EarthLink Shuts Philadelphia Metro Wi-Fi Net

EarthLink is terminating its Philadelphia Wi-Fi service, after failing to reach agreement with the City of Philadelphia and a non-profit organization to transfer to either the City or to the non-profit the entire $17 million Wi-Fi network, for free, as well as pay cash and donate new Wi-Fi equipment.

EarthLink will continue to provide Wi-Fi service to its customers in Philadelphia during a transition period that will end on June 12, 2008. EarthLink will begin decommissioning the network shortly after the transition period.

That's the story these days: Municipal Wi-Fi is so unattractive a business proposition that assets cannot even be given away.

New Android Apps

Silicon Alley blogger Vasanth Sridharan picks five Google Android applications deemed especially cool or useful.

Android Scan scans barcodes on any book or CD when a user is in a store and will pulls up Amazon reviews. The application also will check local library listings to see if the book is available to check out.

CookingCapsules allows users to look up recipes, find a store nearby to get groceries, and provides step-by-step cooking directions.

Eco2Go calculates the carbon footprint a user leaves every time he or she takes a trip, and buys carbon credits to offset the impact.

Locale is a user preferences tool that automatically adjusts ringing or call forwarding rules when a user is in certain locations. At the office, the phone automatically goes on silent. At home, it automatically re-routes calls to a land line.

TuneWiki is a karaoke application and music player for the Android phone.

Online Ad Prices Falling

PubMatic's Web site ad price index indicates that the economic slowdown in the United States is beginning to affect the online advertising industry, with overall monetization dropping by 23 percent. The PubMatic AdPrice Index is based on data from over 3,000 publishers and billions of ad impressions.

The PubMatic AdPrice Index revealed surprising weakness in monetization for the vast majority of Web sites.
Large Web sites fared the worst while small Web sites managed to maintain their monetization rates. eCPMs for large Web sites (more than 100 million page views per month) dropped dramatically by 52 percent from 38 cents in March to 18 cents April. Medium Web sites (1 million to 100 million page views per month) were nearly flat, with monetization dropping from 34 cents in March to 33 cents in April. Small Web sites managed to improve their monetization, increasing from $1.18 in March to $1.29 in April.

82% Internet Pentration and Rising

Roughly one fifth of all U.S. heads-of-household have never used email, according to Parks Associates. That's not even close to being the most significant implication, though. If the Parks survey data can be extrapolated to the whole population, and Parks Associates believes it can, then Internet subscriptions now reach 82 percent of U.S. consumers.

The most recent annual phone survey of U.S. households found 20 million households are without Internet access, approximately 18 percent of all U.S. households.

“Nearly one out of three household heads has never used a computer to create a document,” says John Barrett, director, research, Parks Associates.

The Parks Associates poll found seven percent of the 20 million “disconnected” homes plan to subscribe to an Internet service within the next 12 months. And "Internet resisters" continue to dwindle.

At year-end 2006, 29 percent of all U.S. households (31 million homes) did not have Internet access. So 11 million more homes have gone online over the past year, if the Parks data can be extrapolated.

One half of those who have never used email are older than 65, and 56 percent had no schooling beyond high school.

User Generated Video Growing Faster than Expected

Because of significant growth in the Chinese market, In-Stat researchers have revised upwards their forecasts for user-generated video use and revenue.

Total worldwide UGV revenue is expected to eclipse U.S. $1.19 billion by 2012. In-Stat projects 160 billion UGV videos will be viewed in 2012.

Individuals who use mobile phones to participate in online video sites are most likely to contribute to the market, both financially and in terms of content, In-Stat argues.

HBO for iTunes?

There are lots of rumors about a possible earlier release of the 3G iPhone as shortages build and we approach the June 2008 date when a 3G-capable iPhone will be released. Something else that actually is more important might also be happening at a faster pace, though.

Since most video viewing is substituted for some other mode (you might watch a movie at a theater, or on a DVD, or as video on demand, or on a premium channel or on broadcast TV), changes in the "release windows" that dictate when each delivery mode can get the content also have the effect of shifting revenue shares within the ecosystem.

According to a report published by Conde Naste Portfolio, Apple is on the verge of offering HBO original programs on iTunes. The programming, which would include hits like the Sopranos and Deadwood, offered at a premium to the standard $1.99 an episode fee.

If true, the deal will be a break in tradition as much for HBO as for Apple, and provide further evidence of a quickening pace of "release window" modifications that have more content going to some form of digital delivery.

As release windows change, so do the financial and contractual agreements that govern when content can be made available. That, more than anything else, will determine how successful downloads, streaming and video on demand can become.

Up to this point HBO has been a nearly-complete hold out in the digital and streaming venue. It now is testing streaming for its current subscribers, but has completely avoided any availability for non-subscribers.

Media Consumption: TV Leads, Internet Grows

Adult consumers in the United States still spend more time in front of televisions than they do online, according to a survey sponsored by the Television Bureau of Advertising industry association and conducted by Nielsen Media Research.

Survey respondents ages 18 to 34 spent over an hour per day more watching TV than they spent more time watching TV than they did in online pursuits, the study found. The gap between time spent online and time spent watching TV is closing, however.

In January 2008, TVB found that 18 to 34 year-olds spent 60.6 minutes more watching TV per day (206.0 minutes) than they did online (145.4 minutes). That is down from June 2006, when the gap was 137.4 minutes: 246.7 minutes for TV and 109.3 minutes online. Moreover, TV time decreased while Internet time increased.

A separate study by JupiterResearch and Ipsos Insight reported results in more discrete age groups and found that TV use actually trailed Internet use among the youngest consumers. As of August 2007, US consumers in the 18 to 24 year-old range went online an average of two more hours per week than they spent watching TV.

Neither study specifically addressed multitasking, which can be significant, especially among younger consumers.

"Young people rarely use just one medium at a time," says Debra Aho Williamson, senior analyst at eMarketer. "Often, when they are online, they’ll have TV or music on in the background."

One might be skeptical about a couple elements of both surveys. The TVB study suggests that adults between 18 and 34 spend 115.6 minutes a day listening to the radio.

The Jupiter and Ipsos survey suggests adults 18 to 24 spend three hours a week listening to the radio.

My totally unscientific experience is that none of my 18 to 24 year olds spend any time at all listening to the radio. For similar reasons, I am somewhat skeptical about "time spent in front of the TV."