When I was a little boy in the early 70s, I always wanted to have a futuristic gadget in my pocket that would tell me where I had gone, and what I had done all day. (Remember the Family Circus cartoon with the dotted line that shows where Billy had gone while tearing up the entire house?)

I wanted to be able to talk to my dad and mom with it, and send my friends super-secret, encoded messages. I wanted it to work like the Jetsons’ video phone.

I even thought it would be cool to be able to have it show me how to get to buried treasure, communicate with starships, and even help me speak alien languages.

I was an imaginative kid, I’ll admit, but those were fun, exciting days…

Fast forward to 2008, (July 11th to be exact) and the launch of the iPhone 3G - and Apple’s ‘App Store’. When I got through the line, and left the store with my own precious bundle, I was just as excited as when I was a kid at christmas! I’m continuously amazed at what a great little gadget, with a supremely well thought out and simple UI this is - and how close it came to giving me that futuristic little gadget I’d dreamed of when I was a boy:

• Family Circus style tracking: Loopt’s ‘Journal’ feature is exactly what I was looking for. Okay okay, there aren’t dotted lines all over the ground when I’m done, but there is a whole log of all of my ‘What’s Up’ updates, with GPS location for all day, every day. It even automatically updates Twitter and Facebook, so all of my friends can follow my zany adventures.  Why can’t Calloway or PING or Cleveland make an iPhone app that records your positions on the golf course as you play, tracks your shot count, calculates your handicap and helps you improve your game.  Heck, make it a subscription-based SOA app, and give me free access if I buy Calloway stuff - double points if I order directly on my iPhone.  Hold monthly/weekly iPhone Opens and track leaderboards in the community, and tie in a social networking aspect where single golfers can meet new golf buds and create foursomes.  So much potential here it’s crazy.
• The integrated phone and contact list lets me stay in contact with Mom and Dad, and anyone else I care to. Super simple to use, i just tap and go - and I can even web browse, check email, and play games - all while I’m on talking on the phone. Sure, other phones can do some or all of this, but no one touches Apple’s UI or ease of use here.
• I can email or text message any of my friends, and even though out-of-the-box encryption isn’t available to make my messages super-secret and encoded, there are ways around this, and here’s one of a growing number of apps you can use to do that (though, possibly at the expense of your warranty currently). In any case, I can see a growing market need for this, as iPhone 2.0 and later versions chip away at RIM’s stranglehold on the biz market.
• As for the Jetsons’ video phone, no luck there yet, although Apple has filed an interesting patent in this direction…
• Finding buried treasure is easy with the iPhone, if you’re hungry, lost or looking for a good time, as there’s integrated GPS and Google Maps, and downloadable apps for services like Loopt, Yelp and more.  So many companies have opportunities here: Nike could capitalize on their loyal Nike+ community to share jogging routes/times/workouts through an iPhone app - how cool to get turn by turn directions as you run - two buzzes, make a right - one buzz, make a left - or even audio instructions over the music “turn left at Sycamore.” 
• I can even communicate with starships - well at least satellites, through my DIRECTV DVR Scheduler which lets me set up and record any TV show wherever I am.  Granted, this is just currently a mobile-friendly page, although mobile Safari is by far the best mobile browser which just makes any mobile web usage easier.  But, DIRECTV could easily expand this to a true iPhone app, adding in account management, bill payment functionality, and even pay-per-view ordering.  If they really wanted to get aggressive, they could let me order the latest UFC event on my iPhone, but watch it through my buddy’s DIRECTV subscription, or even stream it directly to my iPhone, instantly.  Same goes for Dish Network, and the Cable guys. 
• Maybe it doesn’t know how the little green guys from Mars speak, but between the Lonely Planet Mobile Phrasebooks, which are available for a number of languages, the 50 or so language podcasts available, along with iTunes U language classes - it does a pretty bang up job of keeping me from getting lost in translation.  I can easily see Rosetta Stone coming out with an iPhone/SOA/subscription-based application here - lower cost of entry to the user, less commitment, and an ongoing revenue stream.  They could even add wave analysis to the iPhone app, just like they have on the desktop, and you’d truly have a translator in your pocket - not to mention an icebreaker in any language.

Even though I was a pretty imaginative kid, I think I can safely say my wished-for, futuristic, everything-in-my-pocket gadget has definitley arrived - and opened up countless doors to all kinds of fun and opportunity…  

There is so much opportunity that this device has opened up, if you’ll only be a kid again, and use your imagination.  Marketers, the future is now.