Context a Key Feature of Mobile App Use

The smart phone is an unusual consumer device in that it is unusually well suited for development and use of all sorts of location-aware applications, allowing features and content to be customized for the actual user context.

Twitter Boosts D.C. Policy Representation

Twitter is taking a highly profile in the Washington, D.C. lobbying scene by hiring of telecom policy veteran Colin Crowell, on top of earlier moves to bulk up its regulatory and legislative staff inside the Beltway. Twitter expands its D.C. presence 


In doing so, Twitter joins other technology firms that in recent years have discovered the importance of regulatory and legislative influence, something telecom and cable firms always have understood.

But the importance of policy is new for the technology industry, a matter of basic importance for telecom and cable companies. Look at Google's various entanglements. Google has faced  a broad U.S. antitrust probe of the company's practices.


Last week, federal prosecutors who had investigated Google's practice of allowing ads from illegal online pharmacies on its Web search engine between 2003 and 2009 singled out Mr. Page. They said he had personal knowledge of the alleged crime and failed to prevent it. The federal prosecutors made their comments after Google paid $500 million last week to avoid criminal charges.


In April 2011, the government approved Google's purchase of ITA Software. In past years, Google has advocated for changes in spectrum policy as well. 

Google faces numerous policy challenges

Will U.S. Telecom Service Revenue Double in Five Years?

Is it possible that U.S. service provider revenue could double in just the next five years? Insight Research Corp. thinks so. The firm reports that predicts that, between 2011 and 2016,, North American carrier revenue will rise from $287 billion to $662 billion, representing 11 percent compound annual revenue growth.

That rapid growth, on a compound basis, would lead to a doubling of industry revenue in five years. That doesn't mean providers in every segment will benefit equally. But a forecast that large would have to assume that most of the growth would have to occur at the largest firms, which represent 80 percent of total industry revenue.

The smaller providers cannot reasonably contribute enough aggregate revenue to tip the needle at such a large scale, even with even-higher rates of growth than 11 percent, compounded. 

Global carrier revenue is expected to achieve a nine percent compound annual growth rate from 2011 to 2016, growing to a total of $5.13 trillion, according to Insight Research Corp. 

The forecast explicitly assumes that North American service providers successfully will grow new revenues at a rate fast enough to compensate for weakening voice revenues, for example. Insight Research findings here 

 In terms of segment revenue, the latest forecast projects a 45 percent CAGR for global wireless broadband revenue, 14 percent for fixed-line broadband, about six percent growth for narrowband wireless services and negative three percent revenue change for fixed network narrowband services. 

One way to look at the structure of the global market is to note that, by 2016, wireless broadband will account for about 28 percent of all communications service revenue. 

Narrowband wireless services will account for 38 percent of global revenue. Altogether, wireless will represent 66 percent of total industry revenue. 

Fixed-line broadband will account for 11 percent of global revenue, while fixed-line narrowband services will represent 23 percent of total revenue. In aggregate, fixed line revenue will account for 34 percent of total service provider revenue, on a global basis.

Google+, Facebook "Searchers" are "Different"

Google+ is moving from early adopter to mainstream use, but the demographics of Google+ searchers still suggest its "early" stage of adoption.

When comparing the demographics of Facebook searchers, and Google+ searchers, the most striking differences between Google searchers and Facebook searchers are in age and income.

Google searchers overwhelmingly skew towards 18 to 34 year olds. Since Facebook is a much more mature brand in the social networking space, their search audience falls closely in line with the search population at large.

The income skews are even more distinct, essentially polar opposites of each other. More than 32 percent of Google searchers have a household income of $100,000 or greater, compared to 23 percent of Facebook searchers. Google is definitely off to a fast start in reaching the most desirable income segments, which may make it more attractive to advertisers and content marketers.

Searcher Demographics

Time Warner Cable Offers Slingbox to Wideband Customers

Time Warner Cable plans to allow its customers subsidized prices on purchases of the Slingbox, which will allow Time Warner Cable users to watch their paid-for video on any broadband connection at a remote location. The Slingbox is priced at $300 but will be available to the subscribers of Time Warner Cable who buy the $99 a month "Wideband" service plan essentially for free, as Time Warner will offer a $300 rebate to customers who buy the Slingbox units. Time Warner Cable Offers Slingbox

The move is part of the growing conflict between content owners and video distributors about what rights are conferred to cable operators as distributors. Time Warner says its current contracts allow it to provide streaming access. Content providers want to be paid extra for such capabilities. The Slingbox capability is one way of giving subscribers remote access on Internet-connected devices while side-stepping such contractual disputes.

Ecosystems Are In, Vertical Integration Out

The content and communications businesses these days are fundamentally different from those same businesses of 30 years ago in one fundamental way. Unlike the situation several decades ago, when value almost completely could be controlled by vertically-integrated providers, value now is derived from loosely coupled ecosystems.

In other words, where a telco in the past could control and vertically integrate every part of the “voice delivery” business, these days network-delivered applications with high value can be delivered to end users (both business and consumer) without any formal business relationship with an access provider.

Much the same is becoming true for just about every other type of content or application you can think of, the phrase “over the top” nicely capturing the dynamics.

These days, telcos, cable companies and media firms alike operate in markets where value is supplied by many different partners. “Telecom ecosystems were easier to define in the days of monopolies and nationalized postal, telegraph and telephone organizations (PTTs),” says Jörgen Lantto, who works with systems management within multimedia at Ericsson. “Nowadays, they include everything from developers and devices to Google and billing systems.” Partners are key.

Razorsight | Corporate Blog:

Cablevision Expands Optimum Business to Include Mobile Service

"In a recent survey of more than 500 small businesses in our area we found that they are often overwhelmed by selecting the right mobile service for their business," said Stephanie Anderson, Vice President of Commercial Marketing for Cablevision. "We have formed a strategic alliance with Sprint to bring our Optimum small business customers a unique package to simplify the process of selecting a wireless service."

The move is an example of the growing importance wireless services play in the small business market.

Cablevision To Include Wireless Service From Sprint

How Google Wants to Change TV

And Google isn't the only company working on this. Apple wants to reshape television as well.

While TV programming is limited by time and the number of TV networks, the Internet provides the possibility of a near-infinite amount of content to choose from.

And, given the on-demand way that viewers are increasingly viewing content — through prerecorded shows on their DVRs, video-on-demand selections through their cable provider or streaming on the Internet — there needs to be a way to sort through those content choices.

For years broadcasters have largely tried to control viewer choices with lead-ins and other editorial hooks, but the vast number of content choices calls for a new way of discovering content. We’ve long argued that personalized recommendations will be vital to the way that viewers discover video in the future.

TV is about choice

Major League Baseball Not Scared of New Media

Somewhat refreshingly, Major League Baseball has embraced newer online forms of media, and actually does not believe that adding new modes cannibalizes television, for example. Starting in 2002, MLB began broadcasting livestreams of games over the Internet.

MLB currently serves up nine million video streams each day, including 1 million live streams. Additionally, they have two million paid subscribers to MLB.tv and their "At Bat" mobile apps (which also stream video).

For many professional sports leagues, complicated television rights or fears that Internet streaming would eat into lucrative TV broadcasts have hampered the availability of Internet streaming. For Major League Baseball, the fears of audience fragmentation have been overblown.

“We’ve learned that wherever you are, you watch on the biggest screen you can,” MLBAM CEO Robert Bowman told The New York Times in 2008. In other words, MLB.tv won’t cut into TV revenue, according to Bowman, because most viewers will opt for TV over their computer or iPhone if the broadcast is available to them.

Baseball Everywhere: How MLB Is Innovating With Digital Media

Isis earmarks $100 Million for Mobile Wallet Venture

Verizon Wireless, AT&T and T- Mobile USA plan to invest $100 million in their Isis mobile wallet venture, Bloomberg reports. The amount of funding depends on how successful Isis is at attracting banks and merchants. $100M for Isis

But transaction-processing networks, while participating in mobile wallet and mobile payment initiatives, also are taking steps to increase the value of traditional credit card and debit card transactions as well, in ways that lower retailer cost of using the traditional mechanisms. If that seems to you like playing both offense and defense, you would be right.

Separately, Visa is encouraging U.S. retailers to shift to retail checkout systems that let consumers pay using their mobile phones. Visa says it will let merchants that switch to credit-card readers supporting EMV technology to forego costly annual security certifications.

EMV is an open standards set of specifications for smart card payments and acceptance devices. The EMV specifications were developed to define a set of requirements to ensure interoperability between chip-based payment cards and terminals. EMV actually could extend the use of card-based payments, as well as play a role in mobile payment capabilities as well.

Starting in 2015, it will also stop requiring banks to reimburse most merchants for some types of credit-card fraud, which can be prevented by using EMV systems, Visa says. Both moves will save retailers money on their transaction support operations. Visa ncourages retailers to adopt EMV

Dwolla Adds SMS Payments

Dwolla has added a new feature that allows users to send money to people using text messaging on Apple iOS devices. Dwolla also supports the ability to send payments using Facebook, Twitter and email.

In order to send money to someone using their phone number, all a user has to do is log in, click the “Send Money” button and then type the phone number of the person to whom you want to send money in the “Send to” box.

Since Dwolla IDs have the same number of digits as a phone number in the U.S., there might be some concern that you are sending a payment to the wrong person. If Dwolla determines that you have entered a number that is potentially conflicting, it will prompt you to confirm whether you want to send the payment to a phone number or a Dwolla ID.

Dwolla: Send Money To Phone Number Using SMS

Mobile money in Afghanistan

Mobile money, or mobile banking or mobile payments, depending on how one approaches the subject, is convenient in many settings, but can be a basic infrastructure capability in others. That tends to be the case in many parts of the world where banking services are not well developed. Turning a mobile phone into a payment device has obvious appeal for "financial inclusion" advocates, mobile service suppliers, banks and consumers alike.

What made Steve Jobs a giant?

As Tim Wu chronicles it in his book, "The Master Switch," (http://timwu.org/) the telephone, radio and movie industries started out as an open, irrationally exuberant, chaotic muddle of incompatible standards, crummy technology and entrepreneurs.

The pivotal moment in the evolution of each industry came when a charismatic figure arrived to offer consumers better quality, higher production vaues and greater ease of use.

With the telephone it was Theodore Vail of AT&T, offering a unified nationwide network and a guarantee that when you picked up the phone you always got a dial tone. With radio it was David Sarnoff, who founded RCA. With movies it was Adolph Zukor, who created the Hollywood studio system, Jobs is one of those kids of people.

What made Steve Jobs a giant?

66% of Smart Phone Owners have Shopped from Device

With a million smart phones being sold every month in the U.S. market, L.E.K. Consulting predicts that more than half of U.S. consumers will be using mobile devices regularly for shopping within the next five years.

In fact, a recent L.E.K. survey of 1,600 U.S. consumers found that 66 percent of smart phone owners have used their devices to make purchases. That doesn’t necessarily mean they paid using their mobile phone, but that they used information retrieved from the device, though 39 percent do report making purchases every month, not including purchases of music and video downloads every month.

Within the past six months, more than half of active mobile consumers surveyed reported using at least one mobile coupon app, nearly a third checked a pricing comparison tool and 29 percent
used a loyalty or similar tool, often while standing in store aisles.

One implication some will draw from the data is that social shopping, mobile coupons and offers are well suited for broader mobile wallet services, as “providing information in exchange for offers” seems to resonate with many users.

The other noteworthy finding was that consumers are bypassing traditional marketing
campaigns and often are highly influenced by the reviews and other posts from members of their social networks.

Mobile commerce on the rise

Time Warner Cable is Right About Cord Cutting, For Now

Time Warner Cable executives are right to point out that people really do want to watch professionally-produced video. TWC executives also are almost certainly right that abandonment of video subscriptions specifically for the purpose of consuming professional content online is not happening, much.

The real issue is what happens down the road as the subscription video business clearly demonstrates it has passed the peak of its product life cycle. At that point, content producers are going to start looking a lot harder at alternatives. And that's when cord cutting is going to be a bigger problem.

It isn't a big problem today. And there is a reasonable chance it might not be for quite some time, if video subscription services are able to strike the right deals with content owners and allow video subscribers to watch the content they've subscribed for on their other devices, at other locations. The issue is value and price. If users have to pay just a little for that feature, one set of behaviors can be predicted.

If the cost of the "TV everywhere" feature is deemed to be "too much" for the incremental value, consumer resistance is certain. Given the steadily increasing prices for subscription TV, one would have to guess that there already is latent demand for a more flexible, possibly a la carte alternative. There just isn't any obvious way for consumers to vote with their wallets, yet.