On November 3, 2009 Business Week had an interesting coverage of augmented reality as it pertains to the CEO. It was called the CEO Guide to Augmented Reality. There were many points and topics in that article that has relevance. Among those I would also like to add a few more points to make a complete list of the 10 buidling blocks to introduce CEO’s to augmented reality.

Here is the CEO 101 Guide to Augmented Reality

1. What is Augmented Reality?

According to Wikipedia the term augmented reality was first introduced in 1990 by Thomas Caudell, an employee of Boeing at the time. Augmented Reality or AR is a term for a live direct or indirect view of a physical real-world environment whose elements are merged with (or augmented by) by virtual computer generated imagery creating a “mixed reality”.

Augmented reality has been around for over two decades with most applications being used by the military, training, automotive research, and aerospace manufacturing.

There are great blog posts here on AugmentPro on the Top 25 Augmented Reality videos and also on BannerBlog that showcases numerous basic examples and concepts of current augmented reality use cases.

2. Augmented Reality, Getting beyond the Hype.

The year 2009 has seen a dramatic increase in buzz and hype surrounding augmented reality. If we take a quick look at Google Trends we can notice since the beginning of 2009 the search terms surrounding augmented reality have grown substantially with the top 10 countries leading the way not surprisingly being from Asia and Europe.

Google Trends for Augmented Reality

Much of the hype was a result of Topps trading cards launching the ToppsTown virtual baseball player. Where brought AR to the general consumer and use it in a practical business case to sell more cards by allowing collectors to not only collect physical cards but also interact online with the virtual player to interact with the Toppstown.com website and games.

Then in the summer the augmented reality development company called Total Immersion created an AR application for Kia Motors directly on Facebook as an application for the Kia Soul. This continued to gain exposure and hype for AR. ( www.facebook.com/kiasoul ).

3. Augmented Reality on Smart Phones

Photo Credit - iPhoneFreakz.com

The proliferation of smart phones such as the iPhone 3Gs and the Android based phones such as the Droid, and G1 have allowed AR to be used instantly and directly by consumers.

In August 2009, ultimate tech blogger Robert Scoble discovered a hidden feature in the Yelp.com iPhone application that allowed users to unlock a hidden feature within the application called “Monocle” where a user needs to shake their iPhone and then it unlocks the ability to look through their iPhone 3Gs and discover various reviews and information on nearby reviews. According to a quote from a Business week article:

“The market for AR applications on smartphones is so new that it has gone from virtually no users in 2008 to an expected 600,000 by the end of 2009, says Christine Perey, a principal at Perey Research & Consulting, who advises companies on mobile augmented reality”. By 2012 there will be 150 million to 200 million users, she estimates.

“In the next couple years, we see augmented reality crossing over from being a rather niche technology for military, medical, and heavy-industry-type applications to being a much more mainstream set of applications in the consumer market,” says Jackie Fenn, vice-president at Gartner.

According to Gartner Research, augmented reality will be one of the top 10 disruptive technologies from 2008 through 2012.

In order to take advantage of this growth certain companies have developed mobile based augmented reality “browsers” that allow other developers to build their AR applications directly on top of their browser. The current leading browsers are:

1. Layar – http://www.layar.com
   
2. Wikitude – http://www.wikitude.com
   
3. RobotVision – http://robotvision-ar.com

With all of these components beginning to lay the foundation for augmented reality on smart phones, as smart phones gain longer battery life and power augmented reality will become a standard in most hand held devices which allows for unimaginable growth.

4. Augmented Reality Online

Augmented reality on a smart phone is one channel that AR has begun to begin to penetrate the marketplace. Besides this channel, another way AR has begun to be used is together with an integrated marketing strategy that allows users to use a “marker” or in other terms it can be called a QR code which the user holds up to a web camera that then triggers the augmented reality experience.

There have been various practices that have been adopted in using the online ability to use AR. Typically they are by way of asking the user to “Print out the Marker” or it is already printed on a physical element  (paper, card stock, etc.) then the user holds up the marker to the web camera which can either be a Flash based application or a downloaded software.

Recent examples include the December issue of Esquire magazine, the John Mayar music video, and even a business card.

Since the Flash community is an ever growing community, this online option of introducing augmented reality is one that will only grow substantially in the next couple of months as more and more developers are quickly learning the nuances of AR and offering it as options on integrated marketing initiatives.

5. Practical Business Case Examples of AR

As a CEO, executive or director the main question after understanding what augmented reality is all about must be what a practical business case is for using augmented reality for your brand, client, or initiative. Gary Hayes from PersonalizeMedia.com wrote a comprehensive list of 16 top augmented reality business models that I would like to list some of them here as a starting point reference.

1. UTILITY: Selling life enhancing AR applications perceived as useful. Development and commercial sale of applications such as underground train orientation, bus stops & times, traffic alerts, airport gates & plane arrivals etc: all overlaid in real space
2. TRAINING: Hands-on with complex equipment and work scenarios.
3. SOCIAL GAMING: Both connotations of the word, pay-per-play mixed reality games in physical space.
4. LOCATION LAYERS: Blended guides to new places, tourism, enhanced travelling or themed space.
5. VIRTUAL DEMO: Display to promote sale, of product in pre-release or remotely via catalogue etc: To promote advance sales before the consumer gizmo hits the stores
6. EXPERIENTIAL EDUCATION: Pay-per-visit educational services to museums, ancient sites, theme parks, zoos, etc
7. ENHANCED CLASSIFIEDS: An AR directory that promotes local 3rd parties product & services overlaid at the location
8. 3D VIRALS: Branded company or personal promotion & ads using ‘cool’ 3D toys.
9. PERSONALIZED SHOPPING: Walking around stores made relevant, opt in personalization and targeting.
10. COOPERATION: Service industry for augmented virtual meetings
11. BLENDED BRANDING: The equivalent of hoardings, virtual poster ads
12. AUGMENTED EVENTS: Pay-per-use of enhanced sport or pop concerts
13. ENTERTAINMENT: New form experiential TV and films. People will pay a premium for a new kind of ‘film’ experience where you ‘live the experience’
14. UNDERSTANDING SYSTEMS: Creating AR for internal or exploded views of complex objects.
15. RECOGNITION & TARGETING: Pushing ‘relevance’ to outdoor consumers – facial recognition linked to online data.

To conclude this CEO 101 Guide to augmented reality, the bottom line is to understand that augmented reality is here to stay and will only grow as brands, agencies, and developers discover new ways to use it as part of their overall integrated marketing initiatives. Quite frankly speaking it seems that AR is at its early stages similar to the early days of web browsing with a few key technologies and players using it successfully. It will be interesting to see the new and innovative ways that AR will be used in the next few months.