Mobile Websites or Mobile Apps?

As we continue to debate whether mobile apps or mobile web is a better approach to the mobile experience, there is evidence for both points of view.

Mobile websites arguably are better for getting "information on the go." There are no serious platform issues and no need for downloading apps.

Mobile apps, on the other hand, are about experience enhancement, not information. Perhaps the best mobile apps allow users to enhance the value of an experience, typically when interaction is required, and are not best suited for gathering in-depth information, some would argue.

Apps, of course, have to be downloaded and installed, which means there are authoring costs and issues.

Mobile Websites or Mobile Apps

Why 4G Standards Really Don't Matter

There was a time, several years ago, when one might have gotten a reasonable argument about which flavor of fourth-generation wireless air interface (WiMAX or Long Term Evolution) was "better." One rarely hears such arguments anymore, for several reasons.

When the world's dominant GSM carriers all decided to embrace LTE, the "standards war" was effectively over. Much in the same way that Hollywood initially squabbled over HD-DVD and Blu-ray as the superior format to bring HD to the masses, the mobile industry at one point argued about the merits of WiMAX and LTE.

The decisions are of course very important to suppliers who had hoped to create a huge new business based on either of the standards. Intel, for example, had hoped to create huge new demand for WiMAX chipsets.

Beyond the technology differences, though, the key questions now are not over format, but business model. It is typical for supporters of next-generation wireless networks to tout new applications enabled by the new networks. Text messaging is a good example of a feature available on a 2G network that could not be provided on a first generation network. Email was a feature available on 2.5 networks.

Proponents of 3G networks always talked about the new applications that 3G would enable. But it took quite some time before specific 3G applications actually developed. As it turns out, PC dongle access and mobile Internet access turned out to be the new apps 3G enabled on a fairly wide basis. But lots of the other potential applications failed to develop.

The issue for 4G networks is whether new apps actually can be created, and how long it will take before that happens. In the meantime, "4G" mostly means "faster broadband" for most end users. The other important angle is that a new network always brings with it the chance to reset consumer expectations about "typical" features and pricing mechanisms.

For the moment, that is the key issue for 4G network operators. In the near term, 4G is unlikely to mean much other than "faster than 3G" as a core value proposition. But 4G pricing and packaging can be different than typically is the case for 3G, and that will be the near term revenue issue of greatest importance.

Over time, it is likely that other "killer apps" will develop. But that will take some time, in all likelihood.

Ironically, neither of these wireless technologies actually qualify as “4G” in the eyes of the International Telecommunication Union, but that hasn’t stopped the carriers’ marketing departments from capitalizing on the term anyway.

The Difference Between 4G and LTE

Is AT&T Hoarding Spectrum?

Some question whether AT&T is simply hoarding spectrum it has purchased, the implication being that the company simply is squatting on spectrum to deny its use to competitors. So is that the case?

The simple answer is "no." AT&T will deploy its new LTE network in 2011, on 700 MHz and Advanced Wireless Services (AWS) spectrum. Hoarding? Hardly. But the question has a lot of other nuances, and explain why spectrum costing billions does not always get put into service immediately. AT&T has perhaps more reasons than most.

Wireless Headsets - Is AT&T Hoarding Spectrum?

The Verizon iPhone Is Too Late?

Questions sometimes are more important than answers. One question might be whether the Apple iPhone can dominate the mobile handset market the way it dominates MP3 players. Another question might be whether Apple can dominate smartphones.

But one might wonder if a better question is what markets and segments does Apple wish to dominate. apple never has shown any desire to dominate the enterprise market. It never has wanted to have market share and volume at the expense of "premium" positioning in the market, or margins.

There will be huge demand for the Verizon iPhone, most observers seem to agree.

But Android has made big leaps forward in terms of quality and quantity: it recently began outselling the iPhone in the United States, for example.

Android phones are sold by dozens of hardware makers, the biggest being Samsung, Motorola, and HTC. There are lots of different form factors. Slider phones. Phones with keyboards. Big screens, small screens, midsize screens.

The iPhone, in contrast, is a bit like the situation people once had with Henry Ford’s Model T, where you could have any color you wanted, as long as it was black. With the iPhone you can have whatever Steve Jobs says you can have, some argue.

Apple likely only wants to be a highly-profitable supplier of high-end devices with premium positioning. It likely will succeed at that. Apple wanted to change the mobile handset business. It has done that.

Android, on the other hand, likely always aimed to be a mass-deployed operating system, and likely will succeed. The big question might be whether Symbian suffers more than others in that regard. Android can be used on lower-end devices as well as high-end devices, and will.

If one assumes that smartphones will, over time, become the "phone," then Apple never would have wanted to have the largest market share.

The Verizon iPhone Is Too Late - Newsweek

Android Users; Giving to Charity Now Easier with PayPal Mobile

PayPal has added a donations feature to the PayPal Mobile for Android app. Now Android users have a fast and convenient way to make charitable contributions to more than 23,000 charities in the U.S, U.K and Canada, including World Food Program USA, St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital, Children’s Miracle Network and Habitat for Humanity International.

Android Users; Giving to Charity Now Easier with PayPal Mobile

Apple wants more money for iPad newspapers

Apple reportedly has told European publishers that print subscribers will not be able to offer those customers "no incremental cost" access to the same content on Apple iPads.

Apple apparently wants to encourage print publishers to create separate digital editions, including either single-issue access or subscriptions, that allow Apple to capture 30 percent of the gross revenue, rather than allowing iPad access for no additional cost.

Apple wants more money for iPad newspapers

Groupon Turned Down $6 Billion, Thinks it is Worth t $15 Billion

Groupon, the social buying site that rejected a $6 billion offer from Google, is pushing ahead with plans for its initial public offering, a debut that could value the company at $15 billion or more. That would be a high multiple for a company with perhaps $1 billion of revenue.

Many have speculated that a new Internet bubble is forming. Of course, bubbles build and then burst with no warning, sometimes leading to a loss of 99 percent of equity value. That is not likely "this time around," as firms generally have some basis in revenue reality.

But whether you think a new Internet bubble is forming, or not, valuations and interest are much higher than at any point in the last five to 10 years. So we are likely to see a rush to go public. Inevitably, insiders will do well. It isn't so clear how well the public investors will do, given the passage of some time.

With I.P.O., Groupon Is Said to Value Itself at $15 Billion - NYTimes.com

63% of Millennials Use Social Media to Engage with Brands

About 63 percent of Millennials use social media to engage with brands, a new study by McKinsey & Company has found.

A Majority of the the Emerging Affluent Uses Social Media to Engage with Brands

Twitter is full of regional 'accents'

Researchers at Carnegie Mellon University examined 380,000 messages from Twitter during one week in March 2010 and found that the social networking site is full of its own kinds of geographical dialects.

Take the word cool. Southern Californians tend to write the shorthand 'coo,' while their neighbors up north use the phonetic shorthand 'koo.'

The 4.5 million words the researchers examined were full of similar examples. Some were obvious — like 'y'all' in the South or 'yinz' in Pittsburgh.

Twitter is full of regional 'accents,' study finds - Yahoo! News

Projecting iPhone's Effect on Verizon's 2011 Wireless Revenues - Seeking Alpha

By one survey conducted by Compete, about 8.7 percent of Verizon Wireless customers are waiting for a specific phone model before upgrading to a smartphone, and most assume that means the Apple iPhone.

According to Verizon’s third-quarter 2010 financial statement, only 23 percent of Verizon’s 82 million post-paid subscribers currently had a smartphone. This means that there is a potential pool of some 63 million post-paid cellphone owners that Verizon can convert to the iPhone, without stealing away a single new net add.

If the 8.7 percent of existing Verizon's customers who are waiting for a specific phone choose to upgrade to an iPhone, Verizon could enjoy a spike of more than 5.4 million new iPhone customers in 2011.

Even if just three million existing non-smartphone Verizon Wireless subscribers upgrade to the iPhone, Verizon Wireless could earn more than a billion dollars in additional data revenue over a two-year period, assuming new monthly data plan revenues of $15 a month and two-year contract lengths.

That does not even account for net customer gains Verizon might pick up as customers from AT&T and other service providers move over to Verizon Wireless to use the iPhone on the Verizon network.

Projecting iPhone's Effect on Verizon's 2011 Wireless Revenues - Seeking Alpha

U.S. Game Revenue Flat in 2010

Total U.S. consumer spend on gaming content in all forms, including new physical video and PC games, used games, game rentals, subscriptions, digital full-game downloads, social network games, downloadable content, and mobile game apps, is between $15.4 to $15.6 billion. That's a range that would make 2010 activity about the same as 2009, or just slightly less, according to NPD Group.

Spending on new physical content at retail continues to account for the majority of the total consumer spend on games content. U.S. retail sales of new physical video game content, which includes portable, console and PC game software, generated revenues of $10.1 billion, a 5 percent decline over the $10.6 billion generated in 2009.

2010 TOTAL CONSUMER SPEND ON ALL GAMES CONTENT IN THE U.S. ESTIMATED BETWEEN $15.4 TO $15.6 BILLION

Shoppers Have More Information Than Store Associates, Motorola Says

The majority of surveyed retail associates surveyed by Motorola (55 percent) believe that 2010 holiday season’s shoppers were better connected to consumer information than in-store associates, particularly because consumers have online shopping tools and mobile phone applications that allow price comparisons, access to coupons and social-networking.

Motorola says that retailers that aren't investing in technology to stay ahead of increasingly tech-savvy shoppers are hurting their own bottom line. Nearly three in 10 (28 percent) store visits ended with an average of $132 unspent due to abandoned purchases driven by deal-habituated behavior, out-of-stocks, limited store associate assistance and long check-out processes, Motorola estimates.

On a positive note, the survey indicates that when surveyed shoppers received guidance from a retail associate armed with a handheld mobile computer, over four in ten (43 percent) reported the device improved their shopping experience. The survey also notes that an overwhelming majority of retailers - 87 percent - believe that shoppers can easily find a better deal so customer service - aided by access to real-time information -- is 'more important than ever.

Motorola Solutions Media Center - Press Releases - 55 Percent of Retailers Cite Shoppers as Better Connected To Information than Store Associates, According To Motorola Solutions Survey

Google Kills H.264 Video Codec Support: Why?

Google says it is removing Chrome support for the H.264 codec. It is the sort of decision that will not have totally-obvious implications for most relatively non-technical people. Google says it is supporting the WebM (VP8) and Theora video codecs, and will consider adding support for other high-quality open codecs in the future, rather than H.264.

'Though H.264 plays an important role in video, as our goal is to enable open innovation, support for the codec will be removed and our resources directed towards completely open codec technologies. A relatively straight discussion of the technology issues is here: http://news.cnet.com/8301-30685_3-20028196-264.html?tag=mncol;txt.

But there's also thinking that the codec decisions are part of developing conflict between Google and Apple. See http://www.digitalsociety.org/2011/01/google-is-killing-html5-to-harm-apple-ios/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=google-is-killing-html5-to-harm-apple-ios

Apple made the decision to not allow Adobe Flash on iOS devices because they want to retain sole control over application distribution and design with their App Store, a technology decision with business implications.

The current near-universal delivery platform was Adobe Flash but that was losing steam because of its inability to reach Apple iOS.

By crippling HTML5 H.264 under the guise of supporting Google’s VP8 codec (which is a nonstarter because VP8 is inferior to H.264, carries potential patent infringement liabilities, and H.264 is entrenched in billions of hardware devices while VP8 has no current support), the only remaining viable option for most content producers is to continue delivering H.264 via the Adobe Flash platform or via Microsoft Silverlight like Netflix, says George Ou.

Larger content providers will be able to deliver H.264 compressed video on both Flash or Silverlight for most of the world and HTML5 just for Apple iOS devices, but it will remain difficult to reach Apple iOS devices. Google Android devices will be able to reach Flash websites like Windows or Mac Personal Computers which gives them a leg up on Apple, Ou argues.

Chromium Blog: HTML Video Codec Support in Chrome

LightSquared in Trouble?

Prominent hedge fund manager Phil Falcone's $7 billion Harbinger Capital Management has been hit by a series of high profile departures in the past few weeks, according to people familiar with the fund.

While some departures were voluntary, others were part of an effort to cut the fund's staff, as the firm's assets have shrunk from a peak of $26.5 billion in 2008, the sources said.

Those moves could have an impact on Harbinger's ability to secure additional funding for its satellite-plus-terrestrial Long Term Evolution wholesale network. About 40 percent of Harbinger's total capital is tied to LightSquared.

Whether the departures are related to perceptions about the chances of success, or not, LightSquared faced big challenges from the start. Mobile satellite networks have lost investors lots of money in the past.

Shrinking hedge fund Harbinger faces staff exits | Reuters

T-Mobile USA Mocks At&T, Verizon

There's "no competition" in the mobile business, some say. Sure, it's anecdotal, but advertising like this suggests there is quite a lot of competition.