Wii are the Future

I did something amazing today. After waking up, cracking open my morning Diet Coke, I ran a quick search on Google News to see if anything on my company had popped over night. Why is this amazing?

1. I did it on my living room sofa on my TV

2. I did it on a Wii.

3. Most importantly, I did it because it was the most convenient method of doing so.

I know I am late to the whole Nintendo Wii story, but it took me a while to get one. Yeah, the games are fun, but what really struck me is that Apple, Sony, and Microsoft have been trying for years to bring Internet connectivity into my living room. Whooda thunk it would gamer whipping boy Nintendo to make it happen.

I've followed the media center hoopla pretty closely, yet I still cannot find a compelling reason to take the plunge other than for the fun of setting it up (Yes, I consider that fun). Why would I want to either leave my PC on 24/7 or wait for the lengthy boot up times when I can just plug an SD card or my iPod into my plasma for photos, videos and music.

I should also note that the Internet set up was the EASIER than either my PC or my or PDA.

Internet browsing is by no means perfect, but it is the potential that should get people really excited. The people who scoff at the Wii Internet connectivity are probably already pretty heavy online users. Wii has a tremendous potential to reach an audience who tends to unplug when the day is done.

Here are my suggestions for Nintendo for the next-gen Wiis.

1. Partner with Google and ship with a Wii version of Google Earth. (The device SCREAMS for this).

2. Integrate a thumb-type keyboard into the remote.

3. Continue to evolve the opera browser.

4. Integrate News and Weather into one "globe" interface, and add additional