Long live the Queen
Subject: Long live the Queen
Long live the Queen
When they say, "Long live the Queen, they really mean it"!!!!
How old does this make you feel?
Emerging Media Insights and Implications
About: 3IS4
Location: Toronto, Ontario
PLEASE NOTE ..... MUSIC HAS MOVED TO
http://3is4music.posterous.com/
Bio:
Jordan Kay is an Emerging Media Strategist, a media consultant and a proud husband and father.
Jordan currently consults for marketing agencies, and is active in the non-profit sector as well.
Contact: jordankay@me.com
3IS4 has existed for some time now. In its infancy it was simply a domain name that I thought was catchy, easy to remember, and generic enough to apply to anything.
No really, what the $%^&* is it?
At the end of the day, it is best summed up as:
Social. Simplified.
This blog is going to be different than the work I do for Benchmarketing (emerging media strategy consultations - currently for Hooplah).
This blog will be dedicated to ALL things social. It will mainly contain links to noteworthy articles. I use RSS to monitor and sift through TOO MUCH media. It's a problem. Really. That said, I do share the good stuff. So enjoy. Spread the word.
Subscribe by RSS to this blog.
Try using RSS for the first time. It's easy.
Most of all, enjoy!
Buying, Selling and Twittering All the Way - NYTimes.com
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/28/technology/28twitter.html?_r=2&ref=business
Best regards, Jordan Kay Best way to find me is:
+14168884422
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KELLNER: New Apple mouse really is 'Magic' - Washington Times
Even though a computer mouse rightly can be thought of as one of the more peripheral of peripherals, a new one just arrived that can honestly claim the adjective "transformative."
Apple Inc.'s $69 Magic Mouse truly brings change this reviewer can believe in.
Until now, a mouse had a singular purpose, more or less: to move a cursor, or pointer, around the screen in a graphical environment such as Microsoft Windows or Apple's Macintosh operating systems. A "click" function would let you select from various menu options or open, close or move a program "window" or an on-screen "folder" of data. Stuff like that.
As computer environments became more graphical, however, other needs arose. Wouldn't it be nice, for example, to be able to enlarge part of a computer screen to read the type more easily or appreciate the detail in a photograph? What about scrolling up and down or from side to side in an application window? And wouldn't it be nice to have the functionality of left- and right-click buttons without some of the mechanics that could break or jam?
Enter the Magic Mouse, announced a few weeks back. Although it is a "normal" computer mouse in the sense of being able to move the cursor around, its clicking, scrolling and "sweeping" actions make it more like the latest notebook touch pads than the older mice this new device has rendered obsolete.
The firm calls it "the world's first Multi-Touch mouse" and is including it with the new iMac computers, also introduced recently. The rest of us have to shell out the simoleons to buy one. Believe me, it's really, really worth it.
Within minutes of installing the hardware and updating my copy of Mac OS X 10.6, I was computing with the same ease that users of those latest notebook touch pads have. Clicking was a simple press of the mouse — once on the left side for a left-click, once on the right for a right-click. Scrolling is now supereasy and very fast: The software controls for the Magic Mouse let you control the scroll rate.
But it's the very act of scrolling with the Magic Mouse that is, well, magical. Unlike using the scroll wheels on many (most?) of today's mice, the simple move of gliding one's fingers up and down the mouse feels more natural than I can describe in words. It just works better.
I would submit, though, that while such simple things as easier scrolling and clicking may seem beyond improvement, the changes the Magic Mouse brings to these operations will mean easier and better computing for me, which means some amount of time savings, which means happier computing. You can't really put a price tag on that, but if Apple wants to say it's worth $69, I won't fight them there.
This is the place where it's good to note that Apple says the Magic Mouse will work only on a Mac-based computer with a Bluetooth connection and the latest Wireless Mouse Software, which an Internet-connected Mac will seek out once the mouse has been "paired" with the device. It's powered by two AA batteries, and I don't have an estimate on how long those batteries will last. Apple says the device can work for southpaws as well as for right-handers, and the very comprehensive software lets you switch left- and right-click buttons to make a left-hander feel more comfortable.
Until a user spends a few minutes with the Magic Mouse, I fear that any description, no matter how enthusiastic, won't properly convey how good a product this is. After decades of using computer input devices, I think this is the finest mouse ever.
• E-mail mkellner@washingtontimes.com.
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JAI, presented by the San Francisco Jewish Film Festival (SFJFF)
Check out this video on YouTube:
Best regards, Jordan Kay Best way to find me is:
+14168884422
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Time’s top 50 innovations for 2009 a worthy read - SmartPlanet
Best regards, Jordan Kay Best way to find me is:
+14168884422
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AdMob Said to Talk With Apple Before Google’s $750 Million Deal
AdMob Said to Talk With Apple Before Google’s $750 Million DealBy Serena Saitto, Brian Womack and Connie Guglielmo
Nov. 14 (Bloomberg) -- AdMob Inc. was approached by Apple Inc. about an acquisition before the company agreed to a $750 million offer from Google Inc., according to people familiar with the matter.
Apple contacted AdMob a few weeks before Google made its bid, said one of the people, who declined to be identified because the negotiations weren’t public. AdMob, based in San Mateo, California, sells ads that appear on mobile phones.
The interest in AdMob highlights the increasing competition in the mobile-phone market between Apple, maker of the iPhone, and Google, the most popular search engine. Google Chief Executive Officer Eric Schmidt resigned from Apple’s board in July after serving for three years. At the time, Apple CEO Steve Jobs said that move was necessary because Google was entering “more of Apple’s core businesses.”
Together, AdMob and Google will be the largest mobile- advertising company, with about 30 percent to 40 percent of the market, according to Karsten Weide, an analyst with researcher IDC in San Mateo.
Buying AdMob would have allowed Apple to expand into online advertising, a strategy that Nokia Oyj is pursuing, Weide said.
“If a lot of traffic goes through my devices, why can’t I become the middleman that serves ads against that inventory?” Weide said. “AdMob would have allowed them to do that quickly.”
Nicole Leverich, a spokeswoman for AdMob, said the company doesn’t comment on “rumor and speculation.” Matt Furman, a spokesman for Google, didn’t return a phone message seeking comment. Apple declined to comment, said Steve Dowling, a spokesman for the Cupertino, California-based company.
Smart-Phone Sales
Apple and Google are expanding in the market for smart phones -- devices that can play music, surf the Web and download video. Sales of those devices climbed 27 percent worldwide in the second quarter, even as total mobile-handset sales dropped 6.1 percent, according to researcher Gartner Inc. in Stamford, Connecticut.
Schmidt said in an interview this week that the company bought AdMob to sell ads that appear in the thousands of programs for the iPhone and devices running Google’s Android software. Being able to place ads in mobile-phone applications is as strategically important as selling links next to Web- search results, he said.
“AdMob is clearly the best of its ilk for applications monetization,” Schmidt, 54, said in the interview at Google’s headquarters in Mountain View, California. “We think that’s as strategic as search monetization.”
IPhone Apps
There are more than 100,000 applications available for the iPhone, while Android has more than 12,000.
Apple has made eight acquisitions over the past decade, including last year’s takeover of chipmaker PA Semi Inc. and the purchase of mapping service Placebase Co. this year, according to Bloomberg data.
Apple, which began selling the iPhone in 2007, opened an online store last year to distribute applications for the device. The company has sold more than 30 million iPhones and 20 million iPod Touch media players, which also can run applications.
Apple rose $2.46 to $204.45 yesterday in Nasdaq Stock Market trading. The shares have more than doubled this year. Google added $4.20 to $572.05 and has gained 86 percent this year.
To contact the reporters on this story: Serena Saitto in New York at ssaitto@bloomberg.net; Brian Womack in San Francisco at Bwomack1@bloomberg.net; Connie Guglielmo in San Francisco at cguglielmo1@bloomberg.net.
Last Updated: November 14, 2009 00:01 EST
via bloomberg.com
for those of you who asked me what i meant in my Linked profile about parlaying Hooplah's success in search to the mobile medium.......
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AdMob Said to Talk With Apple Before Google’s $750 Million Deal
AdMob Said to Talk With Apple Before Google’s $750 Million DealBy Serena Saitto, Brian Womack and Connie Guglielmo
Nov. 14 (Bloomberg) -- AdMob Inc. was approached by Apple Inc. about an acquisition before the company agreed to a $750 million offer from Google Inc., according to people familiar with the matter.
Apple contacted AdMob a few weeks before Google made its bid, said one of the people, who declined to be identified because the negotiations weren’t public. AdMob, based in San Mateo, California, sells ads that appear on mobile phones.
The interest in AdMob highlights the increasing competition in the mobile-phone market between Apple, maker of the iPhone, and Google, the most popular search engine. Google Chief Executive Officer Eric Schmidt resigned from Apple’s board in July after serving for three years. At the time, Apple CEO Steve Jobs said that move was necessary because Google was entering “more of Apple’s core businesses.”
Together, AdMob and Google will be the largest mobile- advertising company, with about 30 percent to 40 percent of the market, according to Karsten Weide, an analyst with researcher IDC in San Mateo.
Buying AdMob would have allowed Apple to expand into online advertising, a strategy that Nokia Oyj is pursuing, Weide said.
“If a lot of traffic goes through my devices, why can’t I become the middleman that serves ads against that inventory?” Weide said. “AdMob would have allowed them to do that quickly.”
Nicole Leverich, a spokeswoman for AdMob, said the company doesn’t comment on “rumor and speculation.” Matt Furman, a spokesman for Google, didn’t return a phone message seeking comment. Apple declined to comment, said Steve Dowling, a spokesman for the Cupertino, California-based company.
Smart-Phone Sales
Apple and Google are expanding in the market for smart phones -- devices that can play music, surf the Web and download video. Sales of those devices climbed 27 percent worldwide in the second quarter, even as total mobile-handset sales dropped 6.1 percent, according to researcher Gartner Inc. in Stamford, Connecticut.
Schmidt said in an interview this week that the company bought AdMob to sell ads that appear in the thousands of programs for the iPhone and devices running Google’s Android software. Being able to place ads in mobile-phone applications is as strategically important as selling links next to Web- search results, he said.
“AdMob is clearly the best of its ilk for applications monetization,” Schmidt, 54, said in the interview at Google’s headquarters in Mountain View, California. “We think that’s as strategic as search monetization.”
IPhone Apps
There are more than 100,000 applications available for the iPhone, while Android has more than 12,000.
Apple has made eight acquisitions over the past decade, including last year’s takeover of chipmaker PA Semi Inc. and the purchase of mapping service Placebase Co. this year, according to Bloomberg data.
Apple, which began selling the iPhone in 2007, opened an online store last year to distribute applications for the device. The company has sold more than 30 million iPhones and 20 million iPod Touch media players, which also can run applications.
Apple rose $2.46 to $204.45 yesterday in Nasdaq Stock Market trading. The shares have more than doubled this year. Google added $4.20 to $572.05 and has gained 86 percent this year.
To contact the reporters on this story: Serena Saitto in New York at ssaitto@bloomberg.net; Brian Womack in San Francisco at Bwomack1@bloomberg.net; Connie Guglielmo in San Francisco at cguglielmo1@bloomberg.net.
Last Updated: November 14, 2009 00:01 EST
via bloomberg.com
for those of you who asked me what i meant in my Linked profile about parlaying Hooplah's success in search to the mobile medium.......
Comments [0]
another good post from the blog Hello Mobile
another good post from the blog Hello Mobile
Begin forwarded message:
Date: November 12, 2009 5:43:40 PM ESTSubject: What Will It Take To Dethrone The iPhone?Source: Hello Mobile!Author: John WoodWhat can Apple’s competitors offer that would give the average consumer a reason to buy their device instead of buying an iPhone? To me, the reasons are few, and becoming fewer.The mobile industry is exploding. In just a few short years, everybody will have a smart phone. A tiny, internet connected, mini computer right in their pocket. As each month passes, we learn more and more about what the future of this industry holds, and what the mobile handset landscape will look like. If one thing is for certain, it’s that nothing is for certain.
As it stands right now, Apple is king with consumers. Though not the first ones to market with an internet connected mobile device (the Blackberry has been around for a long time, and still holds the majority of the smartphone market share), Apple appears to be the first to really understand what the average, non-corporate consumer wants. A true mini computer. An open device that can play music, run applications, take photos, and provide a pleasant web browsing experience. And they did it in true Apple fashion, making the device extremely easy to use. As a result, the iPhone has become extremely popular with consumers, and is widely considered
”the device to have”.With the majority of people still without a smartphone, much of the market remains up for grabs. Apple’s competitors are scrambling to catch up, trying to ensure that they they get a piece of the pie. But, one very important question lingers.
(I’d love to hear your reasons in the comments. So please, chime in.)
A comparable feature set
This pretty much goes without saying. Any challenger to the iPhone crown must offer similar features to that of the iPhone. It is very unlikely that a competing device will lure anybody away from the iPhone if it is missing a feature that is now expected to be there. The device must be capable of running apps, taking photos, playing music, etc, for it even to be considered.
A better network
AT&T’s network leaves much to be desired. Having never been an AT&T customer, I can only relay the opinions of my friends and family who are AT&T customers. However, their opinions are one in the same. I’ve not heard a single word of praise when it comes to AT&T’s network. All of my friends and family with iPhones have expressed frustration that the device they love is frequently crippled by a network that is spotty and congested.
It’s no secret that Apple has an exclusive agreement with AT&T, and that agreement has an expiration date. Rumors have been circulating about a jump to another carrier, possibly Verizon, sometime next year. The more wireless carriers offering the iPhone, the less valid of a reason this will become for not purchasing one.
A comparable application ecosystem
Competing devices will need to have an application ecosystem that is at least comparable to the iPhone’s. This is no small task. There are over 100,000 applications in the App Store. Sure, several offer the same functionality, and many are of very poor quality. However, nobody can argue with Apple’s tag line of “There’s a app for that”. There really is an application, in most cases many, for everything you could possibly want to do with your iPhone.
Given their head start, beating Apple at this game will not be easy. Google’s Android OS currently stands the best chance of challenging Apple on this front, with over 10,000 applications already available. The Android OS is open, and capable of running on hardware from any manufacturer. In addition, applications written for Android are capable of running on any device that runs the OS (for the most part). Next year is going to be a big one for Android, with several new devices coming to market from many different manufacturers. Some analysts are even predicting that the number of Android devices in the hands of consumers will surpass the number of iPhones by 2012. This will no doubt attract more application developers to the platform.
However, Android has its own set of challenges awaiting. The fact that manufacturers are free to run Android on devices with very different hardware specifications (screen size, input controls, etc) poses a major challenge for application developers. Perhaps the risk of rendering thousands of existing Android applications useless by releasing a device with dramatically different hardware specs will be enough to convince manufacturers not to do it. Perhaps Google will provide a set of Android APIs that can help application developers deal with this issue. Perhaps a set of best practices will emerge as a guide for developers looking to tackle this issue. Perhaps we’ll see something similar to the PC application market in the mid-late 90’s (and the Blackberry application market today), where only certain devices will be capable of running certain applications. Only time will tell if these issues will prevent the development of the Android application ecosystem.
A killer feature
One wild card that is always in play is the killer feature. Apple’s competitors are only one, innovative, killer feature away from stealing the spotlight for themselves.
By “killer feature”, I mean a feature so awesome that when you see it in action, you say to yourself, “I need one of those!”.
Version 2.0 of the Android OS took a stab at this with the introduction of Google Maps Navigation. A fantastic feature, Google Maps Navigation morphs your mobile device into a fully functional GPS unit, complete with a synthesized voice telling you where to go, real time traffic information, and several map overlays showing you the location of everything from ATMs to gas stations. But, is this a killer feature? Frankly, I’m not sure. But, its announcement was enough to cause a significant drop in the stock price of traditional GPS manufacturers, and it certainly has potential.
An incredibly easy to use device
Making devices that are intuitive and easy to use has always been one of Apple’s strengths. Look no further than the iPod for an example of this. Competing devices will need to be as easy to use as the iPhone is to appeal to the average consumer.
How do I get my music onto the device? How to I get the photos I take off? These operations should be simple and intuitive. Motorola’s new Android 2.0 device, the DROID, is seriously lacking in this area. Several steps are required to store data on or pull data off of the device:
- Attach the device to your computer
- Use the device’s menu system to instruct it to mount itself as an external drive
- Locate the files on your hard drive that you would like to store on the device
- Copy and paste the files from your hard drive onto the device
- Unmount the deviceFor the iPhone, the list of steps is much smaller.
- Attach the device to your computer, and let iTunes do the restAre the steps required to store data on the DROID too much to handle for an experienced computer user. No, of course not. But, there is still a large percentage of people out there who would struggle with completing those tasks. Believe me, I know. Many are family and friends of mine who I help complete “simple” tasks on their computers all of the time. These people make up a significant portion of the market. If you want them to buy your device, then you have to make it stupid simple to use.
Summary
Apple has set the bar high with the iPhone, very high. While I can think of several reasons why developers and techies would prefer a different device, I can’t think of many reasons why the average consumer would. And, there are a lot more average consumers than there are geeks.
But make no mistake, Apple’s competitors have the iPhone in their sights. The tide can shift very quickly in this market, especially since most people get a new phone every couple of years. Will the iPhone challengers be able make a dent in the iPhone’s market share? Or, will the iPhone be the de-facto standard for smart phones? Only time will tell.
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