Business

Changes to business digitisation brings

Vodafone Mobile Services Expansion: The Why
Vodafone has made three days of surprising announcements. Three of them for Web services soon to be accessible over their mobile network (MySpace, eBay and YouTube) and the other relating to the building out of their 3G networks in the future (analysis).
We thought it would be worthwhile taking a look as to why this might be happening and why it’s come at this time.
Why the push?
Well, lots of other companies are moving in to tread on Vodafone’s toes – example – Virgin Mobile now with NTL/Telewest TV/broadband/telephone service – as all forms of communication converge.
Vodafone is pretty much a mobile only company. They’re trying to change this, through deals with BT to offer fixed-line broadband and similar offerings in Italy and Germany. In the converged game, they’re pretty weak.
This weakness is leaving their previous highly-profitable dominance of the mobile space threatened.
They’ve been aware of the benefit of differentiating their service through providing access to content for a while, but these recent moves mark a serious step forward.
Previously it’s been about them providing the means of accessing content from third parties, games, music, etc. These most recent deals are about access to services.
I know content is being accessed, a la YouTube, but they’re actually providing access to the service … one that happens to be providing content.
What’s the benefit?
There’s many advantages to Vodafone on this.
Short term it’s about making people associate Vodafone with being on the leading-edge – “Wow, they’ve got MySpace and YouTube!”
It’s unclear how far this benefit will extend into the future, as more phones become easier to browse the Web, where these services live.
eBay, MySpace and YouTube all have fanatical following. When people become embroiled in them, they _must_ find out what has _just_ happened. They’re a modern day replacement for TV soap-operas.
Obsessions like these drive people to choose mobile phones that enable them to get access – and Vodafone will be shouting this from the roof tops to encourage people to switch to them.
Interestingly, those three services are also used by a great deal of people who don’t have a strong technical understanding. People who don’t know that the whole Internet is available through the Web Browser on their mobile phone. This changing is just a matter of time.
Another short-term benefit for them is the amount of revenue they’ll end up generating. We imagine that it’s cost Vodafone a pretty penny to get exclusives from all three services, but this will be made up by the seriously boosted data charges that they’ll be clawing in.
MySpace is pretty rich with bandwidth hungry media – lots of photos, and many many pages to check. Same for eBay.
The real earner for them will be YouTube. You’ll struggle to find an application that uses as much data as video and with the ability to pass links to favourite videos, subscribers will be helping their friends run up big data charges too.
9 February, 2007
Vodafone Now Have YouTube
Is this now getting boring? Vodafone have announced another content access deal, this time with YouTube.
Well they certainly have the set in their hands now don’t they? – First MySpace on Tuesday, then eBay yesterday, and today YouTube.
What can you do with the service? Well, watch YouTube videos really. But it won’t be all of the videos, just “a daily selection of new videos,” chosen by YouTube and accessed through Vodafone Live! True, these can be very entertaining, but one of the delights of YouTube is the wide access to all of the content. The process of near-unlimited discovery, down some very strange rabbit-holes, will be lost through editorialised content.
To encourage the viral effect, subscribers will be able to forward links of their favourite videos to friends. No shock there.
One big benefit for YouTube will be Vodafone making it easy for mobile phone users to upload films that they’ve shot on their mobiles, up to YouTube.
The most interesting part of this lies in the following statement, “Vodafone and YouTube will continue to explore ways to enhance this offering and cooperate closely in the coming months.” The potential in this is considerable.
Vodafone will be rubbing their hands thinking about all of the extra potential income from the data charges of delivering videos to mobile handsets.
9 February, 2007
Orange And Vodafone Propose Sharing 3G Aerials In UK
There’s a lot of radical thinking going on in the mobile business these days and here’s the latest. Vodafone and Orange have signed a non-binding agreement to let each other to use the others 3G infrastructure.
It’s all about their RANs – Radio Access Networks, which connect customers mobiles to the operators networks.
Until now they’ve gone around installing their own, but are now realising that this is a mighty expensive business, seeing as the cost is several £100k per base station. In rural areas these may only service a handful of people, thus rending their investment uneconomic.
The core of the proposal is to
- Continue managing their own traffic independently
- Retain full responsibility for the quality of service they offer their respective customers
- Remain competitors in the UK mobile wholesale and retail markets
The summary – share infrastructure, but compete on service.
What’s forcing this?
When the mobile companies bid for the 3G licenses, not only did they pay over a huge amount of money, but they also took on obligations to provider 3G services to a certain percentage of the UK population.
As not many people have signed up for 3G, the mobile companies haven’t wanted to spend the money on servicing a population that isn’t giving them money with subscriptions and they’ve let their obligations slip. Until now Ofcom hasn’t been pursing them on this.
Three, the largest 3G provider in the UK, has recently been saddled with three little letters by Ofcom – SMP – Significant Market Power. They’re not too happy with the restrictions that this imposes on them, so have been pointing out to Ofcom that the other 3G license holders aren’t fulfilling their coverage obligations.
To ensure that they don’t get saddled with substantial fines by Ofcom, the other 3G holders will need to expand their infrastructure. By sharing costs on this, they save money.
More details of this will be provided by Steve Kennedy, an expert in this area, in an article ~~later today~~ tomorrow.
8 February, 2007
Vodafone Europe Gets MySpace Mobile
Vodafone Europe has signed an exclusive deal with MySpace to get MySpace Mobile on their service.
Although currently exclusive, MySpace are remaining elusive as to the length of the agreement. When we asked, they declined to be drawn on how long the exclusivity with Vodafone would last, preferring to tantalise with “our ambition is to get MySpace on as many platforms as possible.”
MySpace addicts will be able to feed their cravings when not glued to the computers.
To tantalise potential subscribers further, Vodafone will pre-load it on to ‘selected handsets.’
MySpace did a similar deal in the US with Cingular back in December 2006. In that deal Cingular charged their subscribers an extra $2.99/month, plus data charges for the privilege.
At the time of going to press it is unclear if there will be a similar charging scheme with Vodafone.
The financial terms of the deal were not disclosed.
More details shortly.
7 February, 2007
Flick Off AGAIN: Flickr-ites Still Don’t Want Yahoo! Accounts
That’s the response that Yahoo! (the owners of popular Web 2.0 photo sharing site Flickr) were greeted with when they announced that they would be forcing a merging of Flickr accounts with Yahoo! accounts.
Users who joined Flickr before its acquisition in March 2005 are known as ‘old skool’ users, and they use the original Flickr accounts to login, rather than the Yahoo! accounts used for those who joined after the acquisition. Old skool status is heavily valued in the community, and successive Yahoo! attempts to force migration from ‘old school’ accounts to Yahoo! accounts has attracted much controversy.
The migration of accounts is not a technical issue; Old skool members will keep their buddy name and are not forced to use any other Yahoo! services. Given that this is the case, it perhaps seems illogical that there is such a backlash. One old skool user’s view is in a post by Thomas Hawk, a keen Flickr user (and also CEO of a rival service).

Raj Parmer writes “I do not like the way Yahoo impose in this manner. I am an old skool member (which I was in a way quite proud of) but when it becomes mandatory to sign up to Yahoo, I will have to delete all my pics and close my account down and join with one of the other similar services on the net.”
The problem seems to be two fold. Firstly, Flickr users simply don’t want to be forced to give up their ‘old skool’ account; they are proud to have been part of one of the archetypal Web 2.0 products before it hit the mainstream, and do not want to see their status lost.
Secondly, there appears to be a wider problem within the Flickr community, namely concern about the direction in which Yahoo! might change the nature of Flickr. Yahoo! recently announced that it would be making use of Flickr images in its new Brand Universe program, a move which has concerned some users, and other attempts to integrate Flickr further into Yahoo! products are likely to be met with concern.
Unlike the last time Yahoo! attempted to merge old skool accounts with Yahoo! accounts (when they bowed to pressure and relented), it appears that this time they are determined. There may be a small number of old skool users who delete their photos, but there will be no major exodus.
Huw Leslie is editor of UK-based Web 2.0 and software blog Gizbuzz, and the co-founder of technology blog network Oratos Media. His personal blog is For Crying Out Loud!
7 February, 2007
Viacom Gets Tough With YouTube
Media giants Viacom International have finally lost patience with YouTube and demanded that they remove more than 100,000 of their video clips that have been posted up without permission.
The company – whose holdings include Paramount Pictures, MTV Networks, DreamWorks and Comedy Central – have calculated that YouTube has served up over 1.2 billion streams of its copyrighted video content.
As a result, Viacom have got out their big pointy DMCA stick and accused Google-owned YouTube of knowingly profiting from material stolen from them, as well as repeatedly breaking promises to filter out copyrighted works.
In a statement, a clearly miffed Viacom said: “Virtually every other distributor has acknowledged the fair value of entertainment content and has taken deliberate steps to concluding agreements with content providers.”
“YouTube and Google retain all of the revenue generated from this practice, without extending fair compensation to the people who have expended all of the effort and cost to create it.”
Google have said that they’ll get the material down tout de suite, although not without adding a valedictory grumble, commenting, “It is unfortunate that Viacom will no longer be able to benefit from YouTube’s passionate audience which has helped to promote many of Viacom’s shows.”
Removing Viacom’s rich portfolio of popular clips may certainly result in loss of revenue for YouTube, but some media analysts reckon it could be a lose-lose situation all round, as both parties risk naffing off consumers.
Viacom has said that although it’s still down with the idea of distributing clips online via YouTube, it’ll only do so via, “a fair and authorised distribution model.”
6 February, 2007
Apple Inc and Apple Corps, Now In Love
Love has broken out between the two Apples – computers and music.
Appropriate with Valentines Day arriving soon – and that it’s the name of the relatively recent Beatle’s album.
We’ve spoken to Apple Corps (music) insiders and learnt that there was genuine shock at them losing the last round of the UK trademark dispute with Apple Inc. (Computers as was – they’ve now dropped the computers part of the name).
Today’s announcement replaces the 1991 agreement between the two and ends up with Apple Inc owning all of the trademarks related to “Apple” with them licensing back certain trademarks to Apple Corps, “for their continued use.”
The terms of settlement are confidential.
With this trademark dispute out of the way, the tables are now clear for a potential deal between the two Apple’s for selling the Beatles music online through iTunes. Some have spoken about the 14 February being the date of the announcement, fitting in with the Love theme again.
Our Apple Corps insider is keeping his cards close to his chest on this one. But if we hear … you’ll be the first to know.
5 February, 2007
Mobile Data Services Set To Rake It In
High speed mobile phones and new gadgets are set to send revenue from mobile entertainment services soaring over the next five years, according to market research firm Informa Telecoms & Media.
Boffins at Informa expect the market for delivering content and services on mobiles to rise from $89.3billion in 2006 to $150billion by 2011.
Mobile music – already the biggest earner – will continue to whip up the biggest wedge of wonga, although its market share is expected to dip from 40 per cent in 2006 to 36 per cent in 2011 in the face of newer consumer technologies like mobile TV and video service.
“Advanced mobile content and services have been slow to take off, but this should not be confused with the deepening relationship that we have with our mobile phones,” commented report author Daniel Winterbottom, senior analyst at Informa Telecoms & Media.
“Over time, users will warm to other data services as well. The mobile web is a prime example: WAP failed to take off when it was first launched, but five years on, more and more users have become comfortable with accessing news or other information on their mobile phones,” he added.
The analysts also predict that the market for mobile entertainment services, including games, gambling and naughty adult content, will more than double during the same period, increasing from $18.84 billion in 2006 to a bumper US$38.12 billion in 2011.
User-generated content is also expected to grow, with Informa predicting that revenue from user-generated services will hit $13.17 billion by 2011.
Full of enthusiasm for the future, Daniel Winterbottom enthused: “The arrival of the mobile web on the mobile handset over in 2007 and beyond will see users embracing the same content they take for granted on their PCs.
[Via]
5 February, 2007
Whoops! PC Users Can’t View UK GetAMac Videos
So I’m being bombarded by Apple’s super-expensive advert campaign telling me how great Macs are and how only dull business nerds bother with PCs.
The adverts feature the smug comedy duo David Mitchell and Robert Webb. And they’re on the tele. They’re on billboards. They’re everywhere.
And when I pop over to my MySpace homepage, what’s that blaring out (with the audio set to ‘on’ by default?).
Yep, it’s another chuffing advert featuring the same two comedians, happily selling their arses for a slice of Apple’s fat budget while insisting that I’m deeply mistaken in my choice of computer.
The two comics – who are quickly transforming from entertaining to kill-them-in-the-face irritating in my book – pair up for a Mr Mac and Mr PC routine, designed to make users want to rush out and put money in Jobs’s already expansive coffers.
The set of six adverts insist that PCs users are doomed to suffer an onslaught of unstoppable viruses, security leaks and endless crashes.
PC users are represented as dull business bores who wouldn’t know what fun is if it French-kissed them in the buttocks, while Mac users are seen to be spontaneous, fun-loving bon viveurs, hurtling along the highway of creativity at reckless speeds.
So I give in. I decide to take a look at the videos on Apple’s site, and click on the link using my virus-free, non-crashing, safe and relatively fun PC and get ready to learn, “Why I’ll love a Mac.”
And then, oh dear. Firefox brings up an error message. From the one, solitary piece of Apple software on my machine; Quick Time.
Still, no problem. After all, I’m trying to look at an Apple site with Apple software and their site proudly boasts that their products “just work,” so I’m sure we’ll be over this little glitch in moments.
“Quick Time is missing software to perform this operation…” says the pop up window as only the audio plays in the background.
“Fair enough,” I think to myself, confident of a slick, smooth, user-friendly solution coming along.
And then comes the killer blow with the final line of the error message: “Unfortunately, it is not available on the QuickTime server.”
And that’s it. No help offered, no options, just a simple, ‘It doesn’t work, it won’t work and we’re not going to tell you how to make it work. So bugger off’
Thanks Apple.
But I’m a determined soul, so I decide to fire up Internet Explorer 7 instead.
As soon as I arrive at Apple’s page it wants to run an Active X control and for me to download QuickTime.
Hmmm. Not very user friendly. Why should I have to go through all the palaver of downloading software just to view an advert I can view just fine on other sites?
But – hey! – I want to be the cool guy instead of the nerdy PC user, so I download the software and get ready to be entertained and persuaded.
Except I’m left with the same blank, audio-only video which ends with a message from Apple asking me, “how much time have I spent troubleshooting your PC?”
I don’t think my answer to that is printable.
Mac Ads
*Postscript: we asked several PC-owning friends to look at the Apple page and they had mixed fortunes. Some had no problems viewing the videos, while others suffered the same blank screen/error message combo as me.
Of course, Mac-huggers could argue that this proves how useless PCs are, but the fact that the videos played back perfectly before QuickTime shoved in its oar sure doesn’t speak a persuasive word to my ears.
30 January, 2007
Giant Graphic For Australian Google Maps
A few bods in Australia got together after hearing that the Google Maps satellite which it takes images from was going to be passing over Sydney.
Their mission? To create a giant graphic, so it would be picked up and be viewable on Google Maps.
It’s not the first time anyone has thought of the idea of course (we’ve all done this at Digital-Lifestyles towers), but these characters actually got off their behinds and did it.
They started at 4am, pegging 2,500 sheets of paper in the grass of a park to form a giant eye – the pun being that Australia was also watching the world.
It appeared on the tech discussion board Slashdot, and subsequently was hit with a ton of comments accusing them of “spamming Google Maps.” You’ll know that we hate spam (natch), but we fail to see why some of the commenters are getting so irate.
As one of the comments pointed out, they don’t really have to wait for the map to appear on Google Maps – they’ve gained loads of it from the stunt alone.
Read more on their posting about it.
29 January, 2007