Mobile as Web content

This is an interesting article, which I have copied here. The full version can be found by following this link:

http://communities-dominate.blogs.com/brands/2007/01/as_web_content_.html

Mobile as Web content

e-mail and mobile

Then consider the other big application currently on the internet: e-mail and thus person-to-person messaging. Here we have a legacy messaging system which is cumbersome, tedious and slow - e-mail. On the mobile phone we can have e-mail (such as on a Blackberry). Many smartphones from the Treos to the Nokia E-Series do e-mail. So again, while it won't kill e-mail, the mobile internet can readily replicate the e-mail experience. And if you've ever seen the addiction of a Blackberry user (who call it the Crackberry for crack cocaine the drug) - then they DEFINITELY prefer e-mail on their smartphone than on a PC.

But the mobile phone has its own messaging platform, SMS text messaging. This is now the first of the new applications, like talk shows, game shows, music videos and reality TV were to cinema. Something that does not work in the old format, but is very compelling on the new. We ALREADY have a bigger service - by users and by revenues - than anything on the fixed internet. There are 1.1 billion people who use the internet, but out of 2.7 billion mobile phone users, 1.8 billion people use SMS text messaging. We have our first new web content category, which has only emerged on the mobile internet, and cannot even be replicated on the traditional internet (yes yes I know we can do it, but practically, it is very rare to find people using SMS on a PC. If not e-mail, on the PC they then tend to use IM Instant Messaging, not SMS text messaging)

Music and mobile

Remember iTunes? So yes, we can buy music - MP3 songs - on the current lecacy internet. We already can buy MP3 songs directly to mobile phones. The IFPI (International Federation of Phonographic Industry, the global umbrella organization for the music industry) - just released its music report in January and found that half of all digital music in 2006 was sold directly to mobile phones. So yes, we can consume the "identical" or very similar experience of MP3 song purchases and downloads on the legacy internet and the mobile internet.

But again, the mobile internet has already innovated in this music area. Ringing tones. They are worth over 6.5 billion dollars (already over six times larger than the size of digital music downloads such as iTunes). Please don't turn snobbish at me now, and claim ringing tones are not real music. Fifteen years ago when the internet came, a lot of old fogies suggested e-mail was not legitimate communincation because it did not transmit on paper and could not have a signature. All kinds of music innovations have been dismissed by older generations as "not being real music" such as rock n' roll which was supposedly not music, and rap which many said was not music, and the recent innovation of sampling and mashing existing music, etc. Ask the person forking over the money. If that teenager spends two dollars to put Shakira's music on the cellphone, who cares if it is of lousy sound quality, and extremely short duration. It is music.

And ringing tones were a content format invented for the mobile internet, not the legacy PC based internet. We have another of our new service categories, optimized for the mobile internet.

Social networking and mobile

Then look at MySpace, the massively successful social networking site online. With 90 million active users. 19% of Americans maintain a profile on MySpace. But look at Cyworld in South Korea. It offers similar profiles like MySpace (and much much more) - but offers access not only by broadband (South Korea is the world's most connected society, with highest penetration of broadband) but also access via 3G mobile phone (South Korea has highest penetration of 3G phones). On Cyworld today, 43% of all South Koreans maintain a personal profile. Can web content migrate to the mobile internet and if optimised, become a BIGGER success there? Of course it can.

YouTube? The massively successful video sharing site with 120 million users worldwide. Cyworld's 22 million 3G cameraphone users upload more videos daily than YouTube's users. The mobile internet is inherently superior, because we have the content creation device (cameraphone/videophone) in our hand - and in our pocket - all the time. AND it has permanent connectivity at high speed.

Oh, and let me show how the mobile internet is already influencing the fixed internet. We've written about SeeMeTV here at our blogsite. The 3G mobile video sharing service, where every time when someone looks at your video, YOU get paid a royalty. A radical innovation in user-generated content. Invented on mobile. Now consider yesterday's announcement by YouTube that they will start to pay the content producers of the most-viewed videos. This concept was invented on the advanced internet, the mobile internet, and now copied onto the legacy internet.

My own version of a mobile to web content management system can be found at immedia24.com

UK SMS Volumes still Rising

The UK text messaging total broke through the 4 billion barrier for the first time during December 2006.

December’s total of 4.3 billion takes the overall figure for 2006 to 41.8 billion (issued by the MDA), surpasses their prediction 40 billion text messages. Before to December 2006, the highest recorded SMS total was for 3.8 billion for October 2006

Person-to-person texts sent across the UK networks throughout December of the year show a growth of 38% on the 2005 figure of 3.1 billion, and represent an average of 138 million messages per day. On Christmas Day this leapt to 205 million texts, an average of 8 million per hour, with the figure for New Year’s Day 2007 even higher reaching a record breaking 214 million, the highest daily total ever recorded by the MDA.

When compared to the mere 42 million messages sent per day five years ago throughout December 2001, it becomes clear just how far the UK has come in embracing text messaging technology which has emerged from a popular craze to becoming an essential communication tool, inclusive to all age groups. The forecast is that figures will continue to rise this year to a total of 45 billion text messages for 2007, with an average of 3.75 billion messages being sent per month and 123 million messages per day.

The prediction is also for a similar growth in business text messaging. Although not measured in the same way, web-based text messaging systems such as txt4ever.com have shown a rise in volumes throughout the year.

Immedia 24

Our new site, Immedia 24 is up and running. The aim of this is to allow anyone to publish content to mobile phones, quickly and easily.
It's a web based system that manages keywords, shortcodes and the files themselves. It also creates web previews for users to browse.