Posts Tagged ‘mobile’
Britain shows strong digital culture
December 14th, 2011
Ofcom’s sixth International Communications Market Report was announced today and it shows Britain’s digital culture is developing well against other countries.
According to the report, covered in the Guardian, the British spend more time online, own more Smartphones and digital video recorders and watch more television over the internet than any country on the Continent.
Breaking down the statistics, apparently the British spend an average of 746 minutes (more than 12 hours) a week online, longer than any of the world’s major economies except the U.S.
However, the UK tops the charts in terms of Smartphone use and online and digital TV viewing, as 46% of all British mobile subscribers are Smartphone users, more than in Europe and the US and up from 24% the year before. The next highest was Spain, with 45% penetration.
61% of young mobile subscribers have been able to acquire Smartphones, and one quarter of 55 to 64 year olds claim to access the internet from their phones.
The UK also tops the online TV viewing figures with 27% of Britons watching TV online every week, higher than the U.S., where the total is 23%. UK digital TV penetration is also the highest in Europe, with 97% of households receiving more than the five basic channels. France is the second highest, with 93%, and America at 87%.
The UK leads the field in buying online, as 79% ordered goods and services. The Dutch are the next most likely to make it to the checkout, with 74% spending online.
Considering our lower broadband penetration (The UK’s broadband penetration is 74%, where as France has reached 77%, Canada 83% and the Netherlands 89%) and often patchy mobile service outside of urban centres, the figures show that the British as a nation have not only accepted digital, but are making it a strong part of our culture in terms of communication, leisure and retail habits.
Mobile years and wallets disappearing
November 30th, 2011
It’s about that time of the year when we start seeing predictions for the year ahead. Top of most predictions lists for the last 5-6 years, if not longer, has been “the year of mobile” and of course that hasn’t quite come to fruition. However, next year…
Joking aside, we are certainly getting closer to the much heralded explosion of mobile, and it’s perhaps supporting services such as ‘digital money‘ that will make it more of a reality than the development of handsets alone.
As you might have seen, PayPal recently predicted that we won’t need cash in its traditional form by 2016, as our mobile will handle the payments for us. In fact, Carl Scheible, managing director of PayPal UK commented in the ‘Money: The digital Tipping Point‘ report that: “Children born today will become the UK’s first ‘cashless generation. It will be completely natural for them to pay by mobile.”
Now of course this is nothing new, mobile payments have been talked about almost as long as the ‘year of the mobile‘ but if anything this timeframe seems a little excessive, after all we can already pay for our food at Pizza Express using an iPhone app, and there are many more examples coming. We’re a long way from abandoning our wallets, but the change can be implemented relatively quickly from here.
Most of us can now swipe our cards over a terminal in a shop to pay for anything up to £15, and from January this will include Oyster card readers, which will accept direct payment. Therefore, bringing contactless card technology and mobile technology together is hardly a major leap, especially as the next generation of mobile phones are being built with near-field communication (NFC) chips, which will also enable contactless payment and offer the advantage of digital loyalty cards, promotional offers and receipts held on phones.
PayPal offers further evidence of the move to leave our wallets at home with stats that show 45m people in the UK use a mobile phone and over a third of mobile users surveyed have used the mobile internet to buy something from a retailer’s website.
The big issue beyond the technology is of course the security, but with advances in device-based, or embedded security, i.e. security built into the device and not sat on top in the form of after sales software, the future is bright. I would estimate that we will be ditching our wallets before 2016, and who knows the year of mobile may have even arrived by then.
Can you imagine life without your smartphone?
August 5th, 2011
Yesterday’s Ofcom report, which focused on smartphone data (Nearly one in three adults in the UK now uses a smartphone) confirmed what we probably already know: the smartphone is now firmly a part of our everyday life. After all, how would we stay in touch with our network, keep up to date with what’s going on in the world, listen to music, take/share photos or even find our way to a meeting without one? You can view the full report here.
Of course we also have the option of a tablet, as overviewed by my colleague Tim Greenhalgh in his piece ‘Where the tablet market is heading and how iPad competitors can catch up‘ posted yesterday. Tablets perform a slightly different role, but for staying connected on the move and immediate access, we as a country are becoming fully dependant on our smartphones. OfCom’s report confirmed 37% of adults and 60% of teenagers described themselves as “addicted”.
Apple’s iPhone has probably done more than any other to change the way we view our mobile phone, picking up from the Blackberry, and unsurprisingly it is the most popular device among adults. Teenagers favour RIM’s Blackberry devices, probably because of its excellent messaging service: BlackBerry Messenger (BBM).
When it was launched the iPhone offered users access to the social web like we had never experienced before, connecting via a Blackberry simply didn’t/doesn’t compare, at least in my opinion. To clarify that statement I’ve been a Blackberry user since its launch, which I was lucky enough to work on, so I hope I can speak with some experience.
However, like many others (well many other adults) I have moved over to other devices that focus more on accessing the Web - in my case an iPhone. RIM has done well to capture the teen market with BBM, and I also feel the Blackberry has benefits over the iPhone in terms of email, which cannot be overlooked. However, recent financial results show both it and the more traditional mobile phone brands are beginning to creek under the mighty weight of trying to keep up with the iPhone.
If we look at the historical data, we can truly appreciate our change in mobile-based purchasing habits. Smartphone sales have rocketed up to claim nearly half of the mobile sales market during the first three months of this year. In 2005 Q1 smartphone sales accounted for 4% of all mobile sales, in 2011 Q1 it was 48%.
This has also had an effect on our digital habits. The biggest decline for adults and teens using smartphones has been in taking photos with a traditional camera. For teens 30% also claim to spend less time playing games on a PC/console.
The importance of the mobile internet cannot be overlooked, as it is a key reason for the success of the smartphone. After all, what Apple, RIM and the many other manufacturers have done is simply give us more of what we want, when we want it: access to the web. Or in some cases an unending appetite for access to Facebook, which was the most visited website on handheld devices, with 43 million hours spent on it in December 2010.
According to a study by IHS, shipments of mobile broadband devices in 2011 are projected to climb to 157.9 million units, up from 100.1 million units in 2010, (See Tim’s post for more info) so we only want more of the same, or in fact simply more access to everything: music, conversation, communication and information, through one easy to use device, that can be accessed anywhere, well almost anywhere…
More on this story from:
Guardian - Smartphone usage ofcom report
BBC - Third of Adults use smartphone say Ofcom
2011: The year of HTML 5 on mobile
December 13th, 2010
Workarounds only work for a short time, until we find a more elegant and cohesive way of doing things online. In this case, it’s the way we engage with web users through mobile devices.
We’ve had to work with a host of dodges, good-enoughs and missed opportunities over the past three years (and more). It’s been exhilarating and frustrating in equal measure.
Now, we have the structurally coherent means to engage on mobile, in a way that should address every mobile device – and so help us to engage more effectively with customers, partners and clients.
HTML 5 will deliver its promise in 2011. The coding is a no-brainer but the execution needs careful, strategically-focused thought.
I’ve been waiting for this moment since the HTML 5 specifications were first announced. HTML 5 will fundamentally change the ways in which we communicate, share, buy and sell on mobile.
Mobile apps will have a share of this engagement market but there is no real reason to use them when HTML 5 mobile sites are ubiquitous. The only reason we use them, is that most websites are not mobile enabled, do not have mobile specific portals and are generally beyond awful at engaging with mobile users.
Giselle Tsirulnik, Mobile Marketer Senior Editor explains this future well in her video:
Imagine a lean, rich-media enabled website that delivers well-designed content to all mobile devices. That’s HTML 5. How many client, customers, purchases, and partners could you engage with?
While we wait for our HTML 5 Christmas gifts, enjoy this utterly brilliant video from Mobile Future – I’ve yet to see a better explanation of why this year was “The Year of Mobile”.
2011 promises so much more but what do you think?
Mobile, LTE and the UK network bottleneck
November 30th, 2010
LTE – three initials that give UK mobile enthusiasts a “desire-on”. We want this more than we want secure mobile shopping, more than next-gen Tablets and more than Wi-Max.
The exotically-named answer to our fast mobile needs, Long Term Evolution (LTE), is a mobile standard that promises to provide downlink peak rates of at least 100 Mbit/s and an uplink of at least 50 Mbit/s with round-trip times of less than 10 ms.
Excuse me while I have a “desire moment”.
If the UK mobile network operators can deliver this, it’s a problem solved. Actually, it’s a number of problems solved and means the delivery of the network that finally enables people to connect, engage and build new forms of fluid online communication.
The beauty of LTE is that it supports scalable carrier bandwidths, from 1.4 MHz to 20 MHz and supports both frequency division duplexing (FDD) and time division duplexing (TDD). (ThanksWikipedia – don’t forget to donate).
But here’s the news less good. We won’t have LTE for the next five years, minimum. John Kennedy outlines the reasons in a precise and excellent article on Silicon Republic. It’s required reading for all UK mobilists.
I think John boosts the debate and shows that consumer demand can push the UK operators’ schedule forward much more quickly. The economic reasoning currently used by Vodafone, O2, Orange, 3, T-Mobile and the virtual network operators in the UK is that LTE is, well, just too expensive.
The mobile network operators have a history of under-estimating the needs of their customers. Good to see consistency in their planning.
I think the networks will be overwhelmed by the data demands of their customers in the next year. They already work overtime to transfer the data load to any wi-fi network that can take the strain.
We need LTE here, right now. The mobile operators need it sooner.
While they dither and dodge, we can make a difference by pushing on all the sensitive pressure points to ensure that we, finally, have the mobile network we deserve.
Yep. Definitely a habit. You want positive? Ray provides:
Mobile the key to more inclusive and youthful social networks
February 10th, 2009
Two reports caught my attention this week and reminded me again how much more effort will be needed before the mobile sector catches up with the rest of the connected universe. The Future of Social Networking workship in Barcelona featured a clear call from Dominique Hazaël-Massieux, W3C’s Mobile Web Initiative Activity Lead for the mobile providers to open up and lead the push for ubiquitous social networks.
She said: “Now is the time for the diverse social network actors out there to work together and resolve barriers to industry growth and stability. All social networks users, and especially young people, expect the richest possible social experience, but with full mobility, accessibility, and privacy.”
The workshop report emphasises the importance of mobile in the social network mix, with contextual information and sharing key data across all networks both key to progress. With the downturn, full-scale collaboration between the operators on all sides is sorely needed to avoid the partial implosion of the still young, vibrant but vulnerable online culture.
And talking of youth, the Independent’s Richard Garner this week flashed a snapshot of youth habits online. It’s even more official - young people are migrating away from TV and spending up to 31 hours a week online with social networks taking an increasingly important slice of that time.
Even more reason, then to ensure that the people and pipes that control and connect are as open, free-thinking and resilient as the users.
PR’s positive attitude to social media can help to play a significant role here and let’s hope that the grumblies and doomists who are joyously predicting the demise of sociability will soon be drowned out by a realistic and visionary chorus of social media advocates.
Moving mobile social networks beyond MySpace and Facebook
November 12th, 2008
A lively time in Wardour Street last night at the Chinwag event on mobile social networks with feisty (and drink-enabled) characters in the audience providing a testing warm up for the expert panel and chair Bena Roberts (GoMo News).
When things settled (departure of character with the Voice of Reason), it soon became clear at the MoSo Rising gathering that while there are no stellar new performers in the space, with established marques like MySpace and FaceBook leading the charge into always-connected social spaces, there are many positive signs.
Right now though start-up and niche mobile-only social networks are wrestling with the best revenue models, with white-label services a winning play at the moment, as ads and subscriptions largely fail to deliver.
More pressing for many agencies and PRs on the night was the need for clarity on how best to advise companies interested but fearful of mobile/social web. Panellist Alfie Dennen, CEO Moblog, suggested that brands and agencies need to think in more inclusive way, and embrace mobile as part of the communications mix, in much the same way that broadcasters have.
Harry Blunden. Head of digital at ?WhatIf! Digital advised that all agencies
should have at least one mobile savant - the one who could read the current mobile terrain and map out the potential for clients. He and other panel members all felt that many agencies did not understand Mobile but needed to embrace it.
Ron Shelton. CEO Next2Friends also urged agencies to encourage client to experiment with Mobile now, educating them away from the fear of the platform.
The view from the panellists, not necessarily shared by everyone in the Slug and Lettuce, was that digital agencies don’t yet get the mobile space and that a focussed education programme was needed to pull agencies into the new age with clients still very reluctant to put money into mobile.
A positive view on the development of the mobile/social web came from the floor as Conor McKenna, business development manager at mobile search company Taptu who said that growing numbers of people leading quite disconnected working lives used mobile web and social networks to communicate and engage and as a form of escapism.
Bena Roberts added how Polish workers she had met were addicted to social networks on mobile as this was all they had to keep connected with their social groups.
And in Hungary, people in villages who had not heard of broadband were using their mobiles as web/social media access tools.
The key messages I took away from a thoughtful evening were that MoSo is only just starting as is going to be a greater part of the mobile, always connected web with massive opportunities for all the players: operators, service providers, brands and agencies. While “always on” mobile is maybe 5-10 years away, there are great opportunities for brands to engage with their customers and for agencies to build business.
At the moment, brands can harness Mobile by playing to its current strengths, keeping it simple and direct but also thinking creatively about how to use the at present limited functionality. It’s not just about delivering ads and brand messages one way.
And the simple questions for agencies and brands to ask around Mobile: “What do we want users to do? How do we create real value that engages?”
O2 engages with customers through Twitter
November 4th, 2008
Hats off to O2 - after years of getting its telephone customer service completely wrong, it’s finally doing a great job of engaging with disgruntled online customers.
Yesterday, in a moment of exasperation, I Tweeted the following about my mobile provider (after being on hold to O2 for 40 minutes):
“wendymcauliffe: O2 truly has the worst customer service I’ve ever encountered. Every time I need to contact them my blood pressure rockets!”
A couple of minutes later, I received the following reply:
“hellojp: @wendymcauliffe Hi there, I work for O2 and saw your tweet - anything I can help with?”
After briefing describing my predicament, I promptly received another reply:
“hellojp: @wendymcauliffe Oh no, not ideal! Definitely not what we’d be aiming for - sorry you had such a hard time! Did you get your problem fixed?”
The O2 representative then went on to give me his personal email address, so that I could email him with the details of my enquiry which he has promised to handle today.
I’m not sure who’s behind O2’s adoption of Twitter, but this is definitely a step in the right direction, and something that all public service companies should be doing. While there are still big improvements to be made with O2’s telephone customer service, it’s great to see them engaging with customers online in such a timely fashion.
It will be interesting to see how my case is dealt with today!
Crisis management storm brewing for O2
April 17th, 2008
O2 is not faring well in the press or public eye at the moment with its blunders over 3G speeds, and PR gaffe where it called readers of The Register “techie nerds”… and I’m about to make matters worse for them!
I’m unfortunate enough to be an O2 customer. My Blackberry is my lifeline. So when my data connection went dead yesterday morning, I phoned O2 up to see what was going on.
The customer service person I spoke to knew “exactly what was going on” before I’d described the problem, which was enough to get the alarm bells ringing.
I was then informed that O2 had moved to a new billing system over the past couple of days, and that all my tariff details had been lost. There was no record of the fact that I was a Blackberry user, had a data tariff, or the number of minutes or texts I received each month. Hence the reason for my Blackberry saying “data connection refused” for the past couple of days.
I was asked to describe my tariff so that the problem could be manually corrected! I’ve been promised that my data bolt-on will be reconnected tomorrow.
In true O2 style there was no apology, no offer of compensation for the impact this might have had on my business, and no explanation.
So in true social media style, I’m breaking the story here!
The new billing system has been implemented across O2’s entire customer base, so I’m guessing if you haven’t picked up on a problem yet, you will when your next bill arrives! I’d love to hear how O2 iPhone customers have been affected.
The final irony in the tale is that when the post arrived later today, I had a letter from O2 about the new billing system, entitled “a change for the better”!
October 9th, 2007
It’s been a busy day in the world of Google. First of all, news reached us this morning that Google shares have risen above the $600 mark for the first time. Not bad considering Google’s stock launched at $85 a share in 2004.
Then came the news that Google will be allowing websites in its ad network (AdSense) to embed videos from some YouTube content creators. This offers Google a new source of ad revenue, which will of course need to be shared with the content creators and sites that embed them.
However, the news that interested me the most broke this afternoon, when Google announced that it had acquired the Finland-based SMS and microblogging service Jaiku, competitor to the better known Twitter.
This is another telling move, proving the all-encompassing Google development arm is now focusing on mobile and social networking…and everything in between. Mike Butcher at TechCrunch has the full story.
Interestingly, Steve Rubel is giving Twitter 45 days to be sold, and he thinks Yahoo! will be the most likely suitor.
Oh and while i’m doing a Google news rundown, I should also mention that Google and IBM are partnering on a university project to provide data centres holding 1,600 computers that students will be able to use to learn cloud computing.
Or as Eric Schmidt put it: “In order to most effectively serve the long-term interests of our users, it is imperative that students are adequately equipped to harness the potential of modern computing systems and for researchers to be able to innovate ways to address emerging problems.”
Now the weather…
Technorati tags: google, jaiku, twitter, ibm, news, cloud+computing, social+networking, mobile