I was directed to one thought provoking rationalization of the phenomenon by Charlie Stross here. But the idea that the PC will be left behind (or at least marginalized) in the Recombinant Communications era was made even stronger when Microsoft, itself, endorsed HTML5 in conjunction with the H.624 as the prescribed video codec rather than a Flash player as part of the forthcoming version of Internet Explorer (IE9).

Disputes about specific players, mobile platforms and device form factors are here to stay. As a matter of fact, it may be a desired state in that it should be the goal of every content and service provider to enable end-users to define how, when and where they gain access to the Internet and Web-based services. Fragmentation and mobility are a given.

At the recent Mobile Voice Conference, I was impressed how the community of attendees – many of whom were Voice User Interface experts and specialists – had made the transition to advocacy of multichannel and multimodal interfaces. Google gets it. So does Nuance. And now Apple and Microsoft are making it clear that the interface of the future will try to make it as seamless as possible to carry out conversations that transcend space, time and modality.

In the coming weeks, Opus Research will be working with our clients and others to make sure that high-quality customer care remains part of the equation. In June, we will start with a Webcast and White Paper, produced in conjunction with SpeechCycle, called “Recombinant Communications: Extending Care to Anywhere Customers”. While we call them “Anywhere Customers”, we’re really out to capture the idea that they are calling the shots and it starts with them selecting the time, place and nature of their interactions.

Azure provides cloud-based instantiations of many core Microsoft server software and middleware. It is going head-to-head against other service clouds, including Web services-oriented API-driven offerings from Amazon, Google, IBM and Salesforce.com. In terms of middleware, Azure will feature an “AppFabric” that will include the resources and interfaces that coordinate interoperability between enterprise data centers and the Azure cloud. In the first half of 2010, Microsoft hopes to attract more developers and partners by introducing Visual Studio 2010 and .Net 4.0, which will make it easier to weave cloud-based resources into enterprise applications. Both are currently in beta.

SpeechCycle’s will position the service as “RPA On Demand”. With its applications running in Azure’s cloud, the company will provide its customers and prospects a way to deploy its services without making major capital investments. Just as importantly, the company will find that its early entry into the Azure community will give it preferential position in the development tools commonly employed by members of the Microsoft Developer Community. It also provides a computing environment that can scale as needed when enterprises expand their phone-based customer care operations. This is a win-win for both SpeechCycle and Microsoft.

Advisories are available to registered users only.

For more information on becoming an Opus Research client, please contact Pete Headrick (pheadrick@opusresearch.net).