I'm more than excited to announce our first partnership, with ArtistData. Not only because it's big news for Adva Mobile, but also because ArtistData's service is so spot-on: giving musicians a service that enables them to enter shows, news, blogs and other assets once, and automatically aggregate that information to other sites. It's the right approach for musicians, who are already sufferring from lack of time to deal with self-promotion on multiple sites.
This integration will allow musicians to bring their assets from ArtistData automatically to their mobile fan club on Adva Mobile. It will happen automatically daily (you need to set it up on both sites).
I think it's very cool and hope a lot of musicians will benefit from it. Certainly a step in the right direction, for everyone.
Finally someone with enough marketing power and following goes through what we've been seeing for at least half a decade: the senseless censorship that is mandated in the mobile world. It's unheard of and unbelievable for traditional web marketers. I've seen this for a while now, specifically in the independant music world: almost every band has some content that doesn't match exactly the rules. is the answer not to serve them, or even worse, their audience?!. As Rich Miner said recently: "Nobody protects me when I'm browsing on my PC, why are they protecting me when I'm mobile-browsing?".
The answer is that this is a problem that operators, specifically US ones, have created themselves. The notion of educating subscribers that they can, and should call in whenever something goes wrong and they're just unhappy and want to bang someone, led to a gigantic and hungry support system that sucks the budgets underneath the carriers legs. (When was the last time you called Microsoft or Intel because you got the blue screen?!). The next piece for the carriers, then, is to restrict things that could go wrong on phones, resulting with subscribers either hacking phones or unaware of their phones capabilities. In other words, "buy a better monthly subscription, but please don't use it".
The reason I'm relating this Apple story to the operators is that I'm guessing these guidelines came from their marriage to AT&T (I already wrote about how healthy it would have been if Apple went operator-independant and sold unlocked phones. Here again, they would have freedom to do what's right, not what's mandated). What's even more infuriating, and it explains the inconsistency in apple's approval process, is that the guidelines change frequently. And I mean, weekly. Who has the time to read a 100-page "new operator guidelines", adn then implement them every time?
It'd be great if Trent could make a dent in how things work in the mobile space. Make decision makers think about the realities out there and growing volume of diverse content available on mobile, and how to best present it (enable parental controls on phones?). The reality, though, is that this is geat publicity for both sides, NIN & Apple. When the app comes out, there's gonna be more interest and demand. Apple will figure a way to work with NIN, it's worth bringing them through the VIP backdoor. The rest of the musicians will need to see their art scrubbed.
BTW...to clarify, I'm not a fan of any of that language or visual, which is why I haven't posted the link to Mashable, where you could see the language in the comments. I think sometimes musicians use it to express themselves, and that's ok, but I'm unsure it's needed outside that world. Just my 2 cents.
Update:
I've just come across Sue Marek's (Fierce Wireless) post on "Why do distasteful apps sell?". It's well worth reading, she makes very good points. I'd say there's no write or wrong in this push-pull economy. Who keeps creating nuclear weapons, despite the knowledge these are overall bad news for everyone? Why they do it? because there's demand.
I think Sue is just slightly off in her conclusion "I'd like to think that most app developers are more interested in creating clever solutions to practical problems rather than selling distasteful apps". While the statement is true, IMO, developers are after making money, primarily. Everything else follows. Which is why the iFarts of the world will proliferate and drive more buzz than any genuinely useful app will.
As I mentioned in my post discussing where consumers get content from, I said: "Don't ignore the P2P elephant: 48% sideloading music from you-know-where is not something one can ignore and pretend its going to go away. I don't even think legislation can make P2P go away but some think so. No, I think we're looking at a vanishing consumer wallet and people will not pay (much, if anything) for music. We need to figure out alternative revenue channels for the operator, content owner, retailer etc."
A new survey shows that 61% of US teens download music illegally. Not a big surprise, frankly. Ask any teen around you whether they pay for music... the answer is no. The survey noted an overall "discretionary recession" in teen spending, finding a 15% year-over-year decline in spending among young men, and an 11% decline among young women. This is the dynamics that will make operators focus on networks as the revenues from mobile content require skills, and budget, that brands, advertisers and content owners have, not necessarily operators.
Another interesting comment was: "Six percent of students indicated they own an iPhone -- double the market share found in a fall 2007 survey -- and 9% expect to buy an iPhone in the next six months."
The iPhone UI really does make a difference to the teens. I believe iPhone and the likes will bring teens to use their phones as their music device. This is a huge opportunity for the direct to consumer content business.
As an engineer who turned to marketing, I keep coming across situations where you want to promise the sky, but you also know the limits. A good lesson one of my previous CEO taught me was: whenever you think of starting the limitation "BUT...", that's when you put the lid on it. Because that's how technology moves forward. If customers were buying existing technology there wouldn't be any innovation. This is why you want to keep your sales guys somewhat aware of what the product can (or rather, can't) do, but they and the market are the ones who will pull you forward.
The thing is, sometimes you cheat. You know the product can't deliver to the spec. Do BMW's really make it to the top speed? who knows? whose going to test it? The wisdom is not to get caught, at least not big time.
Because when someone calls the bluff, it can become painful. And I think that's what's lined up for operators with their data network. They were betting on lack of applications that will drive the data network. And they were right for the longest while. Now, when video is hitting the mobile space, uplink and downlink, it is becoming difficult, and frightening.
So when I read this article about "Researcher warns on flat-rate plans’ effect on carriers", and I read "ABI is also worried that unlimited plans may encourage an increase in unsolicited text messages, instant messaging and picture mail usage.", I think, no, they've got the wrong end of the stick. This is the time to crack the champaign. Because for the longest time mobile geeks complained about people "not getting" picture messaging, Mobile IM, Mobile video etc. "usage/adoption is low" you could hear everywhere.
Well if now people get it, then there could not be better news! That is a good problem to have like my friend Jack always tells me. The operators need to figure out how to keep up the technology and harvest the revenues: making their network perform, and cutting rev share deals with content owners and advertisers.
Overnight it seems like a new mobile video startup, Flixwagon, had managed to grab a lot of attention. Uplink live video for the community is a real interesting cool proposition. They also seem to have relations in the right places, from VCs to a S60 dude filming his own wedding.
I have my own thoughts on community uplink mobile video. What is the implication for users and for operators? (Flixwagon help:) "Since the Flixwagon mobile application uses the internet to broadcast videos, we recommend that users upgrade their mobile plans to unlimited internet access. On average, a minute of broadcast uses up around 1Mb of your data plan. With unlimited access, users will not incur any minute-by-minute charges associated with mobile internet usage."
That's actually great for operators, drives people straight into the stores to get data plans. Finally an application that people want that requires data. No more "operator pushed" data plans. That's smart.
What do operators have for data in their stores? Vodafone UK will give you monthly 120MB for 7.50 pounds or for 1 pound/day for casual use you'll get up to 15MB. You'll find this "unlimited with fair use" policy everywhere. Sprint, a good representative of the new US "Simply everything" set of plans from operators, will give you for $99/month "unlimited data", with the small print "Service is not available to use as modem, ..., other systems that drive continuous heavy traffic or data sessions". W/o a data plan, Sprint data will cost you 3c/kB.
So imagine these guys want to go way beyond YouTube (As you have a cell phone in your povket always, whereas PC cam is...well...connected to a PC). Here's some YouTube stats: 200K video uploads daily. Average Video Length slightly below 3 minutes. Average Age of Uploader: 26.57. That's clearly going to change.
Back-of-envelope math: that's 200k*3*1MB/min = 0.6TB of data/day uplink.
... 0.6TB/day...
here's an interesting quote: "YouTube videos take up an estimated 45 terabytes of storage - about 5,000 home computers' worth - and require several million dollars' worth of bandwidth a month to transmit."
Remember how the introduction of iPhone brought AT&T data network to its knees? I wonder what would this do to the operators, technology-wise and commercially.
I think these guys have got their technology and commercial work cut out for them. Good luck to them!
If you're into weddings, watch the video here
Now all that's left is for someone to step on and play the broker between all these feeds and the news, sports, entertainment channels...
Been reading today from a couple of corners in my Google Reader about mobile content and data.
The first piece talks about Wi-Fi seems to be loosing to mobile broadband: My old friend the pondering primate has a piece on Hotspots being phased out and Ericsson predicts demise of hotspots in favor of mobile broadband. Duh. Everywhere you go, if you're lucky, you may find a hotspot, and even if you did, they will charge the heck out of you. Good 20pound/day in any London hotel. Then you think: let's hook with a network. Think again: the Boingos ("Monthly Flat Rate wifi plans for frequent travellers") of the world may have sensible roaming agreements (but not in your hotel haha) but wherever you may end up...oh...it's a "premium location" (who cares?) hence an additional $0.12/minute. Has anyone heard of Ad supported??? No. Wifi is complex, it doesn't have decent coverage and is a total steal.
This goes well with the next piece, which is that people had figured out it makes more sense to get 'em 3G dongles: Last week 18K 3G dongles were sold in the UK (50% of that from 3: good on ya!). Here's some more. You know why they sold? because it's reliable, it's predictable and it's everywhere. It's because even EU roaming charges will become reasonable one day.
The interesting bit about this is that it's another indication that people are thirsty to mobile data: services and content.
Check this out: "flat-rate mobile data tariffs will lead to usage increasing at a far greater rate than operator revenues. This shift will demand the cost of providing mobile data connectivity be driven down if they were to continue to make money."
"usage increasing at a far greater rate than operator revenues...": uh...hello? sorry a bit stunned here.
I recall reading that the operator investment in advanced IP infrastructure was unjustified because the data based services/content takeup was insignificant (in fact yesterday one of the fierce commentary was talking about "why go to 4G") and now the usage increase is an issue?!
Usage increase is a blessing dudes! you should be blessed to see the usage increase! more content, more services and more consumptions all play very nicely into the operators' 40-60% rev share on consumed content. Even the "flat rate" plans are defined as "fare use".
"It is only a matter of time before we lose all profitability on mobile data" said T-Mobile CEO...well I think something's really messed up if finally users access content and T-Mobile can't make money.
If you've been reading my blog you know that I've been working on code scanning and I believe in that technology as one novel solution to genuine handset usability problem. (BTW, Digit Wireless is recently is making a comeback from a couple quiet years with a new CEO)
People on the go are getting the value of retrieving information or content through their phones by scanning codes (esp. in UK), taking pictures of products etc.
That said, I see codes as a cumbersome geeky solution. too difficult, too many formats fragmenting the market, technologies etc. client development, QA and distribution challenges...
Either way, I won't argue the point of taking a picture of the product vs. a code next to it here (people will rightfully argue the probability of getting to the content one wants is not acceptable other than through code scanning), but I do want to say this:
Take a phone, take a picture of the product you're interested in, send it to a good correlation algorithm, use Google's infinite DB of images, send the user an interesting URL back.
That's an interesting proposition. And Vodafone's just launched it. Perhaps not the best performance, but good on them to get going.
This fits right into the Google's marketing expertise. They should be interested in this
Brings some thoughts around the fixation of targeting direct OTA content downloads. The mobile gaming industry is seeking ways to work with users, not against them. The spread of piracy these days just shows that something's wrong in the way content is handled. Sideloading is something that will eventually increase sales and will enable more viral spreading and recommendations for content. It should be encouraged through social community gadgets etc. All channels should be used: direct OTA, dual download, sideload etc.
(Source) "Digital music in the United States will increase from $1.98 billion in 2007 to $5.34 billion in 2012 according to the Yankee Group, but mobile will only account for 20 percent of that, or $1.068 billion. Overall this will not replace lost CD revenue, but Yankee avoids the mistake of saying that the “music industry” is in trouble—it’s actually the record labels which are in trouble, and the analysts predicts that artists will increasingly keep the lion’s share of music revenues by selling directly to the consumer. In terms of handsets, Yankee predicts that by 2012 there will be 266 million music-capable handsets in the US, but only 9 percent of mobile users will actively use their handset as a portable music player. Mind you, I would like to see what percentage of the population actively use a portable media player of any type…"
My first reaction to this was big yawn. Seen enough 5 years ahead reports on almost obvious stuff. Yes, everyone's about music in some level, yes there is high integration to mobile phones, duh.
The report is very relevant around "direct to consumer" and that the record labels are in trouble. People begin to realize how many middle men are between the content creator and the consumer. Rightfully, they want those removed, or reduced. In the wireless world, operators have been great at providing better than ever technology and throughput. They brought the mobile web to phones. Device vendors are making unbelievable web & Multimedia phones. Which brought both to struggle whether they are technology vendors or want to go into the content business. The answer is that the wireless content business is best managed by content aggregators on behalf of people like the labels and artists. You can distribute content directly from the web today. Reduce operation cost by one deployment fits all. Everyone, the operators, the vendors and the content owners all get a piece of the cake. further, subscribers get ubiquitous, optimized experience, sometime cheaper. It's a no-brainer. Some UK operators get it, some in the US. It's just a question of time until everyone will get it.
This Blog is a collection of my thoughts on the mobile space and more. It is not by any means an official company blog. Opinions and postings are not necessarily related to the company that I work for.
As an engineer who turned to marketing, I keep coming across situations where you want to promise the sky, but you also know the limits. A good lesson one of my previous CEO taught me was: whenever you think of starting the limitation "BUT...", that's when you put the lid on it.
Been reading today from a couple of corners in my Google Reader about mobile content and data.
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