For Many Small Businesses, Facebook is Commerce

For 37 percent of small businesses surveyed by Payvment, Facebook is the sole online sales channel. That probably is because the survey is disproportionately weighted towards "online-only" or "online mostly" businesses. 


The fact that using Facebook is "easy" apparently accounts for much of its popularity. 

Verizon Applies Coding to Save Bandwidth

Verizon Wireless has developed software technology that cuts video traffic by transmitting only the parts of an image that change, Verizon Communications  Anthony Melone, chief technology officer said. It isn't immediately clear whether the coding is done "on the fly" or required pre-processing video. 


That doesn't mean Verizon will not eventually need more bandwidth, but does indicate the range of options and activities service providers are engaging in, to better manage bandwidth. 


Engineers working to develop high-definition television early hit upon the idea of transmitting only the portion of scenes that change, which allows lower bandwidth. Other techniques include the intentional "bit robbing" of information that the human eye cannot detect. The impairments are there, but people cannot see the impairments. 


"There are things that can be done that reduce the amount of bits without degrading quality the consumer can notice," according to Melone. 


Verizon Wireless also is using "multiple input, multiple output" (MIMO) techniques that help the firm economize on consumed bandwidth.


AT&T likewise is said to be working  with Intucell Ltd., whose software automatically assists wireless coverage areas, or cells, that are overloaded. That approach might not help reduce video bandwidth, but does better distribute the load. 

Tablets and E-Readers Changing News Experience?

Mobile devices including tablets and e-readers may be leading to a "deeper experience" with news than on the desktop/laptop computer, the Pew Research Center Project for Excellence in Journalism reports. 


For a light hearted but instructive look at the ways reading is "optimized" for different scenarios, on smart phones, e-readers and tablets, read this.


The study also confirms that audiences are growing fastest online, and that revenue likewise is growing fastest for online media. 


As sales of e-readers and tablet computers grow, Pew's early research has found consumers are reading more "immersively" on these devices than on desktop PCs, for example.


About 27 percent of U.S. residents now get news on mobile devices.


And these mobile news consumers are even more likely to turn to news organizations directly, through apps and home pages, rather than search or recommendations (social media), potentially strengthening the bond with traditional brands.


No more than 10 percent of digital news consumers follow news recommendations from Facebook or Twitter “very often,” the survey finds. And almost all of those who do are still using other ways like going directly to the news website or app as well.
 

The survey also suggests mobile is adding to, rather than replacing, people’s news consumption. Data tracking people’s behavior, for instance, finds that mobile devices increased traffic on major newspaper websites by an average of nine percent.


The technology may also be spreading this access to groups that were passed over by the first generation of digital. Some rural populations like Native Americans who largely missed the desktop generation, are now moving straight to mobile options that do not rely on broadband access.

Nearly Half of AT&T Subscribers Can Save Money by Switching to Metered Plans, Consumer Reports Argues

Close to half of AT&T customers with unlimited plans could save $10 a month by switching to a metered plan, Consumer Reports says.


Consumer Reports came to that conclusion after analyzing usage data provided to by Validas, a company that tracks wireless data coverage.


The data suggests that about 48 percent of AT&T unlimited-plan subscribers, who pay $30 a month for their data service, use no more than 300 megabytes of data a month, on average. 
AT&T's 300 MByte-a-month data plan costs $20 a month.


So subscribers who use little data could save more than $100 a year by switching to it. That is probably true, unless usage grows. And it would be an odd user that did not find gradually-increasing usage, over time. 

U.S. Business Fiber Penetration 32%

Some 32 percent of U.S. commercial locations with twenty or more employees now are able to buy fiber access services, according to Vertical Systems Group. That is up from 28 percent in 2010, Vertical Systems Group says. 


"Buildings" are the key concept here. Lots of smaller businesses are located in bigger buildings, so "connected buildings" are not the same as "connected" or "potentially connectable" organizations and firms. 


Still, one might conclude from the slow, gradual uptake that most buildings that offer enough revenue potential to serve with direct optical fiber connections already have that access. The issue now is how many of the less-desirable locations (in terms of payback potential) can be reached incrementally. 


You might argue that about 70 percent of locations actually are not very good candidates for a payback. 

Cable Got 82% of Net New Broadband Access Subs in 4th Quarter 2011

Cable modem service appears to retain its advantage as the preferred broadband access method for 82 percent of net new customers in the fourth quarter of 2011, according to the  Leichtman Research Group. 

The unanswered question is whether there is a pattern to the new adoptions, such as new customers disproportionately reflecting business customer purchases (either direct or reimbursable by an employer, for example).

Most of the new customers were added, as you would expect, by the 18 largest cable and telephone providers. Those 18 firms got about 93 percent of all the three million new customers.  

Perhaps the more telling statistic is that just two cable companies added 72 percent of those customers in 2011. The largest four firms added 89 percent of all new broadband customers for the full year 2011. 

Likewise, the top three telcos--AT&T, Verizon and CenturyLink--added 84 percent of all new net telco-supplied broadband access connections for the full year. But the largest seven telcos collectively added only 750,000 net new broadband subscribers for the full year 2011.

Broadband Internet Provider	Subscribers at End of 4Q 2011	Net Adds in 2011
Cable Companies
Comcast	18,147,000	1,159,000
Time Warner^	10,344,000	491,000
Cox*	4,500,000	130,000
Charter	3,654,600	252,900
Cablevision	2,965,000	73,000
Suddenlink	951,400	65,100
Mediacom	851,000	13,000
Insight^	550,000	25,500
Cable ONE	451,082	25,680
Other Major Private Cable Companies**	1,925,000	55,000
Total Top Cable	44,339,082	2,290,180
Telephone Companies
AT&T	16,427,000	117,000
Verizon	8,670,000	278,000
CenturyLink	5,554,000	238,000
Frontier^^	1,735,000	37,833
Windstream	1,355,300	53,600
FairPoint	314,135	24,390
Cincinnati Bell	257,300	1,200
Total Top Telephone Companies	34,312,735	750,023
Total Broadband	78,651,817	3,040,203

Sources: The Companies and Leichtman Research Group, Inc.
* LRG estimate
** Includes LRG estimates for Bright House Networks, and RCN
^ Totals prior to Time Warner Cable's acquisition of Insight completed on 2/29/2012
^^ LRG estimate does not include wireless subscribers
Company subscriber counts may not represent solely residential households
Totals reflect pro forma results from system sales and acquisitions
Top cable and telephone companies represent approximately 93% of all subscribers

What Will Cloud Mean for Enterprise Users, VAR Business?

By the end of 2013, consumer cloud services for accessing content will be integrated into 90 percent of all connected consumer devices, according to Gartner. Gartner managing vice president Andrew Johnson said that the emergence of personal clouds reflects the “4S experience”, consumers’ desire to store, synch, stream, and share their content on regardless of device or platform seamlessly.

That raises an interesting question. To the extent that enterprise and business technology increasingly is based on use of consumer tools, that means cloud apps and services will be better suited to business and in many cases enterprise application and information technology requirements.

So what might that mean for enterprise communications, enterprise data architectures and “business technology” in general? The answers of course have huge implications not only for enterprises, but for suppliers of all forms of “enterprise” voice, data and applications.

If in fact we certainly are leaving the PC era, and if the next era of computing architecture, for which we as yet have no name, includes a heavy reliance on both cloud computing and mobile technologies, there are certain to be new developments that essentially simplify and “flatten” business IT requirements.

We can't yet say with definitiveness that the next era of computing is defined by mobile devices, tablets, the Internet or cloud computing or even the fact that leadership is shifting more in the direction of applications and activities than computing appliances.

Those are big changes, indeed. But they are logical implications of a shift to cloud-based computing and mobile devices. More and more people will be able to work by interacting directly, from their mobile devices, with mission-critical business apps that are cloud based.

The need for intermediary and mediating technologies will not be necessary. Users will be able to use any broadband-connected device to access all the apps that formerly were resident on a local server. That could be a big shake up.

“The shift to the personal cloud will accelerate rapidly in 2012 as consumers learn how to use new services on their devices,” said Johnson.  “As cloud services become part of people’s lives, device vendors and platform providers must integrate cloud services in order to win customers in 2012 or risk being displaces by those that offer these services. Brands must stretch across multiple devices, platforms and services.”

According to Gartner’s definition, personal cloud allows consumers to seamlessly store, sync, stream and share using multiple connected devices such as smart phones, media tablets, televisions and PCs over the Internet.

In principle, there is no reason why enterprise apps could not be supported in precisely the same way.

Consumers have begun to adopt cloud-based services as part of their digital ecosystem, thanks to services such as Netflix, Google Apps, Amazon Music, Microsoft SkyDrive and Apple's iCloud. In a personal cloud, a TV show, for example, can be watched, left and resumed across multiple devices.

Might enterprises do the same? And if so, what happens to the business need for VARs and system integrators, when everything is in the cloud, and accessible directly on any device, especially mobile devices that communicate directly with the cloud services?