Is Social Media a Fad?

Hardly anybody thinks so, but it is worth asking the question, I suppose.

IBM's view of the enterprise "data tsunami" or "exaflood"

IBM's view of the enterprise "data tsunami" or "exaflood."

Why Innovation is So Tough in the Communications Business

There are a ton of reasons why innovation is so difficult in the communications business.

"It won't work," "impossible requirements," "we can't do anything about it at the moment" and "business processes won't support it" are the broad categories within which you can probably imaging dozens of separate examples within each category.

The list of barriers is amusing and accurate, but also illustrates why highly-complex systems are resistant to desired innovation.

The Litany of Excuses Stifling Communication Innovation

Is Windows Phone 7 Too Late?

Windows Phone 7 might have been a huge hit, says Matt Burns at CrunchGear. It might have been the true iPhone killer, says Burns. It might have even become the dominant mobile platform. But it won’t, Burns argues. It’s an iOS, Android and BlackBerry world now and there isn’t room for anyone else, he argues.

That's a challenge Microsoft simply has to overcome. There's at least one possible new angle here: Windows Phone 7 is optimized for communication, not apps. That’s a key difference. Where Apple is focused on apps, and Android on mobile Web, Windows Phone 7 arguably is focused on ease of communication.

That is a segment Windows Phone 7 could ride: a smartphone optimized for ease of communication, rather than apps or Web or email, video or conferencing.

Windows Phone 7: Solid Platform, Sorry Future

Laptop, Netbook Sales Dip as Tablets Grow

Market researcher Gartner has trimmed its global forecasts for laptop shipments, but still expects a 26 percent increase to 214 million units this year. The firm says the average selling price of portable PCs has fallen six percent to $668 from $710 a year ago.

Netbooks likely have been affected. The Consumer Electronics Association predicts U.S. retail sales of netbooks, which more than doubled last year, will decline 12 percent this year.

What’s a CDMA iPhone Worth to Apple?

Adding a CDMA iPhone option (usable on Verizon Wireless and other networks), increases Apple’s addressable market for an iPhone by 16 percent, says Horace Dediu of asymco, a mobile research site.

The estimated sales of 10 million Verizon iPhones account for only two percent of that potential market, affording Apple a sizable opportunity to boost iPhone sales outside of the United States.

The CDMA Development Group reports that 164 million mobile phone subscribers in the U.S. use a CDMA handset. That number pales in comparison to the 302 million CDMA handset owners in the Asia-Pacific area, a region that, until recently, hasn’t seen huge demand for Apple’s smartphone.

To put that in perspective, Apple’s total revenues for the 2009 fiscal year were $36.5 billion.

What’s a CDMA iPhone Worth to Apple?

Spanish Telecom Industry Revenue Shrinks

According to data released by Spanish telecom regulator CMT, the country’s telecoms revenues, including TV, stood at EUR9.7 billion (USD13.5 billion) for the second quarter of 2010, a 2.9 percent decline year-on-year but an improvement on the first quarter change, where sales fell 4.8 percent year-on-year.

Retail revenues accounted for 84 percent of the total, of which wireless services accounted for the largest proportion at 43 percent, while the figure was 18 percent for fixed line services, 15 percent for TV, 12 percent for internet, with the remainder comprising terminal sales and business services.

Granted, we are looking at just a couple of quarters of data, and just in one country. But slowing revenue growth, if not actual declines, seem] to be an issue in many regions. If nothing else, that suggests the importance of the search for new revenue categories. Do nothing, or nothing substantial, and decline is a likely outcome.

Spanish telecoms market continues to shrink, but at a declining rate: TeleGeography Research