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March 31, 2008
Johnny B Goode is 50 years old today ..
The iconic Chuck Berry song Johnny B Goode is 50 years old today ..
This vintage video is great! .. enjoy ..
Posted by ajit at 3:04 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
March 29, 2008
Flixwagon, citizen journalism, Mobile Web 2.0
Continuing the theme as per my last post about grassroots political movements let by Mobile / Web 2.0 ..
My friend Xen Mendelsohn recently joined an exciting Israeli start-up called Flixwagon which has the strapline Life is a journey – broadcast it live
Flixwagon have introduced new technology that enable any 3G/WiFi user to broadcast live video from the mobile to the web by installing a small application on the mobile phone.
I have since been following flixwagon through posts from Xen which include a recent post called Walking the dog which Xen compares live video streaming to blogging and says
"What would happen if everyone, anywhere, could have their own live television station from a mobile phone? So I could broadcast something as banal as my walk with the dog, or citizens could go live in conflict zones?"
And rephrases to contrast with blogging
What would happen if everyone, anywhere, could have their own blog/online news site on the internet? So I could cover something as banal as my walk with the dog, or citizens could go live in conflict zones?
This whole idea of capturing content at the point of inspiration has been a driver for Mobile Web 2.0. In my book Mobile Web 2.0, I talked about the concept of ‘capturing content at the point of inspiration’ as being a big driver for Mobile Web 2.0. I also covered the same topic in a recent post called Mobile multimedia twitter .
The ideas are interesting even more so that live streaming is accomplished by companies like Flixwagon without a network upgrade / IMS.
Recently, MTV also used Flixwagon in it’s coverage of super Tuesday in an example of citizen’s journalism, Citizen Journalism.
Armed with Nokia N95 devices and Flixwagon, MTV’s street team went out to cover Super Tuesday from a first voters’ point of view using laptops and mobile devices. All videos were broadcasted to MTV’s website and every 30 minutes, edited snippets were broadcasted on TV. As the stats below show, the initiative was a success and gained a lot of traction.
As the penetration numbers of 3G/WiFi mobile increase globally, and fixed rate price plans become commonplace – as does the tendency to share content within a closed community – a trend which Nokia calls circular entertainment , citizen journalism may well be the next big thing.
Here are some stats from MTV re the Flixwagon initiative ..
Posted by ajit at 7:01 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
What do Operators charge per location hit/request?
Hello
We have discussed this question a few times before.
Currently, What do Mobile Operators charge per location hit/request?
Thanks for your help kind rgds Ajit
Posted by ajit at 6:25 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
March 28, 2008
The decline and fall of traditional media and its grassroots impact on politics
The first time I came to live in England a few years ago, it was a cultural shock.
Not for the people but for the newspapers. Let me explain ..
If you were born outside England(as I was in India), you often have a quaint notion of England. In my case, it was based largely on reading Enid Blyton as a child and watching programs like To the manor born , Yes Minister and others. So, the impression of England is often polite, kind, cultured, dignified and with a sense of fairplay and a sense of humour.
However, when I first came here, I was shocked by the coverage in the tabloids especially the right leaning conservative press such as the Daily express , Daily mail and the Sun .
Hence, a few months later, when my landlord asked me ‘How do I like it here?’ – I said – it is different from what I expected. When I read the newspapers, the coverage seems so vicious and acrimonious. Not what I had expected.
He then smiled and gave me a piece of advice which I have followed ever since.
- Ignore the right leaning newspapers(The daily mail and daily express).
- Treat the left leaning newspapers with some skepticism(since they have an agenda)
- Read the Sun only till page 3 :)
- And read ALL your news from the Financial times or the Economist
Years later, now that I am a British citizen (and proud to be one!) as I reflect on that advice, it was an accurate portrayal of the many positive experiences I have had here.
In other words, the people are a lot better than their newspapers.
But why so?
Since my talk at the European Union on Web 2.0 , I have been following the impact of grassroots campaigning especially with the use of the Web so effectively by Barrack Obama in the forthcoming American elections.
There is a shift away from the power of big media – towards the people.
This can be only a good thing.
When Tony Blair stepped down as the British prime minister, he called the media feral
More recently, two major British newspapers apologized to the parents of Madeline Mc Cann for the outright lies they had published.
Indeed the traditional media is growing more rabid and vicious because they have to compete to gain a share of the attention in an era increasingly dominated by the Web.
I think this is a reflection of the shift of power away from the newspapers to the Web.
Apparently, (I can’t confirm this), the daily telegraph is the only newspaper in the UK which is profitable. The telegraph has an elderly audience – which probably explains its profitability.
This article from the Guardian paints a more accurate picture where it indicates that a majority of the young people no longer rely on the newspapers to get their information.
This can only be a good thing. It is a little unsettling to see media barons like Rupert Murdoch direct their newspapers to ‘support’ a political party .
The decline of traditional media and consequently in the death of the symbiotic relationship between media and the politicians can only benefit people and lead to the emergence of grassroots leaders who don’t need the backing of big media or big business.
This may not happen immediately but may well happen sooner than we think.
As a libertarian, I find this very appealing.
Posted by ajit at 9:51 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Orange tries to do a Blyk but I dont think it will work ..
Orange, the Operator behind the MVNO Blyk, is trying to now do a similar model itself. However, I dont think it will work. The issue is not Mobile advertising, subsidised content per-se, the issue is - the creation of an entire ecosystem to deliver the service including permissions, user experience, personalization etc etc.
For instance
The trial, which will be operated via the operator's mobile portal, Orange World, will see 800,000 of Orange's 15.6 million customers given the option to download a variety of music, from four different genres - urban, pop, rock and dance - to their mobile handsets for free, or a discounted rate. Orange will make over 500 tracks available on the service.
The problem is: how many people will share their music preferences with their Operator on an ongoing basis?
So, realistically only players that try to influence a substantial element of the ecosystem have a chance of working. That includes Blyk, Android, iPhone and others - but not if you retrofit the model on existsing systems
Posted by ajit at 3:14 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Factors driving open mobile ecosystems ..
Hello
I seek feedback on this concept.
As I have mentioned before, I am working on a new book Open Mobile Ecosystems co-authored with Anna Gatti and Mauro Del Rio and contributions from Dr Andreas Constantinou
Here is an elevator pitch for the book
I have been talking of OpenGardens for a few years now, and these are the factors I see which are driving openness in the Mobile Data Industry today.
Question is:
a) What do you think of them and
b) Have I missed any?
Thanks for your feedback
So, here is the elevator pitch
The Mobile Internet has always held potential – but so far, it has not been fulfilled. While the Internet and the Web continue to grow and evolve into a vibrant ecosystem, the Mobile environment remained fragmented and closed.
To fulfil its true potential, the Mobile ecosystem has to mirror the open ethos of the Web. The good news is - recent developments give cause for hope. In many instances, these are driven from the Web rather than from Mobile. While open systems themselves are timeless and inevitable, their practical manifestation to the Mobile Internet is driven by a few key recent developments. Hence, this book represents our selective viewpoint about these developments
There are three major interrelated developments that are impacting the openness on mobile networks at different levels of the stack:
a) Open source on mobile devices at the software/operating system layer
b) The deployment of the full Web on mobile devices at the application later and
c) Social networking at the services layer
This book will focus on these three aspects above. We will see their individual (and combined) impact in creating an open ecosystem on the Mobile Internet. Hence, this book presents a specific viewpoint. We have chosen to focus on these three developments because we believe that they are most likely to impact the Mobile Internet as it stands today.
We can further break these down into emphasis on the following developments:
a) Webkit implementations
b) Mobile Ajax(full web browsers) including DOM extensions/browser extensions and devices APIs(Application programming interfaces)
c) Privacy and security for the Mobile Web
d) Microformats
e) The iPhone
f) Android
g) Linux on mobile devices
h) Open social networks
i) Offline browsing
While Open Mobile covers a wide scope (such as mobile payments, mobile advertising, location based services, mobile content, mobile search, mobile social networking, digital convergence and others .. ), it is always within the context/viewpoint of the factors listed above.
So, what do you think? Are the factors and subfactors correct?
Thanks for your feedback
Posted by ajit at 8:13 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
March 27, 2008
A WiMax breakthrough in India - very interesting ..
One of the world's largest wimax deployments is in India .. very interresting ..
source: businss week/rediff link above
>>>>
India is about to become the frontier for high-speed, mobile Internet connections. On March 4, India's Tata Communications, an emerging broadband player, announced the countrywide rollout of a commercial WiMax network, the largest anywhere in the world of the high-speed, wireless broadband technology.
Already 10 Indian cities and 5,000 retail and business customers use the product, and by next year Tata will offer service in 115 cities nationwide. The folks at Tata can hardly contain their excitement. "WiMax is not experimental, it's oven-hot," says Tata's Prateek Pashine, in charge of the company's broadband and retail business.
* Inside the Tata group empire
Of course WiMax is not new. Most everyone in the industry has been talking about it for years. Intel chairman Craig Barrett has been propagating its virtues in pilot projects across the world, including India and Africa.
Powered by Intel chips
Sprint will be rolling out a WiMax network in Washington next month, and in other US cities next year. Until now the most advanced use of WiMax has been in Japan and Korea, where Japanese carrier KDDI and Korea Telecom offer extensive WiMax networks.
However the Japanese and Korean services are not available nationwide - KDDI will have its major rollout only in 2009 - and most people use them as supplements to the wired services.
* Tata unveils the world's cheapest car
It's in emerging economies like India, where there is little connectivity and where mobile usage is soaring because of the difficulty in getting broadband wires to homes and offices, that WiMax is likely to see its full potential as a commercially viable technology.
Intel, whose silicon chips power WiMax, has been pushing for this technology for some years and its executives are practically salivating at the thought of the successful rollout in India.
"The more countries and telcos that get behind this technology the better," says R. Sivakumar, chief executive of Intel South Asia. Predicting that the new technology will make other types of Internet access obsolete, he boasts "Tata will set the cat among the pigeons."
* Tata: Master of the gentle approach
Tata Communications has been working on setting this up for a couple of years, and successfully completed field trials last December. It has used the technology from Telsima, a Sunnyvale (Calif.) maker of WiMax base-stations and the leading WiMax tech provider in the world.
For now, the technology will be restricted to fixed wireless, but Tata plans to make it mobile by midyear. The company has invested about $100 million in the project, which will increase to $500 million over the next four years as it begins to near its goal of having 50 million subscribers in India.
The world is watching
Global tech analysts are will be watching carefully. Though WiMax is prevalent in Korea, the Korean service is a slightly different version, says Bertrand Bidaud, a communications analyst with Gartner in Singapore. It's a Korea-specific pre-WiMax technology called WiBRO.
But the Indian market is where the conditions for a WiMax deployment are the best, he says, because of limited fixed lines. That means Tata has fewer hurdles to overcome. And as WiMax scales up fast, it will give service providers greater flexibility and costs will drop equally rapidly.
Learning from Tata's Nano
"If it doesn't succeed in India, it will be difficult (for it to succeed) anywhere else, and Bharti, Tata has been virtually asleep, with a limited subscriber base for its limited product. In fact, even with as many as seven broadband providers in the market, the total Indian subscriber base is just 3.2 million and there is no clear market leader.
But with the WiMax rollout Tata can gain a leadership position and add "a few thousand subscribers a day," says Alok Sharma, chief executive of Telsima. Tata is, of course, going for the heavy-billing corporate customer - a target audience that is beginning to make big investments in technology.
Temple service via WiMax
But also important is the ordinary Indian retail customer who can watch movies via WiMax and enjoy Tata's other unique offerings. For instance, users can take in an early morning worship service at the famous Balaji temple in South India.
The temple permitted Tata to install cameras so that Hindu devotees from around the world could watch the proceedings in the temple around the clock. To get connected initially, users will simply have to go to a store, buy a router, install it, and then they become instantly connected. It will be as easy as buying apples, Tata executives promise.
The Tata rollout is a chance for India to become cutting-edge in mobile Internet services, say WiMax boosters. For India, which "always used last year's fashion to dress itself up," says Sharma, it is a chance to launch a brand new. fourth-generation technology that the world can follow. "India is becoming the knowledge centre of the world; it should take the lead in this," he adds.
<<<
Posted by ajit at 7:14 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
March 26, 2008
Portio research trend: 2008 will be the year that the worldwide mobile industry becomes a one Trillion US Dollar industry
This is interesting, for a few reasons.
It says Trillion $ THIS year(2008) so not a forecast.
It also makes some predictions and data about near term trends(2008 to 2011 - data non voice and non SMS)
Qs is: Is it correct?
I am focussing on the statement
But that still leaves more than USD 161 billion from data services in 2008, rising to over USD 251 by 2011
I have a few qs
As I understand it, this is non SMS, non voice. Mature mobile markets like Japan and Korea will not contribute to the jump.
a) Does any one else have any validation of the 161B 2008 figure? What do other analysts say? This is no longer a ‘forecast’ since its already 2008. So, it must be a number that we can verify within a small margin
b) Whats the breakdown of the 2008 number in industry terms(again this must be known or may be imvestigated by other analysts)
c) What do we expect to cause the jump from 161B to 251B? This is a rapid jump of 55% in 3 years. If this is true, my three candidates are China, India and HSDPA.
My presonal view is
a) I don’t understand the 161B figure yet
b) I don’t expect a rapid growth to 251B but I expect that China, India and HSDPA will be the main factors for growth
c) I also expect a more gradual rate of growth for mobile data driven by Nokia, Apple and Google devices overall
thoughts/views??
kind rgds
Ajit
Posted by ajit at 7:13 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
March 24, 2008
Open Mobile business models – the impact of free, open and fremium on the Mobile Data Industry
NOTE: I am tracking developments/links in this space at the end of this blog. These include both development of Open Mobiles as well as development of more closed handsets(in the belief that both will co-exist). If you can add any insights, please do so. You can email me at ajit.jaokar at futuretext.com
Introduction
I started writing this article on a day when yet another component became ‘open’. Unexpectedly, it was ‘search’ – driven by Yahoo open search and ironically for once, the company talking most about openness (Google) - was not doing the opening!
Open is a big buzzword now - Both on the Internet and the Mobile internet
And that makes a change from the early days of this blog - which has been all about openness in the mobile data industry. At that time, openness was a strange word. While the technology has always existed - the business reality was based on hope!
Much has changed over the past few years and it is time to look at Open 2.0 – to use a much maligned suffix.
Synopsis
This is a long article – even by my standards :) -and the links I have referred to on this blog are also comprehensive. It draws from many sources and refers to ‘free/fremium’ business models originally discussed by Chris Andersen at Wired magazine
Further, I expect that there may be an addendum. The overall ideas are discussed in my forthcoming book Open Mobile Ecosystems co-authored with Anna Gatti and Mauro Del Rio and contributions from Dr Andreas Constantinou
This article covers
a) The meaning of ‘Open’ in context of the mobile ecosystem
b) The disruption in business models
c) The emergence of new business models which arise from open ecosystems.
d) Ultimately, we hope to cover the impact on Operators and other players etc and new models they can adopt
e) Free/Fremium business models and their applicability to the mobile data industry.
I have also invited some feedback from people whose views I respect in the industry – to complement my own thinking. So, all feedback welcome.
What is Open? – Defining Open from a customer standpoint
Firstly, let us talk about what we mean by openness. This is not as easy as it might seem. For instance, depending on the context both MySpace and facebook could be deemed ‘open’ (or not!). The same applies to Apple/iPhone.
For the lack of a better definition, we can define openness from a customer standpoint as -
'The freedom of choice for the customer and the removal of commercial and technological barriers that hamper free communication between people’.
This customer oriented definition of openness is universal since benefits to the customer is the common factor for all businesses.
If we break this down into its component parts, then we get
a) The customer is the main driver
b) She should not be patronised
c) She has choice
d) She expects interoperability(systems to talk to each other) and will not like business models which are meant to serve the vendor at the expense of interoperability(for instance region coded DVDs)
e) She owns her own data (Data portability)
By extension,
a) Openness is about services that are driven by communication (and not consumption)
b) Open systems are not synonymous with ‘free’
c) Openness is disruptive and will lead to new business models which affect incumbents and create new winners, losers and partners
d) Creators of platforms which benefit ALL players in the value chain are the winners in an open ecosystem as opposed to closed platforms like the traditional Operator portals
e) Open is not synonymous with open source – in the sense that commercially restrictive business models can still be built around a system that is created using open source.
f) Having said that, Open source is an important part of open systems(as we shall see below)
g) The Web is a driver for open systems and the adoption of the Web, Web standards and Web business models on the Mobile Internet is a catalyst for Open systems
h) Privacy, Identity, security, reputation and revocation will be an important part of the open ecosystem – especially on Mobile devices.
i) ‘Choice for the customer’ means ‘low barriers to entry for third parties’. This is controversial for many people i.e. why should we allow third parties on ‘our’ network? Won’t that affect our profits? We address this question below through the discussion about innovation at the edge of the network.
j) Open systems in general lead to innovation. To understand this, we have to appreciate the ‘edge of the network’ thinking which we also discuss below.
The inevitability of openness
When I talk of Open Mobile Ecosystems – people often respond by framing the problem in terms of ‘On portal – Off portal’(On Deck/Off Deck). This is very limited and it ignores the real issues – for instance choice for the customer, Low barriers of entry for third parties etc
But firstly, why talk of Open Mobile ecosystems? Why not continue with the mechanisms that have worked before?
There are many reasons. Here are a few
a) Customer choice – This is the biggest reason. Customers have a choice and increasingly these choices will increase. The customers will go with what serves them best. These choices extend at the network level(Wimax vs. HSDPA) to devices(open devices vs. closed devices) to services(access to any service – not just ‘on deck’)
b) Market opportunity – Openness can lead to new market opportunities – see the discussion on Mobhappy about the opening up by Verizon potentially driven by opportunities like Amazon Kindle.
c) Openness reflects the way we live I recently asked this to a vendor – Do all your friends and family have subscriptions from the same Mobile Operator? OR Do all your friends have buy devices from the same vendor? – Obviously not. Then why do we base business models and strategies on such ideas?
d) The consumption based Mobile Content model is levelling off out and user generated content may play an important part in future content mix: Again, on first glance, this sounds unlikely. But look again. One of the market leaders in supplying / managing content for Operator portals is Mobile Streams.
However, in a trading statement in Jan 2008, Mobile Streams said: Growth in downloads from operator portals was largely flat
And again in the same statement
The Company expects in 2008 to see the continued gradual opening up of the Mobile Internet around the world as companies such as Apple and Google continue to strengthen their global mobile presence.
I expect others like motricity whose business also depends on Operator portal strategies, will also suffer from the same woes. The market has changed and all players will need to react to these changes.
Nor is it an isolated trend.
BMI Forecasted Ringtone Market Down 8% in 2007 (BMI is an American performing right organization that represents more than 375,000 songwriters, composers and music publishers in all genres of music.). And Nokia predicts 25% of entertainment by 2012 will be created and consumed within peer communities
and again YouTube showed a surge of 18% in traffic in the two months since the writers' strike began
All these trends are collectively pointing to a significant shift in content/media – and they all affect existing business models and partnerships – especially when they are based on consumption based content(i.e. non user generated content) and will get even faster with developments like the deployment of Google Gears on Mobile devices
e) The rate of change is accelerating Just a few years ago, no one talked of ‘off portal’, fixed rate pricing and so on. Today, no one wants to deny that they support fixed rate pricing! The rate of change is faster than anyone predicted.
e) Google and iPhone .. are changing business models .. for instance the iPhone changes the Operator billing relationship through iTunes. Both Google and Apple are unifying the fragmented value chain. Both have their roots in the Web/PC world. Both are developer friendly and have potential to create a viable ecosystem
f) Customer education – AOL learned this recently. In the early days, there is always the perception of the ‘Big bad world’ out there. However, once customers are educated and familiar with technology, they want to explore. In other words, wander out of the walled garden
g) The Mobile Web As the Mobile Web adopts the full web standards (like CSS, Javascript etc), the Web and the Mobile Web become synonymous. This means applications(like Widgets) can be deployed both across the Web and the Mobile Web.
Options to openness
The end goal of Open systems to create interoperable systems. There are other ways to create interoperable systems. A large vendor/ monopoly is one way (Microsoft on the Web, DoCoMo in Japan etc). Government mandates is another way(South Korea and also China).
A preferable way(which we are seeing in the West) is a mixture of Open source and Open standards. Specifically we are seeing the emergence of light weight standards like FOAF and microformats – which are open. Unlike standards driven by the bigger standardization bodies or industry consortia, we are seeing standards created by passionate and knowledgeable individuals Dan Brickley for FOAF and then subsequently adopted by industry players(like Google for Android, Nokia, Yahoo etc)
This is the future as I see it – both for the web and the mobile web.
The question then arises:
a) What are the dominant business models which will prevail in an open ecosystem
b) How should incumbents adapt to the new open ecosystem? How will their business models change?
These are the questions we seek to address in this document
Contra viewpoints
Before we proceed further, here is a contra perspective. One could argue, and indeed some still do, that they don’t need third parties at all(developers). They can do it ‘their way’ all by themselves .. works for Sinatra .. but not for others I suspect :)
In addition, the results of opening up an ecosystem may be unpredictable. Look at facebook. Do we honestly need so many facebook applications? Do they add value?
One could also argue that a closed system provides a better end user experience. This is a well known argument but it tends to favour services where the customer is merely consuming content(not creating it as in the Web 2.0 world).
Then there is the security argument(open systems are more susceptible to risks and threats). And finally the unknown business model argument – for instance Long tail services may work on the Web but they cannot work on the telecoms network where the upfront investment is a lot higher.
Perspectives and benefits of open systems
Before we address Open business models, let us look at Openness from different perspectives i.e. customer, developer and ecosystem
Customer
a) The ability to access any content (note this does not mean for free)
b) The ability to communicate with anyone – whether the person is on their network or not
c) A choice of services - not just services from the provider
Developers
a) A viable off deck ecosystem
b) Open device connectivity – also called the Carterphone principle
c) Transparent pricing(ideally fixed price billing) for both national and roaming scenarios
d) Access to device APIs(subject to security ),
e) Easy availability of technical information, SDKs etc
f) Equal access to third party application in relation to the provider’s application s
g) Unrestricted access to content and applications including via side loading
h) A commercially viable certification mechanism(or ideally a certificate mechanism that is light weight and user driven. For more on this, see this post from Denis at wapreview.
Ecosystem
In this section, I am referring to existing blogs.
Open source and open standards: Open source vs. Open Standards – complementing or competing?
Edge of the network innovation – Smart nodes and dumb pipes:
The rise of the stupid networks 2.0
Open Web business models
Open and closed coexist – but the rate of open systems far exceeds closed systems
So, where is this all going to commercially? To seek answers we have to look at both the Internet and the Mobile Internet. There are two forces: The Internet(and the Web) with it’s free, ad driven and open model on one hand and the Mobile data industry on the other hand
While the Mobile data industry is not used to many such revolutions / paradigm shifts; the Internet is. And the rule of thumb is – new ecosystems emerge but old ecosystems also co-exist. In the early 90s, with the advent of relational databases like Oracle, everyone expected the mainframes to be ‘replaced’. It is coming up to 2010 now and no one talks of replacing mainfames even after Y2K. So, the revolution will be bloodless. But that does not belittle the fact that relational databases are underlying a very large segment of computing today.
It is the rate of growth rather than the segment itself which is the critical factor – and there the incumbents DO stand to lose.
Secondly, hardware costs decrease but software and services costs increase.
Let’s look at an example: Sony NR21M Laptop - Laptop for the Home and Office costs £499.99. The windows Vista edition that goes on it costs £287.4985. That’s 73%. Dixons sells ‘optional Coverplan Support’ (3 Years £189.00, 4 Years £209.00, 5 Years £259.00).If you add other software(Antivirus - £50) then quickly costs of services and software add up.
Hence, I see a range of options. An unlocked phone(sold with supporting ‘coverplans’) on one hand – to a completely locked down phone(with remote monitoring and support) and a range of options in between.
This is not speculative. There is some analyst research to back it up. When I asked Dean Bubley of Disruptive Analysis about this – he said: "Disruptive Analysis expects the handset market to continue to feature both
'operator-locked' and fully-open devices. For example, by 2012, there will be about 250m smartphones capable of supporting non-operator competitive VoIPo3G, plus another 50m mobile broadband enabled laptops. Conversely, there will be over 600m 3G phones in use which mobile operators have restricted or 'closed' in some fashion."
Taxonomy of Free .. Fremium et al – Chris Anderson and Wired
The underlying question for the Web is: How can you make money in an era of abundance as opposed to an era of scarcity. This is made worse with Mobile devices where there are significant infrastructure costs. By that we mean, Web based companies can afford to take risks, try new services since the cost of new services are low. Not so with Mobile ecosystems.
The march 2008 issue of wired has a fascinating article from Chris Anderson called ‘Free’ . (By the way the whole issue is fascinating with two other articles - one on autism and the other about how Kissinger and Nixon tried to bluff the soviets by 'pretending' to launch a nuclear war - only governments can be that stupid!)
However .. back to the topic on hand ..
This article explores the taxonomy of free .. and here are some insights from that article.
Traditional economics is oriented towards scarcity … (Economics is the science which studies human behaviour as a relationship between ends and scarce means which have alternative uses as per wikipedia definition of economics ) This definition breaks down in an era of abundance since there is no scarcity.
The web is all about scale and it is not about the inputs(costs of servers) but rather about the outputs(what can be done with the inputs. Practically everything that web technology touches starts on the way to free. Technology has always had a deflationary effect but the rate of 'free' has increased with the web. Almost free is not the same as free. The moment we charge even a penny to the customer then you are in a different business from 'free'
A taxonomy of free business models on the Web include(as per Chris Andersen)
Fremium - basic version is free. Advanced version is not. The difference is – it is the whole version(not a sample) and the belief is 10% of the paying userbase will pay the remaining 90%
Advertising This is well covered and so I am not discussing it in detail here. We will discuss the advertising business model in subsequent blogs.
Cross subsidies I discussed this in a blog long ago called Salt, pepper and social networking and also JP Rangaswami referred to it as the Prince business model . Any digital product that entices you to pay for another (often non digital) product is free. Money is charged for the non digital product(like concerts).
Zero marginal costs – Things that can be distributed without any marginal costs to anyone. Digital music is the best example of this between digital reproduction and p2p distribution – the production and distribution costs are zero.
Labour exchange – users do something for the provider in return for free content. This is the original ‘Web 2.0’ business model and the information the users provide becomes the metadata for the content. It enriches the data and hence provides value to the provider. The best example of this is flickr. See my blog – Communities are not Web 2.0 because talk is cheap
Gift economy – The best example of this is wikipedia.
Besides this, there are two other examples: The attention economy and the Reputation economy – both of these are separate topics in themselves.
Open mobile business models
How does this work in the Mobile Data Industry? Here are some thoughts and I shall continue to expand this idea more
a) The Web is all about scale. Contrary to the numbers, mobile networks are mainly sub national i.e. there are more than one in a country. Other than SMS, no other service has critical mass. So, the Mobile data industry lacks scale (and hence advertising model suffers)
b) The Web is all about ‘Free’ but mobile has significant investments. So, the free model(which is also tied to the idea of Long Tail i.e. many low cost, low risk services that can be experimentally deployed)
c) You cannot charge money for a service on mobile which the Web provides for free(the woes of IMS are a classic example)
We will continue to explore these ideas .. but here are some thoughts
a) The deployment of mobile services takes longer because the network is tightly coupled to services. A decoupling of the network and the services will drive applications
b) If innovation shifts to the edge of the network, then where is the edge of the network? The two beneficiaries are the device and the browser.
c) How do the free business models apply to the mobile data industry. How do the 'non free' business models apply to the Mobile Data Industry? This is a topic of discussion.
d) Convenience(one click), Identity, reputation, Attention etc are all beneficial business models on the open Internet. How will they play out?
The platform strategy is a true disruptor. Amazon does it with web services, facebook does it with facebook APIs. Google does it with open social. Even Yahoo has joined the game with open search. All these diverse initiatives have one thing in common - they are designed to attract a large numbers of developers / third parties. The telecom industry took the first steps in this direction with web services/network abstraction/Parlay – but little has happened – and I suspect it may be too late now
Conclusions
Open systems and their impact is inevitable. It is clear that recreating existing business models will not work. Savvy companies like Nokia, Google, Opera and Apple are leading the way in this space. Encouraging, I see many operators also looking to embrace this model.
The question we must always ask ourselves is – In an era of abundance, what are the new scarcities? Comments and thoughts welcome at ajit.jaokar at futuretext.com . I will continue to update this.
updates and addendums
I will update this section with relevent links and developmemts which I am tracking
a) Anything but anarchy in the uk - This is a positive development. what is really needed in addition to the revenue model is a 'GSM like ' coopreartion on interoperability/interconnectivity for Mobile Data. If THAT happens, I will be truly encouraged. IPX network is an initiative from the GSMA in that direction - but I am not aware of specifics / status
Posted by ajit at 7:16 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
iMode - another one bites the dust ..
e-plus drops imode. I have said this many times before.
Let us not look to the east for inspiration. The Mobile Web / Mobile data industry is taking off in a big way in the West - but not as a copy of the East.
Here, we will never have the monopoly of DoCoMo or the government standardization of the Korean government.
If interconnectivity and interoperability are the key goals - then they will be achieved in Europe and America through open standards and the adoption of Web standards creating a synergy between the Web and the Mobile web.
There is simply no other way to achieve critical mass as far as I can see - and without critical mass - the industry will forever be tied to voice and SMS. Applications will never gain critical mass no matter how good they are.
Posted by ajit at 9:38 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
A landmark: The opengardens blog completes more than 800 posts in less than 3 years ..
Hello all
We have reached a bit of a landmark .. The OpenGardens blog now has more than 800 posts - and considering some of my posts are extensive(more articles than blogs), there is a lot of content here!
Thanks for all your support over the years - both online and offline where I have met various readers of OpenGardens blogs at conferences but also at airport lounges and hotel lobbies etc when people have stopped me to thank me / discuss this blog !
I know large companies who read it regularly and distribute some blogs internally and many small startups - both Web and Mobile - who also follow it
It all started with this post - Beatles to BT? would it work? way back on 26th May 2005 when I asked ..
Would 'Beatles to BT' work? i.e. If the Beatles had been starting out - would they have approached BT to sell their music? What would happen if they did? Would there be a Beatles - in the first place?
This set the tone for the whole blog - a balanced, human, personal and often extremely detailed view of the Mobile data industry with an emphasis on Open Gardens(opposite of walled gardens). It is an 'outsider's view' i.e. with a bias towards the Web and as the Web and the Mobile Web converge - with companies like Nokia, Opera, Google and Apple leading the way - there are many more interesting things to cover!
Along the way, various personal preferences like Tom and Jerry, ZZ Top, Tintin, Asterix, Snoopy and Pink Floyd have kept it interesting as have my personal ethos about Individualism, human rights, the free market economy and the belief that technology will enrich the lives of people and overcome poverty
Thanks for your support again!
Please subscribe to the OpenGardens blog at OpenGardens
Posted by ajit at 7:08 AM | Comments (2) | TrackBack
March 23, 2008
Rudy De Waele's presentation on Mobile 2.0 startups
Rudy De Waele has an updated overview presentation on Mobile 2.0 startups he did last week in Brussels at the Plugg Conference.
NOTE from Rudy: As for the startups represented in this presentation, they are only some of the ones I am following. This is not intented as a complete overview but a representation and moment in time. If you're not included in this presentation you might be in my next one smile Just ping me if I missed you somehow.
Posted by ajit at 8:06 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
speaking at Over the air(London)
More soon - but I am speaking at Over the air on Saturday(the second day). If you are there, lets meet. I will be speaking on Identity, Reputation and Revocation - (which relates to my PhD work)
Posted by ajit at 6:21 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
March 22, 2008
Johnny Cash impersonates Elvis
I loved this! Enjoy!
Posted by ajit at 6:49 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
March 21, 2008
Object models and data sets for a social network .. a technique for data
following on from my last post .. Object models and data sets for a social network .. crawlers vs simulation ..
(read the previous email first to get the context)
I have been thinking of this last night and this may be a solution
The question is - Can we extapolate social network data based on existing data patterns?
We have three components
a) A knowledge base(typical size of friends, no of blog posts etc)
b) Parameterization (setup configuration to run the generator) and
c) The generation itself
We need a large volume of data to be relevent
We need parameters that mirror real life
Here is my plan
The objective is to 'clone' the transactions from a core set first and then apply the parameters(intelligence)
a) Create configuration tables (for instance a profiles table)
b) Create transactions tables(blog entries, facebook pokes etc) and
populate it with the base entries
c) Create a cartesian join between the profiles table and the blog
entries table. In a normal course of events, cartesian joins are not
desirable. However they are good to create a massively large number of
records very quickly
fror instance
select profile.profile_id, blogs.blog_id from profiles, blogs
If profiles has profile_id P1, P2
blogs has blog_id B1, B2
will give 4 rows
P1, B1
P1, B2
P2, B1
P2, B2
d) We thus get a large number of rows
e) We then 'apply' the rules as a series of update statements on the
base data(post cartesian join)
f) This gives us the 'real' data
g) To make this work, I plan to 'open source' the whole thing -
tables and more importantlyt the knowledge base.
h) So, I see many people contributing insights(A typical user on FB
has typically 100 friends on average, Myspace has 40 blog entries per
week that sort of thing)
i) So, we can now create a set of data based on parameters and its
all open sourced
thougts?
kind rgds
Ajit
Posted by ajit at 11:36 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
March 20, 2008
Object models and data sets for a social network .. crawlers vs simulation ..
This relates to my PhD - I wonder how people do this?(or if you encounter similar problems)
To simulate a social network, we need datasets
These are not easy to get
There are some crawlers. They have limitations
One option I am considering is to generate data for a social network based on a set of parameters
For this, we need a data model/object model of a social network
for ex:
facebook has profiles, relations(friends), posts(wall), groups, applications and so on.
ultimately I am thinking of the characteristics of social data and then considering how closely we can mirror generated data to real life
For this, we need to know the distribution i.e. the typical number of friends, blog posts etc etc for social networks. This link gives some info - but not a lot.
Any thoughts on
a) Existance of a data model
b) Your approach to simulation / data sets
c) crawlers v.s. data generation
d) data distribution
Apparantly, this is also a big topic for sigcomm this year!
kind rgds
Ajit
Posted by ajit at 10:33 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Portable reputation ..
Portable reputations have been discussed recently. Have a look at these recent articles on Portable reputation from Business week and from mashup
Here are two thoughts
Firstly, Is portable reputation overrated?
Do users really care about portable reputation? I know many of the thought leaders, bloggers etc do (for instance with the bill of rights for the social web).
But do users care?
Take me for instance (as a user of social software)
I often speak in Germany or Switzerland.
Every time I speak there, I get requests to connect from a social network called Xing. (The dominant social network in the German speaking world)
A long time ago, I used to be a member of Xing
Now its an abandoned account discovered by German speaking people when I am there
Same with twitter(have an account, don't use)
So from my own behaviour(and I suspect from others) people simply abandon reputation and start again unless there is a good commercial reasons to 'port' the reputation.
Hence, is portable reputation overrated?
Secondly
Given what I think I know about open social - can we not create an application using Open social APIs that enable reputation to be portable from one network to another (for instance from Myspace to Xing. In fact, we can create an application that aggregates all such reputations in different constituent social networks and creates a ‘consolidated’ reputation (so to speak) across social networks covered by Open Social?
I think this is possible via Open social APIs? (and I continue to explore it - so maybe wrong).
Thoughts?
kind rgds
Ajit
Posted by ajit at 8:23 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
March 19, 2008
EU picks mobile TV standard in DVB-H but UK sill lags ...
EU picks mobile TV standard in DVB-H but UK sill lags ...
The critical question for the UK is can national coverage be delivered in time for the 2012 Olympics.
Spectrum will be released only next year, leaving it very tight for coverage to be in place and services available nationally.
Citizens in Italy, Finland, France, Switzerland and Austria (to name a few) will be able to watch. Let's hope the citizens of Manchester, Birmingham, Newcastle, Glasgow, Cardiff and Southampton have the same opportunity.
This is a serious economic question for the UK given the fact that the UK Creative economy has a similar value to the financial services market.
Posted by ajit at 5:56 PM | Comments (2) | TrackBack
Carnival of the mobilists No 115 on Andrew Grill's blog ..
Carnival of the mobilists No 115 on Andrew Grill's blog . Great reading as usual
Posted by ajit at 5:47 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
Opensocial APIs .. Can this work?
Can this scenario work in Open social?
I am a third party developer. I am using open social. I want to create an application that sends a message from MySpace to Orkut. (both being members of open social). Can I write a third party app to do this using open social? In other words, can third party apps bridge constituent networks
kind rgds
Ajit
Posted by ajit at 4:56 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
March 13, 2008
suddenly Yahoo gets VERY interesting!
This is VERY interesting. Suddenly Yahoo gets very very interesting with Yahoo open search
Posted by ajit at 6:40 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
March 12, 2008
The Prince business model for mobile operators
Bena has a nice post at gomonews .. about JP Rangaswami's talk in Berlin about the singer/musician Prince and the business model of giving away CDs
If you dont know this issue, see HERE and HERE
This is on the same lines of Salt, Pepper and Social networking
Posted by ajit at 3:52 AM | Comments (2) | TrackBack
March 11, 2008
Carnival of the mobilists No 114 at Chetan Sharma's blog ..
Carnival of the mobilists No 114 at Chetan Sharma's blog.
Great as usual. Dont forget to read Chetan Sharma's book on Mobile Advertising for the wireless market espeically for brands. Great!
Posted by ajit at 6:50 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
March 10, 2008
Open Mobile and the evolution of Open Gardens
Open Mobile
From the early days of this blog, I have been addressing the problem of walled gardens and talking of ways to overcome the problems we face in the industry today
Over the last few years, things have indeed changed .. Not even the most ardent supporters of walled gardens, on-portal strategy, per Mb pricing etc can deny that now.
But where is this all leading to – especially for the developers?
I have been thinking of the evolution of the Mobile data industry for my forthcoming book Open Mobile ecosystems: The disruptive potential of open systems and open source in the mobile environment
Co-authored with Anna Gatti and Mauro Del Rio(and with strategic insights from Dr Andreas Constantinou Director of visionmobile and support from Al Briggs and Alex Kerr ), this will be a very interesting book.
The book is about the interplay between a series of recent developments like Webkit, iPhone, Android, open source, Open social, facebook, cloud computing and others. For the first time, the combined impact of these developments create the potential for a truly open mobile ecosystem.
Certainly, the problem still exists at a network level as you can see from my recent post The rise of the stupid networks 2.0
However, inspite of network layer issues, services level integration and social layer integration have always offered an avenue to overcome the drawbacks we see in the mobile data industry today.
Service layer integration
Service level integration originally manifested in the rise of Mobile Ajax with the simple proposition that – as the Mobile Web starts to adopt full web browsing standards(CSS, Javascript etc), web applications(and that includes widgets) may be distributed over the Web and the Mobile Web – thereby providing a critical mass and overcoming the bottlenecks we see (such as high revenue share by portals)
This thinking underpinned my now well known blog - Mobile web 2.0: AJAX for mobile devices – why mobile AJAX will replace both J2ME and XHTML as the preferred platform for mobile applications development - Part two
The iPhone is a classic implementation of that philosophy as I said in - The iPhone is extraordinary not because of it’s UI but because it’s the tail wagging the dog ..
and iTunes is a wider disruptor to the sacrosanct Telco billing model as we see in
Is ARPU outdated? The wider impact of Billing in an open mobile environment
Predictably, in the March release of the SDK, itunes has evolved to include mobile applications in addition to content
>>>
Apple will publish all iPhone applications, regardless of the developer, making them accessible through iTunes and a new App Store icon on the iPhone and iPod touch. The applications will be hosted and distributed solely by Apple, and all transactions will be processed by the company, with a 30% cut of all sales going to maintain the App Store. This figure, roughly the same percentage as what is paid to Apple by artists selling music through the iTunes Store, leaves 70% to the developers, who will be paid on a monthly basis. Developers who do not want to distribute through iTunes can create web applications or stay off of the platform altogether.
<<<
In addition, The FUD driven certification process is also under scrutiny and will not survive for long under the impact of an open ecosystem See iPhone and Android herald the end of the FUD(Fear uncertainity and doubt) /certification model ..
So, lots of changes at the service layer and especially changes which unify the Web and the Mobile Web.
But that’s not all. Remember the web itself has been morphing to Web 2.0 over the last three years. And one of the characteristics of Web 2.0 is its social impact i.e. social networking.
Social layer Integration
Why is the social layer becoming important? Let’s put it this way – currently – for most part - we go to the Web to search content. Increasingly with the rise of social networking sites like facebook and myspace, we are logging on to the social web i.e. primarily logging on to seek people and not just content. In fact, this social layer can be viewed as a ‘meta’/umbrella social network spanning both the Web and the Mobile Web. I introduced this idea in a blog called Beyond Web 2.0: The social web or the semantic web ? and the rise of the Umbrella social networks
when viewed in this way – social networks are very important especially because they can act to become recommendation engines and consumers of content as a recent Nokia study reveals that 25% of entertainment by 2012 will be created and consumed within peer communities
Where is it going to?
Coming back to the original problem – we seek service, social level integration between the Web and the Mobile Web in order to overcome the walled garden. Here are the most promising technologies/initiatives that span the Web and the mobile web
On the services layer: full web browser(Mobile Ajax), open standards, open source, Android, iPhone and Webkit
And on the social layer: Umbrella social networks, cloud computing, Open social and facebook among others
By all means .. the jury is still out and not enough is still known.
The iPhone’s strategy is to cut down the friction/fat in the value chain by providing a unified ecosystem and serving their customers through fantastic products. Google’s strategy is to also unify the value chain and make it easier for people to use products across the Web and the Mobile Web(Google products that is!). Nokia continues it’s transformation into an Internet company.
More players will emerge
While the iPhone will never be mass market and it is yet unclear how Android devices will actually look and be welcomed by the customers .. all that does not matter ..
What matters is – an irreversible trend has been set and it is accelerating and much as I like the betavine folk .. they don’t stand a chance against 100 million dollars
Finally let me conclude with this classic from Michael Mace Mobile applications RIP
If you have not read it – don’t miss it!
It’s nice to see others like Micheal are now saying effectively the same thing as above
Here is a section called The mistake we made
>>>
We told ourselves that the fundamental rule of our business was: Mobile is different. But we lost sight of an even more fundamental law that applies to any computing platform:
A platform that is technically flawed but has a good business model will always beat a platform that is elegant but has a poor business model.
Windows is the best example of inelegant tech paired with the right business model, but it has happened over and over again in the history of the tech world.
In the mobile world, what have we done? We created a series of elegant technology platforms optimized just for mobile computing. We figured out how to extend battery life, start up the system instantly, conserve precious wireless bandwidth, synchronize to computers all over the planet, and optimize the display of data on a tiny screen.
But we never figured out how to help developers make money. In fact, we paired our elegant platforms with a developer business model so deeply broken that it would take many years, and enormous political battles throughout the industry, to fix it -- if it can ever be fixed at all.
Meanwhile, there is now an alternative platform for mobile developers. It's horribly flawed technically, not at all optimized for mobile usage, and in fact was designed for a completely different form of computing. It would be hard to create a computing architecture more inappropriate for use over a cellular data network. But it has a business model that sweeps away all of the barriers in the mobile market. Mobile developers are starting to switch to it, a trickle that is soon going to grow. And this time I think the flash flood will last.
If you haven't figured it out yet, I'm talking about the Web. I think Web applications are going to destroy most native app development for mobiles. Not because the Web is a better technology for mobile, but because it has a better business model.
Think about it: If you're creating a website, you don't have to get permission from a carrier. You don't have to get anything certified by anyone. You don't have to beg for placement on the deck, and you don't have to pay half your revenue to a reseller. In fact, the operator, handset vendor, and OS vendor probably won't even be aware that you exist. It'll just be you and the user, communicating directly.
Until recently, a couple of barriers prevented this from working. The first was the absence of flat-rate data plans. They have been around for a while in the US, but in Europe they are only now appearing. Before flat-rate, users were very fearful of exploring the mobile web because they risked ending up with a thousand-Euro mobile bill. That fear is now receding. The second barrier was the extremely bad quality of mobile browsers. Many of them still stink, but the high quality of Apple's iPhone browser, coupled with Nokia's licensing of WebKit, points to a future in which most mobile browsers will be reasonably feature-complete. The market will force this -- mobile companies how have to ship a full browser in order to keep up with Apple, and operators have to give full access to it.
<<<
Posted by ajit at 12:12 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
any facebook developers reading this?
Hello
any facebook developers reading this?
Need some help with a question kind rgds Ajit
Posted by ajit at 6:53 AM | Comments (4) | TrackBack
much as I like the betavine folk .. they may stand no chance against 100 million dollars ..
Much as I like the Vodafone betavine folk .. Paul Golding has a point when he compares Vodafone betavine to to the 100 million dollar fund for iPhone apps. As I have said .. the hour is later than most operators think .. and if they do not make any attempts to commercially support innovation(and this was Paul's point) .. they risk becoming irrelevent
Its hard to compete against 100 million!
Posted by ajit at 12:13 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
March 9, 2008
The rise of the stupid networks 2.0
I recently re-read David Isenberg's seminal paper The rise of the stupid networks which explains the End to End principle . The paper applied originally to IN (Intelligent networks) for voice but today as we shall see below, the same principles apply to IMS for Mobile data applications . This is sad - and explains the low uptake of IMS applications. The only solution is to treat the network as a black box.
The Rise of the stupid networks – a brief synopsis
Rise of the Stupid Network by David Isenberg is a seminal paper which describes the End to End principle. As you read the synopsis below from that paper, remind yourselves that it applies to IN (and note the similarities between IMS).
‘Intelligent’ networks arose with the idea of doing digital switching for voice calls. Driven by the motivation of ‘vendor independence’ and the prospect of getting better deals from their suppliers by fostering interoperability between suppliers; Intelligent networks gained momentum.
In contrast to interoperability between the network and the supplier, interoperability between the network and the customer was managed by limited, carefully designed interfaces. The Intelligence of the network itself was limited to the intelligence of the designers – and hence was confined to what the designers knew best – voice call routing, calling party connect – that sort of thing
The impact of not talking to their customers meant that new customer needs filtered only slowly into the network. More importantly – they needed changes to the network. Consequently, so as to minimize changes to the network, only the needs with the biggest payoff get attention – a risk free, innovation averse strategy. This leads to business cases, ROI, development plans etc etc. This can take years.
The Edge of the network
In contrast, any innovation that resides at the edge of the network (and treats the network as a black box) does not suffer from the same limitations. The success of ‘edge of network’ applications does not demand any changes to the network and does not depend on the evolution of the network.
So, what do did we see? Because the real customers cannot drive innovation and ensure that their needs are being heard (think limited, controlled interfaces as before) .. vendors drive the hype in the guise of customers. This makes matters worse since there is a perception of innovative services .. none of which the real customer wants.
Driving innovation from within the network leads to an odd situation of ideas which depend on the network to catch up. This is never a good place for innovators to be since there is no ‘one’ network(and even within a country there are often many networks). Evolution of networks is unpredictable. It takes too long. It is too risky to tie your business plan to a specific future direction a network may take.
Wearable computing
For instance - At the mobile world congress in Barcelona 2008 - one operator mentioned that 'wearable devices' was a key trend to watch
This is perplexing .. Wearable computing? Are we honestly thinking of wearable computing as a major trend for devices? Should developers start to plan for it? Should they invest their time(and scare resources) on wearable computing applications?
Are there startups in a garage now plotting on the next killer 'wearable device' application?
Perhaps I am missing something .. but I doubt it ..
The point is this: Do we expect the entire network to evolve in this direction? Maybe a specific operator may announce an initiative – but will that matter to innovation in general? Will it lead to critical mass? What about interoperability?
This is an example of innovation driven from within the network – and even if there is a need for wearable computing – will it make commercial sense for innovators to focus on it (considering the issues of interoperability and critical mass).
Sadly, this is IN 2.0. It does not matter if its voice or data - the problem remains two fold
a) Building intelligence in the network limits the innovation to the imagination of the network provider who view each problem within the context of their existing capabilities and
b) The mindset of Intelligent networks keeps the customer driven innovation out of the network
This leads to a negative spiral - which we saw with IN, IMS and other esoteric propositions like wearable devices alongwih any terms like 3G applications, wireless applications, wimax applications, LTE applications and so on (i.e. by definition they tie intelligence and services to a specific network type)
Conclusion
The only solution is to treat the network as a black box and focus on edge of the network innovation. This is also likely to mean that innovation will arise from players outside the current ecosystem – hence look to Apple, Google and others to create network agnostic innovation.
Posted by ajit at 11:36 PM | Comments (2) | TrackBack
iPhone and Android herald the end of the FUD /certification model ..
I don’t often go to high street electronics shops but recently I did.
In the UK .. shopping at the high street stores (Dixon’s, Currys and PC world) .. is not the best of experiences. One special factor stands out .. and it is the ‘hard sell’ on ‘after sales service’. The salesperson is VERY keen to sell you some form of ‘mastercare’ (I think that’s what they call it) – even for the most mundane of items.
Recently, a 3 salesman also called me asking for my interest in the Dog got your phone scheme ..
Expect more of this .. Much more .. especially with the coming demise of the ‘secure/reliability business model’ on mobile phones.
We are seeing a new trend with both Android and the iPhone.
The ‘security/reliability’ business model seems to be under threat.
Fear, uncertainty and doubt has always been a business model – its best proponent being the old style IBM.
In our industry, FUD exists in the form of ‘security’ as a business model.
The thinking goes something like this: The mobile device is mass market. It must work 100% in all scenarios in a simple and a predictable way. If it does not, we will replicate the ‘problems’ of the PC. The operators will have to support all these calls for service (and already these costs are too high). So, let us err on the side of caution .. and lock everything down.
The end result is a market which does not exist for mobile data services.
Both the iPhone and Google are taking on the FUD model – and thereby causing a profound change in the ecosystem.
The iPhone’s strategy is to cut down the friction/fat in the value chain by providing a unified ecosystem and serving their customers through fantastic products. Google’s strategy is to also unify the value chain and make it easier for people to use products across the Web and the Mobile Web(Google products that is!).
To achieve this goal – both iPhone and Google(Android) have to be more open. Specifically, they have to overcome the drawbacks/friction of the software certification model on mobile devices.
The problem is: certification has drifted away from being a virtue(a genuine means to protect consumers) to a vice(a business model, which acts as a market inhibitor)
Dennis says at wapreview in How to define open mobile
>>>
Packaging an application for deployment should not require any additional licenses, certifications or third party testing. Code signing can be supported to insure application authenticity and integrity but should not be required for any type of access.
I'm sure there will be a lot of resistance to the open security model that points 3, 4 and 5 define. I expect carriers and software publishers to defend the current Byzantine maze of application signing. Security is very important, especially to users, but the current mobile security model is totally broken and is severely restricting mobile application development and innovation. Users, not carriers and device vendors should own security. It looks like Google agrees. As I understand it, Android security is completely user driven. All 3rd party applications are treated equally. There are no certificates and no privileged security domains in the Android security model. Applications must declare their intention to use each specific sensitive resource (network, messaging, camera, location, etc.). At install time the user given the choice of allowing temporarily, allowing permanently or disallowing that application's access to each protected resource. That is the open way to do security, with all applications treated equally and the user alone deciding which vendors and applications to trust.
<<<
And again in Why Android matters
>>>
Imagine if developers of PC applications were required to obtain a costly Microsoft or Apple certification before their applications could save files or connect to the network. Had that sort of restriction had been in effect 30 years ago most of us would still be using typewriters. The current signed security model in mobile along with the high price and unpredictability of metered data plans have had a huge negative effect on innovation in mobile services and applications.
The signing model took control of security away from the user and gave it to the carrier, Android puts the user back in control of his own security, something that has worked pretty well on the PC. Sure there are risks in an open application environment like Android or the PC but with risk comes reward. The reward with Android will be the availability of an enormous library of ground breaking software.
<<<
The problems encountered in this scenario are well documented especially with Java certification issues.
In contrast, Android and also the iPhone take a much more liberal view.
iPhone developers pay $99 a year, and apparently get automatic certification of all their apps. (I still need to study the iPhone SDK to understand more)
And, Android’s security model is a prompting model.
Applications must include a manifest stating what sort of potentially dangerous features they want to use, such as making phone calls.
Another good discussion HERE
There are obvious drawbacks – especially in explaining this mechanism to the user and to be sure, many elements of Android and the Iphone security models are unknown – for example - we don’t know who signs the applications for Android (yet)
There are also the more traditional arguments between the merits / demerits of open source vs. proprietary software – but these are not the critical issue
I think the critical issue is - open-source environment would provide a good phone experience and reduce the cost of a phone by 10%
If that is correct, open source is here to stay on mobile device and the drive towards more open devices (not just via open source but also in general) heralded by iPhone and Android(and also Nokia) will be irreversible.
So, how will this play out in the future?
I see a majority of open devices but ironically a large number of completely locked down devices. Dean Bubley had a report with similar insights – have asked Dean for comments.
The factors leading to closed devices include – a demographic who will always want closed devices, security(protection of minors), services that depend on the telecoms bearer/QOS model.
I see this to be a small set – but existing none the less.
What is clear is: the FUD based model based on certification which we see today may well be coming to an end. It will be complemented by a more ‘Insurance/ sales support’ type of model for a majority of phones which will be completely open. There will be always a market for devices that are fully locked.
Thoughts?
Posted by ajit at 8:41 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
March 8, 2008
The significance of Google Gears on mobile devices - part two
In a previous post, I highlighted the significance of Google Gears on mobile devices. Google gears launches on Mobile - The hour is later than you think ...
This follow on post builds on that discussion and is based primarily from online conversation with Morten Hjerde .
The Gears announcement is a market accelerator. Today, the browser vendors badly need to differentiate themselves. With webkit becoming significant over the last year(Apple, Google and Nokia all going for Web kit), pure browser companies like Openwave and even Opera need a differentiator.
One accelerator is standards. Standards are good and standards are coming in this space with HTML 5. However, HTML 5 is a way off(2012)
So, we see the browser market to be driven by some key developments
a) Device manufacturers like Nokia have had success with webkit
b) Apple/iPhone also has done the same
c) Operators are watching this space and also may experiment with initiatives
d) Traditional browser vendors are looking to differentiate
It is in this backdrop that we have to look at the Google Gears announcement. At the moment, there are no standards for browser plugins(excluding HTML 5 as above with caveats). However, browser plugins are only part of the story. Merely extending the browser via plugins/DOM extensions is not enough. We need to address both i.e. browser plugins(DOM extensions) on one side and Native capabilities on the other side.
Consider a simple case like access to the address book from the browser. First, the browser must be capable of extensions i.e. DOM extensions. Secondly, the native capabilities i.e. the Address book API must be programmatically available. The second part(i.e. native access) involves security/privacy and other considerations. With Java ME, this takes the form of security domains and API protection groups.
As CEO explains, In the MIDP authorization model, a trusted application is one that is signed using X.509 PKI certificates and for which both its origin and integrity can be verified, and which is bound to one of the valid protection/security domains. These domains are Operator specific
Hence, any functionality that claims to access device functionality is hampered by an uneven security model depending on the Operator and permissions assigned to the application.
So far, the browser did not have this problem since there was no access to device APIs. Now that has changed – leading to potential problems and opportunities.
Some notes
a) Access to an application is different from access to data. Access to data is a more severe problem(for example actual entries in the address book).
b) An independent / user configurable policy may be needed else we will replicate the same problems from Java ME.
c) The gears security model addresses some issues with offline storage in the local cache. This is distinct from API access.
d) In general, access is a lot better with specific devices(like iPhone) but not mass market devices(yet)
e) A sandbox/privacy model may be needed for data
To conclude, Gears on mobile devices is a step in the right direction. It is no coincidence that it is deployed on Windows(and maybe iPhone). It still has a way to go to get to mass market. One advantage with Android/Google is access to a unified stack. This may work to create a mass market i.e. a Google certificate may span across different devices/operators.
Similarly, Nokia and the iPhone may lean towards a similar direction. My personal belief is: The Operator does not have a large enough user base(considering multiple devices/multiple operators within a country) to provide critical mass. It may be necessary for an umbrella body like GSMA/OMTP to take cross operator view to make this happen
thoughts?
Posted by ajit at 7:50 PM | Comments (2) | TrackBack
March 4, 2008
Google gears launches on Mobile - The hour is later than you think ..
In the Lord of the Rings .. Saruman the white wizard said to Gandalf the Gray .. The hour is later than you think ..
I was using the same quote in discussions with a Mobile Operator at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona – specifically in the context of the launch of Google Gears on the mobile phone.
But despite my optimism, even I did not anticipate writing this blog so soon ..
Google launched Gears on mobile phones today
This is a very significant development which I have been tracking and anticipating for some time now – and I believe that it is disruptive to the existing players – who have been dragging their heels in the task of giving access to device APIs.
The time for delayed access to browser APIs is fast running out with this announcement.
In a wider sense, the announcement is more than ‘offline’ and it is more than Windows mobile.
Look at the Gears wiki in Google code ..
Besides offline browsing – which is clearly needed – reading between the lines - the Gears API can do a LOT more .. for instance Location API, secure file system access APIs as per the Wiki
Let’s see what else needs to happen next ..
There are no standards for browser extension. HTML 5 is the only body looking at them as far as I know.
If Google launches a product taking gears to mobile phones as browser extensions, then the whole space gets a boost(both Google and Opera are heavily involved with HTML5 initiative) .
All we now need is one or two major browser vendors like Opera etc to take up the standards.
And we have access to device APIs through the browser
I expect that Google and others may have their own certification, security models – hopefully they will have a pragmatic balance between access to APIs and security
To conclude .. as Gandalf would say .. A