Oh my, David. The vision is slowly coming to be. What great news. This is so what we all have in mind.
I hope other sites soon come knocking at your door.
Link: Different Things � Blog Archive � Upcoming.org Understands The Value Of “Mobile-Friendly”.
Thanks to Andy and Gordon over at Upcoming, WINKsite is now able to go beyond the limits of basic event feed publishing to deliver a more relevant, more precise means of mobile event distribution and device independent delivery.
Link: Untitled.
C3 Mobile Content Festival with showings of the submitted materials and awards for the categories of Mobile Games, Films, and Applications. (Note: the Mobile Content Festival is a project of the Digital Convergence Initiative and is not affiliated in any way with SXSW Interactive.)
I think this officially signals the demise of everything Palm was. I've been watching them shoot themselves in the foot over the past few years. It's been sad to see such a leader basically undo themselves, among many things: buying Handspring and killing it, spinning off the OS group, botching their whole brand recognition. And the Treo has been chugging along despite all that.
But, I think they are running on fumes and momentum (Andrew will flog me for that comment). What a pity, since they had a lock on the handlheld market, not only defining the experience, but understanding what it meant.
Maybe they'll make a Sony Ericsson-type of recovery.
Link: 3GSM - Palm OS Is Dead, Long Live Linux Palm at MobHappy.
Access this morning announced its Access Linux Platform, or ALP, it’s next-generation mobile OS that will replace Palm OS. They’ve ditched Palm OS 6, saying it won’t ever be used, and sound like they’re even going to ditch the Palm OS name.
Very clever customer service app.
Link: SNAPin - Winner of the Buckley 3GSM Award at MobHappy.
The star of the 3GSM show for me was a young, US-based start-up called SNAPin, which has developed a brilliant, bit of software that solves so much operator and user pain, it takes a little thought to get your mind around the implications.
Link: Jan Chipchase - Future Perfect: Removing, Supplementing Core Features.
Raku Raku 3G phone for sale in Japan - targeted at elderly users. Includes a slider where the owner can write phone book entries instead of using the elecronic address book. Taking core features such as the address book outside the phone can benefit non-literate and elderly users.
Ka-ching! Another mobile marketing purchase by Neomedia.
Link: Musings of a mobile marketer: Mobile Marketing company Sponge acquired by NeoMedia.
NeoMedia Technologies, Inc. has acquired Sponge with an aggregate of �10m consideration, including �3.45 m in cash and the remainder in NeoMedia shares with a further �2.5m available under an earn-out based on targets being reached in the next two years.
Good overview of the fusion of mobile and Web services.
Link: Russell Beattie Notebook - Helping the Mobile Mashup Discussion.
MashupCamp is actually going to have a discussion about Mobility, which I’m extremely happy to see. Here’s the current description of the session from the Wiki:
Consider the content and services that are being supported by today’s mashup API providers… events, places, relationships, media, messaging, search, commerce, and storage. Now match these with the functionality provided by the software components found on today’s most dominant device, the mobile phone. The telcos have so far failed in their attempts to provide a compelling and usable personalized experience that successfully integrates the obvious relationships between these offerings. This is a compelling opportunity that needs to be addressed by those interested in tearing down the walled gardens that have been erected by the proponents of the so-called Open Mobile Alliance (OMA).
So since I’m in London and can’t attend, I wanted to help direct this discussion a bit from here, and correct some issues I have with the description.
From the Boston area, no less.
This is following Neomedia's various acquisitions, including 12snap (from Germany) and Mobot (from Boston area).
Eh, guess mobile marketing is alive and well on the East Coast.
Link: Business Filter - Business Weblog - The Boston Globe.
thirdscreenmedia.jpg
Another Boston-based provider of mobile advertising and marketing software and services, has closed its second round of funding, adding $5 million to its coffers. The software offered by Third Screen provides a system for managing and deploying advertising on mobile devices that enables advertising agencies, publishers and carriers to plan, buy and execute mobile-advertising campaigns. They're chasing down larger competitor m-Qube, based in Watertown.
Link: m-trends.org: 3GSM Afterwrap.
It took me a couple of days to be able to digest the whole event with it's many cocktails and parties surrounding. The best part for me were the many wonderfull people I met behind the companies, projects and blogs.
Really interesting service.
Link: m-trends.org: Canal MiniFizz.
Cityneo and Flow - the people behind my friends in Brussels Minifizz, collaborate to launch 'Canal MiniFizz' targeting young mobile phone feminine users (14-25 years old).
Great stuff by Kelly.
I think every product team should have their own designer embedded with them. I know it's crazy, but that's how I would like to make my products.
On the Lifeblog team, we had three resident designers. Boy, how you get hooked on the feedback loop and being able to mind-meld as needed with some amazing designer (thatks Jorma, Teemu, and boss Laura!).
Link: the mobile designer | gotomobile.
Mobile designers are the bridge between the end user and the engineering community.
Link: work life balance | gotomobile.
At the 3GSM conference held in Barcelona this week, the results of a survey on work/life balance was released by Visto, a US mobile email company. The survey was conducted in three countries and was focused on how mobile is affecting the lifestyles of mobile professionals. The theme resonates closely with gotomedia's mission statement "exeed expecations and take vacations."
Ah, the war between strategy planning and gut feeling, existing markets and unknown markets, your customers' needs today and new customers' needs tomorrow.
Boy, do I have a lot of stories here.
Link: All Good Things.... - Innoblog.
Disruption is hard. That's why so many companies fall victim to the forces of disruption. The case of Western Union demonstrates just one reason why. When evaluating new and unknown markets, traditional methods of analysis fall short. Western Union's evaluation of the telephone was perfectly logical. Their business model was built around long distance communication - reporting news and conducting business. In that model, there was no need for a technology that transmitted a very low quality voice signal over short distances. Even assuming some technological advances, the managers at Western Union could not envision business uses of the telephone.
Traditional analysis failed. An approach built around low risk market tests - planning to learn - was required. Such an approach allows for strategies to be developed and business models to be adjusted as more is learned about the market. When the market is unknown, the only guarantee is that initial models will be wrong. Adopting a process that recognizes this fact is one of the keys to being a good disruptor.
Read the list of user-design suggestions.
Link: Different Things � Blog Archive � Everyware : The Dawning Age of Ubiquitous Computing.
Adam Greenfield’s book “Everyware : The Dawning Age of Ubiquitous Computing” is about to be released.
I’ve known Adam for a number of years (he was an early advisor of mine while WINKsite was being conceived), enjoying many engaging conversations over many a cup of coffee. “Everyware” is the culmination of his life experiences, thoughtful explorations, and beliefs. I for one can not wait to get my hands on my pre- ordered copy.
Link [via Phil]: AAS Feature: The Twenty Five Coolest Things To Do With Your S60 Smartphone.
Steve Litchfield and Ewan Spence brainstorm the 25 coolest things you can do on your Series 60 smartphone. There would have been an order, but fisticuffs couldn't produce a consensus, so in the end we picked the order out of a hat!
I read these guys every month. They have very through reports on different consumer trends, all written in a cheeky and breathless style.
If you need to follow consumer trends, which you should, then these guys are for you.
Link: TREND UNIT | Tips & tricks on how to become a better trend watcher.
Let’s face it: never before has knowing about emerging consumer trends been as important as it is now. Luckily, finding out about trends has become much, much easier. In a world that’s fully connected, where tens of thousands of smart professionals and amateurs are spotting, observing, thinking, and innovating, and putting their findings online for all to see, insanely valuable resources are up for grabs.
BTW, I read Intelligence Group's newsletter, as well. Small snippets of what's hot or up and coming. Useful for keeping a finger on the pulse of emerging culture and styles as it happens. Also, highly recommended.
I read Matthew Maier's latest newsletter (it's now via CNNMoney and called 'Third Screen') titled 'Is that a PC in your pocket?' Of course, it was about shoving PC apps into phones. It was a bit starry-eyed in how phones are becoming more like PCs. Ok, so he does briefly mention that it helps to think of how folks use the mobile to develop good apps. But, he does focus too much on the mobile computing experience.
The article promoted me to finally take a look at OperaMini (point your phone at mini.opera.com). It's decent, but I was able to quickly test it and prove that improving mobile browsers is not going to solve all our problems.
Here's a test:
1) Use your favorite mobile browser to view Bloglines at www.bloglines.com
2) Now use Bloglines via bloglines.com/mobile
Of course, and I'm not stating anything new, the mobile version of Bloglines has the better mobile experience.
What I mean to show is that, yes, it's great to have more fully featured phone browsers. It fills a gap in access. But, let's call a spade a spade - the browsing experience will still not be as effective as any site that has a mobile device in mind.
And that's not only because of the usual layout and content issues. To me the real thing is that PC-centric sites are designed for the PC, broadband, two-handed, mouse-and-click, two-eyes, sitting-on-my-butt, I-have-time kind of experience. Mobile sites or PC sites that keep mobile in mind, remember the one-handed, strawband, one-eye (if any), on-the-go kind of needs. In short, they need to cater to the mobile lifestyle and not just the mobile layout.
I think the mobile computing mentality is fooling everyone into thinking that phones are turning into PCs. Eh, that's not right. Yes, phones are turning into powerful computing platforms that can have rich applications - but those applications must be relevant to the way folks use their mobile.
And that's what most folks miss.
Sigh. This is not a blindspot of mine. I don't think anyone has got this wrong. I think Location-based services are a great idea. The problem is that to make it work, you need to convince the company with the location info (the operator) what's in it for them. I don't think any of it was handled or pitched properly such that these services could be rolled out. It's really no one's fault. It just is a messed up mumbo-jumbo that has been making us drag our feet.
Do you realize that there is no reason technically for location-based services not to be deployed today?* What I'd like to see is more ground-up kinds of services that go around the current barriers, for example Plazes, Dodgeball-like (Jumpclaimer or Wayfaring), or something like what Nathan Eagle did.
Link: Unstrung - Location Services Lost on Users - Wireless Networking News Analysis.
Location based services (LBS) -- which deliver localized information directly to your mobile phone in real time -- have generated plenty of buzz in the wireless industry over the last couple of years, but it turns out these new cellular applications are largely lost on enterprise users.
UPDATE 10feb06: I wrote this sentence backwards and forgot to add an important word 'not'. What I mean is that all the tech is there. There is no reason, technically, we cannot roll out these services today. Sorry for any confusion.
Wish I could be there.
Link: m-trends.org: 3GSM Gathering Of The Mobilists - Line-Up.
Check for yourself the list below of mobile passionates attending; maybe some of them you never heard of but I can tell you this cocktail promises some sparkling and dazzling conversation.
Touché, Mike.
Link: This is Mobility � Blog Archive � Yet Still More Mobile Advertising.
But is advertising supported content on mobiles a natural and correct evolution on the whole? In my opinion, yes. It just might have to look significantly different enough from online advertising that we’ll have to stretch our definitions after the fact in order to include it.
It's about communication. You want to build a community? Build it around something to share (a focus) and conversation will emerge from that.
Link: Joho the Blog: Interests, not demographics.
In a Report in the 6 Jan 2006 Science Kossinets and Watts offered an empirical analysis of social network evolution in a large university community.
...
The results show that at least in this particular environment, people were more likely to form ties with others when they had a shared "focus" such as a class that brought them together or a mutual acquaintance, but were less likely to interact solely on the basis of shared characteristics such as age or gender.
Gotta get that article.
Being a FOG (Follower of Guy) for many years now, I now get daily doses of his wisdom on a regular basis. A recent post on his website stats has a few great gems in it, but one comment on click-thru advertising was enough for me to launch on another Blindspot rant.
Advertising is not the panacea for free services that everyone makes it out to be.
First of all, people act like Google invented the tools for advertising supported websites. Uh, anyone remember ad banners, pop-ups, and other regular advertising channels on websites?
Second (see Guy's quote below), click-thru metrics only pay significantly if you have enough traffic, say Google's or Yahoo's. Sure, some sites are making some chump change with AdSense, no problems there, but don't try to build a company on it (or a company of more than one person). I've been saying that for some time now, and folks have been looking at me as if I was spouting heresy.
Here's what Guy says, spot on with what I've been saying:
I spend about two hours per day on the blog, so I'm making about $5/hour. :-) Also, if any company comes to Garage and says that their business model is to generate a lot of page views and monetize it with Google AdSense, I'm going to be figuring that each page impression is worth $.001. For example, 10 million page impressions would yield $10,000/month. It's not that hard to get 10 million page views in a month, right? :-) “We'll generate a lot of traffic and monetize it with Google AdSense” is hereby labeled the 11th lie of entrepreneurs.
Third, if you want to run an advertising-supported service, study how the pros do it. No, don't go looking on the Internet. Go to your nearest news kiosk. Print publications have been heavily advertising-supported for a very long time (heck, there is no front page news on the main Helsinki rag, it's always an ad). Practically all subscription magazines and newspapers are advertising-based. And they have whole departments working to get advertising that brings in money, that is relevant is relevant to the publication, that is relevant to the reader. Not only is AdSense an automated system that is second best to targeted ads, but you have little control as to what it shows.
Fourth, who makes the money? Google AdSense users aggregate a huge number clicks that bring most of the money to Google, not to the users. Look at Guy's stats again.
Mobile?
It wasn't just Guy's comment on AdSense that got me going, but MoMo Mike pointing out a comment on mobile advertising from the W3C's Mobile Web Best Practices:
Developers of commercial web sites should note that different commercial models are often at work when the Web is accessed from Mobile devices as compared with desktop devices.
You betcha. When you open up a Web page on your PC, you have enough space not to care about those pesky links somewhere else on your screen. Also, your browsing experience really doesn't take a hit, nor do you have to really pay for that advertising to be served to you.
Not so on the mobile, where space is precious, the environment is personal, time is critical, and cost is a sensitive subject.
Enough of the rant. Here are some positive suggestions.
Don't think of advertising-supported services, as that will make you think of traditional advertising. Think 'marketing-supported' services and then you will start to think of other ways to have someone pay for your users' free service. I think if you make clear the 'cost' to the user for using a free service is you channeling brands and such to them.
For example, a company could sponsor a Java game that would have the sponsor's branding displayed in an integrated and unintrusive fashion.
Or, if you have a really cool local map client (uh, maybe Google Local Mobile). When you get the info on the venue in that nifty pop-up, there could be an ad or two. Maybe even a local ad.
Or, think of how your service could be a door to other better paying business, such as consulting or upgrades to paid service. Using a free service or content to drive sales at a store is quite common, that I won't even list the sites that do this.*
So there
As you can tell, this is not just a blindspot I don't understand, but something that I think really others have a blindspot to. I am like guy and shudder whenever anyone says they want to start a business based on AdSense. Heck, that's NonSense.
*Well, this one, Treonauts, I think is nifty. It's a blog that grew into much more. That's how you give free stuff away to bring in folks long enough to have they leave some money behind. :-)
I guess I'm not the only one who thinks .mobi is a bad idea.
Link [Googirama]: .MOBI domains available - Berners Lee opposes
As reported on MEX, .MOBI has been around for almost six months as the new suffix for mobile/WAP sites. The Register reported then that the new domain names would start selling in early to mid 2006. We're curious to see how fast this will take off given the fact that Tim Berners Lee ( so called creater of the world wide web) published a paper last year against the addition of the .mobi TLD rasing issues of fairness, device independance and loss of web functionality.
There have been some recent rumblings in the fixed broadband space (see link to article below). For example, cable companies are no longer held to the same laws as DSL providers. Also, there has been at least one case, that was overruled, of a DSL provider blocking Skype calls.
Two things (of many) have got the broadband service providers worried: VoIP and bandwdth hogs. With VoIP, many service providers are thinking like our dear wireless carriers - it's a service in my pipes and I should be able to charge for it. With the bandwidth hogs, it's not much different, except it can hamstring companies like Google and Yahoo whose users and services make up a huge chunk of Web traffic. And it will only get worse with video and music consumption being more mainstream (and billable!).
Why is this of any import to our 'little' mobile world? Well, the rulings that might go against broadband providers might spill over to the data services of operators. For example, the US House Commerce Committee is thinking of passing a ruling on Net Neutrality, where, as I understand it, everyone has equal access to broadband connections, no preferential treatment, no negative restrictions, no blocking of ports or IP addresses only because of a market protectionism.
Well, a voice call is still a circuit-switched call and is regulated as that. But, mobile data services are part of the Net, so might those also fall under the Net Neutrality? Might that mean that if oprators allow access outside their systems and onto the open Net, they need to allow full access instead of the current, surreptitious (or threatened) port and IP blocking?
On the flip side, if the service providers get their way and can charge and extra fee for bandwidth hogs like Google, how will that impact further growth for mobile services?
Read the article and letme know what you think. It's pretty good.
Link: At Stake: The Net as We Know It.
Google et al fear broadband carriers will tie up traffic with new tolls and controls. Ultimately, it could mean a world of Internet haves and have-nots
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