Wednesday, July 18, 2007

Mobile Monday London - Mobile Identity

Monday August the 6th has now been set as the next MoMoLondon ... and I must say it will be good to get the event back nearer the start of the month again! This time around the theme will be based around Mobile Indentity which is really important subject to discuss in such a group. In recent Web 2.0 discussions I have had outside of the industry with general users, Identity and trust seem to be the top subjects people discuss and worry about.

You read so much in the press about potential employers using social networking sites to check up on candidates. There is also the debate about how people use alternate identities, multiple identities (depending on which social network they are in) and how all of this comes back to things like payments and knowing who you are. It is interesting that the grey area between my identity regarding a credit card doesnt really differ that much to my identity in the respect that I own a mobile phone, for which I have an account. The regulations within the EU have been opening up to allow more flexibility in payments on mobile phones and I think this will lead to more interesting discussions around identity and how to qualify somebody is who they say they are. In the last 5 years I have worked for companies that provide services via mobile for clients in the childrens broadcast TV space, it is important that content (such as images and video) are coming from real kids and that this content can be checked against the right people for being authentic. This is a real problem to moderate with such huge amounts of UGC being passed around these days between users and storage sites such as Flickr.

Anyway, I am sure we will touch on some of these areas in August so come along. Join our user group at Yahoo. We are still looking for authorities on this subject, so anyone fancies speaking or demoing a related product at this event should contact either Dan or myself (dan@mobilemonday.org.uk or alex@mobilemonday.org.uk).