrations with Chatter collaboration and analytics services, so that sales, marketing and service employees can be far more powerful and productive in how they innovate, learn and teach in their roles. The trend toward collaborative business process that mobile-delivered mobile web apps like Salesforce.com's CRM suite now offer are literally changing the culture of workers overnight.

Advancing cloud services

Last month, at its Dreamforce conference, Salesforce also debuted a database in the cloud service, Database.com, that combines attractive heterogeneous features for a virtual data tier for developers of all commercial, technical and open source persuasions. Salesforce also bought Heroku and teamed with BMC Software on its RemedyForce cloud configuration management offering.

Salesforce's developments and offerings provide a prime example of how social collaboration, mobile and cloud reinforce each other, spurring on adoption that fosters serious productivity improvements that then invite yet more use and an accelerating overall adoption effect. This is happening not at what we quaintly referred to as Internet Time, but at far more swiftly viral explosion time.

As I traveled at the end of 2010, to both Europe and the U.S. coasts, I was struck by the pervasive use of Apple iPads by the very people who know a productivity boon when they see it and will do whatever they can to adopt it. Turns out they didn't have to do too much nor spend too much. Bam.

I also recently fielded calls from nearly frantic IT architects asking how they can hope to satisfy the demand to quickly move key apps and data to iPads and the most popular smartphones for their employees. My advice was an is: the mobile web. It's not a seamless segue, but it allows the most mobile extension benefits the soonest, does not burn any deployment bridges, and allows a sane and thoughtful approach to adopting native apps if and when that becomes desired.

Clearly, the decision now for apps providers is no longer Mac or PC, Java or .NET -- but rather native or web for mobile? The architecture discussion for supporting cloud is also shifting toward lightweight middleware.

I still think that the leveraging of HTML5 and extending current web, portal, and RIA apps sets to the mobile tier (any of the major devices types) is the near-term best enterprise strategy, but Bitzer Mobile and its EVM has gotten me thinking. Their approach is architected to support the major mobile native apps AND the web complements.

IT wants to leverage and exploit all the remote access investments they've made. They want to extend the interception of business processes to anyone anywhere with control and authenticity. And they do not necessarily want to buy, support and maintain an arsenal of new mobile devices -- not when their power users already possess a PC equivalent in their shirt pockets. Not when their CFOs won't support the support costs.

A piece of mobile real estate

So Bitzer Mobile places a container on the user's personal mobile device and allows the IT department to control it. Its a virtual walled garden on the tablet or smartphone that, I'm told, does not degrade performance. The device does need a fair amount of memory, and RIM devices will need a SD card flash supplement (for now).

The Bitzer Mobile model also places a virtualization layer for presentation layer delivery at the app server tier for the apps and data to be delivered to the mobile containers. And there's a control panel (either SaaS or on-premises) that manages the deployments, access and operations of the mobile tier enablement arrangement. Native apps APIs and SKDs can be exploited, ISV apps can be made secure and tightly provisioned, and data can be delivered across the mobile networks and to the containers safely, Bitzer Mobile says.

That was fast. It's this kind of architected solution, I believe, that will ultimately appeal most to IT and service providers ... the best of the thin client, virtualized client, owner-managed client and centrally controlled presentation layer of existing apps and data model. It lets enterprise IT drive, but users get somewhere new fast.

Architecture is destiny in IT, but we're now seeing the shift to IT architecture as opposed to only enterprise architecture. Your going to need both. That's what happens when SaaS providers fulfill their potential, when data and analytics can come from many places, when an individual's iPhone is a safe enterprise end-point.

And so as cloud providers like Salesforce.com provide the new models, and the likes of Bitzer Mobile extend the older models, we will see the benefits of cloud, mobile and social happen bigger and faster than any of us would have guessed.