The Internet and Mobile experience at Weddings- a decade of change

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The Internet and Mobile experience at Weddings- a decade of change

November 11, 2012 by apurvadesai

Recently, I went to the wedding of a dear friend in beautiful Lake Tahoe. The setting was remarkable, an outdoor wedding at the foot of the lake, with gorgeous views of the mountains and the glistening water in the background. Truly a memorable wedding—meticulously planned, great company with both old friends and new, and a lovely couple beginning the next phase of their life together.

This wedding was also a great chance for me to observe how technology has changed over the last 12 years when applied to a wedding setting. Comparing my own wedding to this wedding, it’s clear that mobile will be king, crowd sourcing is more prevalent than ever, and photos are the core of a communal event. Below is a table comparing the technology at my wedding vs this wedding.

	My wedding- 2000	Lake Tahoe Wedding- 2012
Website	Built our own website- with section about the couple, wedding details, accommodations, local events etc.	None
Search Engine on Website	Added a toolbar from a little know startup, Google, to our site	None
Mobile	None	Mobile App using Appycouple; full fledged app with couple details, accommodations, local events
Photos	Limited Digital photos; professional photographer who provided negatives after event; a few physical photos mailed by guests after event only way to capture guests photos	Social photo sharing from smartphones; immediate upload from audience phone into Appycouple photo gallery; independent photo sharing directly to social networks Facebook and Instagram
Real-Time Comments	None	Specific Wedding Twitter Hashtag; Facebook Comments
Pre and Post Wedding comments	Integrated Guestbook.com into our Website for an online guestbook; site went out of business a few years later; kept a printed copy	Comments Feature in Mobile App
Music	CDs	Laptop with digital tracks and DJ software; guests could share songs with DJ from their smartphones using bluetooth

The main change is clearly the real time mobile sharing capability through smartphones and mobile apps. Particularly, the sharing of photos from guests into one gallery that guests could see and enjoy as the event unfolded is a real enhancement to the wedding experience. And for the couple, to have access to these photos, often in non-posed situations adds to the memories for the bride and groom who are typically wrapped up in the frenzy of the event to have quality interaction with the majority of their guests. Ultimately, mobile allows for crowd sourcing of the capturing of memories, both for real time and pre-and post event consumption. When it comes to events, mobile is certainly king.