Last week’s release of the HTC G1, a competitor to the Apple iPhone, is giving us an exciting look at the direction in which the smartphone market is headed.  Smartphones like the iPhone and the G1 are beginning to fulfill the promise that cellphone technology would blur the line between phones and computers.  As this trend continues, it is going to generate exciting opportunities for REALTORS® to make the most of some very powerful technology.

 
Earlier-generation smartphones were a step above most mobile phones.  Not only did they have the features of a PDA, address book, calendar, and to-do list, they also allowed you to access email at all times and offered a limited amount of Internet content.  But the Internet access was so limited, and the number of applications so small that you still needed to use a laptop or desktop for tasks like searching for a home or calculating a mortgage.  

Now that’s beginning to change.  The iPhone and the HTC G1 both make improvements in these areas.  First, these smartphones give you both complete access to the Internet and a fully functional web browser.  Second, both the IPhone and the G1 offer strong support for the development of third-party software.  The combined effect of these two features means that the iPhone and the G1 can run the kind of software that used to exclusively belong to the domain of laptops and desktops.

The Internet and high-quality third-party software are morphing smartphones into portable computers that can be tailored to support a wide range of uses and benefit a similarly wide range of businesses, including REALTORS®.  Consider, for example, all the software for the iPhone that a REALTOR® can already take advantage of: maps, a land area calculator,a financial calculator, multiplehomesearchapplications.  This is an impressive list given the short period of time since the iPhone’s initial release.  And much of this software either is or soon will be available for the G1.

We at CRT have already taken a look at how the iPhonemay be of use to REALTORS®.  And keep an eye out on our blog, where we’ll report on both the G1 and the upcoming Blackberry Storm.  We’ll also investigate the software that get released for all these platforms and let you know which of it might be useful to REALTORS®. 

Technologically speaking, it’s an exciting time, and we intend to help you take advantage of it!      

 Andrew Tillman
atillman@realtors.org