Monday, May 7, 2012

Tablets are "Entertainment" Devices With a High "Status" Value

Tablets primarily are used for entertainment and are a status symbol, not devices used for "work" and productivity, Alcatel-Lucent says. 


Though becoming a standard feature of "work" environments, tablets are used primarily for game play, content activities such as reading and  viewing streaming and stored videos, Alcatel-Lucent says.

Key benefits are screen quality, flexible connectivity, battery life and slim form factor, all of which contribute to the device’s ease of use and portability. The study also suggests that use of various computing devices varies with screen size. The smart phone is the universal screen, while tablets are used in lean back environments. 


Smart phones are the primary mobility devices, and tablets substitute for laptops when the primary goal is relaxation or entertainment.


Tablets are "rarely" used for productive work because they lack keyboards and mice for efficient and effective data input and control of the device, the study suggests. 


Most tablet users do not use productivity suites (such as Microsoft Office) on their tablets, for example. 


Also, respondents in Spain and the United States own tablets as a badge of social status. Some might not think such rationales are key drivers of behavior, but one only has to look back a decade or so, when use of a BlackBerry device similarly was seen as a sign of status or importance in enterprise settings. 


The "pain of adoption" (cost) in this case is overwhelmed to a great extent by the value of the status. As equity analyst Pip Coburn has noted, all technology products achieve adoption only when the pain of the status quo is greater than that pain of adoption. And "pain" can be a matter of social status or inclusion. 


Mass adoption of any new technology becomes irresistible when "all my friends have an X." 


Arguments about tablet productivity are to be expected in business settings. Users will not be able to justify buying them, otherwise. 


But it is safe to say many of those arguments are spurious. 

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