Yes, We are in an Investment Bubble

When the advice smart and experienced people are giving essentially is "raise money now, so you'll be able to make it through the crash and funding draught," we are in an investment bubble.


To anybody who asks my advice I repeat the same line, says investor Mark Suster.  “I don’t know whether this party will last 6 weeks, 6 months or 18 months. But it will end," he says.


And when it does the market will shut off immediately. Those of you who lived through the 2000 bubble will remember that. 


Investors will focus only on protecting existing deals. They will enter the “triage phase” of the market where they figure out which of their existing deals will survive, says Suster. Many good companies will not get funded. New investors hate down rounds. Vultures will start circling looking for deals. "Get funded now, if you can.”


This is a thoughtful post and you really should read all of it:  http://www.businessinsider.com/on-bubbles--and-why-well-be-just-fine-2011-6#ixzz1Q6Hsczhm.

Will Data Caps Change Behavior, Business Arrangements?

Tensions within any ecosystem always exist; they are built into the structure of ecosystems where one role's inputs are another role's outputs, and vice versa. So as data caps start to become the norm for broadband access, there should eventually be some adjustments within the ecosystem. For starters, app developers will have some new incentives to think about how user behavior might change if content such as advertising starts eating into data allotments.

On the other hand, as mobile access providers look for ways to replace revenue they are losing from voice and text messaging plans, for example, there will be new incentives to craft business partnerships. A mobile provider might work with app providers to exempt video advertising or other bandwidth-intensive ads and promotions from the caps, for example. That will involve some form of economic value flowing between the app provider and the access provider, but it is an easy matter to predict it will be looked at, at the very least.

Nickhil Jakatdar, who is co-founder and CEO of mobile startup Vuclip, said he has been debating this issue with other entrepreneurs for a while now. He noted that in emerging markets like India, data plans have always been limited, so in one sense U.S. carriers are just following the lead of other countries.

That could be bad news for any mobile app or service hoping to make money through advertising, and definitely will be an issue for over the top video entertainment providers. "As a consumer, I am not going to be to happy if five percent of my data cap was used by ads," Jakatdar said.

That is doubly true for online or mobile video entertainment offers.

Jakatdar predicted that as tiered data plans expand in the United States, we'll see more mobile companies moving away from a purely ad-supported model, and towards models where they partner with carriers on data or premium services.

Verizon's Wireless Data Caps May Not Mix With Rich Media Advertising on Phones | Adweek

1 Facebook fan = 20 additional visits, says Hitwise

For retailers, each new fan acquired on Facebook is worth 20 additional visits to a brand website over the course of a year," says Hitwise. If true, that is one of the best data points I've seen yet about the return on investment from Facebook campaigns, at least if you assume sales are related to traffic on Facebook and other sites.

Our data shows that for the top retailers, even if they have no Facebook fans they can still expect to receive on average 62,000 visits from Facebook each month, says Hitwise.

Facebook is the second most visited website in the United Kingdom, after Google, and is now the second biggest source of traffic to other websites as well, Hitwise says. That is one reason Facebook likely has to be part of any brand's content marketing strategy.

About one in every six page views from U.K. Internet users goes to a Facebook page, and 20 million hours are spent on the website every day from UK users alone.

http://weblogs.hitwise.com/robin-goad/2011/06/1_facebook_fan_20_additional_v.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+hitwise+%28Hitwise+Intelligence%29

Social Gaming Grows

Social gaming has become a mass phenomenon for Generation X and millennial adults, according to research from Saatchi & Saatchi and Ipsos OTX MediaCT.

Consultancy eMarketer believes U.S. social gaming revenues will pass $1 billion in 2011, and a May 2011 survey of US internet users ages 18 to 44 found that half play social games every day.

Among tablet owners, two thirds reported gaming each day, and more than half of smartphone owners said the same.

Parenthetically, one of the elements I do see "missing" from most discussions of mobile wallets and payments is the element of "fun." Granted, payments, credentials and wallets are serious matters requiring a sober approach. But fun tends to be associated with apps that "go viral."

Web Users Welcome Brands to Social Games - eMarketer

Google Tests own NFC Base Statiions in Japan

Google has launched a near field communications experiment in Tokyo, creating NFC base stations that people can use to quickly and easily share their opinions about various locations in Tokyo.

When users tap the base station with their NFC-enabled phone they can immediately leave a rating or review for the place where the station is located. They can also star the place for later or share it with friends and get recommendations about other similar places.

Japan might provide interesting insights, given the high percentage of NFC-equipped handsets already in use, as well as the proclivity for using new mobile capabilities.

Note the emphasis on content, annotation of the real world and local business angle. That is part of Google's perspective on why NFC is is important: it creates new channels and venues for growing the mobile advertising, local advertising and local promotions and social shopping businesses.

Connecting Business Owners and Customers in Tokyo - Google Places Blog

Google Wallet Will be Ported to iPhones

If iPhones get near field communications, Google will port its Google Wallet to iOS, says Eric Schmidt, Google executive chairman. Google Wallet now is a service that runs on Androids, but there is no reason in principle, or even strategically, for Google to limit the reach of its Google Wallet service based on operating system or even handset dimensions.

Apple hasn't yet clarified what it believes its own role will be in the ecosystem, but it does not appear that Apple and Google are targeting the same spots within the business. Google is going to chase the local advertising and promotion opportunity. Apple might decide to leverage iTunes in some way. http://www.mobilemarketingandtechnology.com/2011/toppost/google-mobile-wallet-who-ultimately-controls-the-credentials-process/

The only regularly available NFC-aware smart phones in the US are the Nexus S and Nexus S 4G, but a number of companies have indicated they are moving forward with the feature.

All of RIM's upcoming phones, like the BlackBerry Bold 9900, will have it built-in. Nokia's N9 and possibly its Windows Phone devices will have the short-range wireless. LG and Sony Ericsson have pledged their own support using Android. Apple has been rumored signing on but has seen contradictory rumors that it might wait until 2012.

But one the big issues,, namely the question of which entity controls loading of credentials into the phones, remains unsettled. Both carriers and handset manufacturers have their own reasons for wanting to control the process. See

http://ecommerceblog.fastpivot.com/mobile-store/is-googles-new-mobile-wallet-payment-app-a-sitting-duck/.

Several of us on a panel were asked recently how long it would take for NFC to be adopted. It's a harder question that you would think, in part because you have to decide what "adopted" means. It is one thing to ask how long it will take for most phones to include NFC as a feature. It is another question to ask how long before 20 percent of devices in use have NFC.

My own take at the moment is that adoption is going to take longer than people think. Over the next five years, for example, there will be slower progress than innovators need to scale their offers. At some point after that, possibly in another five years, an inflection point could be reached. Again, the issue is what dimension of NFC deployment we decide to focus on. Availability of the feature will arrive sooner than "ubiquitous and daily use" by consumers.

Even harder to predict is which firms might ulitmately lead the market, or key segments of the market, and why. I used the analogy of 1995 and Netscape to illustrate where we are in the developing business. In 1995, if you used Netscape, there were not a lot of things you could do. Most corporate sites consisted of simple "brochures online."

You couldn't really communicate with other people in real time, within the medium. You couldn't interrogate data bases. You couldn't buy anything, listen to music, watch movies or post photos. Sometimes you could not comment directly within the context of the site visits. You couldn't make or change a reservation.

But that's where we are today. It isn't possible to predict with certainty what will trigger the massive end user and retailer value that causes the capabilities to "go viral." It isn't possible to predict the future leaders for the same reasons. Remember that Netscape was eclipsed. And if you look at all the ways people now use browsers, it would have been hard to predict in 1995 what the level of usage might be, what the apps would be or who the leaders would be.

Google: we'll bring Wallet to iPhone if it gets NFC | Electronista

Google’s Schmidt Predicts Contactless Terminal Rollout | NFC Times New – Near Field Communication and all contactless technology.

Google’s executive chairman Eric Schmidt reportedly predicts that one third of U.S. point-of-sale terminals would accept contactless payment within a year, a penetration rate that he said would be “sufficient” for widespread adoption of NFC-based mobile commerce.

But upgrading a third of the terminals in the United States within a year would be a tall order, given that, at present, only about 2% of the roughly 7 million card-accepting merchant locations in the United States have been equipped with contactless POS terminals since the U.S. contactless-payment rollout began seven years ago. And many merchant locations have multiple POS terminals.

And all of that assumes a clear value proposition for consumers, retailers and other participants in the ecosystem. Many believe it is unlikely all that will come together so quickly.

Google’s Schmidt Predicts Contactless Terminal Rollout

Tablets Emerge as Movie, Full-Length TV Platforms

Tablets are said to be “content consumption” devices, and a new study by The study, conducted by Frank N. Magid Associates., which surveyed 2,482 people, between the ages of 8 to 64, backs up that contention. 

The study found that tablets are preferred to PCs for virtually every form of content consumption.


The study also found that long-form video is preferred over short clips, on tablets. 

That should ultimately have important implications for providers of online video services, as it establishes the suitability of the tablet for long-form video of the sort sold by multichannel video providers and Netflix.


Fully 55 percent of respondents watched full-length movies on their tablets and 56 percent watched full-length TV shows.

Some 87 percent of U.S. tablet users alao are accessing content and information on their devices, the dominant activity for tablets, says the new study sponsored by the Online Publishers Association (OPA). You might also say tablets are “app consumption” devices.


A copy of the study’s findings is available at www.online-publishers.org.

35% of Deals Customers are "New Business"

It's a reasonable question whether consumers using daily deals and social shopping services represent new business, or simply attract regular customers while cutting profit margins.

A new study by ForeSee Results suggests that 35 percent of daily deals shoppers are actually new business for the retailers using the deal programs.

According to ForeSee, 38 percent of the people purchasing daily deals were already frequent customers of the merchant in question, 31 percent are brand new business, and four percent were former customers, which translates to 35 percent new business.

Furthermore, since the remaining 27 percent are described as "infrequent customers," you could even argue that, in total, 62 percent of daily deal buyers are the people merchants are most keen to reach.

New Data For The Daily Deal Value Debate: “1/3 Of Buyers Are Brand New Business”

First ITU, Now Legislators Want to Muddy "4G"

Nobody ever said the mobile business was immune in any way from politics, politicians, regulators, unrealistic and even stupid standards bodies or even, to be fair, silly or unwise carrier executives. First the International Telecommunications Union makes a complete muddle of 4G standards, first defining the standard in unrealistic terms, then retreating so far it blurred the difference between 3G and 4G.

Now Rep. Anna Eshoo, D-Palo Alto, plans to introduce the "Next Generation Wireless Disclosure Act," which would require wireless carriers to inform consumers of minimum data speeds, network reliability and coverage, and the technology used to provide 4G service. In principle, that might be fine. In practice, it will always be hard to define coverage in the mobile realm, not just area by area, but building by building and room by room, season by season and by weather conditions, time of day, device and sometimes even operating system and application.

"Consumers deserve to know exactly what they're getting for their money when they sign up for a 4G data plan," Eshoo said in a statement. "My legislation is simple - it will establish guidelines for understanding what 4G speed really is, and ensure that consumers have all the information they need to make an informed decision."

The problem is that it is literally impossible to know all of those things. It's like having a quality of service agreement that either must be set so low as to be meaningless, or based on "generally available" standards that sometimes will fall out of tolerance.

'4G' wireless data must be spelled out under bill

Fed Plans June 29 Meeting on Debit Card Swipe Fees

The Federal Reserve has scheduled a meeting for June 29, 2011 to discuss plans regarding new debit card interchange fee regulation. The "Durbin Amendment" to the Dodd-Frank financial overhaul bill would limit debit card fees to 12 cents per transaction.

The fee plans are important for mobile payments providers to the extent that the new rules will significantly decrease the amount of payment fees a transaction provider can expect to earn, whether conducted using bank cards or some new mobile payment mechanism.

The Fed, at the June 29 meeting, is expected to issue final rules regarding debit card swipe fees, also known as interchange fees, that banks charge retailers every time a consumer swipes a card at the register to make a purchase.

The Fed missed the initial April deadline for finishing debit swipe fee guidelines as mandated by the Dodd-Frank financial overhaul bill. The U.S. Senate also declined to modify the Durbin Amendment earlier in June. See http://blogs.forbes.com/halahtouryalai/2011/06/08/bank-lobbyists-fail-to-delay-durbin-amendment/.

The Fed has proposed two alternatives to debit interchange fee regulation. Both would set a maximum of 12 cents per transaction for debit cards with no apparent distinction between signature and PIN. Under one proposal, there would be a safe harbor of 7 cents, and issuers could make a case for up to 12 cents based on their actual average variable cost of authorization, clearing and settlement. Under the other proposal, issuers would have a cap of 12 cents per transaction.

Fed Plans June 29 Meeting on Debit Swipe Fees; Likely to Announce Final Rules

AppleInsider | 76% of iPhone owners plan to use Apple's iCloud, 30% interested in iTunes Match

Mike Abramsky, analyst with RBC Capital Markets, revealed on Monday the results of a new survey of 1,500 respondents conducted between June 7 and 14. The poll found that 76 percent of iPhone users said they are 'very' or 'somewhat' likely to use Apple's iCloud service, which would amount to 150 million users.

If Apple were to have 150 million iCloud users, it would be competing with services like Google's Gmail, at 200 million users, Yahoo, with 300 million registered users, and Twitter, also at 300 million.

AppleInsider | 76% of iPhone owners plan to use Apple's iCloud, 30% interested in iTunes Match

Somebody Wants to Buy Hulu

Hulu is in play, potentially, after the Hulu board received a bid from an unknown company to purchase the company.

Comcast Chief Executive Brian Roberts said the “jury is out” about whether Netflix (or other services including Hulu) will compel people to cut their cable service.

The danger might be rather small now, but will grow. I use my daughter and her fiancee as sounding boards from time to time. He works for Amazon and is leaving for Google. She owns a fashion company and has worked as a hedge fund attorney in Manhattan, for the biggest corporate law firm in the United States. Though some Millennials might skip multichannel TV services to save money, that is not the case here.

The bad news for video providers is that they have no need for cable, watch what Netflix streams, and that's it. Broadband is safe; wireless is safe. But to my knowledge neither have ever bought landline voice service or multichannel TV. They aren't cord cutters; they are "never nevers" (never bought either service, and never intend to).

So at least one more company out there thinks Hulu is worth owning, perhaps in part to provide services to customers who never have bought cable TV, and don't see a reason to do so.

Comcast CEO: "Jury is Out" on Netflix's Impact (subscription required)

Were it Not for Legacy, Enterprises Would Get Rid of Phones, Use Skype

After surveying 277 enterprises, consultant Tom Nolle says legacy infrastructure has a profound effect on how enterprise technology managers think about what is possible with their voice infrastructure, and the results indicate what might be possible for competitors, or threats to established business communications suppliers.

The survey shows a preference for a "no phones" approach and software that acts like Skype, but with more features and security.

Asked what they would do with voice technology if you could start over, over 70 percent of businesses in the survey said that their unified communications investment plan was constrained based on their investment in legacy voice equipment, their "black phones" in particular.

If somehow all that gear was whisked away, they believed they'd very likely scrap phones completely and move to a PC-based form of communication based on headsets.

The other 30 percent said that they needed to have their mobile workers tied into their UC, and because they couldn’t get mobile VoIP they would "wait" until mobile technology caught up. The service model they like best? It's Skype, but the way Skype works now isn't how they'd want their future UC platform to work, says Nolle.

In terms of truly incremental features, businesses wanted the UC features that are today available from third-party firms using Skype extensions built in and made part of the standard package. That included the ability to send files via IM as attachments, to support conference calling in both voice and video (one-to-many and pass-the-baton mediation should control who is seen). Whiteboard capability wasn't as interesting as desktop sharing. Call logging was viewed as important, particularly logging of video calls, and IM logging was needed both as a general compliance tool and to trace file exchanges for security purposes.

The survey results should prove worrisome for some in the UC space, positive for others. Though I'm not so sure Nolle would draw the same conclusions, it does appear that many enterprises would just as soon be done with desk phones and phone systems, and use feature-enhanced software like Skype.

Who's Driving the UC Bus?

So Far, it Appears Nothing is Better than an iPad

Every competitor's fear in the PC devices space is that Apple will own the tablet market like it owns the iPod market.

Most people might argue that no Apple competitor has started selling anything that clearly answers a fundamental question: “Why should somebody buy this instead of an iPad?”

Sales figures for tablets show that when consumers compare the iPad to other choices, an overwhelming percentage conclude that the iPad is the best option. You can probably point to a number of differences between iPads and specific other tablets, but many would argue that nothing so far is distinctive enough to drive a breakthrough.

“Why Should Somebody Buy This Instead of an iPad?”