The 21st century with ubiquitous internet access has in my mind brought us four main categories of Personal Screen Media ( PSM).  When I think personal, I feel that with the growth of social media and the ability to be always connected to the internet, in many ways all screens will become somewhat personal as when you log-in or connect the interface and experience begins to optimize for that particular user.   They will not only have the ability to communicate and share with their community, but have channels of personal media consumption and privacy.   We may not think of a TV or a Decktop PC  as personal, but when a user may log-in, the experience and layout has morphed for that user.  Multiple people may access that device, but there definitely will be the growth of customized interfaces like we have seen especially in the PC world.  Other devices such as smartphones, ebooks and laptops are even more personal as usually they are occupied by only one user.

I have been thinking a lot these days about the different categories of media. Even though, I might see this different 6 months from now, at this juncture  for me it appears that there are really these basic four main areas of convergence and growth.   Although many people have classified the iPad as a completely new category, it is an entertainment and multimedia device at its core for consuming  mainly ” New Media” .  A lot of the creative input going into applications and content is coming from an entirely new exciting creative perspective.  We are seeing the same thing happening in parallel with Smart Phones….. growing rapidly to millions of Applications, crushing the portable game devices  and becoming your trusted assistant.

With Smart Phones we see this converge  quite rapidly with Navigation devices, portable game consoles, Music devices, etc…. Each category in many ways leads to a variety of deep differentiated categories  as products  simplify or expand with their own unique targets for price point and focus on certain types of media linking to the internet.

1) Personal Computer ( PC);   Laptop, Desktop computer

2) iTelevision; Large Screen TV’s, game consoles, Entertainment Systems

Google TV’s…..

3) Multimedia Computers; Smart Phones and Tablets

* We might say there is another category that is developed off of this as simpler more focused vertical products, such as portable game devices, navigation systems, music players, accessories, and other forms of entertainment devices.  These are the main devices for convergence today as they are growing as our wallet, our time piece, our portable map and our with our  engagement  loyalty programs.

4) eBooks;  Kindles, etc..

…. so when we are thinking of how many devices do you need to carry or have it is clear that with these 4 categories you are in a good position to consume all media.   Old and New, Fixed or Mobile.

I was touched by the crisp and thoughtful strategy presented by Jeff Bezos recently on Charlie Rose ( also covered by Techcrunch) .

Why?…… well the questions that Charlie Rose asked recently on this interview, have been no different from what any New York Times, Techcrunch or other Media have asked recently;  ” How are they going to compete against the tablet hype of the today, i.e. iPad”.  I felt that that really missed the point entirely.  Jeff Bezos did explain this quite well on what is needed for optimized book reading and a device that is focused clearly on that experience.  What he missed in my mind is drilling down into the real genius behind what Amazon has been doing with access, conversion and fufilling a business model for the old media world in a new media era .   Many ask and  compare the product and the category to the iPad, when it is categorically totally different.   It is like comparing a bicycle to a bullet train as if they were competing products?  Well you can bring your bicycle onto a bullet train, like you can get book titles onto an iPad or iPhone, I guess, but the key is in the usage and the experiences are totally different. eBooks are carving a way to bring centuries of literature into readable 21st century form.  Reading hours on end is clearly an area in user experience that must be optimized.   There are those that gravitate to something new ( such as in new media), and those that cherish and gravitate toward something in the past ( centuries of long-form media for reading).   As Jeff Bezos put it,  - You want the hardware to disappear and for the user to experience the book.

Collecting and consuming media on devices is like an antique collector vs. a Ferrari collector, I guess.   In this case, the News Media has been digging at the core of what is special about the creation of  ”New Media” and business models, when we have something incredible powerful going on here.   The eBook trend is now at the tips of our  fingertips to give us  the ability to get  access to all of the past readable media more readily…. like having those wonderful antiques to experience  right by your side.  As Amazon is now 600K titles strong, how long will it take to get to the 10′s of millions.

According to Wikianswers “How many books exist in the World”,  the answer  comes out to be 3.5Billion.  Most of these books are part of the “old media” and they are not “new media”.  Bringing them to live on an electronic device suited for reading can be a very powerful thing. When we think of “New Media” we might compare that to 700Million Websites ( A statistic I recently learned from a colleague at Google). The books of yesterday may have charts, pictures and have color, but fundamentally they are content in long-form  for researching and for sizable reading periods.  During the 1900′s with the growth of other media such as Radio and Television, the old media of books was paralleled by 20th century new media, but the amount of recorded songs or TV programs does not even come close to the number of 3.5Billion books.   For instance, the library of congress has over 18M books, alone.  So bringing this legacy of information, knowledge is like bringing the worlds libraries to not only access immediately, but to consume in the way we have done for centuries….simple book reading.

So the Kindle as the showcase product of the category “eBooks”  is bringing that “old media” into a more efficient way to consume and access.  This was very close to the original vision of Google ( Access to the worlds information)  that has seemed to morph quite significantly with their obsession for “new media and advertising as well”.   As we now see Google chasing the iPhone and iPad with their Android strategy in many ways they have become ” me too” in their strategy of new products evolution in a category that has been called the  ”Multimedia Computer”.  Maybe we will see simplified Google Android devices that will go head-to-head with the Kindle for purposes of reading as the main design priority.  This will be a very interesting addition to Google Books and Google Print, but it has not yet happened.

As Amazon grows with the Kindle, so will the tendency to migrate the mass numbers of literary form into simple eBooks.  It is clearly a unique additional convergence device worth having to take reading to the next level.

( See Next post on the categories of Personal Screen Media)

In a recent Media Post article yesterday, Steve Smith gives another jab at the mobile video industry- Lets Give Mobile Video a little Push.  However, even though I am a mobile guy myself, I have been quite frustrated with the lack of true delivered content online.  Well, I have looked at the $8.99/month on Netflix and I am avidly scouring to find good movies to watch on Hulu, but the world of mainstream movie media going online has yet to begin.  What will it take for this revolution to begin?  We saw the problems that surfaced in the TV industry between National and Syndicated TV over the major upheaval between Conan and Leno, but with broadband now so prevalent, and some shut-down of services such as Limewire and now the debate over Bittorrent, It makes you really wonder why the MPAA and other organizations are not taking this “horse by the reins” and moving forward with a better model for more distributed cross-channel media in the 21st century.  As it is 2010, how much longer will we have to wait to get proper available new titles and shows to be launched multi-platform. We saw how effective cross media distribution started to work for the Olympics in Vancouver 2010, as well as the World Cup 2010.

Will we need to wait for Steve Jobs to bring all of this via the Apple storefront?  Will it become Amazon’s next mission over eBooks? …Or will it take more file-sharing to just get this Industry so antagonistic and pissed off in order to make change?

As we can see in the advertising space, Hulu is clearly leading the charge with Ads served, but I feel for myself that users would be willing to pay for a reliable convenient service, even with some advertising like Hulu.   Look at what Jeff Bezos, CEO Amazon has been able to achieve with Amazon and the Kindle.  His goal is to get every book available with a 60sec search and download lead time.  They were able to get 600K titles in 33 months.  It should makes sense that we would be seeing this today for all media.  Where is this real giant to make this happen?  Google’s  Youtube just increased the upload lengths to 10minutes, but we need that one-shop-stop of 100′s of thousands if not Millions of movies…. Will Google Video and Google TV in the end be this answer for bringing this all together?  Well the alignment with the Hardware companies has in someway started to attack right in the gut of it all… Having this possibility from the get go right in the box might push users to drop those media cable payments only for more of these online subscription services?

As I have just relocated 50/50 to New York City, I have been subletting a space and do not have a TV.  It has been refreshing to be able to do everything online, but now and again I would like to kick-back and watch a new movie without having to go out and get the DVD ( or go to the theaters and pay $5 for Popcorn).   When I use Hulu, my choices are rather limited and I seem to be browsing through so much stuff from the 1990′s and older, that my interest level has dropped to zero.   Not much of a catalog for the 21st century.   Here is a snap-shop of what comes up in Action and Adventure titles in Hulu…. not that much leading edge stuff ( good, but not great as far as I know what they could do!)

So I then thought to try Netflix… for the $8.99 a month they do seem to have a bit better selection, but still they advertise with  21 leading titles, but this is really it! … Did not entice me to want to get locked into that payment scheme yet until I can feel that they are on-top of getting the best stuff, all the time.

I guess spending the $10~15 at the movie theater is the only real way to see the latest and greatest.  I beleive having a strategy that works along side the DVD releases could possibly be the way to go.  As Computer screens are getting better and better like true TV sets and TV sets are now becoming computer screens, why not have the same kind of pricing structure for starters that mimics the rental DVD business.   I know Netflix and Hulu guys are working hard at this everyday, but just making the movies available at the same price point would not only eliminate the need for me to either drive to pick up a DVD or even pay for the mail back and forth.   It would not only be convenient and add a bit more liquidity in choice that would most definitely bring more distribution and volume….. and think of how green it would be to not expend all that Gasoline.  I am not sure of the carbon footprint between a video stream and a ride to the local Movie Theater, but I would guess it is much less.  I guess the fear is still too great to digitize everything do to piracy, but is this not happening anyway. Does not take long to rip and upload a DVD that has been hacked these days. If Steve Jobs has shown everybody in the music business and the mobile application world that getting stuff out there in an easy and effective way to consume, users would be willing to pay…. We all know he is driving a low cost structure, but does it have to be so low to begin with. Get the stuff out there at the same standards and see what happens!

I feel that it is about time for not only a “little push” as Steve Smith says, but a ” big push” and gripe from consumers to bring us to the 21st century with all the content online and mobile.

Liz Gannes, published an article on NewTeeVee in 2008 decribing that by 2010 we would see 25% of all traditional TV viewers go Online to watch TV…. so is 25% not enough to kick start this revolution?   We are all waiting…. at least I am.

Users love their iPhone Accessories! Is Motorola strategy right to go negative? ( Recent blast by Motorola on NO Jacket Required!)

When iPhone4 launched, I could not stop thinking how much this design aligned to the thinking of a small device that could be mass-configured with changeable covers.  In many ways it is what Modu wants to become!  As I was a lead architect back in the 90′s when Nokia had the mass personalization effort around changeable covers,  we debated as to what would hold true in the future of personalization.  The mobile world has come a long way since the 90′s, but if you have a chance to watch Frank Nuovo on Charlie Rose in 2000, you will see clearly that Nokia had painted a very good picture of what was to come in the future on personalized experiences. Frank was a thought leader 10 years early…

What I beleive has happened is that we have evolved this  unique opportunity of two different types of devices.  Of course there is the personalization of the services and the overall internet, but I am referring to the Hardware aspects of personalization.  Mixing hardware with Fashion.

1) Devices that have hardware that is designed with fashion in mind that target a certain demographic. Multiple colors of the device, target look-n-feel to meet a certain market segment.   ( Mainly this has been the latest thinking of Android HW manufacturers, RIM, NOKIA, Microsoft)

2) Devices that are skinned down simple designed basics that then offer a chance for mass-customization via personalized accessories ( APPLE, MODU)

While Google Android, Nokia and RIM have gone down type 1),  Have a look at the recent announcement of Motorola with Android blasting Apple because they have a cover and used the Antenna issue as a way to market their products.   In many ways, I beleive this is unique approach as blasting them based on a feature, but why kill the Jacket?  As well, Nokia has recently abandoned the concept of simplicity with changeble covers ( Even though they invented it) to build full design elements to target certain demographics.   Then look at Microsofts KIN.  They build hardware to target a certain demo ( young students) and we saw where that went…

On the other hand we have two unique companies, Apple and Modu.  That are building out a strategy of a simple elegant product that is small and that is a starting block for massive personalization.  Yes, users can have the product on its own as it stands alone in its beauty, but how it fits into the accessory ecosystem is a key part of the overall product strategy.

I was sitting in a cafe recently and across the table from me was a police officer from the NYPD.   He was playing with his iPhone while waiting for his lunch to be served.  The beauty of all of this was that he had a very unique leather, urban with rubber jacket on his device! It matched his personal style and his needs.  iPhone’s basic design can reach everybody and then they have the ability to not only personalize the overall look, while still keeping the product small, but the user can as well customize the screen.    We will see Jackets of all kinds…. Metallica Jackets, New York Yankee Jackets…. Ferrari Jackets, as well as Company Jackets…. so what is wrong with the Jacket?

Even though Apple designed a product that was as small, simple and clean as they could go, with a fundamental beyond-physics strategy of embedding an antenna into the body of the product ( nobody had ever succeeded with this really in the history of mobility) they were bound to take criticism and it was a risk!  But in my mind a very amazing risk in that having this kind of simple product as a base to a variety of other accessories and architectures is an avenue to hardware personalization as a means of fashion.   They pushed the envelop to get the size as small as it could go with such a large screen and keeping the product very thin.  Having the antenna in the body was a very difficult and yet impossible challenge, but it was a method for getting the smallest product possible potentially.

I personally think the view of personalization and small framed designed products with ability to add accessories  is a  key driver to real Fashion statements, mass-customization and mass end-user adoption.   The very simple strategy like in the case of Apple that can scale to build its business for starters, is key as part of this thinking.   I think bringing the Press over the Jacket was potentially the wrong thing to do in the long-term….  Apple should highlight more about the opportunities for customization over the fact they pushed the envelop a bit too far with Antenna design.

So where is MODU in all of this?  I would image these Israeli’s are in the labs looking at the smallest iPhone killer Android device that could be configured or skinned with multiple accessories.  They have done done the small match-box route…. why not the Android with a large screen thin route like Apple?  This would be a very interesting competitor of Apple!

Frank Nuovo, ex-Chief of Nokia Design,  talks about mobile devices as “Objects of Desire” and he personally moved down the Fashion route with his move to run design over at Vertu.  In my mind,  this architecture of design personalization and mobile  has really taken form and that these simple products with less buttons and objects of design can now grow toward multimedia rich and configurable products along with the hardware configurations.  Apple is clearly on the right path as a vision,  lets see if this media and the antenna challenge is not big enough for them to get pulled off this strategic path?

In this latest Press-Release, new research shows that at this slice in time mobile for the online retail world is a reality.  Having  your Smart Phone  with you on-the-go now is not only a guide to price comparisons and m-Commerce, but a way to get great recommendations and reviews at your fingertips.  If you have a e-Commerce site and you have not built out a mobile strategy, that you are getting left behind.

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[ Press Release]

Three-Quarters of Online Retailers are Dialing Up Mobile Strategies, According to Shop.org/Forrester Research

Washington, June 29, 2010 – Consumers’ increasing appetite for mobile applications is driving online retailers to speed up their mobile marketing initiatives. According to a Forrester Research Inc. (Nasdaq: FORR) study produced in partnership with Shop.org, the National Retail Federation’s digital division, nearly three-quarters (74%) of online retailers either already have or are developing a mobile strategy. One in five boasts having a fully-implemented mobile strategy in place already. The survey of 109 companies is part of “The State of Retailing Online” research series, which provides eBusiness professionals with an annual industry benchmark for marketing and business investment and activities.

“It’s imperative for online retailers to stay on top of what their customers want and these days it’s all mobile all the time,” said Scott Silverman, Executive Director, Shop.org. “Mobile commerce has tremendous potential and will no doubt grow to become a significant part of overall sales volume in years to come. Whether to increase customer satisfaction, grow their brand or drive traffic and sales, online retailers are in this game to stay.”

“Mobile investment is modest now, but we see that it will pick up in the future, especially among the biggest brands that have already invested significant amounts in their mobile operations,” said Sucharita Mulpuru, Vice President, Principal Analyst, Forrester Research, and lead author of the report.

Earlier this year, Forrester forecast US online retail sales to total $173 billion in 2010. According to “The State Of Retailing Online: Marketing, Social Commerce and Mobile Report,” Web retailers with mobile strategies:

•    Are investing in features that support the cross-channel experience. Product and price information, store information, and coupons to support the in-store experience are among the most popular features that retailers are offering consumers.
•    Have varied level of investment. While respondents anticipated spending on average $170,000 on their mobile sites this year, large multichannel retailers are spending several times that amount, while smaller online pure plays on average are investing much less.
•    Are experiencing modest gains. Retailers reported that their mobile browsers at this juncture are generating a little less than three percent of overall site traffic and just two percent of revenue.

Marketing and Social Media

Tried and true marketing tactics such as paid search, email and affiliate marketing command the biggest percentage of an online retailers’ marketing budget. According to the report, retailers are spending nearly 40% of their marketing budget on paid search.

Retailers are finding value in social media marketing, but the ROI for driving online sales remains murky. Listening to customers is the most significant objective for social tools according to respondents, with 80 percent of retailers reporting that they are pursuing social strategies to experiment and learn. And while 28 percent noted that social marketing has helped grow their business, direct sales from social tactics are not widely measured.

“The State of Retailing Online: Marketing, Social Commerce and Mobile Report” is available to Shop.org members and can also be purchased directly at www.shop.org/soro. Forrester clients will be able to access the report as part of their subscription service one month from publication.

About Shop.org

Shop.org, a division of the National Retail Federation, is the world’s leading membership community for digital retail. Founded in 1996, Shop.org’s 700 members include the 10 largest retailers in the U.S. and more than 60 percent of the Internet Retailer Top 100 E-Retailers. It’s where the best retail minds come together to gain the insight, knowledge, and intelligence to make smarter, more informed decisions in the evolving world of the Internet and multichannel retailing. Shop.org programs and activities include benchmarking research, events, and networking communities.

Shop.org is a part of NRF’s Mobile Retail Initiative, which serves to lead the industry in the implementation and dissemination of mobile related best practices and standards.

About Forrester Research

Forrester Research, Inc. (Nasdaq: FORR) is an independent research company that provides pragmatic and forward-thinking advice to global leaders in business and technology. Forrester works with professionals in 19 key roles at major companies providing proprietary research, customer insight, consulting, events, and peer-to-peer executive programs. For more than 26 years, Forrester has been making IT, marketing, and technology industry leaders successful every day. For more information, visit www.forrester.com.

© 2010, Forrester Research, Inc. All rights reserved. Forrester is a trademark of Forrester Research, Inc.
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It was announced earlier this week that Facebook achieved their 500M User base worldwide.  In addition, it has been stated that there is about 100M of those users that are accessing Facebook via their mobile devices ( about 20%).

Moreover, when we look at the opportunity and potential for mobile, the global  market subscriber base has topped 5Billion strong thus indicating that Facebook is still only about 2% of the worlds marketplace for Mobile Social Media (or MoSo).

Repeatedly, Facebook has been one of the most downloaded Applications on the iPhone, Android, and even Blackberry devices with the amazing statistic of over 50% of all usage of content on the mobile tied to social media.   As the mobile experience has also been “coined” to be very location centric, there is another converging category called Mobile Local (or MoLo).   This is tied to Mobile Search and Location Based Services on the go.  As the Geo API has been made available via many application frameworks, it has also been available via certain browsers to bring Location-context to websites and web applications.   Twitter has included a location API recently to  their suite of unique modifiers for Twitter Search and the Geo API has been a strong debate in the developer community surrounding the iPhone in general for location based advertising.

( Picture and Statistics from Hitwise)

So with 98% of the Global Market in the Mobile Social Space and the amazing growth of Mobile Location Based Services, it is apparent that there is a new opportunity for the next Billion Dollar Company in this combined MoSo or MoLo…… or should we say MoSoLo.   The quiet battle ensues between the several mobile location based social networks such as Foursquare, Gowalla, Loopt, Brightkite, Socialight,  and a variety of others, but they are still all less then 10M users, thus validating it is early days for MoSoLo.

Creating a compelling experience for end-user’s to “share their location”  for not only their friends but for a unique engagement with brands is now at a very interesting crossroads of growth and evolution to the next killer app ( or massive money making app- mmm ) .   Companies like Nokia, Google, Microsoft, AOL and Yahoo have all been putting up billions of  dollars  into this new contest for the next holy grail of advertising and social media, but it seems like  this MoSoLo end-user mind share is with  these new nimble start-ups at this time

Skyhook wireless, a company that has been strong in providing location information as an API for developers,  handset manufactures and Operators had recently released this “heat map” of  real time location interactions.  It will not be long before the heat map itself may be sliced and diced into different behavioral segments for real-time viewing.

Imagine seeing clusters about town of where people that tend to like the same interests or are connected to you are gathering around town at a certain point in time.

So by 2012, I would not be surprised to see a new player, jump out of the blue and take this next wave of MoSoLo or will Facebook be able to take a big chunk of this remaining 98% of the  pie?

In Cooperation with MEF, ADObjects, Inc brings in the valuable overseas experience from Japan in m-Commerce as part of the International Guide on m-Commerce.  ADObjects, Inc provides leading edge consultancy services in the areas of mobile marketing and m-Commerce as well as building revenue generating partnerships with overseas companies looking toward market entry into North America. This guide has comprehensive examples and case studies from both leaders in Japan; SONY FeliCa and Entermotion.

FeliCa is a contactless RFID smart card system by Sony in Japan, primarily used in electronic money cards. The name stands for Felicity Card. First utilized in the Octopus card system in Hong Kong^[1], the technology is used in a variety of cards also in countries such as Singapore and Japan.  One of the key global operators to launch and bring FeliCa to the market was NTTDoCoMo. NTTDoCoMo’s m-Commerse Activities date back to the Early 20o5.   Brands such as McDonald’s and Seven-Eleven have fully utilized FeliCa for m-Commerce in Japan respectively.

Entermotion is one of the leading Japanese coupon and mobile marketing platform companies in Japan.

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Today, MEF North America Launches M-Commerce Guide to Drive Customer Acquisition, Retention and Conversion

• MEF values global mobile media industry at $36bn globally
• 53% of consumers have a propensity to use their mobile handsets for financial transactions*
• One out of every seven minutes of media consumption today takes place via mobile devices**

The M-Commerce guide is the first output of MEF’s M-Commerce Initiative led by an expert committee of members and written through consultation with leading industry players to engage, educate and evolve the potential of mobile. The guide is designed to help brands, content owners/producers and retailers better understand how to leverage the mobile device to drive customer acquisition, retention and, most importantly, conversion.

While the definition of M-Commerce includes a broad range of categories, for the purposes of this guide, we have limited the definition to include the following:

• Digital content, goods and services purchased and delivered on the mobile device (in channel services) as well as tangible products purchased through the handset but physically delivered (out of channel products)
• All forms of commerce whether paid for or ad-funded/sponsored.

Mobile banking is not included.

The guide has been authored with the leadership and invaluable support of the following MEF member companies: 2ergo, ADObjects, Billing Revolution, Boku, engage2mobile, Impact Mobile, Inmar, KPMG, mBlox, Motorola, Netbiscuits, Nokia, Polar Mobile, Playphone, RIM, Samsung, Sybase365, Synergy World, T-Mobile and Zong.

The guide has been published with the kind support and sponsorship of Impact Mobile, Inmar, KPMG and mBlox.

Download the Guide
To see the press release