Mobile adsense? Not there yet.
by Gil Rosen
I’d like to present a different take than proposed by Aner below. When I think of the effectiveness of this new marketing channel I look at the wider perspective of the platform and user habits. To pinpoint the discussion further I’d like to address the action that leads to the ad being served. Google’s definition of a mobile ad is as follows:
“Mobile ads are shorter text-based AdWords ads that appear on mobile websites or when users search Google from a mobile device. When users clicks on your mobile ad, you can send them to your mobile webpage or offer them the option to connect to your business phone.”
The issue that I would like to focus on is the fact that content discovery and search habits are COMPLETELY different when it comes to mobile browsing. As such, I believe ‘copying’ a successful ad model on the ‘pc web’ does not guarantee success in the mobile world.
Mobile web browsing is much more focused. You hardly ever start in one place and ‘wander’ to the next or discover new services and information based on advertising and hyperlinks. Its usually a much more focused action. You are ‘on the go’ you look up ’something’ - news, sports –> these are served via direct links in the Operator’s portal or your own bookmarks - done. There is no (or hardly any) plain search. If there is, its in the context of a use case such as maps, music or video search and that usually happens within a specific service (HooQs 
).
In his MEM2007 insights post Aner mentioned (point #9) users tried Google mobile search and didn’t like it. I did too, and didn’t like it. Not because of Google but because content is scarce and the chance of random discovery which is part of the Internet’s main ‘wonders’ doesn’t [yet] exist in the mobile web.
I’m willing to agree Google’s drive is positive. If anyone can start some kind of drive that will motivate mobile content to be created thus leading to an eco-system that is able to sustain ads based on that content…it’s Google. Google’s mobile ads are basically an experiment that will hopefully lead to more mobile content and probably also lead to a change in the ad model.
One of the greatest killer apps for mobile search will be the integration of location based with search. Not on a country level, on the neighborhood level! If I want to buy flowers for my wife - Go to Google, search “Flowers” –> results = near by flower shops, with link to number and a map. That’s effective and thats the kind of “fused” service I am looking when it comes to using my mobile for search.
For now, the level of service is basic. The action is welcomed but execution not focused enough on leveraging mobile use cases.
Gil Rosen
Track with:
Craig Newmark Rules Rule - golden insights from the internet’s most pleasent man
by Gil Rosen
Live from the Globes Internet and Communication Conference, I just had the honor of hearing Craig Newmark - the man who started and still runs Craig’s list. What an amazing man!
During his talk he didn’t make any revolutionary statements, yet his clear, modest, focused and pleasant manner cut through the fuss, buzz and trash we hear all over. A few golden nuggets:
1. Feel and follow through
2. We take no advertising…no advertisers to make happy.
3. I’m the George Costanza of the internet
4. Listen and try hard to so something about it
5. I refused banner ads - didn’t feel right…I was happy and making enough money…
6. Twelve years later…I do full time customer service
7. We trust our community and they respond in a trustworthy way
8. Treat people in the site in the same way you want to be treated….
9. we don’t take money….we owe no debt.
That’s it. I realize now that reading these statements doesn’t seem like a big deal but the “Craig Package” the way he speaks and delivers is admirable. If you think about it, this is a perfect analogy to the success of his site. It doesn’t seem like a big deal, its totally simple, totally honest…and hugely successful. Makes you think!
Gil Rosen
Track with:
When Worlds Collide As Mobile Meets Internet
by Gil Rosen
IT DOESN’T HAVE TO BE THIS WAY
Aner’s insights from MEM2007 zoom in on the transitional phase the mobile industry is going through. The company I co-founded (TriPlay) recently launched an internet-mobile service (SyncSpace) with an Israeli operator and if there was one highlight to this whole process is that “westbound” mobile operators are sailing in uncharted territory. Here are a few key points I learned that highlight some challenges I came across (far from the complete list which could fill a book):
1. Target audience - there is no doubt that the market leaders on the demand side for web-mobile service are young people (ages 15-25 and we know that even 15 might not be young enough). They breath mobile services, consume content and eat up data services like no other target group. How is this a problem? Because WE - the mobile/internet start-up’ists, the VC partner, executives at large corporates, ALL of us who define, create, build and fund related companies and services are at least twice that age.
How can we be sure we are creating the right service?
Solution - Talk , talk, talk to them, get feedback, have them involved in your development process. Don’t force your vision on them and expect them to comply. If you don’t expect to find out at launch that you are simply not cool enough, that you have given them far too little credit and that you don’t really cater to their need.
About a year ago I read through a fascinating 200 pages research paper focusing on mobile youth. The ONE sentence I still remember a year later is that “Messaging services that fail to reinforce peer groups offer little beyond their initial novelty value to youth“. This is true for any service - there is tendency to seek technological breakthrough with less thought invested in the real life scenarios it supposed to serve. Bottom line - focus on value first, technology second.
2. Mobile operator corporate culture - analyze the typical headcount at any mobile operator and you will find that most are experienced MOBILE professionals who know a lot about mobile but less about web services, content and entertainment. Yesterday’s mission for the mobile was to ‘connect people’ by voice. Today’s Mission is about connection, voice or data and content. Tomorrow - the mobile will be an ‘IP gateway’ through which the users ‘mobile life’ will be enabled. Where mobility is the focus and not the mobile device.
The mobile device will be the users’ setop-box, entertainment and multimedia device as well as the voice/data communicator. These offerings are not only technologically diversified across platforms but also combine different schools of thought on how to launch new services. The words BETA, rapid development, on the fly, viral and other funky web 2.0ish words contradict mobile operator’s mentality. I don’t believe they need to change their skin but some of the attributes that go hand in hand with creating successful businesses in the web and entertainment industries will have to meld into their corporate culture.
Since this is not an overnight revolution, I expect this to be solved over time. Some interesting times ahead for management, HR units in the mobile operator world as well as their supporting industries. Service providers too will have to go through this metamorphoses. One that will reflect the new role the mobile device has in the future world.
3. beta? Don’t be surprised if you get this reaction. Telco’s are not used to running beta, not to mention the famous Google’s “perpetual beta” mode. Beta mean you are tolerant to bugs, open to user feedback and ready to change requirements if the market says you should. Telco’s heritage is simply different. The good old ‘telco grade’ means that when you pick up the phone (old fixed line phone) you hear a dialing tone - no ifs and buts. Web 2.0 user services launch way before they are fully tested for mass market usage. By definition they are not built for scalability and reliability from day one. They launch in beta, make mistakes, learn, fix and invest in scalability when the market demand forces them do so. When the ‘worlds collide’ this will have to change.
Mobile operators launching web-mobile services will not be able to apply this ‘telco grade’ mentality from day one. If they do they will always lag with services and not be perceived by their users as providing them with ‘edgy’ services. If users find their telco is introducing web- mobile services months and even years after independent players do they will find that the leading target users are already engaged with a different ‘off-deck’ solution. Scalability will not be an issue then since no users will use them to begin with.
Nonetheless they don’t have to be complete 37signals’ type cavaliers and mange their projects on IM chats, no meetings and launch. Somewhere in the middle would do.
4. The handset factor - most of the PC’s in the world are about the same, same OS (windows), same browser (Firefox/Explorer), same keyboard, strong memory, big screen, sit on one network - the PC internet is WWW etc etc. In the mobile world the ball game is totally different. A highly diverse OS environment - J2ME, Symbian, Brew, Windows; Countless different browsers, different screen size, open garden / closed garden (E.G Verizon) etc etc. Therefore creating a smooth, unified, simple, reliable and more important PREDICTABLE mobile experience is a mammoth task. Solution - focus on your initial target audience - what OS are they on? what devices serve them, what are the future devices - don’t try to capture all at once. Define an acceptable experience, aim for the core and spread.
On a more macro level ‘the industry’ better get its act together and start to pin point preferred OS’s, browsers etc. and not let this jungle take over. There is no doubt that when the environment will be more standard, a plethora of new services will evolve.
5. AJAX (Web 2.0) meets WML / XHTML (Mobile 0.5 ) - not a problem! The mobile and PC web experiences are not meant to be the same. Stop raping the mobile phone with overly rich ‘web like experience’. On the mobile it is highly important to focus on simple and fast flows so not having the rich PC environment is not as big disadvantage as you think. A good and simple WAP page, can provide the required experience. In any case just like I mentioned above - focus on value (and now I am adding..) usability first and technology second. All in all exciting times are ahead. The paradigm shift I am seeing is that the mobile device will be my ‘handy’ extension to my mobile life…which can be used and enjoyed on the mobile device but has extensions on the PC and TV as well. As such, when designing such services one needs to think of the three dimensional ‘fused’ world we live in, serving real life / valuable scenarios and NOT focus on connecting two or three technological dots.
Gil Rosen
Track with:
MEM2007 Insights - Kids Know Better
by Aner Ravon
Saturday June 09th 2007, 1:19 pm
Filed under:
web 2.0,
Aner Bio,
mobile,
user experience,
walled garden,
3G,
google,
nokia,
advertising,
MEM2007
I spent the week in Monaco at MEM2007. From the personal perspective it was a very exciting show, after all, first time HOOQs was on display. From that perspective we had an excellent show - great feedback and lots of users and leads. We have work cut out for us, but the good news is that the market is HOT! The need for personalized, open, operator independent web to mobile services is all over the place and is welcomed by users, operators, content providers, analysts and bloggers.
MEM2007 is not really a classic exhibition, it’s more of a conference. Participation is nearly exclusive to industry insiders and the tracks, therefore, are very professional. To a start-up-ist, these represent rare opportunities to take a 30,000 feet view and collect some insights that extend beyond the daily challenges. My own personal climax was not a single industry lecture or panel, even though all were very interesting at their own merit. To me, the most insightful session was a focus group with 10 different teenagers. These young adults were gathered from different countries - Australia, England, France, Italy, Finland, Germany - and were all surveyed about their digital lives. Here is some of what they told us:
1. The key elements teenagers look for in their mobile phones is appearance. Then come ability to play music, quality of camera and feature richness.
2. Nokia is the most popular handset brand. Out of the 10 participants, 5 had Nokias, 2 had Samsungs, 2 had LGs (Chocolate) and 1 had a Sony Ericsson. 7 out of 10 devices were 3G.
3. They don’t do mobile clients - only 1 participant ever downloaded a mobile application. A game. Used it a couple of times and ditched it.
4. Teenagers are smart shoppers. They don’t mind paying for Internet content, but hate buying stuff they can easily find for free. In other words, they will not buy songs for 3 Euros a pop. Contrary to popular belief, they buy a lot of CDs in addition to downloading free music. They know how to manage their music collection and how to get their favorite music on their mobile device.
5. On they other hand, all participants testified they would gladly buy new content if only they could find it easily. All participants agreed that the mobile operator portals are close to impossible to navigate through.
6. On top, the differences between operators and handsets make it impossible for users to share experiences. Not tracks or clips - pure information about where and how to find them!
7. They things they on their handsets are better Internet browsing and memory. They really don’t get why MP3 and Video enabled phones come with such little memory.
8. They don’t mind advertising if it makes content free. They are already used to online ant TV advertising, why object to mobile ads?
9. They all tried Google on their mobile and didn’t like it. The mobile experience does not provide anything close to the internet experience.
10. They don’t do MMS. All of them tried and all of them claim that “it doesn’t work”.
11. If they had to give up their TV, Mobile Phone or PC, 9 out of 10 would give up their TV (the only other answer was PC). None would let go of their mobile phone.
These young adults were not screaming in a vacuum. It was great to hear executives from operators presenting plans to further breakdown their walled gardens and push flat data rates. It seems like it’s only a question of price points now. This is music to the ears of user centric service providers. To me, however, getting the bartenders in front of our booth excited and HooQed was most rewarding than anything!
Aner Ravon
Track with:
The iPod Generation dance
by Gil Rosen
The video you are about to watch is very special:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TOXoplVTcfY
I didn’t plan on take this footage or write about it, but it turned out more than post worthy. What you are witnessing is the first time my son has ever used an iPod. As you can see, for him its bliss. A simple, innocent, unpretentious, pure moment where beat meets mind and mind moves body. That, in itself, is probably of no interest to anyone but myself, so why do I care to put it here and write about it? Well, encapsulated in this moment are a few notes that represent how far we have advanced and how backwards we still are:
1. Past sharing = take a vinyl to a friend and play it. No piracy issues. Today = filetype? zune? iPod? player? protected? criminal?
2. Past song=song. Today Song=song/rintone/truetone/mp3/wav/drm/vidclip/cover/bitrate
3. Past music capacity = house shelf space. Today = disk space = $ dad will pay for next iPod.
4. Past 1000 songs = truck. Today 10,000 songs = pocket.
5. Past music = moving parts. Today music = on the move.
6. Past sharing = serenade. Today sharing = P2P
7. Past selling point = city center. Today selling point = planet earth.
8. Past phone = speak. Today (mobile) phone = another music player.
9. Past download = garbage in the house. Today download = music from net.
10. Past (corporate) promotion = Top of the Pops. Today (self) promotion = myspace.
11. Past recommend = talk to friend. Today recommend = something.web20.com
There is no doubt we have come a long way. A very long way. The biggest open issues remain compatibility and legality. The fact that 30 years ago it was easier to go places and “just play a song” whereas today it turns into a techno_legal symposium is mind boggling.
Over time this absurd will be resolved. By the time my son will be my age he will be able to continue to do what everyone should when listing to music - simply, innocently, unpretentiously, purely… dance!
Gil Rosen
Track with:
5Min.com - Great Use of Your Time!
by Aner Ravon
Always had the urge to spread the word on how to draw a perfect Superman? Or perhaps you’re looking to make your first steps as a DJ? If you love teaching or if you simply want to learn something new everyday without breaking a sweat then 5min.com is the place for you.
5Min.com is a new place for sharing short user generated video tutorials. The concept is stunningly simple and powerful; Video sharing networks have not captured that vital niche and expert networks are limited mostly to text. 5min.com jumps on that gap and covers it with style.
The destination itself is well categorized and designed. It is populated with pretty high quality content despite launching only a few days ago. The features demonstrate good depth as well. The tutorial creator lets “tutors” add textual storyboards and the Smart Player (really shique!) offers “students” the ability to view parts in slow motion, frame by frame and so forth. It’s very easy to envision quick spillover to YouTube and MetaCafe channels and to personal blogs and websites. It is also a great place for guerrilla marketers to pitch their goods. Clearly huge potential.
The founding team is comprised of Ran Harnevo, Hanan Lashover and Tal Siman-Tov. Ran also serves as CEO.
Who said fun cannot be serious? Enough said, go check it out!
Aner Ravon
Track with:
Nokia, Google and Yahoo Square Off Over Mobile Killer App
by Aner Ravon
Saturday March 31st 2007, 11:11 am
Filed under:
web 2.0,
Convergence,
mobile,
user experience,
ctia,
walled garden,
3G,
search,
google,
nokia,
yahoo,
lgCTIA fueled some significant mobile news this week as Google, Nokia and Yahoo are about to crash helmets over the next mobile killer app.
Google has made a couple of significant steps this week. The more significant announcement came on Monday, as a strategic deal with LG was announced. Mike Evant reports that Google and LG will preinstall Google Maps, Gmail and Blogger on a wide variety of LG phones, making it a no brainer for carriers to ship and for users to try.
In addition, YouTube will be launching a mobile site as soon as the exclusivity period with Verizon Wireless expires. Unlike the Verizon version which is client based, the mobile YouTube will be WAP based. It will be interesting to see how YouTube deals with video streaming issues across different carriers, networks and devices. All in all a “two punch strategy”, Google for text and YouTube for video, could end up being very effective.
Nokia has not kept quiet. Unwired view is telling us about Nokia’s patent bound semantic visual search engine, screen shots and further explanation of the search process is provided. Katie Fehrenbacher speculates about the natural synergy with Nokia’s camera phones and if half the rumors are true, Google will soon have to go back to protecting home turf, at least when it comes to search innovation.
Yahoo has not kept silent and may very well be making the most concrete steps to date. The introduction of Mobile OneSearch is a promising mass market step, taking search to every internet enabled phone. Yahoo already offers Yahoo Go, the full blown Yahoo experience, to the high end, and together with OneSearch a comprehensive strategy seems to be forming.
These seemingly little steps are very significant for a number of reasons. Such proactive steps by handset manufacturers and web titans take the carriers further out of the “next killer app” equation. In addition, these provide indication that search, rich content discovery and messaging are the areas where the leading players look for the next killer app. Search has never been carrier territory and carriers have struggled with putting together winning propositions around content. On the other hand carriers do make a lot of money from content and tons of money from messaging. The battle over who owns what asset is definitely not over, but this time, I believe, the space is mature enough to focus on the criteria for splitting the larger pie rather than fighting over who gets to burn it.
Aner Ravon
Track with:
The iPhone - The Modern Sasquatch
by Gil Rosen
MacNN reports that “iPhone makes rare appearance at CTIA - Apple’s iPhone has surfaced in the public eye after a long absence”. Have we all gone insane? I mean, I wrote a poem about it but even that can be excused as a ‘momentary lapse of reason’ driven by the peer pressure that surrounds the digiworld we live in.
A few months passed and I thought we all kicked our hangovers by now. There are still open issues such as battery power, touch screen usability, price, quality of service (no one really knows) etc.
When you encounter a beautiful craft for the first time you tend to ignore the obvious impediments and focus on the romantic and the fantastic. That’s great. Then we should snap out. That is what separates the “men from the boys”. The responsible adult can get excited but also keep realistic.
I found this hilarious widget on apples website - the sasquatch news tracker. If you haven’t snapped out of it yet I this one is for you. Never miss a public appearance, a mysterious unveiling, a behind the scenes glimpse…ooooh
having said that…I still want one badly
Gil Rosen
Track with:
Symbian Upgrade Blows a Hole in the Wall
by Aner Ravon
GigaOM reports that Symbian is about to announce a significant upgrade to its operating system on Monday at CTIA. According to ABI Research, Symbian held a commanding 73% market share of the loosely defined Smart-phone market in 2006, resulting in about 50 Million shipments.
Improvements include battery and memory management, camera and multimedia enhancements and the introduction of transparent and automatic roaming between WiFi and 3G. MobHappy brings the full details.
The upgrade is very significant for a number of reasons. Symbian is reaching out of the Smartphone niche. The multimedia boost, for example, is clearly a consumer focus. Push email and Voip are communication apps and not “business apps” anymore. Symbian is slowly but surely building an attractive and real consumer position, realizing that the higher end market would pay a little more for high quality feature phone.
The introduction of transparent WiFi - 3G roaming is even more significant. While full handset OEM support is needed, this has the potential of making operator independent mobile internet actually usable. Very few users actually bother with switching networks on an ongoing basis. Making the switch automatic would not only reduce costs for the end user, it would also break a wide open hole in the walled garden. And this does not only apply to browsing but to the very core - phone calls. Now, I don’t see Mobile VOIP going mainstream very soon, but I definitely see a gradual uptake, mostly by the cream of the crop from an operator point of view - the travelling professionals.
How will Operators deal with this? Good question. So far everybody’s happy with the containment of Symbian devices as “Smartphones”. It makes it easy for everyone to avoid a clash. Some operators force vendors to take off the WiFi feature for now (Cingular and Nokia E62 for example). Some put a more constructive focus on upgrading their 3G networks. In any case, it’s all a prelude to the unavoidable reshuffle of the mobile universe.
Aner Ravon
Track with:
Joost is a World Wonder Facing a Huge Roadblock
by Aner Ravon
I have Joost on my computer and it’s practically a new world wonder. Finally, a TV app that looks great and works even better. The user experience is absolutely flawless - sexy, simple, cool. It blends the benefits of TV and Computer interaction very well and the quality of the video itself is the best I have seen. Even the inserted ads don’t look intrusive, perhaps because we are all so used to ad-raping by network TV by now. These folks are doing something right.
But will it succeed? I see one, huge, problem. It can’t be used at work! And what is the only place left without TV access? That’s right. Work!
Let’s take a look at the successful viral apps of the last decade - Instant Messaging, P2P File Sharing, Skype, Blogging. All have one great thing in common - we can safely use them at work. I am not referring to IT security because most of us couldn’t care less about IT security. I am referring to job security. The ability to play hookie without getting caught. IM and Kazaa could simply run in the background and consume very sporadic attention. You can download a file and write a post without drawing the attention of your roommates, or worse, of your boss. And you can minimize all in a split second if someone walks behind your back.
Can you do that with Joost? Nope. TV is TV. It takes up your attention and it’s intrusive to the environment. Wearing headphones is possible in some places, but then the detachment from the environment is so complete one cannot really sit back and enjoy without keeping an eye on the door. This practically means Joost will hardly be used at work but at home. Except that at home we have a great alternative already - a 30+ inch TV with gazillions of channels.
Which means the premier target audience, for now at least, are kids playing in their room behind closed doors, assuming they have attention span left to squeeze between MySpace, TV and PlayStation. While I don’t underestimate the huge potential of that target audience, I don’t think it’s up to par with the wide audience and virgin attention span IM, Kazaa or Skype enjoyed.
Then again, Joost has all the right ingredients. P2P technology is definitely mature enough for Video on Demand. You couldn’t ask for better founders - both in terms of technology and of marketing. We are all really, really tired of outdated TV content distribution models and Joost will have no trouble at all getting a first time look by any reasonable user.
They should be smart enough to have a plan for that problem too. I am just curious to see what that is.
Aner Ravon
Track with:
Swallow My Tongue, Eat My Hat, Google App Rocks!
by Aner Ravon
After I got busy trashing Google Apps, I finally received a human support callback today (thanks Sonya!). We managed to fix the CNAME and MX issues, got it up and running and ladies and gents, it Rocks!
I still think this whole domain administration challenge is an absurd, but the result is rewarding:
1. Straight forward company Intranet.
2. We are all on the same calendar, each one of us not compromising access to the personal one as well.
3. Our docs and spreadsheets are aggregated.
4. VERY easy administration.
5. We already know how to use it from our previous experience with Google.
While clearly not an enterprise solution (and not even a medium size business solution) Google Apps is an excellent solution for the Internet Savvy / SoHo.
Aner Ravon
Track with:
Google’s Latest Trick
by Aner Ravon
The devils greatest trick was convincing man that he didn’t exist, Baudelaire
Our informal corporate motto is “Don’t be evil.” Google Code of Conduct
It’s been a week since I tried moving my company to Google Apps.
(1) My domain has yet to be verified.
(2) My Partner still has no access to his old calendar.
(3) My support call has yet to receive a human or a relevant response.
I did get an automated response though, a totally useless one that copied text from the website, text I was intelligent enough to read in the first place.
Hello Google Support!! Anybody Home??
Aner Ravon
Track with:
Fontip & The power of Shnick-Shnack
by Gil Rosen
Shnick-Shnack is not a word you’ll find in Webster or in Wikipedia but it should get there soon. In one of my recent trips to Europe, someone quoted a big shot CEO for one of the leading mobile operators as saying early in 2000 that “ringtones are shnick-shnacks” or in other words “irrelevant” OR “not significant” ….yada yada yada, 7 years later, they have generated a multi-billion dollar industry.
The context of the conversation was one of humbleness. One should not dismiss what seems like a shnick-shnack service at a wave of hand, with a dismissive ..“…this will never catch on…” attitude. Sometimes people want shnick-shnacks. Sometimes shnick-shnacks let you get personal, express yourself. Fontip is just that kind of thing.
Simply put, Fontip provides what’s called FMS or Font Messaging Service (yes…you ain’t a startup unless you invent a new abbreviation). Using Fontip’s mobile client every mobile user can send colorful text messages combined with jumpy icons and crazy slangons. Its kind of like
incredimail for SMS.
Is this shnick-shnack of what
Incredimail is another perfect example for a shnick-shnack service. Do you really need it?No. Does it solve any technological barrier? No. Is it innovative in a way that can’t be duplicated? No. Yet these are ‘VC type’ questions. People have psychological motivations and drives and look for services that answers such needs regardless of passing the ‘investment benchmark’ checklist.
If Fontip is first to serve the need to personalize sms’s and does it well, there is no reason why it can’t be a huge success. Making communications personal (and cool) has landed Incredimail with a huge install base with around 50 million client downloads!
Will Fontip follow suite? I’m no prophet but there is no reason why they shouldn’t. There is no reason why out of the billions of SMS users there will not be enough ‘personalization’ freaks that will go ahead and down load it.
Competition may come from the handset providers, with them creating built tools or similar services, but with such a wide audience there should be a room for them all.
Is this another 7 billion dollars shnick-shnack market, probably not, but the power of shnick-shnack has surprised before.
Gil Rosen
Track with:
Google Apps? Na-ah!
by Aner Ravon
I was really excited when Google announced the rebirth of Apps. My expectations were high due to two main reasons. First of all, it takes a mega brand to do mass market education. I love Zoho, Clarizen and 37Signals, but they are not big enough to drive non-high tech SMEs to the web in masses. Perhaps more importantly, Google have so far managed to apply a “creative chef touch” to online office. GMail, Google Talk, Google Spreadsheets, Google Docs have all displayed freshness that kept the good essence of MS office but went beyond just mimicking; They managed to capture the value of the web over desktop - simplicity, easy collaboration and pure web elements such as free, advertising and blogging.
Then something happened. I really needed a solution for my company. A Solution for simple task and project management and for document sharing. Something not too expensive. Naturally I went online and started with Google Apps. I sadly found out that not only is Google Apps just a new marketing wrap for old stuff, it also has major flaws.
First of all, you need to manipulate your domain DNS to get started. Repeat, manipulate your DNS - CNAME, MX record and other Latin names. Why? Why do I need to touch the CNAME in order to start doing online task management on my domain? Can’t you verify my identity in some other way? It took me an hour just to figure out what to do (and I used to work at this!). Oh, one more little details, it takes about 48 hours for DNS changes to populate the Internet, which means I am still waiting for a verification in order to get started. Hard work and a 48 hour wait! What a contradiction to the whole concept! Do you seriously expect businesses to migrate this way?
During the process something “funny” happened. My partner’s Google calendar (which was registered to his work address, the one I was trying to activate) was deactivated. deactivated! He didn’t understand why he lost access to his calendar all of a sudden. I had to unregister his user at my still not working Google Apps suite. Luckily his calendar ”returned” after about an hour.
I put a stop to it right there. This was clearly half baked. All I needed was effective task management for 15 people in the first place. I checked out Zoho Projects, which seemed like a great web application but an overkill for simple task management. I finally landed on 37Singal’s Basecamp and got started. What a relief! Simple, easy to get started, works. it took me 15 minutes to get started. My colleagues got the hang of it in less than 10 more.
I’m going to stay off Google office for a while. Let me know when it’s usable.
Aner Ravon
Track with:
NBA and YouTube Sign Deal! Hallelujah!
by Aner Ravon
The NBA and YouTube announced a deal today, finally making a significant step towards real collaboration between a blockbuster brand and a user generated community.
David Stern gets it. Mixing original content with the pile of semi-legit content will improve the overall result and exposure. And yes, it will push the NBA brand to new markets and demographics it has yet to conquer.
According to the reports, NBA original clips will be aggregated under a dedicated YouTube NBA channel (Pete Cashmore reports about the details). Frankly, I am not going to watch any pre-edited channel, I have other websites and TV channels for that. To me, the most important thing is to find NBA clips will within search results.
Way to go. I wonder what Mark Cuban has to say.
Oh, and is there any chance EUFA will follow? Yeah right…
Aner Ravon
Track with:
The death of the Mobile Operators’ Closed Garden and the Dawn of the Smart Pipe
by Gil Rosen
3GSM was overwhelming - Any trade show that takes you more then three straight days to walk through is. From system integrators, content providers, enablers, device manufactures - the industry has indeed matured.
Out of the hustle of such a big event, there is one mega trend that I’d like to focus on - the death of the closed garden and the emergence of the smart pipe.
To understand why this is happening I think we need to quickly examine the role of the ‘Garden’ and see how it came to be in the the first place.
Many Internet years ago, when the world wide web had just started reaching mobile devices, when such devices were few, when they were expensive and of with horrible quality of service - mobile operators felt obligated to fill the default Internet home page with mobile adapted content. This, in turn, was supposed to have given users a good enough reason to surf from their mobile. The mobile content market was non existent and there was simply depth for users to find their own content. In addition, the companies providing mobile content were inexperienced and scarce. WAP was a techie buzzword, but all consumers got was a poor and slow experience, very much inferior compared to what they were getting used to on the PC.
Ego was (and still is) another factor. Yes, pure ego. Mobile operator executives believed (some still believe) that the mobile Internet should not be free as the “PC” Internet. The basic “rational” was that since they controlled the ‘gateway’ already they could and should control the content. This attempt is similar to what AOL has done very successfully for a long time - provide your subscribers with a content portal through which most of the content was consumed.
Most users have supposedly basic needs and when information is prearranged for them - they supposedly just use it, many times being unaware of the rich world beyond the fence. In the regular (PC) world it would be unheard of to have your ISP control your content but in the mobile world it became the de-facto reality.
The accumulated result drove many operators to try and develop in-house content divisions whose sole purpose was to fill the portal with content and services. Since part of the problem was the scarcity of the content, this was a necessary evolutionary step for the mobile Internet to develop. Someone had to get the snow ball rolling.
Today, I believe, the snowball has reached its critical mass ad guess what? People want more. Almost all new devices come with Internet connectivity, screen quality is good, connectivity fast/er, mobile content is abundant, mobile applications easy to install, WAP is rich, an open mobile billing ecosystem is in place, there is an understanding that the mobile web is different (more passive then active), services and sites have developed accordingly and most importantly users are getting more sophisticated. They actually know how to reach the web, save bookmarks and change default settings, all in all leading to the maturity level required to change the closed garden model as we know it.
My argument is not that the portal is dead, but that it can no longer be closed. Operators must focus on two major and parallel agendas:
1. Provide users with selected, popular, edgy content through the portal - a good example is mobile TV. Mobile TV broadcast is not mature enough to be outside the portal.
2. open the portal and work hard on partnering / enabling third party, independent, niche content/service providers serve users directly. Let users roam the mobile Internet world and reach places that are far from the portal as could be - and actually promote it. When more users will roam free, the more they will understand how to use it better and increase their data consumption, overall benefiting the mobile operators more then anyone else.
The almost incredulous statement I am making is that there is such a thing as mobile Internet. There isn’t! The mobile device is only a terminal. The Internet is the same Internet only viewed by a different lens. Its the years of indoctrination that have led most people to perceive them as two separate universes.
For several years now I have heard Mobile operator executives fearful of what they call becoming a dumb pipe. I don’t know who invented this word, but the psychological association in it has made the industry paranoid of what can be (and in my mind should be) the modus operandi for making loads of money - and its far from being dumb.
Becoming a pipe that effectively channels content while creating adequate processes for billing, content delivery and quality of service assurance (and a ton of other things) is very sophisticated, far from dumb. Dumb is thinking you rule the world. Smart is understanding your users want more choice then you (as an operator) can ever supply. Happy customers and loyal. That is the focus.
Focusing on loyalty through openness and wide selection of added value service, whether in house or external, is the right challenge ahead. Trying to win ground by holding on to something that is not yours is a battle all ready lost.
Gil Rosen
Track with:
The Wow Stopped Yesterday
by Francois Depayras
The marketing genius who picked out “Vista” must have been looking at this definition: a far-reaching mental view: vistas of the future.
It is, after all, a pretty good name.
Right after though, was the following definition: a view or prospect, esp. one seen through a long, narrow avenue or passage, as between rows of trees or houses.
A week ago, high from caffeine and the arrival of a newly purchased PowerBook Pro, I decided to use Boot Camp to install Windows on my Mac (gasp). Now, now, prior to a slew of negative comments, I am not a complete Mac-head. I love my ThinkPad and its bulbous battery allowing for hours of fun-filled Excel exploration while flying to gay Paris.
Having learned from previous mistakes, I started with a gentle installation of Windows XP SP2. Smooth, done in 45 mn, works like a charm (I won’t go through the install procedures, they’re explained elsewhere and it’s not the topic). 5 gigs of space taken out of 20, I was close to fitting my 17gig of email (yes, the IT guys love me). Feeling gutsy, I erased XP and installed Vista.
Hot dog, this UI looks better than my beloved OS X??? Yes, yes, I can see the touches of genius here: the slick start-up and login screen, the dark toolbar with a very elegant background. Wait, are these good looking icons I see? Well, well… someone’s been learning.
Checking the hard drive size, this bad boy clocked at a hefty 17 gigs! It’s good to know that America is not the only thing that’s obese nowadays.
After getting a few blue screens of death and missing drivers (Boot Camp does not support Vista yet), I was impressed enough with what I’d seen – and a sucker for running the latest and greatest – I upgraded the Thinkpad… The IT guys had not heard from me in a couple of days and I figured they were getting bored without my antics.
Installation went without a hitch. Desktop looked good. I started noticing the blatant OS X parts.
Signed up as an administrator. Kept it clean with nothing but MS Office 2007 (oooooh, larger icons), Yahoo! Messenger, MSN Messenger, ActivePDF and Quicktime. That’s it. Pretty restraint.
Then it started.
Outlook Web Access wouldn’t work anymore (wait, it’s “normal” to see an “X” icon in the compose window with IE 7… Ok, so there is a patch. Alleluiah. I’ll download and run it.
Neuuuuh, not so fast my fearless friend. You could be a phenomenal foe and need to run this as an administrator (I guess that’s what it means because the error message was actually: “THE REQUESTED OPERATION REQUIRES ELEVATION.”)
My karma must be shit for Windows to tell me I need to elevate myself.
Not a problem, I’ll change the user setting. Nope, already an admin… Mmm, let me check online. Oh, I see, it’s quite simple really: one only has to right click on the application and select “run as administrator” to watch the install, er… fail.
Alternatively, you can easily access the Command Line Interface and install as admin from there. Right then, like whistling in the shower. Expect for the slight disadvantage of HAVING TO RUN A COMMAND LINE INTERFACE TO LAUNCH AN .EXE!
Remember the joke on Windows 95 = Macintosh 1984, yeah, I thought that was funny too. Well, here we are with Vista (don’t be shy, read the definition above once more and let it soak in) and we’re back to CLI. I can’t tell you the joy of running an application through that puppy. Yeah, who needs a mouse? Finally, it told me that my 30 free gigs weren’t enough storage to install the hotfix.
I called my shrink.
I talked. He mainly listened.
It felt good.
He told me to update my version of Windows before doing anything I might regret. Then he hung up because he was on a VoIP line and downloading a file that was sucking his bandwidth.
I updated (there were 8 updates within 10 days of the release) knowing full well this wouldn’t change the problem but needed some fresh air. The screen went black and asked if it was ok if Windows Updater was unresponsive. I didn’t find the F U button combination, so I clicked on “yes”. It crashed.
After that, I added Firefox to my list of apps, just so I could run Outlook Web Access. Ironic
Ctrl+Alt+Tab doesn’t do much either. I haven’t been able to stop a crashed app yet. It‘s cool though; I actually like rebooting: it’s my favorite part of the OS.
I could go on. The “blackening” of the entire screen each time some communication with the outside world happens asking if “I allow”.
“Windows need your permission to use this program.”
“Windows need your permission to continue.”
Why do I prevent pop-up windows on my browser if I get even more in my OS?
You can thank the User Account Control (UAC) for this, which basically transforms any administrator into a de facto user. Whhhhhaaat? Ok, thankfully, it’s fairly easy to turn off, once you know about it.
And that is my other gripe with the OS. I haven’t opened a manual in years but there are so many choices and funky details going on, I’m not comfortable with the basic functionality.
Yep, the Wow starts here. It’s taking me twice as long do tweak things in the control panel (good luck finding your way there) and I don’t understand half of the “features” – which is a bummer because I’ve always pride myself in being so computer avant-guardist and quite nifty for a non techy. Guess Microsoft finally wanted to show guys like me who was the smartest. Well done, boys, well done.
I like the icons and the 3-D thingy when doing an alt-tab. Interestingly, that’s the type of details that enhances the experience. It’s a shame that a fruit-named company has been laughed at for focusing exactly on enhancing the user experience for the past 20 odd years.
Bottom line? Love the icons, boys.
And the theme.
Kicks ass.
Really.
Francois Depayras
Track with:
Musicovery! Web 2.0 at it’s best!
by Aner Ravon
My buddy Ofer Kalisky referred me to, Musicovery, a BEAUTIFUL Interactive Music Discovery site. I have no idea who the people behind the company are (the corporate identity is hidden), but the creators seem both smart and fun loving!
Musicovery is an open, web radio service. You begin your journey with a navigation widget that helps you pinpoint your starting point according to genre, mood, and era. The widget itself is beautiful, but the real kick is when you start listening. The interactive music map is really cool and intuitive. I keep on playing with it.
Oh, the business model… It kind of looks simple as well. Referrals to Amazon and iTunes for purchasing.
Is simple beautiful or what?
Aner Ravon
Track with:
Cartoons and Animation are not Video
by Aner Ravon
Pete Cashmore reports about MyToons, “YouTube for Cartoons”, that has gone beta. Aniboom has been live for some time now and is quite an impressive site.
Which brings about the obvious question - can Cartoon or Animation communities hold their own against YouTube? After all, it’s pretty much the same territory. Theoretically, all YouTube needs to do is add a category and customize the interface a little bit. This, by itself, will deter most VCs on grounds of competitive advantage, or lack thereof.
But the point is different. Animators are not some kids sharing Coca Cola and Mentos videos. They need dedicated, undivided attention, like most of us would demand for our own passion. I haven’t seen MyTunes (I don’t have an invitation yet) but Aniboom definitely speaks to it’s crowd better than a generic site like YouTube.
The same applies, of course, to other horizontal services. Think of search for a minute. Do you really think Google search is good enough for all verticals and niches? Of course not! But would a VC invest in a search start up right now? Hmm….
Aner Ravon
Track with:
Conference mania – the tree holocaust!
by Gil Rosen
I am hectically preparing for 3GSM in Barcelona next week. A great venue by all standards. As a presenter, there is a mountain of collateral to prepare - the service overview, the technical white paper, the content provider offering, the mobile operator offering, the stand background, the poster, the this, the that.
So here I am trying to do what most people do before a show and then it strikes me what a waste it all is. We all know but hardly admit that most of these papers will be thrown away or at best looked at very briefly. And what do we do about it? Nothing.
This stupid (sorry, couldn’t find a better word) march of industry clones that exchange papers from one hand to the next and on to the closest waste basket. We often even deliver the paper overseas and back into our offices and then throw it or put it on some shelf to stand there as a silent testimonial “we were there” … but rarely look at it again. The one or two times we do take another look is come preparation time for the next show – then we pick it up and see what interesting ideas we can use for this year’s show – and so the paper parade continues and no-one is shouting that the king has no clothes.
It’s not that the information within is useless, it has some (limited) value. That too is usually filled with empty promises and a stack load of buzzwords. That I could take. But why for heaven’s sake do we need to kill so many trees in the process?
The same info, the same sheets should not leave their original electronic formats. They should stay on websites, PCs, USB drives, you name it – put please do not print it.
We can be very critical of our politicians for not doing enough to save the world BUT WHAT DO WE DO ABOUT IT in our closed garden? NADA.
I would like to see the first mobile / web / telecom etc. tradeshow pick up the challenge and declare – PRINTABLE MATERIALS ARE BANNED!
Simple and to the point. It will not harm the venue quality, even help it. All these carry-on bags are useless. You want to give me something – tell me where to look it up online, transfer me an electronic file. Anything but paper.
It is we that are destroying the forests in Brazil, not someone else! Its about time we put an end to this killing spree.
Gil Rosen
Track with:
Design-geneering the iPhone [and a poem]
by Gil Rosen
iSee thy iphone and iThink
Will my iWallet weather in iBlink
iDream thy iPod iHave will stretch
and into an iPhone will iMiracle create
Hey Steve iHope, iDream thy truth become
iDesire thy iPhone to be my one.
iHope thy wait will be iShort
iPatience can not uphold
Oh thy iPhone what have you done
An iChild and iDiot I have become
When you look at the iPhone, whatever you think about it - one thing can’t be ignored:
THE DESIGN IS NOT JUST THE SURFACE, ITS IN THE TOTALITY OF THE PRODUCT.
Noone can escape that notion. Just like fractals, the closer you look, the more evident the design DNA is.
Take the Motorola razor, the winner of numerous design awards and undoubtedly the phone that saved Motorola. The design of the clam shell is unique, the phone’s dimensions are impressive but when you look beyond the skin its shortcomings are in abundance - Motorola have failed to expand innovative physical design to the other ‘parts’ of the phone. Motorola traditionally deliver one of the worst graphical user interfaces of any mobile phone on the market today. There is a total disconnect between the shell (literally speaking) and the inside.
The revolution that Apple brings to the mobile phone industry is its TOTALITY, and its not ‘clam’ deep.
I sometimes look at the Razor with all its awards and think that Motorola might have fluked it.
Why? because it was inconsistent with anything they did in the past, because ever since they did it, their biggest innovation has been to change its colors, because its all about the clam and not about the GUI. It’s a very good design fluke.
Is the iPhone a fluke?
All of the lame prophets (myself included) of the iPhone imagined an iPod with a keyboard. We took two existing bricks (phone and music player) and imagined how they looked after a head on clash.
Apple’s approach was different. To come up with what we see today there must have been such a revisit to the whole concept of the cell phone, that the WHY’s must have been flying left and right. Why keyboard, why right, left,center key - why, why, why. And when the pieces were put back together (with talent of course) the outcome is as great as the guts it took to do it.
Nokia, Motorola, Samsung and company had more resources and time to focus on phones and yet what we see every year is an iteration on the year before. And when they do come up with something innovative (Razor shape), its good enough for them, they’ll take care of more innovation next year/release/model. They (mostly) treat mobile phones as plastic commodities that need better screen resolution and memory for the next release. in contrast and much like the iTune-iPod symbiotic relationship, iPhone is not only about the inside and out, they planed a whole eco-system.
Apple has yet to prove the iPhone is a big seller, have yet to prove its reliability as a cell phone, have yet to prove their sustainability in the mobile industry - that is in their future. What they have proved is that design and engineering should be and are meant to be one of the same. That separating the two creates less than perfect results.
Design is not king - Design-geneering is.
Gil Rosen
Track with:
wallop? Walleap!
by Gil Rosen
Whether it was their intention or not, the “GUI statement” is a defining theme for the new Microsoft spinout social network.
Every flow, from the registration, navigation to the opening of a new window, is different than what you have been used to. For the first few minutes I felt like I landed in widget land. I am not implying this is bad, it just takes a while to adjust to.
A few notes from my brief first impression:
1. Taking a brave GUI direction has its hitches. I once got totally lost in my lateral browsing trip and since there was no traditional use of the browsers’ back and forward keys it was hard to get oriented. I finally pressed “home” and had to guess my way back to someone else’s page. Suggestion - if you are doing an application that is totally based on flash provide a ‘path memory’ or some other type of ‘bread crumb’ mechanism.
2. Free form windows do provide freedom and personalization options that are beyond the boring drag and drop options offered by Netvibes or other me2.0 website around, but in extreme cases there were so many of them (widgets) open that i got dizzy (or maybe I’m getting old).
3. First time run - an often underestimated process was thought of very well, maybe too well. I got to the stage where I wanted to just start and the website still took me by hand from one point to the next.
4. Eco-system - bought myself a nice background for 0.40 Waller cents. I could see this picking up. If Second Life got people buying virtual real estate for money why not here
5. Advertising free environment - in the words of Kozmo Kramer “Its very refreshing..”
6. Question - what’s the plan for mobile? i think all social networks today need to plan for mobile access and interaction. Mobile is part of our life - it needs to be part of my social network.
My recap is as follows:
I have personally been part of many projects that wanted to take a leap, planned a leap, sketched a leap but eventually just didn’t do it. There are always 1000 reason why not - “people are not used to it”, “the CEO doesn’t like it”, “we don’t want to be first”, “its great but lets do the regular version and leave that for future versions (which are never done), “lets do the funky design in a special tab we’ll call “the lab” and on and on - you name it, the excuse exists.
What I really like about Wallop is the guts! The guts to try something new, the guts do to it all the way and not half assed, the guts to leave advertising out and build a whole eco-system/marketplace before they have critical mass, the guts to create a currency (Wallers), translating to the bottom line of the guts to do what you think rocks and go all the way.
To often these days we see great companies that churn out mediocre products because consensus had to be reached up in the management clouds. This could very much have been the reason for spinning out of Microsoft.
Being bold will not however buy you success, just like a party, the success of a social network is not all about the surroundings…but rather “Who’s in da’house” - The setting is great…lets see who they invite.
kudos to Karl, Sean and the rest of the team, this is a rocking start - good luck!
Gil Rosen
Track with:
Camera phones have finally Crossed the convergence Chasm
by Gil Rosen
I just returned from a four day trip with the family. That is my family, myself and 2.5 suitcases full of unneeded luggage (the notorious “Dump the Closet” system which sucks in mainly woman - you don’t choose what the kids are going to wear so you just bring their closet).
Anyway, I took my 4mpx Canon and the Nokia N73 equipped with a 3.2mpx camera with me. Before this vacation it the thought of leaving the Canon at home was inconceivable. I used to own a Sony Eriscsson with a 2mpx camera, which was very cool, but not nearly a real camera. Pictures were OK but once less then optimal lighting conditions set in the quality diminished quickly.
Not so with the N73.
When you say “camera phone”, you usually don’t mean a camera but a phone with a cool add-on. With the N73 this is not the case. Equipped with 1G memory card, I took 10’s of photos, a few short videos and came back a happy camper. The Canon didn’t even leave the hotel room. You can always use Picasa or Photoshop to apply your own special touch, but its really not necessary. Look at the below…honestly…does it look like a phone took that photo?
Press photo to see larger version
The N73 and the SonyErricson k800i make an important mark in the age of convergence. A Camera Phone (CP) TURN to Camera and a Phone (CAAP). The AA nuance is not trivial. This means I will probably not upgrade my 4mpx Canon rather prefer an upgraded release of any CAAP that will be equipped with a better lens. True - camera’s are not dead but pocket cameras are dying. For us, casual snappers that fill our Picasa / Flickr web albums with loads of senseless family, friends, you name it moments….a CAAP generation will be the obvious choice.
Now where do I see the regular digital camera market going? First of all it’s about innovation. A wi-fi phone, a super slim phone (that doesn’t hurt lens quality) Anything to make it super cool and worthy of carrying it alongside my CAAP. I can imagine more JV’s in the likes of SonyErricson - A NokiaNikon etc. is not something that would surprise me. In the same way the iPod has to be equipped with a 20G-40G memory for me to consider it over my …once again phone. Here too the manufactures will have to keep on their toes and provide extra value over an above a developing CAAP category.
Whichever way you look at it…the chasm has been crossed. Long live the CAAPs….
Gil Rosen
Track with:
