| Title: |
Going Wireless |
| Author: |
Jaclyn Easton |
| Publisher: |
HarperCollins Publishers |
| Date/Time: |
2002 |
| Pages: |
English text 259 pages (Hardcover) |
| ISBN: |
0-06-621336-3 |
Review:
The author is a "business technology futurist," and has won an Emmy Award for her technology reporting for CBS News in Los Angeles. In this new book, she tries to provide an overview of the wireless options that individuals and corporations can make use of for enpowerment and liberation in the process of the information revolution.
She begins with a list of reasons why the U.S. is slower than Japan in adapting to mobile/wireless Internet usage. First, there is a difference in the style of living and commuting: "While the Japanese amuse themselves on their train commutes with their iMode technology, Americans are behind the wheel, talking instead of tapping." Second, more fundamentally, most Americans have been introduced to the Internet through big desktop computers with large monitors and full-size keyboards, and are not used to a small display on a cell handset. Third, home connections based on land lines are much better in the U.S. than in Japan, and for that reason, it is more difficult for the U.S. to develop strategies and standards for mobile and wireless communications.
Having said that, she is optimistic about the future of mobile and wireless technologies and their applications in business and society in the U.S. and elsewhere. Although its clunky interface and slow connections are still a problem, mobile/wireless will beome the preferred method of Internet access and hence a world-changing invention, according to the author.
The following is an outline of the book from the publisher's website:
http://www.harpercollins.com/catalog/book_xml.asp?isbn=0066213363
Going Wireless delivers the unexpected by showing how wireless is transforming every type of enterprise from micro-businesses to multi-national conglomerates.
Award-winning technology journalist Jaclyn Easton begins with an in-depth look at owning your customers and clients through mobile commerce -- whether your company focuses on consumers or business-to-business.
From there you will learn about the advantages of wirelessly fortifying your mobile workforce of itinerant executives, sales personnel, and field service technicians as well as how wireless is dramatically redefining customer service, marketing, and advertising.
Going Wireless also delves deep inside the corporation. First you'll find out why most companies are "handsizing" in addition to deploying wireless technology to rejuvenate warehouses, supply chains, procurement procedures, data collection, competitive intelligence, and much more.
The best part is that these scenarios are supported by over 40 brand-name success stories, including:
How Sears saves millions by wirelessly enabling 100 percent of their appliance repair technicians;
How the Gap proved that by sewing wireless technology in their clothing they could reduce labor distribution costs by 50 percent;
How McKessanHBOC -- a Fortune 40 corporation -- used mobile technology to entirely eliminate all their manifest imaging costs.
While most people associate wireless with cell phones and Palm handhelds, you'll also learn that wireless has been around for over 100 years and has spawned mobile options you've never heard of and is being used in ways you've never imagined.
This makes Going Wireless the perfect book for executives and managers who need a comprehensive overview of the wireless options that can make their companies more competitive, more productive, and more profitable.
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