Over 66 million consumers are using the Internet while camped out on their sofas watching TV, according to market research firm In-Stat. About a third of male respondents to a recent survey say they "sometimes" do so. About 25 percent of female respondents say they use a PC while watching TV.
One-fifth of all respondents reported doing instant messaging while watching TV.
That's both good news and bad news. The good news is it suggests there might be some upside for content, application providers and service providers in the area of integrating PC, mobile or Web features with the TV experience.
The bad news? One reason some people might be time-sharing is because the TV content is not that compelling, compared to alternative pursuits such as using the Internet.
Monday, April 20, 2009
66 Million U.S. Consumers Now Multi-Task
Gary Kim has been a digital infra analyst and journalist for more than 30 years, covering the business impact of technology, pre- and post-internet. He sees a similar evolution coming with AI. General-purpose technologies do not come along very often, but when they do, they change life, economies and industries.
$5 Billion Less Consumer Spending on Mobile, Broadband, TV?
Though first quarter financial results are not yet available to confirm the possible existence of the trend, about 15 percent of respondents say they will cut back spending on subscription-TV, broadband, and mobile services in response to economic pressures, an In-Stat survey finds. Precisely what that means is the question.
If any significant trend of that sort emerges, U.S. consumers could cut spending on mobile, broadband and pay TV services by nearly $5 billion due to economic turmoil, In-Stat says.
Will consumers drop mobile, broadband or multi-channel video subscriptions completely, or simply shift consumption to more-affordable subscriptions? The former would cause a greater hit to revenue and a risk that customers do not return later, the latter might "simply" pressure on average revenue per user.
In the fourth quarter of 2008, a slowing rate of growth could be seen for at least some services, but it was hard to separate purely-economic effects from product maturation. So far, mobile service providers have seen a shift to prepaid services from postpaid.
It wouldn't be unusual to see consumers dropping some premium services or postponing upgrades in the face of a tough recession. What would make news is negative growth for subscription services other than wired voice, which has been declining, at least for some providers, for years.
We'll find out soon enough what is going on.
If any significant trend of that sort emerges, U.S. consumers could cut spending on mobile, broadband and pay TV services by nearly $5 billion due to economic turmoil, In-Stat says.
Will consumers drop mobile, broadband or multi-channel video subscriptions completely, or simply shift consumption to more-affordable subscriptions? The former would cause a greater hit to revenue and a risk that customers do not return later, the latter might "simply" pressure on average revenue per user.
In the fourth quarter of 2008, a slowing rate of growth could be seen for at least some services, but it was hard to separate purely-economic effects from product maturation. So far, mobile service providers have seen a shift to prepaid services from postpaid.
It wouldn't be unusual to see consumers dropping some premium services or postponing upgrades in the face of a tough recession. What would make news is negative growth for subscription services other than wired voice, which has been declining, at least for some providers, for years.
We'll find out soon enough what is going on.
Gary Kim has been a digital infra analyst and journalist for more than 30 years, covering the business impact of technology, pre- and post-internet. He sees a similar evolution coming with AI. General-purpose technologies do not come along very often, but when they do, they change life, economies and industries.
WeFi, fring expand VoIP over Wi-Fi Options
WeFi Inc, an open global Wi-Fi network, and fring, a leading mobile Internet community and communication service, today launched the WeFi add-on for fring that gives users mobile access to the largest database of 20 million Wi-Fi access points worldwide, said to be growing by over one million a month.
The new WeFi add-on for fring provides users with easy and free access to millions of Wi-Fi hotspots from their mobile devices. The alpha test of this service has been particularly popular with business and pleasure travelers, WeFi says.
The WeFi add-on currently works on hundreds of Symbian and Windows Mobile devices with the latest version of fring which can be downloaded or upgraded from www.fring.com/download/.
A full list of supported handsets is available at www.fring.com/download/default_PC.asp.
To locate and access millions of hotspots from these mobile devices, users simply select the WeFi add-on from the add-ons tab within fring. Users can locate their Wi-Fi hotspot location automatically using their handset’s GPS capability, or manually by typing in any address worldwide.
Gary Kim has been a digital infra analyst and journalist for more than 30 years, covering the business impact of technology, pre- and post-internet. He sees a similar evolution coming with AI. General-purpose technologies do not come along very often, but when they do, they change life, economies and industries.
Bandwidth Caps a Competitive Disadvantage?
Time Warner Cable has shelved its plans to shift its residential broadband customers to “consumption-based billing”, at least for the moment, as a way of controlling excessive bandwidth use by a small number of really-heavy users and maintaining quality of service for other users who share the network. Short of investing in a higher-capacity access network, it isn't clear how some way of matching consumption to cost is avoidable, long term.
But that points out one advantage Verizon Communications has: it has ample access bandwidth to provide uncapped usage, which could become a marketing weapon wherever it competes with other providers who do impose caps or other sorts of restrictions.
Gary Kim has been a digital infra analyst and journalist for more than 30 years, covering the business impact of technology, pre- and post-internet. He sees a similar evolution coming with AI. General-purpose technologies do not come along very often, but when they do, they change life, economies and industries.
Sunday, April 19, 2009
Bandwidth Caps Driving Dissatisfaction?
One wonders whether consumer outrage about Time Warner Cable's bandwidth caps play some role in Time Warner Cable's low consumer happiness ratings.
Time Warner ranks on this March 2009 survey as low as Charter, which never has had especially high consumer satisfaction ratings.
Frankly, we are used to seeing Time Warner rank higher than this.
Ranking that low--equivalent to Charter-- is absolutely nothing to be proud of, and quite a change from past years.
Gary Kim has been a digital infra analyst and journalist for more than 30 years, covering the business impact of technology, pre- and post-internet. He sees a similar evolution coming with AI. General-purpose technologies do not come along very often, but when they do, they change life, economies and industries.
Twitter Crosses the Chasm
There's a difference between early adopters and mass markets. That being the case, Twitter is crossing an adoption chasm. Early adopters will look around for the next new thing, because it won't be so much fun now that "everybody" is discovering it.
But what also is likely to occur is that Twitter's usefulness now will grow, as the reason most people use tools is that they are useful. Twitter is now about to find its place as something so useful most people will find they want to use it.
Gary Kim has been a digital infra analyst and journalist for more than 30 years, covering the business impact of technology, pre- and post-internet. He sees a similar evolution coming with AI. General-purpose technologies do not come along very often, but when they do, they change life, economies and industries.
Virgin Mobile Wants Greater Share of Prepaid Mobile Market
Presumably first quarter financial results will show continued growth in uptake of prepaid wireless plans in the U.S. mobile market. Virgin Mobile USA
hopes to capitalize on the trend, as it has cut its unlimited calling plan from $80 to $50 a month.
Two of Virgin's other monthly calling plans also get a price cut. The 300-anytime minute plan was cut to $30 from $35. The 400 anytime minutes plan was reduced from $50 to $40.
Text-only plans also are offered: the new Texter's Delight plan costs $15 a month for 1000 messagesa month. An unlimited texting plan is available for $20. Those plans include photo, instant messaging and video messages as well as SMS. Voice calls cost 10 cents per minute.
Virgin has also introduced a Pink Slip Protection (PSP) program. To be eligible for PSP, customers must be a Virgin Mobile USA customer for two consecutive months prior to losing a job, and become eligible for state unemployment benefits within 12 months. Virgin Mobile will cover the costs of a plan including taxes and surcharges for up to three months.
Gary Kim has been a digital infra analyst and journalist for more than 30 years, covering the business impact of technology, pre- and post-internet. He sees a similar evolution coming with AI. General-purpose technologies do not come along very often, but when they do, they change life, economies and industries.
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