"Mobile Wallet" Tutorial

This "mobile wallet" tutorial points out why application providers, mobile service providers and traditional payment providers all are working on mobile payment and mobile banking applications, at least in terms of the "payment transaction" parts of mobile payments.

Some of us are pretty sure it is all the other stuff that ultimately going to be more important. In part that's because the current business of making money supplying payment services using credit cards and debit cards is likely going to face regulatory pressure in any case, shrinking the total size of that business.

But there are lots of substantial businesses that can be transformed by better application of smart phone capabilities, ranging from advertising and promotion to loyalty programs and in-store promotion, not to mention actual retail shopping.

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Best Buy Lags Online Sites

It probably was inevitable that Best Buy would start to feel the impact of competition from online sites. It now appears as though the serious pressure has arrived.

While Best Buy remains the largest electronics retailer, consumers these days are used to having multiple options for everything, and many of the other retailers are rapidly encroaching on the space. It goes without saying that the competition is online.

Simplicity, for Sprint Means Unlimited Usage

Sprint has been pushing the value of "simplicity" for its unlimited usage plans. It still is.

Survey Shows Growth of Brand-Sponsored Media

Ignoring for the moment the somewhat odd way of displaying trend data, for which the convention normally is to display chronological data left to right, the amount of money brands are spending to create original content of various types keeps growing.

If you hadn't thought about it much, this shift is part of the broader shift in "media." Where once it was publishers, film makers, record labels, newspapers and other traditional entities that created media, these days it is that, plus millions of consumers creating videos, blog posts, Facebook entries and Twitter posts that also are a new form of media.

Among the other changes, brands themselves are becoming more active content creators, blurring the line between traditional and new forms of media.

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Google Buys PushLife

Google has purchased PushLife, a Canadian company that provides Apple iTunes functionality. Presumably the assets will be used to create a more robust music store capability.

Verizon Launches New Mobile Streaming Platform

Verizon is unveiling new "content-to-consumer" delivery capabilities, allowing content owners to distribute live and on-demand, personalized video content to users of smart phones and tablets. Verizon Digital Media Services automates manual workflow processes associated with formatting, managing and delivering digital media to virtually any device or platform on a large scale.

Verizon Digital Media Services will ultimately enable high-quality and reliable "unicast" (individualized video streams), though initially it is multicast content that the service will support.



http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/verizon-unveils-advanced-digital-media-management-and-distribution-platform-for-entertainment-industry-to-capitalize-on-new-content-to-consumer-experiences-119578669.html

Coupon Factory Launches Small Business Coupon Platform

Rockfish has launched CouponFactory, a coupon platform for businesses that combines the coupon creation with distribution and analytics. 

CouponFactory is a platform that gives brands and small businesses a simple way to create coupons. The service includes an easy-to-use web interface , customer data collection, no set-up fees, detailed digital coupon analytics, coupon fraud control, as well as mobile, web and social embed options. The service also lets companies place their coupon widget wherever they choose.

CouponFactory from Rockfish on Vimeo.


CouponFactory launches coupon platform

Netflix Is 2nd-Largest Pay Video Provider, by Subscriber Metrics

If one were to add Netflix to this chart, it would rank about second, with some 20 million subscribers. Granted, there is a significant revenue magnitude difference. Netflix gets something on the order of $12 a month per subscriber, while Comcast gets about $118 a month. On the other hand, Netflix offers a product that competes most directly with premium channels such as HBO, Showtime and Starz.

Those channels cost between $10 to $16 a month, typically. We are some ways from the possibility that Netflix or YouTube could actually become a competitor in the "basic cable (ad-supported channels)" segment of the business. But 20 million paying customers is a huge advantage.

Facebook's "Open Compute Project" Will "Commoditize" Data Center Facilities

Open source projects almost always represents an effort to take something that is essential for a business and reduce its cost of acquisition. In other words, a firm benefits if it can bring much more competition to the businesses that supply its inputs. Firms try not to do this with respect to the core values companies believe they bring to the market. Open source tends to level the playing field while marginalizing competitive advantages others might have had.

Microsoft commoditized PC hardware because its software needed a home. Companies that contribute heavily to open-source, such as modern-day IBM, commoditize software because they sell consulting and support services.

Google commoditizes applications, platforms, and web technologies because it needs places to put its ads and people to see them. (Google also tries to commoditize anything required to get online: web browsers, DNS, and in some cases, even internet connectivity.)

Apple commoditizes apps to make iPhones and iPads more attractive. That's why telecom and other capacity and access executives hate the notion of "dumb pipe" so much. It is essentially an effort by other players in the ecosystem to reduce network services to a commodity.

Marco.org - Facebook's Open Compute Project

RIM Gets "No Respect"

Research In Motion co-CEO Mike Lazaridis is frustrated about investor concern. “Why is it that people don’t appreciate our profits? Why is it that people don’t appreciate our growth?"

"I don’t fully understand why there’s this negative sentiment, and I just don’t have the time to battle it," he said. The quick answer is probably jitters over recent market share losses.

RIM's CEO Is Annoyed That "People Don’t Appreciate Our Profits

Apple Keeps Lead, but Android to Grab 39% of Tablet Sales in 2015

Gartner said it expects 70 million media tablets to be sold this year and 108 million in 2012, compared with 17.6 million in 2010. Apple's share of the market will gradually decline to 47 percent in 2015 from 69 percent this year, while Google's share will rise to 39 percent from 20 percent now. 

Apple to stay ahead in tablet boom: Gartner | Reuters

Startups Use Free WiFi to Limit Expenses

Small business owners are notably parsimonious when investing in information technology, so you might not be surprised that many startups take advantage of free Internet access in public locations as much as they can.

In some cases, very-small business owners even use the public spaces when they could otherwise simply use the connections at their home offices.

Small businesses tap into free WiFi - The Washington Post

Tablet Role in "PC" Market?

People disagree about the role tablets play today, and might play in the future, in the consumer computing device market. Some think the tablet can, and will, displace other PC devices as a "primary" device. Others think the tablet is an ancillary device primarily to be used for media consumption. Some think "consumption" will remain the primary usage mode, while some think "content creation" capabilities will grow, over time.

Up to this point, the center of gravity likely remains "consumption," however. Recent surveys suggest users play games, check and respond to email and surf the web and watch videos on their tablets. But that doesn't mean they can't be used, and are not used, in a "business" or "work" context. As in the past, where some business people when traveling relied solely on a smart phone, rather than carrying a notebook PC with them, so tablets seem to be used in settings, where the actual work activities mostly consist of checking email and surfing the web.

For sales personnel, the tablet likely represents a more-convenient way to make presentations, as well.

"Easier to use" seems the key, in that regard. As it turns out, for many users, most "PC" activities take the form of consuming content, with the exception of responding to email. The tablet then represents a more convenient way to use the apps that actually are important in many settings.

PCs still remain necessary for "content creation" and other work tasks. In that sense, tablets represent a new element in computing ubiquity and pervasiveness, rather than a direct replacement for "primary" PCs, much as smart phones do not generally replace PCs, but extend web and Internet access to a wider range of settings.

Why "post PC" doesn't mean "sans PC" | Computers | MacUser | Macworld

UK Merchant Test Loyalty First, Payment Might Follow

In launching a trial of a loyalty program, "Eat," an Ireland-based sandwich chain, is following the Starbucks model of focusing on loyalty as the driver of it mobile payment application, rather than "payments." In fact, the program will launch with a focus on loyalty rewards first, and later might be expanded to include purchasing functions.

New point-of-sale terminals capable of supporting RFID and the stickers, as well as Visa payWave and MasterCard PayPass payment systems, are being added as part of the trial. Eat is said to be the first merchant in the United Kingdom to introduce an integrated contactless POS system. The trial will start in May 2011.

Eat would issue stickers affixed to mobile devices that enable them to tap to receive points and redeem rewards. They could also view coupons and rewards, along with account details via a smartphone app on their phones.

The test uses RFID stickers rather than near field communications, likely for a couple very-practical reasons. The number of NFC-capable phones in current use is too small to support a viable test, much less a full-production commercial system. Also, by using the stickers, Eat does not have to worry about all the details of phone type, make and model. In principle, the phone becomes a vehicle for attaching the sticker, which could in principle, be affixed to a credit, debit or loyalty card as well.

The trade-off is between speed to market and ubiquity versus application features. The advantage is that anybody will be able to use the stickers. The disadvantage is that the system is relatively "dumb," providing only as much information as any other numerical identification number would, at the the time of transaction. The sticker approach cannot take advantage of a smart phone camera, location information, processing power, memory or other apps that might increase the range of features a payment or loyalty program might offer.

But stickers have one key advantage: they are easy to use, and anybody can use them, without regard for the type of phone in use. In fact, a sticker approach is not much different from using a plastic fob or card of some type to enter loyalty information for any other existing retail program. Again, it's a trade off: a simple approach available to every customer, right now, versus a more-complicated technology approach that is more powerful in terms of new features.

UK Merchant Plans to Launch Loyalty Trial with Stickers

Mobile Payments: Not Really About the Payments

The thing about mobile payments is that application providers are going to have to figure out what the value for consumers and retailers is, and what the revenue models are. Managing spending could be one of those ways to add value. It isn't so much "electronic receipts" as it is the ability to post all transactions to a ledger or account, rather than adding up amounts manually, after the fact.

Automated check-ins and information sharing are another angle, possibly the ability to create a blog or social app post with some details (name, location, menu item) pulled directly from the transaction data and purchase location.

Purchases might also include automated tip calculation when restaurant bills are paid, using rules the user has set up in advance.

Many think retailers, banks and other loyalty programs will want to provide instant alerts for users to use specified accounts at specified retailer locations, possibly because the payment accounts are linked to loyalty programs at that specific location or a specific offer can be triggered.

Also, users might be able to link their loyalty program information with payment information so the loyalty information does not have to be separately entered every time.

The value might be the value add that is wrapped around "payment," rather than transactions themselves.

Why does NFC matter? Does tap beat swipe for mobile payments? | VentureBeat