Pearson Head of Future Technologies: “Mobile is today, not the future.”
We are running the Mobile Publishing Masterclass on 12th April in London and already have 30 leading publishers registered for the event. As with previous events, I have been carrying out mini interviews with the attendees to ascertain where the state of the mobile publishing industry is. First up is Diana Stepner, Head of Future Technologies at publishing giant Pearson.
In the mobile industry there has long been the expectation of an impending ‘Year of Mobile.’ However, Diana Stepner believes mobile is the here and now. According to Stepner, “Mobile is today, not the future.” This will make good reading for those in the mobile industry who still believe that platform fragmentation, an obsession with iPhone apps and the excruciating 18-24 month operator contracts are slowing down the pace of innovation and revenue growth.
Stepner continues, “We should be building in mobile experiences right from the start,” giving further evidence that Pearson and other publishers are no longer viewing mobile as a difficult add on that needs to be engineered post product launch, but that it should be integrated into the planning process at the very beginning along with more established media.