Amazon: It's Tough Being "Number One"

The appearance of arrogance is a constant danger for any firm that leads its business category.

New Cox Wireless Campaign Targets "Unfair" Mobile Practices

Cox Wireless is launching its branded wireless service in Hampton Roads, Va., Omaha, Neb.., and Orange County, Calif. with an unusual pricing plan and a clear attack on a perceived weakness on the part of the dominant service providers.

"Our research found that value and transparency are very important to consumers when choosing a wireless service plan, but they are not finding these qualities in the wireless plans offered today," said Cox Wirless VP Stephen Bye.. "Total loss of unused minutes as well as unforeseen overage charges on bills are just two examples of what our customers have told us is just unfair."

To address those issues, Cox Wireless has created the "MoneyBack Minutes" program, where customers receive a five-cent credit for unused minutes, up to $20 a  month. 

86% of Firefox Revenue Might be at Risk

Financial analysts get squeamish when too much of any company's revenue comes from a single, dominant customer. If so, Mozilla should make virtually all analysts blanch. Fully 86 percent of Mozilla's revenue in 2009 came from a single customer, Google.

There are a couple of dangers here any analyst would note. First, Google now has launched Chrome, its own browser. To be sure, Chrome has perhaps nine percent share of the browser market while Firefox, Mozilla's offering, has about 23 percent. That likely means Google still will want to pay Mozilla for access to premiere placement in the search pane.

So would Google renew its contract with Mozilla after November 2011? That depends on how many search queries, and how much revenue, Google gets from the deal today. If the money outweighs Google's long-term strategic plans for Chrome, then Firefox is safe.

But as Chrome encroaches on Firefox's market share, there will come a tipping point where the search deal no longer makes sense for Google.

Is November 2011 Armageddon For Firefox?

Is an iPad More Like a PC or an iPod?

Lots of people will argue about what a "tablet" device actually is. Some might argue an iPad, for example, is an iPod "Touch" with a much-bigger screen. Others will argue it is more like a PC without a keyboard and mouse. To make the argument even more complex, there now are different form factors for tablets. There's the iPad with a 10-inch screen and the Samsung Galaxy with a seven-inch display.

Size matters in mobile devices, and smaller is usually better. The iPad is 50 percent heavier than the Tab, about a half a pound more, and that makes a big difference if you're holding it for long periods, some would argue.

The form factor might ultimately lead to differentiation in the tablet space. Most tablet users will wind up using them as an e-book reader and video player. So the issue is how much value a user places on larger screen size versus portability. It isn't so clear yet how much content creation actually will be done on such devices. They are built for consumption (reading, watching, hearing) more than creation of such media.

For some of us, that really does make the iPad an iPod "Touch" with a bigger screen, Apple's protests notwithstanding. To that extent, the question is whether an iPod Touch style device with a seven-inch screen, or a 10-inch screen, is useful. Don't get me wrong, one would have to conclude that the tablet really is a brand-new product category, not simply a new form factor for a notebook PC.

But like many other devices that are "multi-function" appliances, there are trade-offs. Smartphones have to work well as phones, even though they also are mobile Web devices. PCs have to work well for content creation and work, even though they can be used to read e-books, listen to music and watch videos. E-book readers have to support the reading experience. A tablet arguably has to work well as a mobile Web appliance.

But that's where the product category issues lie. Smartphones and Internet-connected PCs, notebooks and netbooks also support the mobile Web. The tablet lies between the smartphone and the notebook. Tablets support content consumption "better" than a smartphone, but do not support "content creation" as well as a notebook.

But that still leaves lots of room for positioning devices. You might say an e-book reader now is a tablet optimized for reading, an iPod is pocket-sized device for listening to music, while other multi-function devices are optimized for watching video or navigating the touchscreen Web. In some ways, you might argue the tablet has separated the "work" and "content creation" roles of the PC from the web browsing role.

Let the tablet wars begin

FCC Looks to "Lame Duck" Net Neutrality Push

Federal Communications Commission Chairman Julius Genachowski is planning to take action on a network neutrality rule-making in December, during the congressional lame duck session, Politico reports.

Some 282 lawmakers, both Democrats and Republicans, already have gone on record opposing such a rule-making, and U.S. courts have in the past reined in on any FCC exerting power when there isn’t any explicit congressional authority, and despite the fact the courts recently have ruled specifically on the issue of whether the FCC has authority to impose such regulations, and decided against the FCC.

An attempt earlier this year by Congressman Rick Boucher (D-Va) to get congressional backing for a new law that would provide such direction to the FCC, and which might have been characterized by many observers as quite a decent compromise, failed to get any traction, and odds will be even worse in the new congress.

The FCC is said to be readying regulations that go further than the Boucher proposal did, basically including both wireless and wired networks in a "no packet shaping" regime. That ensures determined opposition by mobile providers. Verizon earlier had indicated it could live with "no packet shaping" rules for wired networks so long as wireless networks could be managed more intensively.

A reasonable person might wonder why the FCC would persist with a rule-making it recently has been told by the courts it doesn't have the authority to undertake.

Genachowski pushing ahead with Net Neutrality during lame duck

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/1110/45371.html

Are We in a Bubble, Again?

Venture capitalists John Doerr (Kleiner Perkins) and Fred Wilson (Union Square Ventures) talk about the state of both investing and the state of the web ecosystem at large.

While Wilson worries that we may be in the midst of the next “bubble”, Doerr thinks of it as a “boom”.

Wilson Vs. Doerr. Bubble Vs. Boom. East Vs. West. Android Vs. iPhone. Facebook Vs. The Web

Broadband Gets Better, Globally

Broadband Quality Score III

View more presentations from Cisco Systems.

 Global broadband "quality" has improved by 50 percent in just three years and penetration of broadband continues to improve, with about half of the households (49 percent) of the countries investigated now having access to broadband (up from 40 percent in 2008), a study by a team of MBA students from the Saïd Business School at the University of Oxford and the University of Oviedo's Department of Applied Economics, has found.

Using data from 40 million real-life broadband quality tests conducted in May to June of 2010 on the Internet speed testing site speedtest.net, the researchers were able to evaluate the broadband quality of 72 countries around the globe.

Twitter on Making Money

Twitter exec talks about how the firm will make money.

Google's "20 Things I Learned About Browsers and the Web: E-Book

I'm not a fan of e-books, but here's Google's "20 Things I Learned About Browsers and the Web," a tutorial about those subjects.

http://www.20thingsilearned.com/home

What Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg is Thinking These Days

Tablet PC shipments to reach 100 million units in 2013

Smartphones, tablet PCs and notebooks will all become mainstream terminal devices in the mobile Internet market in the future with smartphone shipments having a chance to reach 800 million units in 2013, up more than double from 2010, with tablet PCs at 100 million units and notebooks 300 million units, says Digitimes Research senior analyst Joanne Chien.

As smartphone shipments will reach 440 million units in 2011 and continue to see surging growth over the next few years, Chien believes tablet PCs will benefit from the opportunity as consumers will want to enhance their experience from smartphones and decide to choose a tablet PC.

However, since tablet PCs are unlikely to become as popular as smartphones, if tablet PC and smartphone shipments are combined, tablet PCs will only account for 10 percent to 12 percent of the shipments from 2011-2013.

Tablet PC shipments to reach 100 million units in 2013, says Digitimes Research

Apple's iAd Has Signed On "Over Half Of The Top 25" U.S. Advertisers

Apple boasts today that its iAd mobile advertising program, which launched this past summer, has already signed on 'over half of the top 25 leading US national advertisers in just four months. One might say these mostly are trials, which to an extent, they are.

One can argue the campaigns are driven, in part, by the "how it looks" angle. The advertisers want to be seen as forward-thinking, smart, and cutting-edge. None of those are bad reasons for using the iAd network at this point.

The publicity and "we're leaders" aura is a big reason that a lot of these big deals happen in the first place, even if they do drive some sales, too. But driving sales probably isn't the main reason many of these brands have signed up with iAd.

Apple's iAd Has Signed On "Over Half Of The Top 25" U.S. Advertisers

Mobile Broadband Requires Fixed-Line "Over the Top" Services

It is hard to argue with the proposition that the number of U.S. mobile broadband subscriptions is going to eclipse the number of "household" broadband connections, for the simple reason that there are more people than households and that perhaps 75 percent of all mobile devices will be using mobile broadband, relatively soon.

Infonetics Research directing analyst Diane Myers think that will happen in about three years, in 2013. That has implications for nationwide and large regional providers of mobile services and larger fixed-line service providers. Perhaps the most-significant implication is that although most service providers have competed "in territory," the availability of a large mobile broadband user base also means that applications and services can be delivered "out of territory."

"TV everywhere" is one example, and possibly the best current example. One might point to Comcast becoming a mobile video supplier. But one might also say Comcast for the first time will leverage its in-territory video services "over the top," on a potentially nationwide basis. Application providers, of course, long have taken this route, creating apps and services that are consumed "over the top" on any broadband connection.

The big issue is how important a similar approach might be for other services traditionally thought of as "fixed line" services provided "in territory." Voice, texting and messaging services are other examples of "over the top" services provided without regard to territorial restraints.

There are several obvious additional observations one might make. Going "out of territory" is something most smaller service providers already do by "edging out" from an existing service territory into an adjacent market where business customers can be served, using a combination of new facilities and wholesale access.

Smaller providers might continue to find that a viable way to go "out of territory," as the complexity and cost of supporting a full "over the top" applications offering is more than a small company can support or envision. But those limitations also illustrate the changing nature of competition in the consumer services market. Fixed-line providers increasingly will face mobile-based broadband competition from much-larger competitors across a broad range of products, including, but not limited to, voice, entertainment video, broadband access and applications.

"If telecom operators aren't able to provide competitive mobile services, they will be at a significant disadvantage," says Myers. One might argue there are limited responses a small provider can take, beyond doing its level best to maintain high levels of customer service and satisfaction.

"Now that residential voice and Internet services are no longer tied to a physical household, operators can, and should, customize services for individual members of a household and compete on a nationwide basis versus a specific fixed territory,” says Myers. For most, that will require scale and investment few smaller companies can afford to make.

The largest national mobile providers, the largest telcos and cable companies, on the other hand, do have the scale and heft necessary to undertake operations of that sort. The top national mobile providers are, by definition, already operating over a national territory, considering their own networks and extensive roaming agreements.

The biggest telcos and cable providers already have programming relationships and customer volume that will give them a head start in the over-the-top video services business, while a few "over the top" providers, including Netflix and Apple, likewise have the advantages of huge installed base to work with.

That is not to say that in-region assets are unimportant. In many cases, it is the value of those assets that provide the springboard to out of region efforts. One might argue that metro Wi-Fi networks are an amenity cable and telco providers use to glue customers to fixed-network broadband services, for example.

At least for the moment, that's the same business value "TV Everywhere" provides: it provides enhanced value that glues customers to Comcast's at-home video services.

In fact, though it is correct in one sense to talk about "mobile" extensions to "fixed" services, it also is correct to characterize such efforts as "out of domain" efforts as well. Services might be sold to an enterprise location, which is the primary revenue venue, but then be revenue enhanced, directly or indirectly, by extending service outside of the domain to mobile devices and remotely-connected computing devices.

MMS to Generate $31.5 Billion in Revenue in 2010

Multimedia message service (MMS), often cited as a failure, is said to have generated $27 billion in global revenues in 2009. Portio Research researchers say that is equivalent to what SMS was generating about five years ago.

Most of that revenue is generated by people sending pictures and videos from their mobile phones, it appears.

Syniverse Technologies, for example, posted 128 percent organic growth in MMS traffic year over year, in the third quarter of 2010.

In terms of total peer-to-peer (P2P) messages, which include MMS and short message service (SMS), Syniverse moved an average of 1.6 billion messages per day during third quarter 2010, with overall P2P volumes up 35 percent versus third quarter 2009. That average is the equivalent of 1.1 million messages every minute or 18,519 per second across mobile service providers worldwide. The company has processed more than one trillion P2P messages since 2007.

MMS is projected to generate $31.5 billion in revenue by the end of 2010, making MMS the second most successful messaging service, behind SMS, in revenue terms until end-2014.

In 2009, worldwide MMS revenue saw a year-on-year increase of over 22 percent; worldwide MMS traffic in 2009 achieved year-over-year growth of 48 percent.

Portio Research

Android: "The Phone for the Rest of Us"

Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak says Android smartphones, not the iPhone, would become dominant, noting that the Google OS is likely to win the race similarly to the way that Windows ultimately dominated the PC world.

In part, that will be intentional on Apple's part, as Apple never has shown too much interest in making and selling "the most affordable" devices. Also, Android devices will be sold by any number of firms that do make a business selling "devices for the rest of us."

Eventually, he thinks that Android quality, consistency, and user satisfaction will match Apple iOS devices.

Steve Wozniak: Android will be the dominant smartphone platform

Mobile Editing of Google Docs

Mobile Advertising Now Getting its Own Budgets

Mobile applications budgets in 2010 moved away from cannibalizing online budgets, accordinhg to Millennial Media. (click on image for larger view)

Budgets designated specifically for app development grew year-over-year, now comprising nearly 25 percent of the overall budget for online projects. At the same time, mobile apps have become a more-important part of the ad impressions and revenue on the Millennial Media ad network as well.

"This year we’ve continued to see applications grow in importance and now represent approximately half of the overall monthly impressions and revenue on our network," says Michael Avon, Millennial Media EVP & Chief Financial Officer.

The number of mobile applications developed by advertisers and marketers in 2010 increased significantly. For example, just four respondents reported they were developing 20 to 50 apps a year, when Millennial Media took its 2009 survey. In the 2010 survey 83 brands reported developing tht many apps.But most respondents reported creating one to five mobile apps over a year's time.

read more here

$6.4 Billion in Q3 2010 Sets New Record for Internet Advertising

U.S. Internet advertising revenues hit $6.4 billion in the third quarter of 2010, representing the highest quarterly result ever for the online advertising industry and a 17% increase from the same period in 2009. The third quarter 2010 revenue estimates were announced today by the Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) and PwC US.

$6.4 Billion in Q3 2010 Sets New Record for Internet Advertising Revenues

Mobile Now Meditates the Majority of Digital Experiences

T"he majority of the world's digital experiences now happen through mobile devices linked by wireless networks," says MEX founder Marek Pawlowski.

It is this untethered medium that is defining future trends in user behavior, sweeping away the legacy of interaction methods established for fixed computing scenarios, he argues. In other words, "touch" is emerging as the preferred interface for content consumption, though mice and keyboards still are required for content creation. But since most people primarily consume content, rather than create it, the change suggests a reason why tablet devices have proven they have a new niche in the computing devices market.

Mobile User Experience Trends on the Horizon | UX Magazine

Networks are Difficult, Business Models Stressed, Net Neutrality Makes it Worse

Comcast’s David L. Cohen noted at his Brookings Institution Center for Technology Innovation speech that "the courts … the FCC … and the Congress [are] all valuable institutions filled with capable, conscientious people … but few of them [have] the background to work out consensus on what are essentially complicated technical issues.”

Cohen noted broadband policy is dominated by lawyers and lobbyists, not engineers who know how things really work: “No offense to anyone here,” he said. “I’m a lawyer and have done my share of politics. But that kind of experience doesn’t make me, or anybody else like me, an authority on the Internet."

That is not a call for decision making by technocrats or engineers; simply an acknowledgement that network management is unavoidable when running a network that must take a statistical approach to usage. And all public networks are oversubscribed, intentionally.

That always means there is potential for some actual blocking of access or degradation of service, because no company can afford to build a large network that is engineered to support every conceivable level of demand.

Net Neutrality Is a Bad Marriage of Government, Internet - by Bruce Edward Walker