Vodafone takes Jamie Oliver mobile

Netimperative - Vodafone takes Jamie Oliver mobile: "Vodafone has partnered with mobile content firm Inventa to offer film clips of chef Jamie Oliver making over 100 of his top recipes as downloads"


Is this as good an idea as it seems ??? get Jamie to tell you how to cook or if you have a 3G phone watch him rustle up something creative in just 5 minutes, it was great of them to offer a free teaser MMS too.

Some food for thought - device rendering! get it right - text that doesnt wrap correctly or pictures that are too small make the service look unfullfilling. I didn't stick around to try the video version. Oh and the quality of the receipe .. didn't stop to try it... yet

Nokia holds fire on mobile gaming

Nokia holds fire on mobile gaming - vnunet.com: "Nokia is holding off on mobile gaming for a few years and will not be building new versions of the N-Gage gaming phone."


Well that could be some good Christmas news for the rest of the gaming industry - one less platform to support and even the admission of it not being a success hasn't come as a suprise for retailers.

What this means is Nokia refocusing its attention on areas it knows users and operators want developments - mobile music, tv and internet are all big contenders for 2006/07. Leave serious portable gaming right now to the bigger platforms players and develop better phones for us all.

Vodafone KK launch Mobile Wallet

Vodafone has announced the launch of its first Mobile Wallet phone - a terminal with the FeliCa chipset. Felica allows e-money, ticketing and transit payments (and some loyalty programmes) to be made by just holding the phone over a terminal reader. NTT Docomo launched the service less than 12 months ago.

This will be a welcomed by operators as it develops a basic cash management proposition and of course intergrates this with their terminal/consumer lifestyle propositions. Customers can also benefit by this development if everyday items can be purchased using the FeliCa chip or it is enabled for mass market ticketing (ie Oyster cards, electronic train ticketing, movie tickets).



703SHf Mobile Wallet 3G Handset Release

Sony BMG Rootkit --- to increase online sales?

SONY BMG MUSIC ENTERTAINMENT - cp.sonybmg.com/xcp

The announcements this week about the ROOTKIT have seemed endless - that it is trojanware, that it was safe, that there are ROOTKIT viruses, then Sony released a removal tool and then the news that you can swap the CD!

What this does for consumer confidence is boost doubt that the medium is 'safe' and potentially affect the CD sales in record stores and we will be needing to watch how 'quiet' the Christmas trading period is to gather if there is negative affect.

We can expect legal download services from Napster to iTunes and even the mobile fulltrack download (FTMD) services to see some growth- or if this stay steady, we have to assume those customers buying music from retailers have either stopped buying or moved to other P2P services.

Mobile FTMD and PC interoperability is set to be the biggest hot topic for 05/06 as consumers push for easier file management within their chosen music library. IF only the operators would see this and make it open source so that users could switch between winamp, Windows Media player or iTunes -- if they so choose.

It's all a matter of wait and see

What's happening with illegal downloads ... The wild, wild web from Guardian Unlimited:

The wild, wild web from Guardian Unlimited: Newsblog: "On the face of it, this is shaping up to be good week for the entertainment industry in its war against the illegal downloading of music and videos, writes David Fickling."

Yes ... keep watching what happens here ..

Like other negative activities, the regulators will want to get to the pusher/dealer and not the poor consumer. But who is it actually harming? Most of us have copied Tapes, CD's, recorded TV shows for later viewing with friends etc etc. We have all breached copyright laws, hence most of us are not distracted by this.

The big thing to note is that for every case that goes against a program another one becomes popular. Every downloader that gets charged and punished is not going to have any impact on the millions who have PC access and are still downloading (this article estimates some 93m users downloading at anyone time).

For mobile the impact is huge - putting a squeeze on illegal downloading and legitimising (cheap) distribution networks has changed the way we look to get our music. Music on your mobile has to go one step further than just being simple ... it has to have music rights allowing you to play it on your Phone, PC or MP3 player and it has to be transparent to the average phone owner.

Music Videos Rocking the Portable Video Market

Here's another survey in the youth/teen market proving that music content is the lucrative honeypot. A US internet survey found that teens prefer easy to consume content such as music vids, sitcoms and trailers.

Amongs all of the hype about TV on your mobile this Xmas, try to spot the retailer or operator who takes note of this and is actually delivering content that fits - or will their content schedules focus on those with the cash. The problem with easy to consume content like video clips is that it ages fast and needs to be easily deleted (and cheap too).

Further more the itunes 'killer' mobile is still a long, long, long, long ... long, long, long ... (even longer) way off. The youth market still want their MP3 players and those with broadband are still going to want to download music (legally and illegally)



Parks Associates - Music Videos Rocking the Portable Video Market

your Mobile: mobile data costs too much

http://www.moconews.net/?p=4108

Getting to know more about your customers (Orange)

Orange internet advertising spots have taken a new turn, rather than pushing contract handsets or content in time for Xmas these are linked to their new interactive portal 'talking point'.

This seems to be engaging with internet users - young and old on a specific topic (currently mobile music). Once you have selected your one word answer you can add your own comments and see what other people are saying.

Interesting point - if you click on previous topics, you can see a summary of what action Orange has taken from the feedback.


Try out Talking point.

DAB Radio and TV on your Mobile (BT Livetime)

BT Livetime is pushing ahead with its trial in Greater London using digitial (DAB) technology to send radio and TV to mobiles to Virgin mobile customers. There are 2 things to watch here - it's not using the existing media streaming solutions and is actually a managed solution rather than being developed and trialled by a network operator.

Reading the presentation on BT Livetime you realise that radio and TV on your mobile can be connected to any operator ... so long as the customer has a DAB chip in their mobile. This is a smart move by not limiting the launch market, but BT need to sell this product and solution in onr or more markets to get some scale (and ROI) going. With terminals from Samsung not launched in Europe and the large leadtimes to develop new terminals this still could be awhile before we actually get to see this on the shelf.

Read the presentation on BT Livetime

TV on mobiles proves a turn-off

Well it's being given away at the moment - TV (while not the true free to air) is now coming to the small screen .. so long as you are in coverage and got a 3G phone, but will it work longer term?

TV maybe the hero service for customer aquisition this Xmas and some customers could hopefully see they can do something with their 3G phone, finally... some talk has it that the phones sell themselves when TV is on. Reports from SE Asia tell of adult TV and mobile content being used to drive sales as in .. the 'dirty' salesman tactic of 'come into my office and let me show you what you can see on your small screen'

I'd say the biggest challenge is finding time in your everyday life where TV on your mobile works - travelling on the tube NO, in your car NO (way are you mad?), on the bus MAYBE ... sitting at home NO (got the bigscreen flatpanel LCD). So it's the late night home alone content that will sell Mobile TV.

Secondly cost - you have to get the mix between content and network fees just right. Your average MALE (face it sports, girls and mobiles are for boys) needs to have quality before they will start forking out extra £££'s on weekly basis. What are the operators going to offer to keep the lad's keen???

http://technology.guardian.co.uk/news/story/0,16559,1635968,00.html

mobile data costs too much

Tell us something we don’t already know! Survey findings conclude if mobile content was cheaper more people would buy it. Importantly it ignores the point - if there is a need for the service / content then there would be a demand.

Young people, trendsetters, and self-employed are big markets for new content and services but some of these are also the biggest penny pinchers. It’s far harder to get youth markets to increase their usage of mobile content (ie spend more) when they are living on borrowed money, part-time income or still at school/uni. Trendsetters and early adopters are more likely to see the benefit of a new service and be prepared to part cold hard cash for it.

At the moment mobile is in a limbo land as 3G needs to be more mainstream (whats the ratio of 3G to 2.5G users?) and service (or content) demand remains low. People are maybe inclined to try so of these new services, but its moving them from high customisers of their phones to demanding more that is the hard step

read the article … http://www.moconews.net/?p=4108

test test

this is my newest blog trying to add some fresh focus on mobile content and mobile industry

from Adverts to brand, from youth markets to content freshness

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