A recent test of app data consumption suggests that using a mobile app rather than a browser to view the same content has vastly different bandwidth consumption implications.
The test compared PC and tablet web browsers to view the Wall Street Journal home page, with an iPad Wall Street Journal app to reach the same home page.
The data consumed using the Web browser on the iPad and on a PC to access the WSJ home page was similar, both averaging around 2.2 megabytes in total consumption (sent and received).
The same test was run accessing the The Weather Channel site, which revealed similar results (around .9MB in total consumption).
Although the iPad Web browser consumed slightly more data than the PC web browser for TWC, the difference was not enough to warrant further investigation, says Greg Wolf, a principal with NetForecast who conducted the test.
However, using the iPad apps to read the WSJ and TWC tells is a very different story.
The WSJ on average consumed 47MB of data when downloading a daily issue, while TWC consumed on average 7MB just to display the main menu.
In other words, the WSJ iPad app consumed 21 times more data than accessing the WSJ homepage using a Web browser, and the TWC app consumed over 7 times more data than accessing the TWC main menu using a Web browser.
Putting aside the obvious fact that the experience of using a native iPad app is designed to deliver a richer, multimedia experience, the point here is that this experience comes at a price. App data consumption much higher than web sessions
Thursday, January 5, 2012
Apps Consume Much More Bandwidth than Web Sessions
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.
Video and Cloud Killer Apps for 4G?
About half of the respondents seem to think 4G mobile service is just "faster" access.
2012 in mobile
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.
Apple TV: a Content Device Needs Content
Content businesses use technology, but are not fundamentally about technology. Back in the days of analog television, three decades ago, a couple of delivery systems, such as laser discs, provided much-better image quality. Laser disc lost out in the market to VCRs, which offered visibly-worse image quality.
But there were two distinct advantages: lower device cost and much-greater content selection. All other things being equal, consumers will tend to choose wide content choices over video quality, and lower-cost devices over higher-cost devices.
But all would-be video providers have to convince content owners to license content. And that will remain a key challenge for any would-be developers of new TVs and video playback and purchasing systems.
An Apple television foray makes sense. People could use any Apple device to buy TV shows, movies, music or games through iTunes and then play their purchases across all Apple's products.
But, so far, it does not appear that Apple has been notably successful at convincing content owners to license TV programming for sale through iTunes. Apple television
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.
9% of U.S. Consumers Have Abandoned Video Service
About nine percent of U.S. respondents to a Deloitte survey say they have stopped buying video entertainment subscriptions from cable, telco or satellite providers, while another 11 percent report they are considering doing so.
Perhaps the important finding is why people are considering doing so. The 11 percent who report they are considering abandoning subscription TV services say they now can watch almost all of their favorite shows online.
One would guess that, as typically is the case when product substitution occurs, that the first “switchers” are users for whom the existing solutions have low value, compared to product price.
The classic example is the person who doesn’t watch much television in the first place and does not have children or other family members who do enjoy television, making a $100 a month fee “high” in relationship to value.
In the case of the "typical end user," video cord cutting seems to be more of a barrier than some might think. Highly-motivated end users might put up with quite a lot of hassle to avoid buying video. For most, such efforts will be too much bother. 9% of U.S. Consumers Have Abandoned Video Service - Carrier Evolution
Perhaps the important finding is why people are considering doing so. The 11 percent who report they are considering abandoning subscription TV services say they now can watch almost all of their favorite shows online.
One would guess that, as typically is the case when product substitution occurs, that the first “switchers” are users for whom the existing solutions have low value, compared to product price.
The classic example is the person who doesn’t watch much television in the first place and does not have children or other family members who do enjoy television, making a $100 a month fee “high” in relationship to value.
In the case of the "typical end user," video cord cutting seems to be more of a barrier than some might think. Highly-motivated end users might put up with quite a lot of hassle to avoid buying video. For most, such efforts will be too much bother. 9% of U.S. Consumers Have Abandoned Video Service - Carrier Evolution
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.
Mobile Payments, Commerce Big in 2012?
There's an unusual finding in Chetan Sharma's most-recent survey of 150 mobile service provider and suppler executives looking at what will be hot in mobile in 2012. The respondents believe mobile payments and mobile commerce will be more popular consumer applications than location services and music, and will be only modestly less popular than messaging.That is almost shocking. The only way to make sense of the findings is that "commerce" is broadly defined to include checking product availability and prices from a mobile, browsing shopping sites on a mobile device, or looking for a particular store.
The clue is that there appear to have been separate questions asked about use of near field communications, for example. Still, the fact that mobile payments and mobile commerce are considered the second most popular consumer application of 2012 is instructive, even if most observers might agree that the bulk of that activity will take the form of commerce rather than payments.
The other noteworthy finding is that many of the executives expect Amazon will enter the mobile market in a more-direct way in 2012. Mobile executives views on 2012
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.
Western Europe Mobile Churn Will Grow in 2012
Mobile customer churn will increase in many European Union markets in 2012, analysts at Yankee Group now predict. “Value” is expected to be a key driver for much of that churn, one might conclude, with potential winners among the ranks of service providers with a “value” orientation.
During 2012, several European Union countries will slide into recession and governments will press ahead with tough austerity measures, Yankee Group believes. The most affected countries will include Greece, Italy, Spain, Portugal and Ireland, but others, including the U.K. and France, will also be impacted.
“As they did during the last recession, customers will optimize their mobile consumption behavior in an attempt to minimize monthly spend,” say Yankee Group researchers.
During the first year of the recession between the fourth quarter of 2008 and the fourth quarter of 2009, monthly churn increased by 0.14 percentage points. That might not sound like much, but leads to about a 17-percent increase in churn rate over a year’s time.
During 2012, similar switching behavior will contribute to another increase in churn rates. Western Europe Mobile Churn Will Grow in 2012 - Carrier Evolution
During 2012, several European Union countries will slide into recession and governments will press ahead with tough austerity measures, Yankee Group believes. The most affected countries will include Greece, Italy, Spain, Portugal and Ireland, but others, including the U.K. and France, will also be impacted.
“As they did during the last recession, customers will optimize their mobile consumption behavior in an attempt to minimize monthly spend,” say Yankee Group researchers.
During the first year of the recession between the fourth quarter of 2008 and the fourth quarter of 2009, monthly churn increased by 0.14 percentage points. That might not sound like much, but leads to about a 17-percent increase in churn rate over a year’s time.
During 2012, similar switching behavior will contribute to another increase in churn rates. Western Europe Mobile Churn Will Grow in 2012 - Carrier Evolution
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.
Lower Mobile ARPU in Latin America
The current strategy used by virtually all mobile service providers to combat declining voice average revenue per user is increased data revenue. So far data revenue growth has slowed the decline of blended ARPU, but it hasn’t stopped the bleeding entirely, in South American markets.Excluding Venezuela and Argentina, voice ARPU in Latin American markets are declining at about two percent per quarter, according to Yankee Group analysts.
“Simple linear projections indicate nominal voice ARPU won’t stop declining until late 2017,” Yankee Group says. “By then regional voice ARPU would be just over U.S.$5.80, about 40 percent less than it is today.” Lower Mobile ARPU in Latin America - Carrier Evolution
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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