Today, Cisco announced the 2012 findings from the annual Cisco Connected World Technology Report (CCWTR). Last year, CCWTR has found that, for about one third of Generation Y, staying connected to the Internet is just as important as air, food and water and two thirds would choose the Internet over a car! This year the CCWTR revealed that at the center of it all is the smartphone, which was identified as the single-most desired device for 18-30-year-olds globally.
We all have 206 bones in our bodies, but it could be argued that for Generation Y, the smartphone has become the 207th. In fact, 60 percent of respondents said they find themselves sub-consciously or compulsively checking their smartphones for emails, texts or social media updates. More than 40 percent would “feel anxious, like part of me was missing,” if they couldn’t check their smartphones constantly.
The smartphone is just about everywhere, it seems. Three out of four global CCWTR respondents said they use their smartphone in bed and more than a third use their smartphones in the bathroom. Enough said.
The need for these 18-30-year-olds to stay connected is stronger than ever and made me wonder just how far someone might go to keep that connection. I took to the streets of San Francisco with a cameraman by my side to find out and asked a few people just how important that mobile connection is for their lives. I asked some “Would you rather…?” type questions to see just how far some people will go stay connected.
How important is it for you to stay connected?
Join the conversation by following the #DataInMotion hashtag and follow Cisco on Twitter and Facebook for more “Would you rather…?” questions. Stay tuned for more video results from around the globe.
Cisco’s Smart Grid Team is excited to support the Wireless Smart Utility Network Alliance (Wi-SUN). Lionel Chocron, vice president and general manager of Cisco’s Connected Energy Networks Business, will be representing Cisco on the Wi-Sun board of directors. Cisco will be joining at the promoter level and the entire team is looking forward to helping drive the development of interoperable Field Area Networks (FAN) for utility applications.
Field Area Networks today are often closed, proprietary systems and generally just supporting a single service. As a result, they do not support interoperability across multiple vendors or take advantage of the decades of networking expertise available within the Internet Protocol suite (IP).
By supporting Wi-SUN, Cisco will help drive the technical definition for standards based, multi service, secure, and scalable Field Area Networks. The Field Area Networks will support important utility use cases including Automatic Metering Infrastructure, Outage Management, and Distribution Automation.
The Wi-SUN defined Field Area Network will be based upon the IP protocol suite, with the initial release based on IEEE 802.15.4g PHY and 802.15.4e MAC wireless mesh technologies. Usage of the IP protocol suite will provide many benefits, including the ability to support additional PHY/MAC technologies in the future.
Our team will further assist in the development of certification testing and “plug-fests” for regions around the world. This will ensure international interoperability between multiple vendors implementing the Wi-SUN defined Field Area Network.
“We are very pleased to be joining the Wi-SUN alliance, and look forward to collaborating with our industry partners to bring interoperable, standards based utility Field Area Networks to reality,” said Lionel Chocron, vice president and general manager of Cisco’s Connected Energy Networks Business Unit.
Other companies who are promoters of the Wi-Sun alliance include:
Further details about the Wi-SUN Alliance can be found here
Cisco Connected Grid products and solution information is available here
The “We’re Listening” blog continues to look at actions taking place across Cisco to improve your experience working with us. In this post, Jim Fuller, Senior Director of Technical Services focused on entitlement, joins us to talk about improvements to services accessibility.
By Guest Contributor Jim Fuller
Imagine you’re in the back seat of a taxi—the driver is in complete control. You have little to no control on speed or route, limited visibility, and no power. Now, imagine you’re the driver—you control speed and course, have full visibility, and it’s your hands on the wheel—you are empowered. That’s what I’m going to talk about—improvements we’re making to simplify customers and partners’ ability to take the driver’s seat. Read More »
Recent Cisco news highlights two prominent service providers – Deutsche Telekom and Telefonica – who have chosen Cisco IP Next-Generation Network solutions.
Key elements include all-IPv6 streamlined routing architecture; fully converged IP and optical layers with 100G coherent technology; integrated cloud service centers, enabling virtualized network services and applications for rapid service innovation; programmatic interfaces aligned with the software-defined networking architecture for real-time automation and OSS; and customer self-service management capabilities.
Cisco has delivered the following technologies in this landmark deployment:
It’s easy to take our connectedness for granted, isn’t it? We often don’t even think about all the innovation behind our connections, but it’s mind boggling when you actually consider just how much getting connected has revolutionized nearly every facet of life over the past two decades. Even more amazing is the fact that we’re just getting started. I like how Mary Meeker, in the most recent installment of her highly anticipated annual “Internet Trends” presentation, described it as still being in “spring training.”
It took us more than 20 years to get two billion people on the Internet, but estimates suggest the next two billion will connect to the network in less than half that time. And the growth of connected “things” is even more incredible. Sometime around 2009, the number of things connected to the Internet surpassed the number of connected people, at which point we began to experience what some call the “Internet of Things.” Read More »
