Baseball has been on my brain a lot.
Perhaps it was hearing our July speaker show the way the baseball industry is using technology tools to improve player development. Or maybe it’s just because, like lots of you, I have a child who is building a Red Sox scrapbook, which seems to be a rite of passage for any of us within the New England area codes.
So it won’t surprise you to hear that I was out and about this week to ... a baseball game. In this case, to McCoy Stadium in Pawtucket. Funny thing is, even while participating in this traditional summer event I couldn’t escape the integration of consumer-driven technology.
It all started when I ordered the tickets. Which I did, of course, online at the PawSox site. Did a review of the seating options with interactive availability updates, a quick email to a friend to find out where the shady areas were, and concluded with an all-digital transaction. It was a full consumer integration of digital technologies, so integrated that I didn’t really even think of the purchase process as being tech-enabled. But five years ago, this was revolutionary.
McCoy is lovely park, comfortable in size, big enough but not overwhelming. It features old fashioned paper billboards around the infield ... and a large multi-screen video display above, a display that drew on those mountains of data collected by the baseball industry for snapshots of every player’s performance flashed in continually updated form. The one-two combo of paper and screen formed a nice juxtaposition of promotional progression. And again, the consumer technology was so integrated it didn’t even feel one tiny bit high tech.
Then, of course, was the real time recording of pitch speed. Not exactly new tech, but certainly another integrated example of a digital element within the consumer experience. The pitch is thrown and everyone knows that it went at 91 miles per hour. The ability to know this is not considered remarkable.
At one point in the game it was time to vote for favored players. When half the audience whipped out their cell phones to record their preference, using a cellular quick messaging service, it really struck me just how far we’ve come so fast.
Here we are with the green grass, Crackerjacks, and Coke of years past ... and our all-in-one personal communication devices voting for one of four player options in real time, with results displayed in moments on the afore-mentioned digital display. A voting percentage of a crowd of 7000 using a mobile device without a second thought. Not technology! Just a perfectly normal way of communicating.
There’s nothing that serves up a cross-section of humanity better than a ballgame. And if anyone doubts that daily life is infused with digital elements, those nine innings were a pretty clear demonstration the once "gee-whiz" is rapidly becoming the "so what."
The reason this all matters is that it’s one of those summary moments, where you pause, take stock, and realize that we’ve passed the point of no return and that our world is forever fundamentally changed. Our expectations and behaviors are set to a new direction. There isn’t any debate about whether we are in the digital era or if the digital era is good or bad. The bottom line is that we are there and we don’t even notice it any more.
There was a group of middle and high school students sitting in front of us. In classic tweener/teen mode, the game was merely an excuse and a sort of convenient background to practice social moves, to form changing groups, to practice a little flirtation. Experimental interaction was the real game.
Timeless. The same moves we’ve all made at one point in our lives. Except that part of this mix was messaging via cell phone amongst the group, and a few interactions via mobile devices with friends who weren’t at the game, including them in the mix in virtual sort of way that was very real to everyone.
But once again, the point hit home. These kids aren’t using technology. They’re just hanging with each other and whether it was dropping a chuck of ice down another’s back or messaging the cute guy at the end of the row with a giggle, well there really wasn’t any difference.
E-commerce, wireless communication, remote group access, streaming video, data collection -- yup, there was an example of all of the above there. But who cares? It was really just life as we live it in the 21st centurty, while visiting the ballpark on a hot July evening, score 8-6, PawSox ahead.
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