A very quick post on practising what you preach

The Australia Council has just reached their new research report called Connecting:// art audiences online. I haven’t had a chance to have a full read of the report in depth just yet, but one thing leaped out at me this morning when I started looking through the website… The website, which contains pieces of advice like this:

The internet – and in particular, mobile technology, provides a range of opportunities for arts organisations to make it easy. Already, there’s strong adoption of mobile apps in relation to arts events, with strong interest in apps to support ticket purchases, program customisation, interaction and content sharing, to name just a few.

cannot be read fully on my iPad. I was flicking through the site first thing this morning, and was pretty frustrated to find that the text on the site would not scroll so that it could be read in its entirety. I could see the start of bar graphs, but not the important information at the other end of them. I thought the report was relevant enough that I would actually try to access it again from my laptop… but very easily I could have just dismissed it as inconvenient and not looked again.

If you are going to talk about the importance of mobile technology, then please consider how mobile audiences will access your information when designing your site.

FOLLOW UP: But here’s the nice thing about social media, and a demonstration of how to use it well…  OZCO responding to the problems mentioned above.

But do I need an iPad?

At MW2011, I got some serious gear envy. I am iphone-less (although I have a ‘smart phone’ I intentionally bought a phone that I wouldn’t use online too much, so I could disconnect my life occasionally), I wasn’t carrying my laptop with me most of the time, and everywhere I looked, people were tapping away on tablets.

This, combined with the resounding cry that the future is mobile, and recent predictions from Cisco suggest that Tablets Will Generate 17 Percent of Mobile Wireless Data Demand by 2020, have got me considering whether an iPad has a place in my life (there was also some peer pressure from Tim from Museum Victoria)…

I am going to be taking the train to Sydney at least once a week for the foreseeable future, and I think the iPad would provide me with an easy way to do work whilst en route. But I think I mostly want it because it’s pretty, and I’m having a little fear of missing out.

If I get one, I could be just like this chick – see how happy and shiny she looks.

Do you have one? Would you recommend it? Or do you think this is just a case of unnecessary gear-related vanity?!?