Markets Morph as Local, Location, Social Converge

A decade ago, "location" and "local" were two very distinct product verticals for most Internet companies. "Local" developed out of the Yellow Pages market, while location was about maps and navigation. The obvious result was that application development was conducted in two different groups.

Today, there is a growing recognition that local, geo-location and mobile are not distinct product groups and technology stacks, but rather essential components of a unified toolset that better connects people with the world around them.

That's the genesis of the "local, social, mobile" theme, which now sees things people do in the real world, where they are, in a more collaborative way, as keys to developing compelling new applications and revenue streams. Location can be used to build apps that are monetized by shopping, for example. "Local" can be monetized by advertising or promotion activities.

"Social," meaning collaboration, or word of mouth referrals, can be monetized by commerce activities. In other words, the confluence of social, mobile and local creates revenue opportunities primarily focused on people spending money and shopping in the real world, not online commerce or online advertising, which have driven most existing online revenue streams.

Snap to the graph, not the grid - O'Reilly Radar

Harris Interactive Says Google Has Best Reputation

The 2011 Harris Interactive "RQ Study," which measures the reputations of the 60 Most Visible Companies in the United States, shows Google at the top, with Apple rising into the top ranks.

As typically is the case, service providers, including leading telcos and cable companies, did not fair that well, showing the middle to bottom of various metrics ranging from customer service to integrity. For whatever reason, and many will have clear opinions about those reasons, service providers tend never to rank too well in such reputation surveys. In fact, service providers often are lucky simply to avoid appearing in the bottom of the rankings.

Some of us who have followed these things for a couple of decades can only note the pattern. Some industries just seem to be perceived more favorably than others, and it never seems entirely clear how much rests entirely within a firm's control. Airlines likewise rarely are likely to be ranked well.

Technology companies tend as a group to fare better, for example. In general, firms that are perceived to be so reliable that they are virtually invisible tend to score better, as well as firms that provide "delight" or "enrichment." One might infer that, for whatever reason, service providers are not consistently viewed as invisibly reliable, or providing clear life enrichment.

One can only speculate, but perhaps the difference, at some level, is that many consumer packaged goods or technology products are paid for only once. By definition, a service requires a recurring payment. How much that affects thinking is hard to say.

But one way of looking at matters is that a consumer gets reminded every 30 days of the cost of a service. Irritants are more irritating when a new payment has to be made repeatedly.

Google Ranks Highest on Corporate Reputation in 12th Annual Harris Interactive U.S. Reputation Quotient Survey

Android Market Withdraws Tethering Apps

Most free or low-cost tethering apps formerly available at the Android Market now have been removed from the Android Market, meaning that AT&T, Verizon and T-Mobile Android smart phones will not be able to use them.

Easy Tether, Internet Sharer, Klink, PDAnet and Tether for Android are among the apps observers say no longer are available. Users can still install free tethering apps on rooted phones, or from another source other than the official Android Market.

The consumer interest in such apps is obvious: it allows them to use the smart phone data plan to connect other devices. Service providers of course sell service plans to connect PCs and other devices.

The perceived fairness of access plans has much to do with expectations. Even "capped" fixed-line plans offer 150 Gbps to 250 Gbps worth of monthly consumption, at a time when most users probably use several Gbps a month, across all PCs, tablets and other devices used inside a home. Wireless plans are sold differently, on a per-device basis, with varying caps and price plans that tend to top out at 5 Gbps a month for any single device.

Sprint is the exception, offering unlimited 4G usage plus 5 Gbps of 3G usage each month for HTC Evo and similar devices. Users seem to accept as fair an allotment of 150 Gbps to 250 Gbps at a fixed location, supporting multiple devices, for possibly $60 a month. Wireless plans often cost $60 for a 5-Gbps plan for a single smartphone.

That's a big difference, and so the interest in tethering is not surprising. Mobile executives often point out that the cost of delivering bandwidth over a mobile network is more costly than on a fixed network, and there is almost-complete agreement with that general principle.

How plans might change in the future is not clear, but it is clear that mobile users already have learned to use Wi-Fi connections for tablets and smart phones, instead of their mobile usage buckets, when Wi-Fi is available. Also, the typical mobile user simply does not consume as much data as when using a PC. These days, it remains an unusual smart phone user that actually consumes more than hundreds of megabytes a month from a smart phone. Tablets represent a mixed case.

And, of course, everyone expects usage to climb, over time. "Fairness" is a moving target.

Android Tethering Free Ride is Over | PCWorld

Browser Shares Stable

After a month of availability of Internet Explorer 9 and Firefox 4, it appears that the browser market remains stable.

Internet Explorer is down slightly, dropping 0.81 points to 55.11 percent. Firefox experienced a small drop of 0.17 points, to 21.63 percent. Chrome was up 0.37 points to 11.94 percent, and Safari was up 0.54 points to 7.15 percent.

The implication is that people adopting the latest versions are upgraders, and that little major change has occurred.

Apple Has 50% of Smartphone Market Profits

According to an analysis by Canaccord Genuity’s T. Michael Walkley, Apple now captures 50 percent of first quarter 2011 smart phone operating profits among the top 8 OEMs, despite having only 4.9 percent of global handset unit market share.

Apple Has 50% of Smartphone Market Profit Share

Wireless Carriers Say Their Use of Location Data is Opt-In

The four largest U.S. wireless carriers say they obtain customer permission before using a subscriber's physical location to provide driving directions, family-finder applications and other location-based services, and before sharing a subscriber's location with any outside mobile apps that provide such services.

But the wireless companies also say they have no power to require device makers like Apple or independent developers of location-based apps to get similar user consent if these apps don't rely on the carriers themselves to track a user's whereabouts.

Wireless Carriers Get Consent To Use Location Data

Is Telstra Getting Out of Fixed Line Consumer Voice?

In what might strike you as an odd statement, Telstra executives say that VoIP is not sufficiently reliable to sell to consumers.

While launching a new IP telephony services aimed at small business customers, Telstra CEO David Thodey said the company was only continuing to review consumer VoIP services.

“As we think the product is mature enough, and has enough technical backup, we’ll bring that product to market,”Thodey said. However, Thodey didn’t appear to believe a Telstra VoIP offering would appear soon, according to Australian content provider Delimiter.

“We don’t think the quality and reliability is there," Thodey said. "We could bring it to the market tomorrow, but we don’t want to."

That explanation might strike some as quite odd, given the success carriers are having with consumer VoIP.

In fact, some of us might speculate that something else is afoot, namely an unwillingness to invest in consumer VoIP because Telstra might not want to sell consumer VoIP when it starts to buy wholesale access services from the National Broadband Network.

When that happens, Telstra, like other retail service providers, will have a choice of customers to serve. Given Telstra's belief in 4G Long Term Evolution, Telstra might be planning to rely on wireless for consumer voice, staying out of the consumer fixed-line voice service.

That might strike you as odd, but keep in mind that Telstra also operates separate cable TV facilities, running on separate networks. While you might think Telstra is giving up a "triple play" opportunity, it isn't. Telstra can deliver broadband access using the NBN, video entertainment on its existing cable TV networks and voice and mobile broadband on its planned 4G network.

In principle, Telstar could deliver voice using its cable networks as well, but Telstra might simply have concluded that mobile is the best way to sell voice to consumers.

http://links.eqentia.com/520b2ad1536d771f/?dst=http://delimiter.com.au/2011/05/02/consumer-voip-not-reliable-says-telstra/&utm_campaign=visibli&utm_source=cisco&utm_medium=twitter

RIM Goes Multi-Platform, Losing Smartphone Battle?

In a move almost certain to be interpreted as a sign enterprises are migrating to iOS and Android devices and away from their past heavy reliance on BlackBerry devices, Research In Motion announced plans for a multi-platform BlackBerry Enterprise Solution for managing and securing mobile devices for enterprises and government organizations.

The solution is expected to incorporate secure device management for Android and iOS based devices and tablets, all managed from a single web-based console, RIM says.

Some might try to spin the announcement as an extension of BES features to other key enteprise operating systems, and that it is. But others will say the move suggests RIM already can see that enterprises and larger organizations are moving away from BlackBerry and towards Apple and Android devices.

In fact, some might already be ready to predict the possibility that RIM might someday be a provider of server solutions, not handsets.

RIM's business has traditionally been driven by IT departments at enterprises, as BES gave companies an easy way to do things like activate devices, manage passwords, push out software updates, and wipe lost or stolen devices clean.

That might be the future of the business, not handsets.

read more here

AT&T to Take On Groupon

AT&T will itself get into the social shopping business by launching its own service within the next several weeks in Los Angeles, Atlanta and Dallas-Fort Worth.

The service, apparently to be housed within AT&T's yellowpages.com subsidiary, confirms the potential of social shopping as a new part of the local advertising business, historically where directories have part a part of the business as well.

The U.S. social shopping or group shoppingmarket, offering discounts at local businesses, will grow to $3.93 billion in 2015, from $1.25 billion this year, according to BIA/Kelsey.

Some might not believe the business will last, and in that case AT&T is just chasing a mirage. But there is good reason many now are optimistic about what might be possible as mobile devices, location awareness and local advertising and promotion meet to create what some believe is a genuinely-new business capable of diverting spending from other existing channels at the very least.

AT&T to Take On Groupon With $10 Promotion for Daily Deal Site - Bloomberg

Facebook Dominates Display Advertising

It wasn't so long ago that observers speculated about whether Facebook could keep growing, much less find a viable, self-sustaining business model. Looking at Facebook's share of online display ads, the concern about business or revenue model is not relevant any longer.

The only question might be the scale of Facebook's ad operations. These days, it is Twitter that occasionally still faces questions about its own revenue model.

http://goo.gl/utliu

PdaNet 3.0 Hides Android Tethering

The game of cat-and-mouse between developers and others in the ecosystem never ends. The developer of PdaNet, an app for tethering mobile phones to computers, has released an updated Android app that PdaNet says will hide tethering use from a user's wireless carrier. Data usage will look like regular smartphone data usage and won’t be distinguishable from data being transferred through your phone to your computer.

Carriers will respond, no doubt.

PdaNet is available as a free download from the Android Market. Users also will need to install a desktop app on a Windows or Mac computer, presumably the device using the tethered connection. A full license for the software currently runs $15.95.

PdaNet 3.0 lets you hide Android tethering from your wireless carrier

Twitter Amplifies Other Media, Is Media

Some argue that Twitter is not in and of itself a "news source," though some will argue it sometimes is just that.

Some will point out, rightly, that Twitter is a channel for a source, or a channel for pointing to a source. But there might be cases, many cases, perhaps, where Twitter "acts" in its own right as a media channel, even when it amplifies other media.

One might argue about whether Drudge Report or Huffington Post, among many other outlets, is "media," or simply "points to" other media. In truth, it is hard to separate the roles.

But one suspects that more people every day are using Twitter precisely as any other news medium is used, to deliver "news."

Twitter Does Not Supplant Other Media, It Amplifies It

Africa's Growing Middle Class is a Huge Deal

Some problems seem unsolvable; some probably are nearly unsolvable. But the growing middle class in many parts of Africa is a huge and important deal, given the relative or nearly-complete failure of many aid programs over the last half century, one might argue.

From a communications industry perspective, the growth explains, in part, not just growing interest but growing revenue possibility.

People often forget that all jobs come, in the final analysis, from the health of the private economy. People work in public sectors, to be sure, but all those jobs are funded by taxes on people who work, and companies that hire them. The whole point of any economic development effort is sustainable growth of the private economy.

Without robust economic growth, little in tax revenues is possible. The growth of the African middle class is a hugely-important development.

App Stores Pose Challenges Within Ecosystem

The "application store" might be among the more-significant innovations in the device and software businesses of recent years. Perhaps it is the single most-important innovation, as it illustrates the importance of content for many device strategies. It isn't so clear that the iPod could have come to dominate the MP3 player business without iTunes, and it seems unlikely the iPhone or iPad could have achieved their early market share leads without the trove of applications available in the Apple App Store.

Of course, app stores also mean that the relative balance of value within the software and device market also changes. Service provider businesses also are affected, obviously, as the device, with its app store, becomes the primary user connection with an access service.

Can Skype win in the Windows app store as it did in the iPhone app store? Skype Journal

Google Chrome Adds Speech-to-Text

Version 11 of Chrome now includes speech input and speech to text capabilities. Using Chrome, you can now translate what you say into other languages with Google Translate. If you’re translating from English, just click on the microphone on the bottom right of the input box, speak your text, and choose the language you want to translate to.

You can even click on the “Listen” feature to hear the translated words spoken back to you.

Google Chrome Blog: Everybody’s talking (and translating) with Chrome

Motorola promises more Atrix-like Smart Phone Docks

Motorola CEO Sanjay Jha says "you will see multiple devices from us in the second half launching with these capabilities, and we will expand the range of our Lapdock devices so we cover a broader price point, addressing both the enterprise premium tier as well as more consumer tiers."

Some observers say they were disappointed by the Atrix, but lots of concepts do not fair so well in their first incarnation. Consider the tablet device itself, something suppliers have experimented with for more than a decade, and which conceptually has been thought about for several decades.

Not all users will necessarily be intrigued by future implementations, simply because a tablet with a touch interface is what works for them. There is another group of users that requires fuller PC style features in a device, typically because the work tasks to be accomplishments require more horsepower and a wider range of interface options.

And not all the initial issues were Motorola's doing. See http://www.bgr.com/2011/04/29/att-issues-update-for-motorola-atrix-4g-hsupa-restrictor-plate-removed/.

The potential for a docking system of this sort will appeal to some portion of those users who need a keyboard interface when traveling or otherwise away from a desk.

Motorola promises more Atrix-like laptop docks for future phones -- Engadget

Video on Demand Consumption Grows, So Does Rest of "On Demand"

Video-on-demand services offered by cable, satellite and telco TV providers have been a modest success so far. In fact, one might well make the argument that digital video recorders represent the biggest innovation in "on demand" viewing in recent years, though some also would note even that viewing is relatively low, compared to total viewing.

Still, there was a 35 percent increase in VOD transactions in 2010, compared to 2009, according to Rentrak OnDemand Essentials, an audience measurement company.

According to the Leichtman Research Group, DVR penetration rates have reached 54 percent for consumers with households exceeding $75,000 while those with incomes below $30,000 only have a 16 percent penetration rate. See http://www.marketingforecast.com/archives/6941.

Last year, a Nielsen survey revealed that over 30 percent of consumers owned DVRs, but a more recent survey conducted by Comcast says that up to 60 percent of households may be time-shifting their TV viewing.

According to Leichtman analysts, live programming still represents about 80 percent of total viewing. But DVR now represents about 41 percent of that activity.

Online is 17 percent of total TV consumption while other forms of video on demand represent 16 percent of viewing.

But estimates vary. Overall, consumers watch an average of 158.25 minutes of TV per day, according to Nielsen. And they spend just 9:36 minutes watching time shifted TV daily, a 14 percent increase from last year, but still a small amount, according to Nielsen.

On-Demand Viewing Poses a Test for Broadcasters - NYTimes.com

AT&T's Broadband Caps Start Now

AT&T's new broadband data caps take effect April 2, 2011, affecting more than 16 million U.S. broadband users. The new limits include 150 Gigabytes of consumption each month for DSL subscribers and 250 GBytes for UVerse users.

The typical Comcast residential broadband user consumes 2 Gbytes to 4 GBytes of bandwidth per month, Comcast's own studies have shown. See http://ipcarrier.blogspot.com/2010/12/typical-comcast-user-consumes-2-gbytes.html.

So the reason ISPs are worried about the impact of increased online video consumption is that the current level of usage is roughly equivalent to two or three or iTunes-sized movies per month. But everyone expects video consumption to keep growing.

A widespread shift to significant movie viewing online would disrupt usage patterns fairly quickly. But is probably fair to note that a typical consumer is two orders of magnitude (about 100 times) away from having to worry about the current caps.

AT&T's broadband data caps start today

Google, Apple Location Data Benefits Consumers

Google and Apple are facing, and will face more scrutiny, about the protections built into collection of Wi-Fi hostspot location data. A legitimate case can be made about potential abuses, but consumers will benefit directly if anonymous data can be used to enhance GPS and cell site mapping data.

"Information about the location of WiFi networks improves the accuracy of the location-based services, such as Google Maps or driving directions, that Google provides to consumers," Google explained last year in a letter to U.S. Rep. Henry Waxman, D-Los Angeles.

"Because GPS and cell tower data can be unreliable or inaccurate, in some cases using the location of Wi-Fi access points can enable a smartphone to pinpoint its own location more quickly and accurately," Google said.

Beyond improved navigation services, there is lots of interest in location-based marketing, promotion and e-commerce applications. Some would not see that as providing a direct consumer benefit, but advertising underwrites much access to free, reduced cost or "no incremental charge" content, for example. Consumers also will benefit from discount offers of other types.

In the future, Google and Apple will have to be more careful and transparent about how they collect such information, and well as how personally-identifiable data can be used. But the data will be directly useful to end users, all that said.

Google emails highlight value of location data - SiliconValley.com

Millennials Most Responsive To Text Ads

GFK MRI has found that the Millennials (born between 1977 and 1994) are 57 percent more likely to recall seeing a text message ad on their mobile device, compared with the average mobile phone user. More importantly, they are 93 percent more likely to have responded to a text ad or made a purchase using text messaging.

Overall, the study found that about 6.2 percent of adults with a mobile phone had looked at an ad sent by SMS. In terms of response, 2.65 percent had used SMS to respond to an ad or make a purchase during the last 30 days.

Millennial Generation Is The Most Responsive To Text Ads