Apps May Kill Golf As We Know It

My informal polling reveals that no golf course in America prohibits cellphones on the course. It is a sport where cultural common courtesy screams for quiet during shots and immediately prior thereto. We can now safely assume that every single golfer who can afford to play can also afford a smart phone. if nothing else, Apple made sure of that. Public course users can buy its older iPhone 3 for as low as $49 on specials as it attempts to slow the increased market share of Google’s smart phones that use the Android operating system. my fearful prediction is that Apps will add time, distraction, disgust and disgorgement from the traditions of golf. The demise is not just because of Apple smart phones, but that’s a good place to start.

Apple has plenty of cash for research and development. Net income rose an eye-popping 118% over last year. Profits doubled in the last quarter of 2011, one of the biggest numbers for any corporation in the history of the world. Its cash and securities now are about $100 billion. The majority of that increased profitability is attributable to iPhones and the iPad tablets. Apple CFO Peter Oppenheimer recently told analysts they were aggressively looking to actively use those profits. in his words, “We’re not letting [the cash] burn a hole in our pockets”.  I fear Apple will reinvest profits into R & D, including golf exploration. I suspect they are thinking, “How can we help golfers find functionality from their smart phones while golfing.”

The App industry has already teed off. GolfLogix is the leading app producer in golf. They just signed seven-time PGA tour winner Zach Johnson. He will wear their logo and market their golf App. The App finds courses and measures distances. as Johnson says, “knowing the exact distance to a pin and other locations from tee to green drastically improves my course management and, in turn, my ability to score.”  but of course, the App is not limiting its functionality. Johnson says GolfLogix offers an “amazing array of free services” so that ordinary golfers are beamed tour-quality information.

Golfers cannot escape this alluring opportunity by just changing smart phones. The GolfLogix GPS App is compatible with over 60 smart phone models. It provides imagery of each hole, keeps score, and includes statistical tracking. There is already the ability to examine each pin placement, hazard locations, and landing zones. The statistical analysis will probably soon track who was closest to the pin on a par 3, who had the longest drive, and who was closest to the middle of the fairway. It will probably soon allow you to count strokes of others in your foursome. Then somebody is going to storm off the course when past suspicions are now confirmed. Increased acrimony is just a download away.

Imagine the impact of the help-apps on all the ego-driven delusional wanna-be-great golfers who play without practice. Any tech edge is worth it if the score goes down since golfers are a highly competitive group on and off the course. There will be some amongst us that will point their smart phone before every shot on every hole, oblivious to the accumulated delay to the foursome behind them and the backup consequences for the entire course.

I have that App, foolishly thinking it could somehow be transformative for one struggling to form a golf game. my experience is using it interrupts the flow. And then you also see emails you otherwise would have ignored. It was easy for me to stop using it, since distance knowledge can be intimidating when most of your shots don’t get there anyway. if everyone started Apping the distance, the hazards, the scores to date, the comparisons with others, the 4 1/2 hour excursion becomes an unexplainable-to-spouse, you-just-missed-your-daughters-concert kind of day. that could get costly at several levels beyond greens fees.

Time Warner just built a new 9,600 square foot lab. They are examining biometric reactions to political candidates. TW may conclude that people also want an App of reactions to golf shots among fellow players. Once they gather around the clubhouse for a brew and postmortem of the round, they would laugh or hate each other all over again. Time Warner owns CNN and HBO. both report and comment on sports. not surprisingly, Time Warner’s chief marketing officer for global media, Kristen O’Hara said, “we see a real opportunity particularly in news and sports.”

The Time Warner R & D includes 3-D innovations. someone in R&D is thinking, “Let’s have the foursome video each other’s swings in 3D, correlated to the mechanical swing plane models already used in golf stores”. Their already thinking, “We’ll just move those swing models from the stores to the course.”  The players will stop to watch video of where the last swing was off-plane. And the whole course will be off-schedule as a result.

There are Apps with sensors to measure sleep patterns. They are designed to only wake you at the optimal time rather than when you are in a deep sleep. The golf App is coming I suspect that senses when your energy, nerves, and karma are best suited to golf. I can see it now. Joe backs off the tee until his Bio-App tells him its time. Slow play is inevitable.

Add to the equation that online spending for advertisements is projected to nearly double in three years. The sophisticated targeting of consumers will reveal that golfers have discretionary income to buy more stuff. Once they buy Apps for their game, golfers will likely be inundated with ads for merchandise, resort packages, advice on how to golf more and save your marriage, and a myriad of other spending schemes based on research of golfer predilections on and off the course. much of that information will be gleaned from data mining of what you provide unwittingly from the use of your Apps and the smarter-than-you (STU) phone.

Apps May Kill Golf As We Know It

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