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CoNSuMeR iNSighT

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Augmented reAlity:Can the world beCome a hyperlink?

A user’s guide:what is going on in the hearts

and minds of young men?

intervieW:get a head of the game with ea

trend:keep it short, stupid. the way we CommuniCate has Changed.

1stglobaledition

Mobile is changing MarketingA new mindset is needed!

trend: it isn't just your customers' opinions that matter. their friends' opinions matter as well.

mOBile: How to engage your customers with mobile campaigns. success-ful cases you should know about.

ereAder:do ereaders have a future? - What to pick - user experiences

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CeO's nOteintrO

COlOpHOnBlink is published by

MediaCom124 Theobalds Roadlondon WC1X 8RXUnited kingdomTel +44 20 7158 5500 Fax: +44 20 7158 5999 blink.magazine@mediacom.comwww.mediacom.com

Editor in chief: Signe Wandler, MediaCom, signe.wandler@mediacom.dk

Editorial team: Jonas Hemmingsen (nordic CEO), Joanne Brenner (Global PR and Marketing Manager), ida Hemmingsson-Holl (Global Marketing Director)

Visual concept: Brandhouse, www.brandhouse.com

Printed by: Clausen Offset, DkCirculation: 3.900iSSn: 1903-5373

The opinions expressed in the articles are those of the authors. Minor textual contents may be republished as long as the original author and publication are cited.

Visit blink.mediacom.com

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CeO's nOteintrO

every CeO worth his salt has his brightest minds on the case. the challenge for those trying to provide an answer is that digital changes everything a company does. As the internet has become an integrated part of our business, communication and marketing through anywhere, anytime access, the question has simply become less relevant.

in the same way that electricity powers every aspect of our business, increasingly so does the internet. And yet, no one’s asking: “what is your electricity strategy?” it’s diffi cult to put a precise date on when this change occurred but sometime near the end of this decade, digital ceased to be distinct. it became, for those lucky enough to have it, like clean, water at the switch of the tap.

it hasn’t happened everywhere yet, but certainly in developed markets and the more affl uent parts of countries such as india, China and Brazil, digital can be classifi ed as an essential service. Without it our lives and our businesses would simply not function in the same way.

the challenge of adapting to this new reality is huge, and much of the adjustment will be in the area of mobile. globally, mobile internet access is set to grow 66% by 2013. in the uk, for example, it will become the most common way to go on the web by 2015.

this fi rst global edition of Blink is dedicated to all things mobile and what it means for businesses. We aim to provide guidance on some fundamental issues: does the humble handset represent a medium in its own right? is it simply a pipeline for the web? Or should we regard it as a new distribution platform? Our policy is that Blink should be an open forum for the most interesting experiences, profi les and analysis, so we’ve col-lated points of view by various insightful observers to give you a fully rounded view of the world of mobile.

i hope you enjoy Blink. let me know what you think.

stephen AllanCeO, mediaCom Worldwide

We’ve all been in meetings where someone asks: “What’s our digital strategy”.

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CoNSuMeR BeWaRe- oF WhaT YouR FRieNdS ThiNK!pages 30-31 By Kim Møller-elshøjTomorrow, consumers will be combining shopping sprees with surfi ng social media. in fact, they’re already doing it now.

all eYeS oN MoBile Value added SeRViCeSpages 18-19By MediaCom Interaction, IndiaThe ubiquitous mobile phone has come a long way since it fi rst appeared in india about a decade ago.

By Helge TennøMobile is at the forefront of a completely new way of thinking about marketing.We need to stop thinking of mobile as a technology or a tool. People, not technol-ogy, drive innovation in communications.

ReaSoNSTo ReThiNK MoBile

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The ouTeRNeTsAy HellO tO tHe Wild WOrld WeB!By Torsten Rehder, Norbert Hillinger and sven TollmienOnline and Offl ine are merging into the Outernet and placing itself over our environment as a second skin. Read about the drivers, the theories and the consequences.

Staying ahead of

THe GaMe pages 8-9 interview with Morten nielsen from Electronic Arts

FRoM ReadeR To eReadeRBy Patrick Bay DamstedRead about the personal experiences and reflections of a newly converted ereader.

pages

54-57

KeeP iT ShoRT, STuPidBy Patrick Bay DamstedThis is the story of why a growing 160-character culture is making us communicate much more than we did before.

eReadeRs iN The u.S.MediaCom Us/ edited by Michele skettinoWhere is the market heading for eReaders and who will win the race for dominance? a snap-shot from the u.S.

PageS 44-49

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BooKWoRMS BehiNd The SCReeN By patrick Bay Damstedkindle is much more than just a success for Amazon – there is also a community and an ecosystem of related products emerging around the device. An example is kindleBoards.com, a site for anybody with an interest in kindle, founded by Harvey Chute.

pages58-59

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34-43 The aNSWeR

FaCToRY: demAnd mediA And tHe FAst, dispOsABle, And prOFitABle

As Hell mediA mOdelBy Daniel Roth

instead of trying to raise the market value of online content to match the cost of producing it

— perhaps an impossible proposition — the secretis to cut costs until they match the market value.

MediaCom

introduces

three new

planning

tools from

our network

pages

52-53

in the last couple of years MediaCom Global has been collecting econo-

metric modelling cases identifying effective

ROi campaigns to establish a global benchmark base.

Mobile CasesCases from the mediaCom world that will inspire you.

pages32-33

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Like most other industries, the gaming business has been hit by the fi nancial crisis, prompting software companies such as Electronic Arts (EA) to go back to the kinds of marketing strategies that they know work: Television, Out

of Home and various digital activities. However ,Morten Nielsen, Nordic Marketing Director, emphasises, the company is still aiming to stay innovative and is always looking out for new ways of doing things.“We want to stay Top of the Pops,” says Nielsen.

Jonas Hemmingsen (JH): How does the need for constant innovation aff ect your co-operation with your media agency? What do you expect from us?

MN: “Th e young consumers use their mobile phones, iPhones and iPads all the time. Social media is a very high priority to them, and thereby to us. We’re already the biggest supplier of games for iPhones, and in all our 2010-title launches you’ll fi nd hype games for Facebook, Twitter and Youtube. Th is makes it very important to us that our advertising agency and media agency stay ahead of the game and propose new paths to us with due respect to the ROI.”

JH: In reality the iPhone works as a gaming device. How do you see the arrival of the iPad? It has a better screen than the iPhone, which already has around 150,000 applications – most of them free. How will this aff ect your business?

MN: “Th e iPad is not a top priority for us.Th is is due to several reasons. One, we see that the market share for PC games in general is

going down. And two, the area in growth is social games like Wii. Th e mobile phones are primarily for the quick fi x, when you’re on your way to school or university, whereas the com-puters or Playstations provide an experience of a higher quality.”

JH: And if the free applications for iPads spread in the same way as they have with the iPhone ..?

MH: “I’m sure we’ll see that happen but I don’t think it will catch on in the beginning. If you look at the iPhone the graphics are great and the usability is amazing. For the simple games

[mobile]

intervieW WitH mOrten nielsen

Staying ahead of THe GaMe interview with morten nielsen from electronic Arts

innovation is the ful-crum for Electronic Arts, whether it is business development or market-ing. it is what it takes to stay ahead in the gaming business with new plat-forms, new media and new competitors.Morten nielsen, nordic Marketing Director at gaming giant Electronic Arts, talks to Jonas Hemmingsen, CEO at Media-Com nordic, about iPads, co-promotions and thinking outside the box.

"games have surpassed movies

in many ways"

MH: “I’m sure we’ll see that happen but I don’t think it will catch on in the beginning. If you look at the iPhone the graphics are great and the usability is amazing. For the simple games

CAse: tHe mAdden nFl 10 CAmpAign in denmArk

the cooperation included:• Sponsorship of NFL on TV2 Sport with logo or product

display before, during and after matches.• Ownership of the NFL on tv2sport.dk• Editorial integration of NFL Madden10 in the NFL

program on tv2 sport.• Inclusion of gameplay footage during every

sunday match broadcast• Product placement in the studio• Use of the game in special events and competitions

rOi was a staggering 7.81 and the sales index was 169.

madden nFl (national Football league), the Ameri-can Football game, is one of eA’s most successful titles in many territories. However, this was not the case in denmark, which led to a very limited market-ing budget in the region. to get the most out of these limited funds, eA games cooperated with danish television channel tv2 sport during their broadcast-ing of the super Bowl, the premier American Football competition in the usA.

of Home and various digital activities. However

the iPad will obviously be perfect, but if you want to play more complicated games, like Counterstrike for instance, you have to be online and to be able to react within seconds. Th e iPad simply won’t do the job.”

JH: Innovation has been a top priority for EA since 2007…

MH: “Yes, we aim to launch two, three innovative titles every year. And we aim to position ourselves as the online leader. When we launch a new title we always include an online plan. It’s extremely important to us to hold onto the gamers so they don’t think: ‘Th at was it? Now I have to go down and invest another €80 in a new game’. We need to supply free online content, new fi elds, uniforms and the like to keep them going. Th e best example was a FIFA gamer in USA who spent $2,500 because he was so fascinated by all the extra assets.”

JH: Do you see any possibilities for in-volving the advertiser to a higher extent? Obviously in-game advertising has been around for years...

MH: “No doubt about that, in-game advertising has been around for what feels like forever. Th e best example is FIFA, where you can buy the classic in-game banners. Obviously there are lots of other options and the great thing is that we can track it and report it to the advertiser. In the future we will sell ads in two ways: Th e classic way and the new way where we intro-duce it as part of the game, which will ensure higher involvement and we’ll be able to track it quite accurately in the targeted groups. We know this method from the movie industry, where they have worked with product placement for years, and we’ll see a lot more of it, as games have surpassed movies in many ways.”

aim to position ourselves as the online leader. When we launch a new title we always include an online plan. It’s extremely important to us to hold onto the gamers so they don’t think: ‘Th at was it? Now I have to go down and invest another €80 in a new game’. We need to supply free online content, new fi elds, uniforms and the like to keep them going. Th e best example was a FIFA gamer in USA who spent $2,500 because he was so fascinated by all the extra assets.”

from the movie industry, where they have worked with product placement for years, and we’ll see a lot more of it, as games have surpassed movies in many ways.”

intervieW WitHmOrten nielsen

Staying ahead of THe GaMe "The ipad

simply won’t do the job"

• Console gaming for a more intense gaming experiences

• Social gaming is growing• Games for smart phones as a quick fi x

prediCtiOns FOr tHe gAming mArket

mOrten nielsen is nOrdiC mArketing direCtOr At eleCtrOniC Arts. He HAs Been WitH eA sinCe 2001.eleCtrOniC Arts is a leading global interactive entertainment software company. eA develops, markets, publishes and distributes

interactive software for video game systems, personal computers, wireless devices and the internet.in 2009 eA had 31 titles which sold more than 1 million copies – some of the most popular titles include the sims, Battlefi eld, madden nFl and FiFA. electronic Arts inc is listed at nAsdAQ and had a revenue of $4.2 billion in fi scal 2009.

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MoBile

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CoNTeXTAdding value to the situation where the product is valuable and the brand mean.

Value ChaiNtracing participant action from A to z. action from A to z.

CheSSpeople watch a tv programmeonce, maybe twice. But they can play chess a thousand times.

oBJeCTSthe mobile is just the thing stuff talks to. the thing stuff talks to.

ReMoTe CoNTRolWhen the device interacts with the surroundings - on the participant's behalf.

the device interacts

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[mobile]

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mobile is at the forefront of a com-pletely new way of thinking about marketing. But in order to under-stand its potential we need to look beyond the sms, the advertising and the text voting. We need to stop thinking of mobile as just a technolo-gy or a tool, but instead start concen-trating on how people use it and the behaviour of those users; because people, not technology, drive innova-tion in communications.By Helge tennØ

CollaBoRaTiVe &SoCial deViCeit´s a collaborative platform helping people connect and do stuff together.

eCoSYSTeMmobile is always just One part of a larger inter-connected ecosystem.

gaMiNgnever underestimate the power of gaming activites.

deSigNthe gui has to be designed to invite people in, and facilitate the activity.

eVeRYdaY liFethe pC is inaccessible in almost all situations where the brand is relevant.

eCoSYSTeM

One part of a larger inter-

ecosystem.

activites.

SeNSe/ReCoRdthe beauty of digitial is its ability to record anything - as it is happen-ing. the mobile becomes a huge sensing advice.

geoTiliTY aNd SPiMeSdevices responsive to geolocation and time.

eVeRYdaY liFe

12 reAsOns tO retHink mOBile

aNd SPiMeSevices responsive to

geolocation and time.

12 Blink#1 [mobile]

the traditional advertising and media landscape is, as suggested by kevin slavin , md at Area/code, “a competition of stories”, where the edito-rial content of one media channel is forced to compete against the content of others. When a brand’s advertising enters the mix, three, four or fi ve stories can compete for the same attention.

this has led to an enormous focus on attention strategy, where a lot of the investment goes into

getting noticed. However, for this attention to be worthwhile, it needs to be earned, not just grabbed.

As C2C and personal devices become more and more prominent for marketers, it’s important to take notice; as consumers we share information because it’s valuable, not simply because we are aware of it.

this is the starting point from which we need to rethink mobile strategy. But to create share-able value, how should our strategies change and what should we be thinking about? We need a new mindset.

the following list suggests twelve ways in which can rethink our approach for future mobile plat-forms. Hopefully one or more of them can ignite the imagination and new ideas.

Technology is everywhere; it has become both ubiqui-

tous and invisible and allows us to place our market-

ing initiatives within easy reach of the participants

every hour of the waking day.

But companies often fail to maximise the opportuni-

ties available, using portable devices as tools to fi ll

the available spaces inside the lives of consumers

with senseless messaging.

What we really need to understand is that even though

people are technologically available, it doesn’t mean

they are behaviourally available. As marketing moves

from the battle of stories (in media) to everyday life,

it turns from thinking about short-sighted attention

strategies to long-term relationship-building.

We are moving away from attention-grabbing and

towards value, from time being a cost, to time being

an opportunity, from campaigns to relationships.

1.every day life the pC is inaccessible in almost all situations where the brand is relevant.

Mobile is not a media platform, it’s a communications device. it is a means for people to exchange ideas and build relationships, quite the opposite of a one-directional content distribution system.

an opportunity, from campaigns to relationships.

Blink#1 [mobile]

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What we really need to understand is that even though

people are technologically available, it doesn’t mean

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never underestimate the power of gaming activities. There is a common misconception in participatory culture that content equals participation. This is fundamentally wrong. inviting people in to register and submit content, gives no reason for return visits, and no reason for active collaboration over time.

There are clear guidelines and suggestions as to what creates a liveable, breathable community. it has little to do with the gathering of content and more to do with the lubrication of the exchange of ideas through mechanics and dynamics.

One of the more effective ones is the application of gaming concepts. not necessarily games themselves, but embed-

ding mechanics or dynamics from gaming culture into the functionality of the application in order to enhance explora-tion and engagement.

This applies to our instinctive human curiosity, regarding understanding how things work, and our competitiveness, which is embedded deep within the human mind.

Adding a bit of the gaming mindset to an otherwise tedious task can both liven up your existing audiences, and also open up new models for participation and collaboration that dramatically increases engagement with the activity.

2.design the graphical user interface (gui) has to be designed to invite people in, and facilitate the activityThe GUi has to be designed to invite people in and facilitate the activityBehavioral Psychologist Donald norman has been quoted as saying:“Each time a new technology comes along, new designers make the same horrible mistakes as their predecessors. Technologists are not noted for learning the errors of the past. They look forward, not back, so they repeat the same problems over and over again.”

When it comes to design for interactive platforms, it seems that the knowledge from existing design practices has been overlooked in favour of designing interfaces that ease the technological development budget, rather than accommodate the human mind.

This is certainly true when it comes to mobile, with devastating effects when it comes to engaging the mobile user. Algorithmic logic and robotic rationality seem to shape the reasoning behind the interfaces trying to engage people in services, content and marketing.

luckily there are exceptions. Companies like TAT from Sweden have been exploring mobile design for years, and whilst not every project has been a commercial success, it seems that they are creating valuable insights that will to lead to more dynamic, desirable and effective solu-tions. Design is for humans, not robots, and it should force technology to adapt and evolve, not the other way around.

3.Gaming

[mobile]

12 reAsOns tO retHink mOBile

never underestimate the power of gaming activities.

the graphical user interface

4.ecosystem mobile is always just One

part of a larger inter-connected ecosystem.

Digital is not a silo; it’s an ecosystem

of activities. it engages people on

a range of platforms; depending on

context and availability, and connects

these interactions into one coherent,

synchronous universe. it is only people

building content for platforms who

think about platforms. Customers think about experiences.

Mobile is a trigger, a lead generator, a remote, a sensor or

a recording device. By using its capacity to be everywhere

anytime; you can create relevance for the brand and value

for the participant. But mobile has clear limitations, both

due to limited interaction abilities, limited bandwidth (at

present), and limited processing strength.

As marketing campaigns now utilise numerous formats

and activities, it is clear that one platform alone cannot

do everything. Mobile has clear and defi nite abilities that

can be rivalled by no other platform. Using mobile for

these specifi c operations puts it to work doing what it

does best.

6.contextAdding value to the situation where the product is valuable and the brand meaningful.The difference between traditional advertising and new marketing can be summarised in two sentences:• Traditional advertising is all about affecting our anticipation

of an experience outside of the experience itself, in order to change or manipulate the evaluation of the experience after it has happened.

• new marketing is about adding value inside the experience itself.

Traditional advertising proves to be complex and costly. This is because our ability to reach out and talk to people is to a large extent limited to media, consumed in specifi c contexts, unrelated to the communicated products or brands.

But technology has changed; it has become ubiquitous and in-visible. This means that people and participants can access our marketing all the time. But why would they want to access it? Context is about understanding the situation where the prod-uct is relevant. it is about understanding that product design is about identifying the features of a situation and adding value to it through a specifi c product. Service design is simi-lar. You must understand the context surrounding the product and then design services that create additional value inside this context. By doing this you will create a more unique brand experience, rendering the product invaluable.

Digital services are now a part of the product development process as they can offer unique experiences and value to an otherwise ordinary product.

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it is interesting to note that before we put computers into telephones, they were purely collaborative devices – it’s almost as if, by introducing technology, the telephone has tuned into an anti-social device.

People belong to networks, and enabling these groups through the exchange of ideas is one of the most impor-tant abilities of the digital/real world.

The mobile is essential to this, and has historically been a

great socialising device, strengthening our connections with friends and family.

The mobile platform expands our present notion of the tel-ephone into something more like a super-communications device, with strengths in all dimensions of communication.This means that whereas most applications today are inherently unsocial and database-driven, we are only at the start of a new learning curve; soon it will be the exception when applications or abilities remain individual.

5.collaborative & social deviceit´s a collaborative platform helping people connect and do stuff together.

process as they can offer unique experiences and value to an otherwise ordinary product.

´s a collaborative platform helping people connect and do stuff together.

[mobile]

12 reAsOns tO retHink mOBile

4.ecosystem 4.ecosystem obile is always just One

5.collaborative & social device

´s a collaborative platform helping ´s a collaborative platform helping

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7.objectsthe mobile is just the thing stuff talks to.Already we are seeing our everyday objects being upgraded to include some form of ‘intelligence’, able to communicate with us and enforcing its utility.

What we as marketers need to understand is that mobile strategy is not about being accessible through an application on the phone, it is increasingly about helping people connect to stuff in the real world.

A quote by kevin Slavin explains it:“Mobile is just a reference to an eco-system that phones are a part of.”

in his talk at Webstock in 2009, Matt Jones, an expert in interaction design, referenced the future of smart objects:“now, hackers are building sensors, bots and software into everything around them, bottom up, fast, cheap and out of control. They are creating environments that react, adapt and respond to us – and perhaps, more importantly – each other”

This is a reference to a future already here, where objects gain a level of intelli-gence, being connected and in a dialogue with their surroundings. And in this world mobile will be the interface, receiving their feedback, communicating with them and enabling us to control them.

8.Value chaintracing participant action from A to z.A sale is the result of a chain of events happening in mostly random order from the time when a customer fi rst shows interest in a product to its fi nal purchase. Digital has a clear role in this process but often fails to prove its direct effect on sales due to black holes, non-digital, non-recordable steps in the purchase process.

This is often the case in retail, where engagement online is parallel to increased awareness in-store, but where the opportunity to accurately or correctly measure the related activity is non-existent because of lack of measurability.

Mobile can help remove these black holes so that, to a more certain degree, we can measure the direct effect of an online marketing activity to actual in-store purchasing. Mobile can be the platform connecting online to in-store.

[mobile]

12 reAsOns tO retHink mOBile

8.Value chainracing participant

8.Value chain

their feedback, communicating with them and enabling us to control them. more certain degree, we can measure the direct effect of

an online marketing activity to actual in-store purchasing. Mobile can be the platform connecting online to in-store.

he mobile is just the thing

16 Blink#1 [mobile]

9.chesspeople watch a tv programme once, maybe twice.

But they can play chess

a thousand times.

in the words of kevin slavin: “people watch a tv-programme

once, maybe twice, but they can play chess a thousand times.”

this quote has great implications for how we think about

marketing. We need to stop asking ourselves which platform

is best suited for display advertising, because there is no

question: traditional media far out-trumps the ability of online

and mobile. What we need to ask ourselves is this; is online

and mobile a direct sales medium for our brand? What are the

best abilities of the connected platforms?

it seems we have been blinded by our eagerness to measure

direct sales, the ease of analytics engines spewing out statis-

tics on click rates and unique visitors at extremely low costs.

But this has led us into a haze, where the simplicity of measur-

ing our ability to transport people around the web has got in

the way of us seeing the platform's real potential: establishing

lasting relationships with participants through fresh content,

conversations, ideas and limitless value.

Online is a relationship platform, not a direct sales platform.

it may be easy to measure, but is also guilty of creating the

illusion that most products can be sold solely through a

display ad.

As the new york times suggests, more and more business

models are focusing on subscriptions rather than single

sales. As an ever increasing number of products are becom-

ing inherently similar, the unique offering of one business

has to come through unique experiences offered through

its marketing, rather than the product alone.

the question is: where can we grow our most important

customers? this is the single most important future role

of connected platforms.

10.Remote controlWhen the device interacts with the surroundings - on the participant's behalf.A chip implant in the back of the neck or the retina might be some decades away but mobile is already offering a lot of the functionality presented in movies as a remote control to communicate and respond to future connected environments.

the mobile is a sensing device, connected to a database of knowledge through its access to the owner’s social networks. By combining it with either geo-positioning or near fi eld technology, it can control the surrounding environment in order to either accommodate disability or facilitate tailored real world services.

We are already familiar with conscious action related to direct payment or ticket registering via mobile. At the same time geo-apps on the iphone or Android are tracking our every move and can react or have our surroundings react to us.

[mobile]

12 reAsOns tO retHink mOBile

tracking our every move and can react or have our surroundings react to us.

17 Blink#1[mobile]

12.sense/recordthe beauty of digital is its ability to record anything - as it is happening. the mobile becomes a huge sensing device.this brings with it two opportunities. the fi rst is as a measuring device, giving us access to knowledge that we didn't have previously, the second is in regard to the quality of data we can acquire when technology obtains it without demanding any con-scious participation on our behalf.

traditionally, we tend to understand situations by asking people directly or indirectly about to experi-ences outside the situation itself. this is a rational approach to discovering secrets hidden away inside a rather complex and subconscious brain. Asking people to imagine why they did something, or how they experienced it, when they might be completely unaware of why and how they did it creates a huge source for error.

With the mobile set to record, the experience can be sampled as it is happening. Without the person act-ing as a fi lter between the action and the recording, the mobile will be able to record an unbiased record of the process providing unique insights which can-not be collected through interview or observation alone.

Future digital activities will have to be built with data collection integrated, as marketers will grow increasingly aware of the value these recordings will have when it comes to understanding participants and contexts.

11.Geotility and spimesdevices responsive to geolocation and time.A spime is an abbreviation of the combination of space and time, referencing an object that combines temporal aware-ness with geographic location.

even though the term was coined by author Bruce sterling only some years ago, the idea of spimes have been on the lips of direct marketers since the dawn of mobile.

the dream has been to have an object ‘attached’ to a person, pushing coupons, freebies and other short-sighted intrusive incentives, as one is moving around in civic surroundings. passing an ikeA sends you an sms of a free dinner if you come into the store, Jessops photo laboratory would offer you a free 20x15 print, and the coffee shop invites your friends in for a free cup.

luckily, these ideas became illegal even before they had the opportunity to intrude on people’s lives. However, some retail chain applications do offer this as an option to their service today.

But spimes have far greater reach, and are only restricted presently by our own actions. let us look beyond coupons and augmented reality layered maps, and integrate the functional-ity into our services and ecosystem.

[mobile]

12 reAsOns tO retHink mOBile

to learn more from Helge tennø:Blog: www.180360720.no

linkedin: http://www.linkedin.com/in/helgetennotwitter: @congbo

presentations: http://www.slideshare.net/helgetenno/

18 Blink#1

Today, mobile phones are not just about making and taking calls – they are boosting India’s m-com-merce with both India’s central bank and the market regulator

mulling over proposals to allow active trading via mobile phones. While the Blackberry has become a lifeline for a million urban Indians, the rural junta has not been left behind in the race, as telecom operators slug it out to capture the biggest slice of India’s growing rural markets.

According to research fi rm Gartner ‘mobile applications with money transfer via short message service’ lead the list of top 10 most used mobile applications, followed by ‘mobile search’ to drive sales and marketing oppor-

tunities on the phone, ‘mobile browsing’, ‘mobile advertising’ and ‘mobile music’(see box).

Most kids in rural India do not have access to formal education and often end up working on the farms during the day. So to help reach out to these children, an inspiring project, Millee, is under consideration, which uses mobile gaming technology to enhance access to literacy among children of school-going age in the developing world. “It is a very interesting and encouraging initiative.” said Sidhartha Bezbora, who regularly writes about technology and telecom on his blog www.wirelessduniya.com. “Another very interesting project is farmers using a phone to water their farmland in i Gujarat”

mobile gaming technology to educate rural kids,

trading information to farmers, mobile advertis-ing platforms, music and movie downloads, games

and a lot more… the ubiquitous mobile phone

has come a long way since it fi rst appeared in

india about a decade ago.

[mobile]

All eyes On mOBilevAlue Added serviCes

By mediACOm interACtiOn, indiA

on mobilevalue added services

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no. 1: money transferno. 2: location-Based servicesno. 3: mobile searchno. 4: mobile Browsingno. 5: mobile Health monitoringno. 6: mobile paymentno. 7: near Field

Communication servicesno. 8: mobile Advertisingno. 9: mobile instant messagingno. 10: mobile music

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According to research fi rm gartner, the

toP 10 consumer mobile applications by 2012 will be:

All eyes On mOBilevAlue Added serviCes

VaS iS PRiMaRilY BeiNg uSed iN ThRee FoRMS: EnTERTAinMEnT VAS is designed for mass appeal and extensive usage. examples include jokes, Bollywood ringtones and games. Th ese services are currently very popular and are driving the revenues for the indian mobile Vas market.inFO VAS provide useful information, often in a personal context, to the end user. examples include information on movie tickets, news, bank accounts etc. Th ese also include user requests for information on product categories like real-estate, education, etc.MCOMMERCE VAS enables conducting a transaction using the mobile phone. examples of this kind involve buying railway tickets or movie tickets through the mobile phone.

in december 2009, infosys announced the launch of flypp™, an application platform that has delighted digital consumers with a host of ready-to-use experiential applications across a universe of devices. mapmyindia, in partnership with sygic, has launched mobile apps that give the user street level directions, and lets them search across points-of-interests (Poi) on their mobiles without the need for a data plan. Th at’s not all… mobile trading will soon be a reality, and india’s markets regulator seBi is currently working on the fi nal guidelines.

According to seBi’s proposal, brokers who provide internet-based trading are eligible to use wireless technology after getting ap-provals from stock exchanges. Th e net worth requirement per broker is proposed at Rs 50 lakh if he provides the facility on his own. in case a service provider provides the inter-net trading facility on behalf of a group of brokers, the net worth criteria stipulated by his stock exchange will apply. already, nokia has partnered with itc e-choupal to off er personalised agri-services on the nokia Life tools to e-choupal network. and, information giant Th omson Reuters’ latest off ering for farmers, Reuters marketLite, is already "all the rage" among the village folks who use information on seeds, weather and other farm inputs regularly.

With intense competition driving down tariff s, mobile operators in india are increasingly focusing on value added services (Vas) to generate revenues. Vas, which covers the entire gamut of ser-vices from downloads of movies and music, to sms and mms, ringtones, callertunes and games, has been on a solid footing globally, but given the low base and the familiarity with information technology, it is witnessing exponential growth in india.

Th e global Vas industry is growing at about 40–50 per cent, but the indian Vas market has seen growth rates of 60 percent in recent years. it is estimated to touch 251 billion rupees ($5.5 billion) in 2009/10, on the back of a pool of more than 500 million mobile customers.

Although most indian consumers are not very comfortable with non-voice usage of their mobile phones, that trend is gradually reversing, helped by the entertainment sector, with music and fi lm companies, game makers

and television channels aggressively entering the mobile content market.

around 60 percent of all Vas revenue cur-rently comes from music downloads and ring-tones, and driven by a huge youth market, demand for gaming, mobile imagery and streaming audio and video is rising.

Recently, imimobile, the global service crea-tion partner for operators, media providers and enterprises launched daVinci social, a white-labelled service that enables people to

easily manage their mobile digital social-life. it is apparently the fi rst Bollywood streaming application ready on nokia s60 5th edition devices and streams Bollywood songs, movie trailors, director’s cuts etc.

“When the internet came, people hardly thought it would be useful and look where it has gone now. so having access to high speed internet on mobiles with 3G will allow peo-ple to do a lot more of the stuff they are now doing on their laptops, at the same speed,” says suraj nalin, a software engineer working at Yahoo!

A recent study by consultancy informate mobile intelligence revealed that mobile users spend 15-20 minutes on messaging activi-ties daily, while 40-45 minutes are spent on entertainment where users listen to a mini-mum of 2-3 songs and click 15-18 photos in a month. Th e study also revealed that card

and puzzle categories are the most favoured among gamers in india.

With its mobile subscriber base growing rapidly, advertisers in india are also adopt-ing innovative ways of reaching out to the consumer on their mobiles. While basic promotional sms alerts are used by every-one—from small businesses to national-level politicians, advertisers are focusing on more complex mediums such as embedding promo-tions within mobile games.

indian telecom fi rms currently draw only a small portion of their revenues from Vas, but this will likely grow to about 18-20 percent in 2010, and once 3G services are launched in the country in 2010, this could increase fur-ther. Th e average Revenue Per user (aRPu) from non-voice services, including data card access and sms, is expected to rise from 9 per cent now to about 25 percent.

data services should see a surge in adoption and usage. High-speed applications will open up a lot of possibilities of innovative Vas enabling diverse infotainment service opportunities in this fi lm and cricket-focused country.

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Say hello to the wild world web!under the name ‘Outernet’ a technological development is approaching that will profoundly change our relationships with each other and with the objects around us in the world. the internet is leaving the previously detached realm of cyberspace and placing itself over our environment like a second skin.

By tOrsten reHder And rené HentsCHel / illustrAtiOns AnnA Ax / pHOtO: spOrt-mAster - pHOtO: tOm rOssum

Th e possibilities we are familiar with from the internet – links, search function, personalisa-tion and interaction – are being transferred to physical objects. Th e connections between people and things are thus becoming denser, more specifi c and taking on a local component: depending on our interests and needs, diff erent information becomes visible in the environ-ment. a new dimension of perception is created in which virtuality and reality are merged. HsdPa, WiBro and WimaX are systematically erasing the dividing line between offl ine and online. so in the future we are always on and always connected!

The ouTeRNeT.

[mobile]

tHe Outernet

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[mobile]tHe

Outernet

the term ‘the Outernet’ refers to the development of online abilities in physical objects and in the real world.

As a second layer in our everyday lives it will change the way we interact with each other and with objects.

the theories are that • the whole world will become a hyperlink.• Computers will become invisible.• information and networks will become ubiquitous.• reality will be reintegrated and augmented. • environmental perception will become more selective.the consequences affect life, business and of course marketing.

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tHe Outernet

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ccdriving FOrCe 1: LocaLisationlocalisation is an essential element of the Outernet as it establishes the vital link between the digital data infrastructure and the real world. the ability to determine where and at what distance we are located in relation to one another is a prerequisite for many Outernet applications.

lOCAlising By gpsTh e Global Positioning System (GPS) makes it possible to localise people and objects geographically. Digital cameras and camera phones are increasingly equipped with GPS, automatically adding the relevant geo-coordinates to photos and videos.

triAngulAtiOn As An AlternAtive tO gpsBesides GPS, triangulation of GSM towers or wireless LAN hotspots can also be used to localise mobile devices. Compared to GSM, localisation by wireless LAN allows far more accurate positioning in urban areas and particularly in closed buildings. Wireless LAN hotspots therefore play an important role in the spreading of the Outernet.

HigHly ACCurAte lOCAlisAtiOn WitH gAlileOWhen the EU launches the Galileo satellite navigation system in 2010 there will be a signifi -cant improvement in localisation accuracy: in the freely available service people and objects can then be localised to an accuracy of about four metres, and for fee-paying customers to less than one metre. Galileo will therefore be a key driver for the Outernet.

THE SOCiAl TRAVEl GUiDE FOR MOBilE PHOnESThe fully customisable social travel guide “tripwolf” is availa-ble as an iPhone application that can also be used in offl ine mode. During installation a selection of city guides is stored directly on to the iPhone, and these can be synchronised at any time. in addition, the application displays suggestions in the surroundings once the mobile phone has been localised. „tripwolf“ sources the content from its own online commu-nity and the travel literature published by MairDumont.

cdriving FOrCe 2:

WeB of tHinGsthe Web of things networks physical objects and turns them into information carriers. in this way, everyday objects work like a website: they are linked to the information resources of theinternet and can be clicked on like hyperlinks via mobile phone.

OBJeCt Hyperlinking By BArCOde And imAge reCOgnitiOnVisual codes such as the QR Code, Semacode or Aztec Code serve as a method of linking objects to the Web. A further development of this technology is the recognition of objects by their shape: objects are photographed using a camera phone and matched with an image database, upon which a corresponding link is opened (e.g. kooaba.com). However, it is above all RFID technology, NFC and sensor technology that will give the Web of Th ings a huge push.

rFid is On tHe AdvAnCeRFID tags are tiny radio modules which permit the automatic remote identifi cation of objects. Th ey are already quite common in ski passes and electronic labels. RFID tags can also be used to link objects to information. It is conceivable, for example, that

every physical object will have a website which can be called up directly via RFID-capable mobile phones.

mOBile pAyment viA nFCNear Field Communication (NFC) works in a similar way to RFID technology, with the diff erence that the exchange of data takes place over a distance of just a few centimetres. As this short distance is tantamount to physical contact, NFC is tipped to become the key technology in the fi eld of mobile payment.

sensOrs „Feel“ tHe pHysiCAl WOrldTo some extent, sensors act as the sense organs of objects. Bright-ness, noises, temperature or pressure – sensors make it possible to read out the surrounding situation sensitively on diff erent levels. On the basis of this information, mobile devices can interpret the context in which a person is currently to be found.

MOBilE ARTiClE RETRiEVAl ViA iMAGE RECOGniTiOnThe kooaba company has developed a new application for mobile devices which makes it possible to link entire magazines and newspapers via mobile image recognition without having to alter the editorial content graphically. The reader can then not only participate in mobile marketing activities such as competitions, but also forward content to friends and archive it online in PDF format.

Interactive PrintMobile visuelle Suche als Mehrwert für Zeitungen und Magazine im digitalen Zeitalter

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tHe Outernet

cdriving FOrCe 3:

smaRt infoRmation PRocessinGOn the Outernet there will be an exponential increase in information. to master this information explosion a new generation of intelligent informa-tion processing is needed: the smart Web.

semAntiC inFOrmAtiOn prOCessing On tHe smArt WeBWith the Smart Web, computers will become capable of understanding information semantically. For example, if the user enters a query into the semantic search engine Powerset.com, a real answer is given. Th e question “how tall is Queen Elizabeth II?”, for instance, will generate the answer namely “1.63 metres”. Semantic tools can also be used to augment conversations with additional information: Th oughttrail.com, for example, analyses chats and automatically imports related content.

tHe WeB OF diversity Will BeCOme tHe WeB OF impOrtAnCeWhen context information such as time, place and user profi les are taken into account, the relevance of search results increases. Th is is already beginning to happen: Google‘s mobile application ‘Voice Search’ automatically takes the location into consideration for search queries. If, for example, “movie showtimes” is spoken into the mobile phone, all the cinema schedules in the immediate surroundings are displayed.

smArt WeB + sOCiAl sOFtWAre = enduring COmmunitiesIf the Smart Web is combined with social software (social networks, wikis, blogs, etc.) a more specifi c and more intensive connection between people is created. Th e community functions that we know from the Internet get out on to the street and into real life. As online com-munities on the Outernet are enhanced by the factors of time and place, they are transformed into enduring communities.

lOCATiOn-BASED inFORMA-TiOn FROM THE COMMUniTYThe joint project of the location-based networks Brightkite and the augmented reality browser layar (via iPhone), which encourages users to take photos or post something. By simply pointing the camera at any place the user can receive all the information available from the social network in real time on the display. in this way, the service provides a real-time view of the location based network.

cdriving FOrCe 4:

neXt-GeneRationi/o deVicesin order for the Outernet to be able to assert itself successfully, mobile devices which can be operated intuitively are needed. For this reason, all eyes are turned to the new generation of input and output devices.

tHe ipHOne sHOWs HOW it’s dOneTh e iPhone can be seen as one of the main reasons why people no longer scoff at the Mobile Web and its applications. Yet the multi-touch usability of the iPhone is only the beginning: numerous new materials, media and technologies are currently under development that will make mobile com-munications even more intuitive.

FrOm Oleds tO WeArABle eleCtrOniCsMotion sensors, fl exible LED displays (OLEDs) and speech recognition systems have already found their way into mobile devices. In the future, they will be joined by technologies such as gesture control, face recognition and electronic ink (e-ink). Haptic displays, which make digital information tactile on the display surface, are also now practicable. As the technology is becoming not only more effi cient, but also smaller, the concept of the wearable computer is drawing closer all the time: it is conceivable that smart glasses, retina implants or even control over brainwaves will also become reality one day.

tHe virtuAl extensiOn OF reAlityAugmented reality (AR) does not describe a technology, but a way of perceiving the environment – virtually extended reality. Augmented reality can be understood as a layer model that enriches reality with virtual levels and thus merges the real and the digital realms of experience. An example of an AR system is the mobile travel guide “Wikitude”. It augments the user‘s view of the surrounding world by overlaying additional digital information on the mobile phone‘s camera image.

THE SMART MOBilE TRAVEl COMPAniOnWikitude is a mobile phone ap-plication which uses augmented reality to overlay information about the surroundings on the real image of the mobile phone‘s camera. With GPS and a digital compass, the position and viewing direction are recog-nised and relevant information

(e.g. about places of interest) is retrieved from the Wikipedia data-base. With this innovative mash up it will be possible for users to have an extensive, mobile travel guide at hand at all times.

ptHeOry 3:

infoRmation and netWoRKs WiLL Be uBiQuitousNetworks are the capital of the future because access to resources and not possesion of them will be of crucial importance in the future. Th e Mobile Web and corresponding terminal devices allow us ubiquitous access to information, services and networks.

ElECTROniC ViSUAl AiD FOR THE BlinDPhysicians in Tübingen have developed a kind of electronic retina for blind people: the retina chip. The wafer-thin chip, on which sit 1,540 photocells plus electron-ics, is implanted beneath the nerve cell layer of the patient‘s retina. As with a healthy eye, the light falls through the lens, shines through the nerve cells of the retina and then hits the chip‘s photocells. The retina chip facilitates visual acuity of six percent – suffi cient to recognise people‘s faces.

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ptHeOry 1:

tHe WHoLe WoRLd WiLL Become a HYPeRLinKIn the age of the Outernet the physical world functions like a website. Every object can be clicked on like a hyperlink in order to access information, services and communication off ers.

tHe teCHnOlOgiCAl inFrAstruCture FOr tHis is AlreAdy in plACe tOdAy: Th e mobile devices currently available are suffi ciently equipped, and the production costs for RFID tags, microchips and sensors have been reduced to an economically acceptable level. In view of the rapid technological progress being made, there are now very few people who still doubt the prediction made by Marc Weise, senior scientist at the Xerox research centre, in 1991: “In the 21st century the technology revolution will move into the everyday, the small and the invisible.”

OBJeCts Will BeCOme selling spACe, plACes Will BeCOme AnCHOr pOintsTh e Outernet will radically change our relationships with one another and with objects around us in the world: when real objects – such as cars, billboards, or urban trains pulling into stations – become hyper-links, then people, objects and information will enter into a new relationship with each other. Objects must therefore be seen and designed in the future as interfaces and – even more so – as potential selling spaces. Due to the possibility of interlinking, physical locations become anchor points around which local communities form and at which context-relevant information is exchanged.

On THE OUTERnET, THE inTERnET Will EXPlODE inTO THE REAl WORlD.“People, systems and products link up directly with each other and interact. Via mobile devices which are constantly connected wirelessly to the internet, the Web will conquer the street and only then will it realise its true potential.”Nils Müller, founder and CEO of TrendONE

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tHe Outernet

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diFFerent spHeres OF identity Will mergeOn the Outernet, access to digital information is no longer physically limited, while on the Internet a distinction is still made between online and offl ine and thus between real and virtual identity. By removing this boundary on the Outernet the diff erent partial aspects of our social identity become merged. In the age of the Outernet it will therefore become necessary to create a uniform self-image that coher-ently integrates the diff erent spheres of identity.

COmmunities Will BeCOme mOre spOntAneOusOn the Outernet, communities will become more spon-taneous, more dynamic and more specifi c. Th e joining together of the community members is not only based on their common interests, but also on their location. Th e fl ash

mobs organised online and carried out offl ine are a good example of instant community building in the age of the Outernet.

COmmunities Will AlsO BeCOme mOre enduringAs the thread to the virtual community is never broken on the Outernet, an ‘ambient intimacy’ emerges. Th is term describes the sense of feeling close to people despite the fact that they are at a diff erent location. Th e practice of being in constant contact with friends via digital communication technologies can lead to the stabilisation of communities. On the Outernet, communities will therefore become more erratic on the one hand, but also more enduring on the other.

ptHeOry 2:

comPuteRs WiLL Become inVisiBLeComputers will be so small in the future that they will be practically invis-ible. Th is will make it possible to embed computers in everyday objects, in our clothes and even in our bodies.

tHe envirOnment Will BeCOme sensitive And reACtiveProgress in microelectronics and nanotechnology is bringing the vision of the comprehensive informatisation of the world closer all the time. RFID tags, sensors and microchips can now be produced with such small dimensions and so cost-eff ectively that they can be integrated into everyday objects and items of clothing. Computers will therefore disappear from our fi eld of vision and embed themselves seamlessly in the physical world. Our environment will become sensitive and reactive, adapting automatically to our needs.

smArt OBJeCts AllOW intuitive OperAtiOnEven when computers almost literally vanish into thin air, they will nevertheless be ubiquitous. Th ey operate invisibly in the background and act as intelligent helpers in our everyday lives. Examples of smart objects are a car tyre that tells you when it is losing air, or medication that draws attention to the fact that it is past its use-by date. As smart objects possess intuitive user guidance, technically inexperienced users can also use them without diffi culty – unlike the conventional Internet.

COmputers And inFOrmAtiOn Will BeCOme intimAteAs computers become embedded in our environment, the physical distance between user and desktop will be removed. Computers integrated in textiles, intelligent contact lenses and retina implants will make the relationship between people and computers much more intimate: media content and data will get much closer to the recipient – they will ‘touch’ us in the true sense of the word.

BEOBlE.ME: OUTERnET SOCiAl nETWORkbeoble.me combines different functions of the Mobile Web and Web 2.0 in one platform and aims to become the new social network of the Outernet. Users of beoble.me can determine at any time

which friends and members of their network are nearby and which bars and restaurants in the surroundings are recommended. They can phone and mail each other and get to know new members without having to exchange mobile phone numbers or similar contact data.

ptHeOry 5:

enViRonmentaL PeRcePtion WiLL Become moRe seLectiVeTh e merging of online and offl ine appears to be increasing the complexity of our world beyond measure. In fact, the Outernet is much more about reducing complexity: as with an ad blocker, unimportant information can be suppressed and important information included via augmented reality.

THE PROACTiVE BROWSER FOR THE MOBilE WEBAloqa is a provider of location-based services which supplies users proactively with location information. Thanks to Aloqa, companies and businesses wishing to draw attention to their location will no longer have to develop suitable software for each mobile telephone in the future. The user is spared the laborious task of typing search terms into the mobile phone as the location-related information on preconfi gured topics (such as dining out or live music etc.) appears in the display by means of the push method.

ptHeOry 4:

ReaLitY WiLL Be ReinteGRated and auGmentedOn the conventional Internet, data is uncoupled from the dimensions place and time. Th is is in contrast to the Outernet, were data assumes a direct contextual relevance. Instant messengers such as Skype, microblogging services such as Twit-ter and social communities such as Facebook have already successfully incorpo-rated the time factor. Th e location and time context dramatically increases the relevance of data – and thus becomes a killer application.

reAl interACtiOn is reintegrAtedOn the Outernet a comprehensive reintegration of real interaction processes into the digital environment takes place. When someone reports on an experience in real time via Twitter, a direct link is established between reality and virtuality and reality reintegration occurs.

severAl versiOns OF tHe reAl WOrldTh e reintegration of reality into the digital world is mirrored back into the real world on the Outernet. Th is is done by enriching and extending the real world by means of augmented reality. As augmented reality complements our perception by adding digital layers, our environment becomes customisable: depending on which fi lters we use, we perceive our environment diff erently.

THE MOBilE AUGMEnTED REAliTY BROWSERThe company SPRXmobile has developed the ‘layar’ appli-cation which makes the browser of mobile phones capable of displaying local data in augmented reality. When the surroundings are fi lmed using the mobile phone‘s camera a radar on the display indicates the distance to places of inter-est. if, for example, the user is searching for houses for sale,

these are displayed showing a picture and the purchase price as soon as the mobile phone is pointed at the house in question.

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tHe Outernet

seleCtive envirOnmentAl perCeptiOn is A nAturAl prOCessTh e possibility of consciously selecting information will make the world a place with more options and therefore greater clarity in the age of the Outernet. Th e phenomenon of selective environmental perception is a natural process and one we are all familiar with: depending on our inter-ests and needs, we focus our attention on certain details in the environ-ment. It is therefore not necessary to relearn how to use the diff erent fi lters through which we perceive our environment on the Outernet. However, as augmented reality visually highlights information, the selectiveness of perception will become more explicit and more specifi c.

COmmunities OF interest BeCOme COmmunities OF perCeptiOnWhat are the eff ects of selective environmental perception on social inter-action? One consequence could be the formation of communities on the basis of the currently activated perception mode: Beatles fans, for example, who walk around Liverpool in „Beatles mode“, perceive the environment through the same fi lter. Th e common interest community of the Beatles fans thus becomes a common perception community at the real location. Social communities become more specifi c and shared experiences more exclusive on the Outernet.

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Blink#1 [mobile]

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tHe Outernet

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„COnseQuenCes:

maRKetinGTh e outernet expands our possibilities for communication in all directions and makes interaction even more personal, more selective and more optional. market-ing has been aware of this paradigm shift since the emergence of Web 2.0. on the outernet, the focus of marketing will therefore be on adapting even more individually and sensitively than before to the needs of the customers. communication on the outernet takes place primarily via the most personal medium to date – the mobile phone.

COntextuAl tArgeting As A stArting pOintTh e mobile phone enables brands to reach customers in a more targeted way (ubiquitous advertising). in the future, contextual targeting (location, time, pro-fi le, mood, status, etc.) will be the starting point for all marketing activities. Th is will make it possible to approach customers on the basis of their current situation and mood – leading to mood marketing in its purest form.

BrAnds As pOints OF OrientAtiOnHow can contextual targeting be employed without the customers feeling pestered? orientation is the keyword here: if brands already provide orientation in the real world, they should be able to do the same in a mixed world of reality and virtuality. Th e right tip at the right time in the right place – this is how concrete added value with contextual relevance is created. special off ers limited in terms of time and place (e.g. mobile coupons) can be an eff ective way of establishing contact with customers.

Advertising As A serviCeadvertising will become a service and the brand a good friend. Th e application “Passport to Greatness” from Guinness or the “soundwalk” from Louis Vuitton show what it can actually look like. in addition, mobile augmented reality ap-plications such as Layar or Wikitude.me provide an indication of how a mixed reality can be created on the outernet which is fi lled with content not only by the users, but also by commercial providers.

mArketing BeCOmes trAnspArenCy mArketingon the outernet, transparency increases dramatically. Resourceful technologies like the iPhone application “amazon mobile” already challenge marketing to pro-vide more transparency: with “amazon mobile” users can photograph products in stores and are immediately notifi ed of the cheapest supplier of the product in question. Th e product can then be purchased with one click. marketing is also increasingly challenged when it comes to relevance as context factors such as geographical location and user profi le must be taken into consideration on the outernet. marketing will therefore develop more and more in the direction of transparency marketing and position itself as an effi cient complexity reducer.

„COnseQuenCes:

LifeTh e Outernet will change our lives even more dramatically than the Internet. Th is will not take place from one day to the next,

but in a constant, evolutionary process. However, the opportunities arising from the Outernet are already emerging today.

tHe Outernet prOmOtes individuAlity

Th e Outernet promotes individuality by providing us with individually tailored information. Th is enables us to act more

effi ciently and make more informed decisions. A virtual personal assistant supports us in our everyday lives by taking our

preferences (context layer) and our frame of mind (mood layer) into consideration.

tHe Outernet prOmOtes tHe independenCe OF Older peOple

Th e Outernet will even be manageable for young children and the elderly. Th is is particularly relevant in view of the ageing

structure of society: concepts such as ambient-assisted living or home monitoring make it possible for even the very elderly to

lead an anxiety-free and self-determined life outside over-burdened nursing homes.

tHe Outernet strengtHens suBCultures

Th e Outernet makes it possible to rediscover the world every day. One of the consequences of this is that sub-cultures

become more diff erentiated. Entry into niches can be more erratic and is usually only temporary: gothic today, eco tomorrow

– depending on time, location and mood.

WHO Will BeCOme tHe trusted pArtner?

In spite of all the convenience it off ers, the Outernet also raises questions regarding data security: who will be the trusted

partner to whom I entrust my data, and who helps me to keep track of my activities? Will there be an MOT-like authority

that administers the personal data, or will private providers perform this task? Th e job will probably go to whoever comes up

with the most coherent personal identity management concept. After all, situation-dependent partial identities (occupa-

tion, shopping, party, etc.) have to be administered somehow.

„COnseQuenCes:

BusinessTh e Outernet off ers a wide variety of cross-industry business opportunities. It is th

erefore never too soon to start

thinking about new products, services and business models.

tHe pOint OF sAle is sHiFting tO tHe mOBile pHOne

Th e combination of Mobile Web and Web of Th ings will result in all objects becoming communication channels

and selling spaces. If we like the shoes of the person sitting next to us, we focus on them with our mobile phone and

can immediately see the model, price and a possibility to order in the display. Th e point of sale is therefore shifting

to the mobile phone, transforming the world into one big shopping mall. As a consequence, the stationary trade will

have to compete with millions of products which are shopping windows and check-out at the same time. Physical

shops will therefore have to develop into places off ering an experience – from point of sale to point of experience.

neW serviCes Are emerging

Th e comprehensive networking on the Outernet gives rise to new services. Th e analysis of movement patterns al-

lows, for example, car insurance premiums to be calculated much more accurately. Location-based services such as

the localisation of businesses or location-based mobility and entertainment off ers increase time effi ciency and create

transparency. Dating and gaming will also be boosted: profi le-matching services based on the direct surroundings in-

vite users to participate in spontaneous speed dating; multi-player games in augmented reality mode move computer

games into the physical environment.

prOduCts BeCOme HyBrid prOduCts

On the Outernet physical products become hybrid products by including further (in some cases also premium)

services in addition to the original product benefi ts. Examples are football trading cards that provide access to an

online exchange, or medication that not only relieves the symptoms of a disease, but also provides information about

its geographical proliferation.

tHe segment OF One BeCOmes reAlity

In the age of the Outernet, products and services can be customised on the basis of user profi les. In addition, off ers

can be tied to a place and time, creating an artifi cial shortage and suggesting a certain uniqueness. Th is represents a

possible strategy to counteract price wars arising from the high degree of transparency on the Outernet.

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tHe Outernet

Recommended couRse of action:

yOu HAve tO get Better in Believing tHe impOssiBle!

One thing is clear: everything is going to change – and fast! The Outernet characterises a technological development which has already begun, is gaining pace and will have a fundamental effect on our lives. But how should companies respond to this process?

The sentence “You have to get better at believing in the impossible!” was uttered by Kevin Kelly of Wired magazine and describes precisely the way we must approach the Outernet. The recommended courses of action listed here should be seen as stimuli for our thoughts to opena door into the future.

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tHe Outernet

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authors: tOrsten reHder And rené HentsCHel, trendOne HAmBurgForeword and editing: mAx CelkO, trendAnAlystrecommended course oF action: lArs sCHlOssBAuer, prOximity ger-mAny gmBH

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„1. COmmuniCAtiOnas a result of the outernet, the fi rst thing to change will be how to approach

customers and target groups in the future. information will be placed in

a context and the channels and measures to reach the target group will

explode. one-to-one communication will become possible and target groups

previously considered unreachable will move within grasp. Th e drastic rise in

communication channels will make the creation of a campaign architecture

increasingly complex. Th e gathering and sharing of campaign experiences

within the company will become more and more important for the meaning-

ful allocation of the marketing budget.

TO MAkE THE VARiETY COnTROllABlE REQUiRES THAT …

• a commitment to test and learn is made

• communication is geared consistently to the ROI

• a campaign-tracking system is installed to monitor the success

of the channels and measures

• the continuous adjustment of the channels and measures takes

place based on conversions.

„2. BrAndTh e digital fi ngerprint of a brand can be experienced on

the Internet today. Campaign websites, Web TV and so-

cial media are now used to off er the customers a digital

brand experience.

However, the digital brand experience usually ends at

the edge of the computer screen – in isolated cases it

manages the leap to mobile devices or game consoles.

Yet it is precisely the digital devices which are experienc-

ing such rapid development. Microsoft Surface, for

example, off ers a multi-touch and multi-user experience

that allows a completely new kind of brand showcas-

ing at the POS. Furthermore, the fi rst video-in-print

solutions are making the leap from prototypes to mass

market readiness. Video-in-print is the integration of

moving images into print products. Displays, loudspeak-

ers and batteries are made so thin that they can be

integrated into magazines.

Th is gives companies the opportunity to engage in

interaction with consumers at existing and at new touch

points and to expand the dialogue.

BRAnD COMPAniES MUST THEREFORE …

• develop a device strategy to identify relevant

devices for the company and to integrate them

into the brand presence

• defi ne a digital brand experience to guarantee a

uniform multimedia presence on all channels

• establish the screening of new digital stimuli to

ensure that the digital brand experience is

maintained continuously.

Th e driving force ‘next-generation I/O devices’ alone as well as the topic augmented reality (AR) of the Outernet make it obvious which service extensions will become possible as a result of enriching the real world with virtual information. Th e virtual postbox, for example, represents an enormous service gain for the customer, who can have a virtual postbox corresponding to parcel dimensions projected on to the desk via PC and web cam. Th e customer then places the real object in the projected postbox to check whether it is the correct size. If we add the other driving forces of the Outernet we get an idea of how big the service infl uence of the Outernet is.

COMPAniES MUST THEREFORE …• establish service quality management to augment existing

services with the potential of the Outernet• establish innovation management to identify additional services

for the customers• involve employees and customers actively in the process

of service optimisation and extension.

„3. serviCes

Th e music industry is the prime example of how the internet

can threaten existing business models and how, from that, new

business models are developed,(e.g. itunes.) Th e outernet will

have an even greater impact on existing and potential business

models because it will aff ect a much larger area of our lives.

Wikitude is one of the fi rst outernet business models to be

based on two driving forces: localisation and next-generation

i/o devices. By combining these two driving forces it is possi-

ble to transform android phones or the iPhone into a mobile

travel guide. Th e Wikitude browser superimposes itself like a

layer on the camera lens, and the real world is augmented with

travel information from Wikipedia and Qype reviews.

Th e power behind the outernet and the possibilities it off ers

for this business model are demonstrated by amazon with its

mobile application ‘amazon Remembers’. Th is application

allows users to upload photographs of objects to the amazon

store (e.g. chairs, shoes or tVs) and receive product recom-

mendations for mobile purchase in return. By doing this,

amazon moves the Pos from the internet into the real world,

allowing it to compete with conventional retailers.

Th e outernet can therefore be good and evil at the same.

it has the power to bring about new business models and

to jeopardise existing business models. one of the biggest

challenges for companies will be to assess the potential or the

dangers of trends in good time.

COMPAniES MUST THEREFORE …

• look further to the competition

• regard the critical analysis of their own business

model as a matter of course

• reinvent and redevelop themselves every year.

in the end, what remains is the simple, old formula: relevance.

only those companies which have relevance for the customer

in an increasingly complex world will be able to enter into a

dialogue with a view to establishing and developing a relation-

ship. and only those which understand their customers and

act accordingly will achieve relevance. in the future, the busi-

ness of the companies will be determined by ‘management by

consumer insights’.

„4. sOurCe OF Business

[mobile]

tHe Outernet

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Y esterday's received wis-dom on how consumers choose one product over another is simplistic, based on the assumption that they behave in a ra-tional manner. today we know that this paradigm

tends to relate only to the process of pur-chasing mid-range, humdrum items (think printer toner!). consumers feel more than they think, and will make their decisions accordingly.

When the new Jaguar Xf came out, i immediately coveted it (zero rational behaviour there) even though i knew i already loved it that evening i spent hours trawling the web for more information: my emotions had started to give way to reason, and i needed to post-rationalise my initially strong aff ective response.

tHe sOCiAl risk OF COnsumptiOnof course, almost everything on the aver-age shopping list is going to cost a lot less than a Jaguar Xf; when someone consid-ers buying a handbag, mobile phone or clothes, it’s often not just the price tag (be it too cheap or too expensive) that stops them from buying – far more important is what their friends will think of their purchase.

consumer behaviour theory refers to this as ‘perceived risk’. in the affl uent Western world, fi nancial risk is secondary to the (psycho-) social risks such as: “my friends may think i look so last year”, “Will they think i’m green enough?”, “i won’t be respected”. Th is is particularly true for the buyer when there is something at stake and it explains why consumer behaviour tends towards minimising the risk of unfavour-able evaluation by their peers. With the advent of social media, they can do this more easily than ever before.

sOCiAl mediATh ere are several online facilities that will assist consumers – in real time – with their decision making. type “should i buy” into facebook search and twitter search and you’ll fi nd hundreds of people asking and answering that question. Hunch.com helps you make decisions and gets smarter the more you use it. as they themselves put it: “in ten questions or less, Hunch will off er you a useful solution to your problem, con-cern or dilemma across hundreds of topics.” another, pollpigeon.com, allows you to cre-ate a poll to obtain people’s views on what laptop, dress or rhinestone glove to buy. all of these services are set up in seconds and easily accessed from your BlackBerry, Google android phone or other web-ena-bled mobile devices.

imagine this scenario. a young woman goes handbag shopping. she casts her eye over the bewitching display. should it be a La Perla, a Longchamps, or something

CoNSuMeRS BeWaRe - of what your friends think!

tomorrow, consumers will be combining shopping with social media.

in fact, they're already doing it now, using Facebook and twitter from the comfort of their own homes to ask their friends what

to buy. soon, consumers will be just as comfortable networking from their

iphones while in the middle of a shopping spree. new technology drives new

behavioural patterns. By kim mØller-elsHØJ

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COnsumerBeWAre

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iF yOu WAnt tO knOW mOreFacebook search: http://www.facebook.com/search/twitter search: http://search.twitter.com/Hunch.com: http://www.hunch.com/women-s-shoes/poll pigeon: http://pollpigeon.com/search/?query=should+i+buy

example of someone who, from the dressing room, has posted a pic of a dress, asking for her friends’ evaluation: http://tweetphoto.com/6621137

source on quote on google’s move:http://www.biggu.com/2009/12/31/announcing-shopsavvy-3-6-for-android/shopsavvy Apphttp://www.biggu.com/apps/

examples from Japan:http://blog.cliffano.com/2009/05/18/qr-code-usage-in-japan/

packaging news ukhttp://packagingnews.co.uk/channel/converting/news/980776/

else? she takes a photo of the chosen bag with her iPhone and, via twitPic, posts it onto her twitter feed to be picked up by her fellow fashionistas, and then carries on browsing in the store. five minutes later, she gets the feedback she needs: “Love it”; “Gorgeous. Buy it!”; “don’t buy it! i hear they use indian kids to do the tanning of the leather”. in a trice, she has gone from admiring a handbag to knowing that she shouldn’t buy it, because the company may be using child labour. What better way for a young shopper to minimize the associated social risks?

Th is behaviour poses a challenge to the retailer. a poor-quality snap of a beautiful product or an untrue product story could result in negative online buzz, despite the fact that the person photographing it is actually in the store looking at it, and loving it. But retailers, be warned: any business that tries to seize all control of the information that customers share with

their network online will fail. instead, it is important to seek to understand this natu-ral evolution of behaviour and support it.

tHe retAilers’ respOnsedeveloping responses to this is crucial – and the only limit as to how, should be our im-agination. customers can be helped to share thoughts and feelings with their friends online: today an increasing number of mobile devices have built-in barcode(1d)- or QR-code(2d)-recognition software, capable of holding simple data such as an internet address. Th e next generation of mobile phones will have built-in Rfid-chip readers, and the generation after that will have super sophisticated photo-recognition software installed. Th is software will be able to recognise any object, and link it with matching data from the web. all customers have to do is activate their cameras which, in an instant, will recognise the code and respond accordingly.

Last december Google announced their Google favorite Places program whereby Google mailed QR code window stickers to something like 190,000 local retailers. all of these QR codes are tied to Google’s local search feature and allows the retailer to include coupons and special off ers to users who scan the codes (Google can track the use of these codes and charge accord-ingly just like they do with adwords). next step is that these codes become product specifi c, which has been acknowledged by the company “Big in Japan”, who has made the mobile app “shopsavvy” that links a product barcode with a wealth of online opportunities.

in the case of the handbag scenario de-scribed above, the store could have added a QR-code to the price tag; the code could hold a shortened uRL that would take the customer directly to twitter.com, where the entry fi eld would have been pre-fi lled with a link to the product page for that

particular bag, or perhaps a link to a web page containing a review or background story on the product.

Th is way, the company could achieve a de-gree of control and be assured that the pho-tograph viewed online would be top quality, and the product story would be correct. in addition, friends who click on the link on twitter would even have the opportunity to purchase the product online, there and then.

Th e technology for this is ready, and the shift in behaviour has already advanced; espe-cially in Japan,where similar concepts have existed for a while. nowadays it is rare to fi nd a product, poster or magazine in Japan without a QR code, according to Packaging news, uK.

today QR codes are used by record compa-nies in ads. Th e consumer snaps the code, and is brought to a website where he or she can listen to samples of the artist’s music, there and then via the mobile device. Japa-nese Jagariko snack food’s QR-codes link to free downloads of ringtones. You fi nd them on disney posters, outdoor advertising, mcdonalds cups and paper bags (nutritional info), t-shirt tags have them, and so do magazines; integrating off -line with on-line.

now retailers in the rest of the world need to get ahead of the curve – before the curve gets ahead of them. in the future, an even tighter merge between off -line shopping and on-line social media will be inevitable.

kim møller-elshøj is a futurist and the founder and director of scuttlebutt, a research and strategy consultancy

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COnsumer BeWAre

the graphics on this page is

an example of aQr code.

made from theword mediaCom.

MediaCom and their mobile specialist group, Joule, are lead-ing the efforts to migrate Dell’s successful direct selling model to the mobile channel. • The central challenge to

Dell’s mobile efforts is creating a consumer proposition that encourages the purchase of high consideration items, like computers, through mobile phones.

• MediaCom and Joule approached this challenge by creating mobile-specific direct selling efforts that maximize the personal, immediate and interactive aspects of the mobile channel.

• MediaCom and Joule provide a turn-key mobile marketing solution for Dell – channel and campaign strategy, media planning and buying, WAP site develop-ment, SMS, consumer messaging and measurement and analytics.

dell Back to school (direct selling)Dell’s Back to School campaign focused on direct selling of student-oriented items through the mobile Internet.• Highly targeted, performance-based media on the mobile Internet drove users

to the Back to School mobile micro-site.• All products featured on the micro-site linked directly to Dell’s m-commerce

engine for purchase.• An SMS call-to-action was incorporated into the BTS direct mail pieces,

allowing consumers to interact immediately with the program via mobile.• A robust analytics system tracked user activity from banner click

through transaction.

results• Average order values in triple digits, demonstrating a successful

consumer proposition• The performance based media generated sufficient transactions to deliver a

positive ROI for the campaign

For more information please contact Director of Team Dell Media Adam Komack at adam.komack@mediacom.com

mobile Case from usdell

Mobile CasesCases from the mediaCom world that will inspire you.

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Challenge TDC Butik wanted to use their existing print media to maintain and continue the sales dialogue with their clients on their mobile phone from February 1st 2010 with a target is to reach 25.000 mobile permissions by the end of 2010.

solution MediaCom Mobile delivered a sms-based competition with built-in permission and an interactive mobile plat-form to send out newsletters with a high degree of sales incentive, inspiration and involvement and also a viral effect. The newsletter was sent out weekly during the campaign periods.

results 15.000 permissions were collected by May 1st 2010 through three sales catalogues. Unique insights into the respondents use of smart phones and terminals in general were gained. In addition, tracking on other teleoperators' clients, on visits to the store, store locater and redemption of vouchers were also attained. For more information please contact Mobile Director Steffen Krabbenhøft at steffen.krabbenhoft@mediacom.dk

mobile Case from denmarkTdC BuTiK(Tele operator: TDC Retail)

Courtesy of Dell Inc

summaryA radical new approach to Mobile, and a sensible new approach to buying space helped Snickers grow in a declining market. 1980s icon Mr T helped young blokes get one up on their mates, creating the world’s first voice-message generating ad in the process. The campaign was spread by consumers themselves – this viral success led to a turnaround in sales.

Opportunity/problemSubstantial chocolate bars like Snickers are fundamental to Mars’ business. Despite the successful launch of the new campaign in 2007, spearheaded by Mr T encouraging the nation’s males to “Get Some

Nuts”, increasing sales in this category is a tough call. We had to make “Get Some Nuts” famous amongst young men.

insightThis category is in long term decline with the rise of healthier eating – even amongst the young males. Giving them another reason to be a part of the brand was key. This audience thrives on an environment of one-upmanship – their friendships are a tsunami of ribbing, piss-taking, and general abuse. How could we harness this behaviour and become a part of their daily banter with mates?

making it happenA digital campaign that featured the world’s first in-banner voice message generator, developed by MediaCom’s in-house creative team. Rolling over the ad, the user could select a friend’s name, phone number, and one of seven reasons why they think that friend needs to “get some nuts”. The friend would receive a call from Mr T, pointing out their foibles and culminating in the suggestion that they “get some nuts”. To make it viral, they’d receive a text asking them to send it to their friends. The voice-message generator was also housed on the website with other Mr T content. In a first, all digital media space was bought on a “cost per voice message” basis.

resultsOver 66,000 unique phones calls delivered in 8 weeks.

For more information please contact Mobile Manager Peter Fyfe at peter.fyfe@mediacom.com

[mobile]

CAses

the briefNatWest and RBS needed a ready-made audience for their iPhone apps. Our job was to encourage the custom-ers to download them.

the offer Our customers could download the apps before anyone else.

the answer First, we searched our data for customers with NatWest or RBS sort codes. Next we checked if any of them had iPhones. Then we told them about the app.

results The number of people who've clicked through on our messages has stayed high. Nearly 23% people have down-loaded the apps so far and the apps have picked up a lot of social media buzz.

For more information please contact Mobile Manager Peter Fyfe at peter.fyfe@mediacom.com

mobile Case from ukNaTWeST PhoNe aPP(Royal Bank of Scotland)

mobile Case from ukSNiCKeRS – geT SoMe NuTS!Masterfoods/Mars

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tHe AnsWerFACtOry

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demand Media and the Fast, disposable, and Profitable as

hell Media ModelBy dAniel rOtH / pHOtOgrApHy: tOm rOssum / illustrAtiOn:

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tHe AnsWerFACtOry

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employer of

the day …

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t oday’s topic is kayaking. Muñoz-Donoso has enlisted a local instructor to meet him and to bring along four of his boats. Every five minutes, Muñoz-Donoso’s assist-ant shouts a new subject — “Kayak basics!” “Paddling tips!” — and the expert, sitting in one of his rigs in the bourbon-colored water, riffs off the top of his head. Muñoz-Donoso gets most of his shots in one take. But

conditions are working against him. Shifting winds and changing light require him to adjust his setup. The instructor keeps switching kayaks and gear. Finally, the entire shoot has to be put on hold as three bearded fishermen loudly and slowly drag their boats into the lake, directly into the frame. Muñoz-Donoso hoped to finish his shoot by 11, but it’s al-ready 12:45 when he crams his equipment into the back of his SUV and speeds back to his office, 20 mile away.He climbs a flight of stairs to his studio above a strip mall, unloads his gear, and keeps up his breakneck pace. As he opens his files in Final Cut Pro, he winces. “Normally I’d eliminate the wind or the kid screaming in the background,” he says. “But in this case we don’t do any of that.” He points out that the focus is off: The rippling water is sharp while the kayaking instructor is slightly blurred. But the company he’s working for won’t care, he says, so why should he — especially for $20 a clip? Within a few hours, he has uploaded his work to Demand Media, his employer for the day. It isn’t Scorsese, but it’s fast, cheap, and good enough.Thousands of other filmmakers and writers around the country are oper-ating with the same loose standards, racing to produce the 4,000 videos and articles that Demand Media publishes every day. The company’s am-bitions are so enormous as to be almost surreal: to predict any question anyone might ask and generate an answer that will show up at the top of Google’s search results. To get there, Demand is using an army of Muñoz- Donosos to feverishly crank out articles and videos. They shoot slapdash instructional videos with titles like “How To Draw a Greek Helmet” and “Dog Whistle Training Techniques.” They write guides about lunch meat safety and nonprofit administration. They pump out an endless stream of bulleted lists and tutorials about the most esoteric of subjects.Plenty of other companies — About.com, Mahalo, Answers.com —

have tried to corner the market in arcane online advice. But none has gone about it as aggressively, scientifically, and single-mindedly as Demand. Pieces are not dreamed up by trained editors nor commis-sioned based on submitted questions. Instead they are assigned by an algorithm, which mines nearly a terabyte of search data, Internet traf-fic patterns, and keyword rates to determine what users want to know and how much advertisers will pay to appear next to the answers.The process is automatic, random, and endless, a Stirling engine fueled by the world’s unceasing desire to know how to grow avocado trees from pits or how to throw an Atlanta Braves-themed birthday party. It is a database of human needs, and if you haven’t stumbled

on a Demand video or article yet, you soon will. By next summer, according to founder and CEO Richard Rosenblatt, Demand will be publishing 1 million items a month, the equivalent of four English-language Wikipedias a year. Demand is already one of the largest suppliers of content to YouTube, where its 170,000 videos make up more than

twice the content of CBS, the Associated Press, Al Jazeera English, Universal Music Group, CollegeHumor, and Soulja Boy combined. Demand also posts its material to its network of 45 B-list sites — ranging from eHow and Livestrong.com to the little-known doggy-photo site TheDailyPuppy.com — that manage to pull in more traffic than ESPN, NBC Universal, and Time Warner’s online properties (excluding AOL) put together. To appreciate the impact Demand is poised to have on the Web, imagine a classroom where one kid raises his hand after every question and screams out the answer. He may not be smart or even right, but he makes it difficult to hear anybody else.The result is a factory stamping out moneymaking content. “I call them the Henry Ford of online video,” says Jordan Hoffner, director

if Christian muñoz-donoso is going to make this job pay, he’s got to move quickly. He has a list of 10 videos to shoot on this warm June morning, for which he’ll earn just $200. to get anything close to his usual rate, he’ll have to do it all in two hours. As he sets up his three video cameras on the rocky shore of a man-made lake in Huntington, massachusetts, he thinks about the way things used to be. He once spent two weeks in a bird blind in his native Chile to capture striking footage of a rarely seen Andean condor. But those jobs are almost as endangered as that bird. now he trades finesse for speed.

online content is not worth very much.

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tHe AnsWerFACtOry

employer of

the day …

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of content partnerships at Youtube. media companies like The atlanta Journal-constitution, aoL, and usa today have either hired demand or studied its innovations. This year, the privately held demand is ex-pected to bring in about $200 million in revenue; its most recent round of financing by blue-chip investors valued the company at $1 billion.in this industrial model of content creation, muñoz-donoso is working the conveyor belt — being paid very little for cranking out an end-less supply of material. He admits that the results are not particularly rewarding, but work is work, and demand’s is steady and pays on time. Plus, he says, “this is the future.” He has shot more than 40,000 videos for demand, filming yo-yo whizzes, pole dancers, and fly fishermen. But ask him to pick a favorite and he’s stumped. “i can’t really remem-ber most of them,” he says.

in an era overwhelmed by flickrYoutubeWikipedia-Bloggerfacebook-twitter-borne logorrhea, it’s hard to argue that the world needs another massive online content company. But what demand has realised is that the internet gets only half of the simplest economic formula right: it has the supply part down but ignores demand. Give a million monkeys a million WordPress accounts and you still might never get a seven-point tutorial on how to keep wasps away from a swimming pool. Yet that’s what people want to know. ask Byron Reese.

reese is a tall texan who serves as demand’s chief innovation officer and who created the idea-spawning algorithm that lies at the heart of demand’s process. to determine what articles to assign, his formula analyses three chunks of information. first, to find out what terms users are searching for, it parses bulk data purchased from

search engines, isPs, and internet marketing firms (as well as demand’s own traffic logs). Then the algorithm crunches keyword rates to calcu-late how much advertisers will pay to appear on pages that include those terms. (a portion of demand’s revenue comes from Google, which allows businesses to bid on phrases that they would like to advertise against.) Third, the formula checks to see how many Web pages already include those terms. it doesn’t make sense to commission an article that will be buried on the fifth page of Google results. finally, the algorithm, like a drunken prophet, starts spitting out phrase after phrase: “butterfly cake,” “shin splints,” “Harley-davidson belt buckles.”But that’s just the start. armed with those key words, another algo-rithm, called the Knowledge engine, dives back into the data to figure out exactly what people want to know about the term. if the original al-gorithm divines “2009 chevy corvette” as a profitable title, the Knowl-edge engine will return with “cost of 2009 corvette”; for “shin splint” it might come back with “equine treatment shin splints.” The second

He HAs sHOt mOre tHAn 40,000 videOs FOr demAnd, Filming yO-yO WHizzes, pOle dAnCers, And Fly FisHermen.

But Ask Him tO piCk A FAvOrite And He’s stumped. “i CAn’t reAlly rememBer mOst OF tHem,” He sAys.

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tHe AnsWerFACtOry

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algorithm also looks at how well past titles with similar words have performed in terms of ad revenue. Demand has learned, for instance, that “best” and “how to” bring in traffi c or high clickthrough rates, while “history of” is ad poison. At the end of the process, the company has a topic and a dol-lar amount — the term’s “lifetime value,” or LTV — that Demand expects to generate from any resulting content.

Th e focus on LTV keeps Demand away from any kind of breaking news coverage or investigative work, neither of which tends to hold its value. It does, however, produce the kind of evergreen stories typically seen in newspaper features sections. Th e Atlanta Journal-Constitution recently commissioned Demand to produce some travel articles that ran online and in print.

the algorithm’s endless ramblings — a collection of cacophonous phrases and esoteric subjects — seem haphazard and chaotic. But Reese knows there is logic at work. When asked for the most valuable topic in Demand’s arsenal, he replies instantly: “‘Where can I donate a car in Dallas?’ One, you have a certain number of people searching for it. Two, the bid term ‘donate

a car’ is in the double-digit dollars, like $15 or $20 per click. People have a propensity — 17 percent — to click on an ad when they see the word car. Th ere’s very little competition. And the article will retain its value for a long time.” So why Dallas? He has no idea: “Dallas just happens to be the location where we know people are searching for how to donate a car.”

T hat’s not to say there isn’t any room for humans in Demand’s process. Th ey just aren’t worth very much. First, a crowdsourced team of free-lance “title proofers” turn the algorithm’s often awkward or nonsensical

phrases into something people will under-stand: “How to make a church-pew breakfast nook,” for example, becomes “How to make a breakfast nook out of a church pew.” Approved headlines get fed into a password-protected section of Demand’s Web site called Demand Studios, where any Demand freelancer can see what jobs are available. It’s the online equivalent of day laborers waiting in front of Home Depot. Writers can typi-cally select 10 articles at a time; videographers can hoard 40.

nearly every freelancer scrambles to load their assignment queue with titles they can produce quickly and with the least amount of eff ort — because pay for individual stories is so lousy, only a high-speed, high-volume approach will work. Th e average writer earns $15 per article for pieces that top out at a few hundred words, and the average

fi lmmaker about $20 per clip, paid weekly via PayPal. Demand also of-fers revenue sharing on some articles, though it can take months to reach even $15 in such payments. Other freelancers sign up for the chance to copyedit ($2.50 an article), fact-check ($1 an article), approve the qual-ity of a fi lm (25 to 50 cents a video), transcribe ($1 to $2 per video), or off er up their expertise to be quoted or fi lmed (free). Title proofers get 8 cents a headline. Coming soon: photographers and photo editors. So far, the company has paid out more than $17 million to Demand Studios workers; if the enterprise reaches Rosenblatt’s goal of producing 1 mil-lion pieces of content a month, the payouts could easily hit $200 million a year, less than a third of what Th e New York Times shells out in wages and benefi ts to produce its roughly 5,000 articles a month.

algoRiThM No.1The algorithm determines what articles to produce, it also estimates a search term´s earning potential - its lifetime value, or lTV.

To predict any question anyone might ask and

generate an answer that will show up at the top of google’s

search results.

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tHe AnsWerFACtOry

demand Media has created a virtual factory that pumps out 4,000 videoclips and articles a day. it starts with and algorithm.The algorithm is fed inputs from three sources. seArCH terms (popular terms from more than 100 sources comprising 2 billion searches a day.tHe Ad mArket (a snapshot of which keywords are sought after and how much they are fetching), and tHe COmpetitiOn (what´s online already and where a term ranks in search results).

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Before Reese came up with his formula, Demand Media operated in the traditional way. Contributors suggested articles or videos they wanted to create. Editors, trained in the

ways of search engine optimization, would approve or deny each while also coming up with their own ideas. Th e process worked fi ne. But once it was automated, every algorithm-generated piece of content produced 4.9 times the revenue of the human-created ideas. So Rosenblatt got rid of the editors. Suddenly, profi t on each piece was 20 to 25 times what it had been. It turned out that gut instinct and experi-ence were less eff ective at predicting what readers and viewers wanted — and worse for the company — than a formula.

Th e humans also couldn’t produce ideas at the scale of the algorithm. On a recent day, Demand Studios had nearly 62,000 freelance assign-ments ready to be fi lled; coming up with that many ideas takes more than a white board and a conference room jammed with editors. And to Demand, scale is essential. One outside search engine marketer esti-mates that Demand earns a mere 15 to 60 cents per ad clicked. It takes millions of clicks to build a real business out of that.

volume is also crucial to Demand’s top distribution partner, Google. Th e search engine has struggled to make money from the 19 billion videos on YouTube, only about 10 percent of which carry ads. Advertisers don’t want to pay to appear next to videos that hijack copyrighted material or that contain swear words, but YouTube doesn’t have the personnel to comb

through every user-generated clip. Last year, though, YouTube execu-tives noticed that Demand was uploading hundreds of videos every day

— pre-scrubbed by Demand’s own editors, explicitly designed to appeal to advertisers, and cheap enough to benefi t from

Google’s revenue-sharing business model. YouTube executives approached Demand, asked the company to join its revenue-shar-ing program, and encouraged it to produce as many videos as possible.

Since then, the two companies have grown even closer. When YouTube’s sales team bemoaned the tiny supply of Spanish-language videos for it to run advertisements against, YouTube’s Hoff ner called up Demand. Within weeks, Demand Studios started issuing Spanish-language assignments. Soon it had uploaded a few hundred clips to YouTube — everything from how to be “un buen DJ” to how to fi x a bathroom towel bar. “I know we do deals with the ESPNs and ABCs of the world, but De-mand is incredibly impor-tant to us,” says Hoff ner (who is married to wired’s executive director of com-munications). “Th ey fi ll up a lot of content across the site.”And they do it by taking what used to be a deeply human and intuitive endeavor and turning it into a purely mathemati-cal and rational one. Th is, Reese says, is the ultimate promise of his algorithm:

> PRooFeR No.1A freelance title proofer looks at the term spit out by the algorithm and, for 8 cents each, tries to make it into a real title.

> algoRiThM No.2A second algorithm, the knowledge Engine, generates title ideas by combing through search queries that have included that term.

“You can take something that is thought of as a creative process and turn it into a manufacturing process.”

[content]

tHe AnsWerFACtOry

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> PRooFeR No.2

> FReelaNCe WRiTeR

A second proofer, also paid 8 cents a piece, im-proves on the fi rst title.

An editor (in thsi case from eHow) loads the phrase into the central repository for assignment, a Web site called Demand Studios.

A writer trolling through Demand Studios spots the title and writes it up for $15.

> ediToR

[content]

tHe AnsWerFACtOry

FReelaNCe

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“You can take something that is thought of as a creative process and turn it into a manu-facturing process.”

richard Rosenblatt was born and raised in Southern California’s San Fernando Valley and has rarely ventured far from Hollywood’s orbit in spirit or in

geography. He is 40 and wiry, with carefully tousled brown hair, a bright-white, ever-present smile, and a long, pinched nose. One day this spring, Rosenblatt was in the foyer of Demand’s Santa Monica, California, headquarters, casually chatting with Brooke Burke — the bikini model, former TV host, and Dancing With the Stars winner — and her fi ancè, a Baywatch actor. Rosenblatt is also friends with cyclist (and Demand investor) Lance Armstrong, a fact that he mentions frequently. (“I’m supposed to go to France Wednesday with Lance, but I just can’t,” he confi ded, sighing. “It’s a lot of travel.”) He is particularly fond of the exhortation “Go big or go home,” a phrase that he includes in his email signature and has commemorated in the naming of Demand’s Go Big conference room. Numerous executives told me that when they fi rst met Rosenblatt, they were immediately repulsed: He was too slick and seemed to be missing the geek edge. “Th en in fi ve minutes you’re like, ‘Holy cow, this guy has it all to back it up,’” says Quincy Smith, CEO of CBS Interactive.

Demand is just the latest of Rosenblatt’s run of startups, nearly all of which hewed to his “go big” mantra. After graduating from USC law school in 1994, he saw that companies were growing curious about the Internet, so he set up a company that off ered a $3,000 Web-design seminar that came with a custom-built Web site.Th e startup, which was later called iMall, went public at $18 a share, shot up to $112, then plummeted when the Federal Trade Commis-sion investigated the fi rm’s claim that its clients’ sites were earning $11,000 a month. Th ey weren’t, it turned out. Rosenblatt was forced to kill the seminar division, losing 95 percent of his company’s $16 million in annual revenue.

He quickly refocused on iMall’s other business of providing an ecom-merce platform for small and medium-sized companies and sold the company in 1999 to Excite@Home for $565 million in stock. Rosenb-latt bought a Ferrari. Excite@Home soon went bust.

In 2000, Rosenblatt took over the ailing drkoop.com, an online site tied to C. Everett Koop. Where others saw just another ad- dependent disease-information site, Rosenblatt saw a chance to turn the bearded former surgeon general into a brand, the next “Martha Stewart or Walt Disney — but for health,” as he told BusinessWeek at the time. He created a line of Dr. Koop Men’s Prostate Formula pills. Th e company went under.

> PlagiaRiSM CheCKeRThe article is checked against a database to make sure it´s not cribbed.

> CoPY ediToRA copy editor gets paid $2.50 to read the article, make any fi xes, and upload it back to Demand Studios. it´s auto-matically posted on eHow.

ads from google (and other sources) appear on the page with the article.

By next summer, according to

founder and Ceo Richard Rosenblatt, demand will be pub-

lishing 1 million items a month, the equivalent of four english-language

Wikipedias a year.

[content]tHe AnsWer

FACtOry

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Perhaps weary of going big, Rosenblatt went home, where he derived some comfort from the millions he had earned. He bought and sold a domain registrar company. He started a site called Superdudes, where users could create superhero-like avatars. He invested in a nightclub in San Diego.

But with the birth of Web 2.0, big was back. In 2004 a group of investors tapped Rosenblatt to run eUniverse (later renamed Intermix Media), a struggling Internet conglomerate that happened to own MySpace. Soon after Rosenblatt started, New York attorney general Eliot Spitzer charged Intermix with bundling adware and spyware with

its free games and screensavers. Rosenblatt settled almost immediately, handing over $7.5 million — the entire cash holdings of Intermix. “It was the worst, most miserable time in my life,” he says. Still, he could be consoled by the fact that his company had survived and still had MySpace, which was exploding into the Internet’s dominant social media site. AOL, Viacom, and News Corp. were all sniffing around, and Rosenblatt began to play them off each other. Not long after set-tling with Spitzer, he sold Intermix to News Corp. for $650 million, of which he earned $23 million. Then he left the company.Although Rosenblatt had been at MySpace for only 18 months, he had seen enough to come up with a theory: The social network was doing it wrong. It had built a supersite, aggregating millions of users and encouraging them to root around. But they had difficulty finding information about specific subjects. “I kept thinking about gardening,” he says. “People wanted to talk about gardening, but they didn’t want to do it on MySpace.” Instead they went to Google, which was its own kind of aggregator, collecting everyone who searched for specific terms and directing them to appropriate sites. If he could collect enough tiny sites and sell Google ads against them, he could potentially build a more successful business than he could with one supersite.

On the strength of this plan, Rosenblatt raised $355 million from funders like Goldman Sachs, Oak In-vestment Partners, and legendary investor Gordon Crawford. Then he went looking for acquisitions. He bought eNom, one of the largest domain registrars, and Pluck, a company that handles com-menting and social networks for Web sites, along

with dozens of amateur-content sites that could catch lowly keyword ads. Among them: eHow, Trails.com, GolfLink.com, and Cracked .com. Rosenblatt now had three revenue sources: domain sales; services; and video, banner, and Google ads.Demand Media was born. But it wasn’t until 2007, when the company bought ExpertVillage.com, Byron Reese’s how-to site (reportedly for roughly $20 million), that it began to realize its potential. Reese and Rosenblatt soon began working on an idea that Reese had long struggled with: Millions of visitors were coming to ExpertVillage and generating reams of data, but his editors didn’t do anything with it. What if they used that information to determine what content to create?Here is the thing that Rosenblatt has since discovered: Online content is not worth very much. This may be a truism, but Rosenblatt has the hard, mathematical proof. It’s right there in black and white, in the Demand Media database — the lifetime value of every story, algorithmically derived, and very, very small. Most media companies are trying hard to increase those numbers, to boost the value of their online content until it matches the amount of money it costs to produce. But Rosenblatt thinks they have it exactly backward. Instead of trying to raise the market value of online content to match the cost of producing it — perhaps an impossible proposition — the secret is to cut costs until they match the market value.

not everybody agrees with him. Howcast, one of Demand’s largest competitors, also produces explainer videos and how-tos. Unlike Demand, the company employs a staff of editors and writers and gets freelance voice-over pros. Filmmakers can earn a couple thousand dollars shooting the videos, and the difference is noticeable. (Howcast’s

“How to Make Friends at a New School” includes such useful tidbits as “sit in the middle of the classroom to surround yourself with as many potential new friends as possible.” Demand-owned eHow’s “How to Be Popular in School” video, in contrast, offers such vague guidance as “be nice to everybody.”) “We believe that quality holds long-term value,”

COpyrigHt © 2009 COndé nAst puBliCAtiOns. All rigHts reserved. OriginAlly puBlisHed in Wired. reprinted By permissiOn.

[content]tHe AnsWerFACtOry

employer of

the day …

employer of

the day …

Demand Media was born. But it wasn’t until 2007, when the company bought ExpertVillage.com, Byron Reese’s

how-to site (reportedly for roughly $20 million), that it began to realize its potential. Reese and Rosenblatt soon began working on an idea that Reese had long struggled with: Millions of visitors were coming to ExpertVillage and generating reams of data, but his editors

didn’t do anything with it. What if they used that information to determine what content to create? Here is the thing that Rosenblatt has since discovered: Online content is not worth very much. This may be a

truism, but Rosenblatt has the hard, mathematical proof. It’s right there in black and white, in the Demand Media database — the lifetime value of every story,

algorithmically derived, and very, very small. Most media companies are trying hard to increase those numbers, to boost the value of their online content until it matches the

amount of money it costs to produce. But Rosenblatt thinks they have it exactly backward. Instead of trying to raise the market value of online content

to match the cost of producing it — perhaps an impossible proposi-tion — the secret is to cut costs until they match the market value. Not everybody agrees with him. Howcast, one of Demand’s larg-

est competitors, also produces explainer videos and how-tos. Unlike Demand, the company employs a staff of editors and writers and gets

freelance voice-over pros. Filmmakers can earn a couple thousand dollars shooting the videos, and the difference is noticeable. (Howcast’s “How to Make Friends at a New School” includes such useful tidbits as “sit in the middle of the classroom to surround yourself with as many potential

new friends as possible.” Demand-owned eHow’s

“How to Be Popular in School” video, in contrast, offers such vague guidance as “be nice to every-body.”) “We believe

that qual-ity

try and Google it …

Demand-owned eHow’s

since discovered: Online content is not worth very much. This may be a

how-to site (reportedly for roughly $20 million), that it began to realize its potential. Reese and Rosenblatt soon began working on

when the company bought ExpertVillage.com, Byron Reese’s

black and white, in the Demand Media database — the lifetime value of every story,

coming to ExpertVillage and generating reams of data, but his editors

realize its potential. Reese and Rosenblatt soon began working on an idea that Reese had long struggled with: Millions of visitors were

Howcast CEO Jason Liebman says. He emphasizes that his team comes up with titles the old-fashioned way: deciding what people want to learn based on their own instincts, what holidays and events are coming up, and from general research. Yet Howcast pulls a tiny — and getting tinier — fraction of the traffi c that eHow does, and Liebman hesitantly acknowledges that he’s working on an algorithm to compete with Demand.

liebman isn’t the only one ready to mimic Demand’s approach. CBS Interactive — which owns CNET, UrbanBaby, GameSpot, and other sites — also deploys an algorithm that helps guide what its sites cover. AOL is working on one as well. Smaller sites like

Helium and Associated Content are trying to bring their own fl ood of freelancer-written work to the Net, using many of the same contributors as Demand.Th e fact is, the Demand way may be inescapable. A senior execu-tive at a major media company likened Demand’s algorithmic-based content-creation factory to what he saw in the advertising industry in the past decade. Experience, relationships, and gut checks started losing out to raw data. “To customers, advertising may not look that diff erent, but the systems to deliver the right ads to the right consumer at the right time have changed dramatically,” he says. “Th e content systems are going through the early, early stages of that right now.”Still, Rosenblatt says he is trying to place a new emphasis on quality. “Th ere’s a constant debate internally,” he says. “Th is might sound crazy, but I’d rather spend more and put more quality into the process. Long term, we’ll make more money by increasing quality.”But when he gets into the details, it’s clear that he’s not moving far from his Henry Ford model. “We’re not talking about $1,000 videos, so a couple dollars here or there can make a serious diff erence. For in-stance, pay an extra dollar for fact-checking.”How can anyone survive on that? Good question. Google it. If the answer isn’t out there, it soon will be.

44 Blink#1 [content]

[content]keep itsHOrt, stupid

As new forms of emerge, we develop new ways of communicating. the intrinsic limitations of each medium generate a surge of human creativity which ensures that the receiver understands the communication. this is the story of why a growing 160-character culture is making us communicate much more than we did before.

By pAtriCk BAy dAmsted

45 Blink#1[content]

[content]keep it

sHOrt, stupid

46 Blink#1 [content]

On 29 May 1913 there was a riot at the Paris Ballet. It was the premier of the Russian composer Igor Stravinsky's ballet Th e Rite of Spring.

Th e audience immediately reacted. Right from the quiet opening bassoon solo, a number of jeers and boos were heard from the audience, and as the ballet progressed, the jeering and booing escalated. Th e audience were hearing something they had never heard before and re-acted spontaneously. Th e sound was diff erent from what they were used to, and the music, the choreography and the scenography were totally diff erent from what they had expected to hear and see at the Paris Ballet on that night in May. Stravinsky had created a sponta-neous failure, which provoked fi ghting in the audience. As a result, police had to arrive in the interval to restore a reasonable degree of order. Th e performance was completed with a certain amount of riot and disorder in the audience – but there was no doubt that the new form was making great demands on those in the audience. Later, psychologists have suggested that the surprising jumps in melody and the shifting rhythms characterising Th e Rite of Spring made the audience feel uneasy, thus making them aggressive, especially as they did not have the ability to decode the music because it went beyond their expecta-

tions and their past experience with ballets. Nobody helped them understand what they were hearing and seeing – and that left them perplexed and angry.

FreedOm is WHAt We dO WitH tHe limitAtiOns We HAve In 2008 Americans sent a total of about 75 billion SMS messages per month. What was originally intended as a way to use unused resources during time periods with no traffi c on the mobile phone network is now a billion dollar function that has long since caught on, with all its intrinsic limitations. When the Finn Matti Makkonen invented the SMS

system, he and his colleagues had to limit the amount of data per message so that the format could fi t into the existing signalling format on the mobile network. Th e length of messages was initially limited to 128 bytes

and later to 140 bytes – or the equivalent of 160 characters. Th e fi rst message was, in all its simplicity, “Merry Christmas” – and since then we have used the 160 characters for a wide range of human communication. Every day, jokes, marriage proposals and gossip are fl ying through the network, aided by the tools we have invented to work around the limita-tions to our communication. But how come a medium with such great limitations is still so successful – despite the fact that abundance and unlimited possibilities are the very sym-bols of our present-day expectations of both media and life?

This is because limitations can be man’s best friend. Limits make us feel secure but also awaken our intrinsic creativity. All through history and everywhere

in art we see how limitation has been the starting point and driver for wilder creativ-ity. From the freaky French-speaking Oulipo group of writers, poets and mathematicians, who, through restrictions, tried to invent new ways of writing, and the Japanese haiku

neW sHOrt FOrmAtsOn tHe net

if this article has made you feel like exploring the new short formats on the internet, the natural place to start is status updates on Facebook or the large number of messages on twitter – where organisations as diverse as Wal-mart and nAsA communicate their messages and a large number of celebrities keep in touch with their fan base. you can also see creativity fl ourish if you search the web for 6-word novels – a form inspired by ernest Hemingway’s statement that the best novel

he wrote consisted of just six words: “For sale: baby shoes, never used” – or if you enter the search string #twitterart in twitter’s search fi eld. One thing is certain: limitations break down all limits.

all through history and everywhere in art we see how limitation has been the starting point and driver for wilder creativity.

[content]keep itsHOrt, stupid

47 Blink#1[content]

poems, which were written according to strin-gent rules, to the American writer Heming-way, who personally found that the best novel he wrote consisted of six words. Across their fields, artists and inventors are using limita-tion as a principal driver of creativity, based on the philosophy that without limitations we will create nothing new of any value.

tHe pOWer OF tHe smileyFrom the beginning of his long career, film director Lars von Trier, who has won the Palme d'Or at Cannes, among other awards, has used strict self-imposed limitations to strengthen the creativity of his production. For instance, he made a film under the self-imposed limitation that he could spend no more than € 133,333 on its production, and in another film, camera movements were controlled by a computer. But he is probably best known as the insistent member of the quartet of film directors behind the Dogme 95 films, where a large number of interna-tional film directors undertook to abide by ten rules, referred to as “the Vow of Chastity”. For instance, they were not allowed to add sound or light after filming. The result was more than 200 films from all over the world that focused on telling their story rather than on technique. Von Trier learned the technique behind creative limitations from the hero of his youth, Danish film director and poet Jør-gen Leth, who has used the art of limitation stringently in his entire production. Von Trier later turned what he had learned from Leth against him in the film The Five Obstructions, in which Trier challenged Leth to remake his classic 1967 short film The Perfect Human. In The Five Obstructions the master is thus tor-mented with his own technique by his pupil. If you know the story behind the films, they are masterpieces. However, von Trier’s films are not easily accessible if you do not know the background; then the absence of added sound and light will be just a shortcoming – or the computer-controlled camera move-ments will be peculiar, purely and simply.

15-Apr-79 12:05:26-PST,1142;000000000000

Mail-from: MIT-MC rcvd at 12-Apr-79 1740-PST

Date: 12 APR 1979 1736-PST

From: MACKENZIE at USC-ECL

Subject: MSGGROUP#1015 METHICS and the Fast Draw(cont’d)

To: ~drxal-had at OFFICE-1

cc: msggroup at MIT-MC, malasky at PARC-MAXC

In regard to your message a few days ago concerning the loss

of meaning in this medium:

I am new here, and thus hesitate to comment, but I too have

suffered from the lack of tone, gestures, facial expressions

etc. May I suggest the beginning of a solution? Perhaps we could

extend the set of punctuation we use, i.e:

If I wish to indicate that a particular sentence is meant

with tongue-in-cheek, I would write it so:

“Of course you know I agree with all the current

administration’s policies -).”

The “-)” indicates tongue-in-cheek.

This idea is not mine, but stolen from a Reader’s Digest article

I read long ago on a completely different subject. I’m sure there

are many other, better ways to improve our punctuation.

Any comments?

Kevin

[content]keep it

sHOrt, stupid

Blink#1 [content]

the same applies to sms mes-sages, which would not be a very sexy medium if we had not invented an entirely new form of grammar to superim-

pose on the basic text communication. Th is technique takes its starting point in what we are dealing with – the letters and other char-acters available to us – adding a good deal of human creativity. one of the most important additions is emoticons, which are now such a well-known and established aspect of our daily communication that they are taken for granted. However, the need to express the mood of a message emerged with our ability to communicate by means of text via a net-work where messages were sent in dialogue form but still spoke to only one of our senses. Th e limited bandwidth of text communica-tion forced us to be creative. Th e post (see page 47) – from 1979 – on a mailing list is one of the best – and fi rst – examples of that:

Without a smiley, you may off end the receiver – despite the best intentions – with something that was meant to be friendly. Th erefore, we need a set of characters with which we can express emotions. Kevin mac-Kenzie’s suggestion to his colleagues on the american aRPanet mailing list resulted in a rapid development – which accompanied the development of digital communication on the mobile network and the internet for the simple reason that the meaning of amessage is not created by the sender alone but just as much, or perhaps to an even high-er degree, in the space between the receiver and the message. students of this fi eld call it reception theory – research into the meaning we create when receiving communication.

Th e diffi cult thing about communication is not to send a message – but to make sure it is received as precisely as possible. and that can be diffi cult as reception takes the form of decoding in the mind of another human being and is thus deeply dependent on the sum of his or her life experiences and cultural background. Th erefore, nothing can stand alone if it is to be understood correctly. and therefore, the audience was unable to understand the depth of stravinsky’s creativ-ity at the premiere of his new ballet on that evening in may 1913. it was the fi rst time

they heard and saw it, and nobody helped them understand it. time has helped us, and as Th e Rite of spring has found its place in history, we have gradually become able to see that it is remarkable and of lasting value – in fact a work of genius – solely because we now know the context.

A 160-CHArACter Cultureemoticons make it possible for our facebook updates, our tweets and our sms messagesto be understood as intended: a smile may fl icker across the receiver’s face – or he will understand that now we are serious. However, our creativity goes much further than just combinations of colons, dashes and bracket signs intended to be viewed with one’s head tilted to the left. Th us, as the trend towards short messages requires us to be

more economical with letters because we are rarely permitted to use more than 160 characters, we are beginning to develop other ways of squeezing more and more commu-nication into the cramped space available. We are beginning to communicate in a more condensed way rather than at length.

Th e basic question is: why is our use of short messages growing in an age when the techni-cal limitations should have been overcome? “in my opinion, where there have been short message requirements imposed on current media, this has typically not been driven mainly by technical limitations but has rather been due to providers’ billing models, in the case of sms messages, or people's shorten-ing attention spans due to the breadth of

The Rite of Spring, which stravin-sky composed in 1913, was so creatively striking that it has gone down as one of the most important moments in music history – a point in music history where one could speak of a “before” and an “after”. this surge of creativity sprang in part from the art of limitation. stravinsky had composed the whole of the rite of spring without time signatures and the

result was a piece of music which later became world-famous for its violent and unpredictable rhythms. those in the know about classical music speak of three categories of classical composers: those who take the past as their starting point and never let go of it, those who start in the past and move on – and stravinsky, who started in the future. But he lacked one important thing at the premiere in paris: the ability to convey his music to the audience. time and, with it, many other classical experts took care of that – and only later did we all understand his vision. His music became a success when somebody who had the necessary experience and was suffi ciently cultured heard it and conveyed it to the rest of us. the music lacked the punctuation which was necessary in order for it to be widely understood.

The meaning of a message is not created by the sender alone but

just as much, or perhaps to an even higher degree, in the space between the receiver

and the message.

[content]keep itsHOrt, stupid

tHe meAning is CReaTed in

tHe mind OF tHe reCeiver

49 Blink#1[content]

shortened uRLs, which is far more than is.gd will ever require.” Th us, the future can easily remain short.

sHOrt is gOOd for a long time, we believed blogs would become all the rage on the internet. How-ever, they only caught on among large numbers of the general public when the form became short and to the point. on the other hand, we quickly learned that a status update like “Just took the dog for a walk” will get much fewer comments on facebook than the update “Th e dog just took me for a walk” solely because the latter leaves room for interpretation in the receiver. something that can happen in the encounter between text and receiver – that can shift the experience from sender to receiver. creativity fl ourishes on both sides of the commu-nication when we encounter a limitation.

entertainment now available, in the case of twitter and other social networks,” says Richard West, the creator of a so-called uRL shortener called is.gd.

a uRL shortener makes it possible to shorten very long web addresses to short strings of characters, which are better suited for media intended for short messages. “uRL shortening services are useful mostly in media that allow only a limited number of characters, the best example being sms messages. uRLs, which might be deep within a site or dynamically generated, very often run to 50+ characters, and this simply isn't a good use of space within an sms message. another very popular use is in twitter messages, which have similar restric-tions,” explains Richard West, who developed his uRL shortener because he was dissatisfi ed with the existing options.

Th e uRL shortener is an eff ective addition which makes it possible to squeeze much more data into less space. if, for instance, i wanted to write a twitter message, where i have only

140 characters available, and wanted to include the uRL of a previous article i wrote for Blink, i would have to write: http://blink.mediacom.com/new-business-model. By now i would already have used 44 of the 140 characters avail-able – and there would not be many characters left for explanatory text. after visiting is.gd, however, all i would have to write would be: http://is.gd/6n6Vn, in other words only 18 characters. Th e link works just as well as the direct one, and it is the is.gd server that ensures that anyone who enters the shortened uRL is taken to the original one. so far, is.gd has shortened 100 million links, and Richard West explains that it will be a long time before they run out of short uRLs: “is.gd's uRLs won't become signifi cantly longer than they are cur-rently. Th ey'll stay the current length until just over 916 million shortened uRLs have been created, and after that, adding one additional character will allow over 56 billion unique

The basic question is: why is our use of short messages growing in an age when the technical limitations should have been overcome?

[content]

keep itsHOrt, stupid

52 Blink#1

MediaCom introduces

three new planning tools from our networkin the last couple of years MediaCom Global has been collecting econometric modelling cases identifying effective ROi campaigns to establish a global benchmark base. This base is the fundament for a couple of new planning tools allowing plan-ners at MediaCom to provide our customers benchmarks for expected campaign performance. These tools are now part of MediaCom's Global core planning suite of support tools.

[mediaCom promotion]

m:Files

Econometric modelling shows that exposure on Radio is not as impactful as exposure on TV (e.g. when we aim to create brand or product awareness). However, the level of impact can also vary across categories. TV, for instance, might be more powerful in one category than another. Th ese econometric modelling fi ndings are the foundation for the Media Multiplier planning tool. Media Multiplier uses the impact index across media for the relevant category when estimating the net impact reach for a campaign. For example: When a TV campaign generates 80% net reach, the radio campaign generates 50% net reach and the print campaign 75%. Media Multiplier estimates the combined net reach for the campaign as a whole, using the impact index developed from our econometric modelling studies. Th erefore, the tool can be used to set objectives for the combined net impact of a client’s campaign.

When introducing a new brand or a new product that consumers have never heard of or hardly know, we need higher frequency in order for the message to cut through. Th e Eff ective Frequency Calcula-tor, like the Media Multiplier, is based on the MediaCom Global econometric modelling benchmarks and allows plan-ners to establish diff erent scenarios for the planned campaigns based on a number of diff erent factors (e.g. competitive noise, expected campaign strengths & weak-nesses, consumer involvement and category characteristics). Our benchmarks establish diff erent scenarios to give Planners an estimated best eff ective frequency for their client’s brand or product. Th e Eff ective Frequency Calculator is mostly used in close cooperation with the clients as some factors - like expected campaign creative strength and weaknesses, for instance - could be an evaluation if no pre-test of the campaign has been made.

Planning campaigns aimed at generating Brand Awareness requires a set of activated touchpoints very diff erent from campaigns aimed at repurchase sales. But which touch-points have most impact when planning Brand Awareness campaigns and which are most impactful when planning sales driven campaigns? If the client already carries out econometric modelling studies for their brand, these studies will provide the answer. However, for clients who have not yet engaged in econometric modelling, Touch-points is a planning tool that evaluates up to 30 diff erent contact points (e.g. TV, radio, word of mouth, displays, sponsorships, etc) and has the ability to impact diff erent plan-ning scenarios such as: Awareness, Considera-tion, Preference, Start Dialogue, Purchase, Experience/Loyalty, Repurchase, & Advo-cacy. We work with our clients to calibrate touchpoints for their brand and invite our planning team and marketing departments to reply to an online touchpoints survey. Th is gives the client a unique opportunity to dis-cuss which touchpoints are most relevant for diff erent planning scenarios. Using the results of the Touchpoints survey (based on the cli-ent’s replies as well as those of the MediaCom planning team) as a basis for the planning process, future planning can be carried out in a smoother and faster manner.

Media Multiplier – cross-media impact on net reach

effective Frequency Calculator

Touchpoints

Photo: Corrina Bachtiar, MediaCom TorontoPh

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53 Blink#1

m:Files[mediaCom promotion]

New accurate

Mobile Measure

in the uKOn the 4th of February the gsmA (body for all global mobile

operators) launched the mobile media metrics reporting

system in the uk. this is a landmark in the development

of mobile advertising because for the fi rst time we will be

able to access census level data and view the traffi c visiting

mobile internet sites. the mmm data will allow us to plan

effectively on mobile for our clients and it also provides a

common trading currency for the industry.

the gsmA mmm is the most accurate media measurement

tool ever launched. it anonymously tracks real-time cen-

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industry

A 10 minute launch video can be found on youtube. search

for gsmA mmm video

For further information, please contact peter Fyfe, mobile

manager, uk at peter.fyfe@mediacom.com

54 Blink#1 [ereader]

Are you considering whether to make the switch from reader to ereader? Blink reports on the experiences and refl ections of a newly converted ereader. By pAtriCk BAy dAmsted

[ereader]

FrOm reAdertO ereAder

ereaderereaderFrOm reAder tO

55 Blink#1[ereader]

gOOdBye tO upsI buy quite a few books from abroad. Both new and used books fi nd their way into my shopping basket from a variety of countries and bookstores as I usually become aware of a book I want to buy when browsing the Internet and rarely when browsing a physical shop. Th erefore, I decide that my next gadget is going to be an ebook reader. Th e choice is simple: the combina-tion of user-friendliness, assortment and accessibility points towards Amazon’s Kindle.

My Kindle arrives two days after it has been shipped. It travels from Kentucky via Cologne and Malmo to Denmark. It travels 7,000 kilometres in two days and arrives at my address in the easily recognisable brown van from UPS. Th at is ten days less than it typically takes to get a book delivered from Amazon.com in the US to Hans Christian Andersen’s – and yours truly’s – town of Odense, Denmark.

As I close my door, I think to myself that because of the very parcel which my always friendly UPS man has just delivered, it will probably be a long time before I see him again. Th at is, if my Kindle is

as good as Amazon promises. I tear open the box, which is the size of a thick book in A5 format. Th ere is my Kindle, in a soft cardboard insert. I take it out and push the switch at the top right. It switches on and writes: “Hi Patrick”.

Th e next minute I have downloaded a 20-page sample of a book that Amazon recommends for me – a recommendation I choose to ignore

after skimming through a few pages. Instead, I fi nd a book in Kindle Store about how to write sitcoms and buy it. 20 seconds later it is on my Kindle and I start reading.

A neW generAtiOn OF gAdgets My Kindle is not very attractive to look at. It looks slightly clumsy and dated but it is functional and user-friendly in a way that surprises me. I belong to a generation that grew up with the Commodore 64 – and thus the fi rst tape and disk drives – and with automatic answering machines and Video 2000 players. My generation is not used to being wooed by gadgets. On the contrary, electronics, especially the digital kind, had a high entrance barrier when I was a teenager. One had to adopt the machine’s way of thinking and accept its mood swings. One minute it would say: “Use me!”, and the next minute it would crash while one was trying to use it. A Kindle is not like that. It takes its starting point as the lowest common denominator. A Kindle has a user

interface that never screams: “Op-erating system!” or “Blue screen!” Instead, it speaks to – and with – the consumer’s impulses.

Right from the start, I operate my Kindle intuitively, and even if my life depended on it, I would have no idea where the user’s guide is – or if my Kindle came with a user’s guide at all. Th e Kindle is navigated using six navigation controls and a

small joystick which is a bit like a built-in mouse. However, I have yet to learn how to control my impulse shopping – with the built-in mobile data connection, it is a very short step from thought to action. As my Kindle knows it belongs to me, it also knows my preferred credit card right from the start and there is nothing whatsoever to stop me from buying and downloading books on the spur of the moment from an online store which is open 24/7, with approximately 390,000 titles available so far in Europe (592,000 in the US). Th e advantages are very tangible. Th ere is no waiting and an ebook does not have to make a long, CO2-expensive journey from the UK or the US.

“Well, have you read any books on that Kindle thing?” asks a slightly sceptical, and slightly jealous, friend who drops by for coff ee a couple of days later. And the answer is yes; in fact, I have read more than I nor-mally do. I always have my Kindle with me – when I am out during the day and when reading in bed at night. Since I am the kind of person who reads more than one book at a time, it is great that it remembers the last page I was on and also stores my notes, which I normally scribble down on loose pieces of paper. But most importantly, my Kindle has made me read more because I have all my books with me wherever I go. So no matter which of my books is relevant in a particular situation – or which of my books I feel like reading – it will be there. Which of course means that it will more often be relevant to read. My Kindle has a good memory and is a great com-panion for me, who typically buys four or fi ve books per month on

[ereader]

FrOm reAder tO ereAder

the switch has happened: i am no longer just a reader, but an ereader.

From the start, i operate my kindle intuitively

56 Blink#1 [ereader]

impulse. However, I only read non-fiction on my Kindle. Not one short story, novel or book of poems has found its way into the digital memory, which holds 1,500 books. But this is quite typical of my usual reading pattern as I read two or three novels a year at the most. 1.7 kilOs OF pAper So far, my only problem has been how to find the right way to hold my Kindle, especially when I am lying down. After a couple of days I decide to put my Kindle away for a bit and continue where I left off in the latest non-digital book I have bought: Walter Isaacson’s Einstein biography. However, as it has more than 700 pages and weighs 1.7 kilos, I soon find myself longing to hold my Kindle instead

as my arms are trembling by now.

The switch has happened: I am no longer just a reader, but an ereader. I don’t mind at all not having a book to put on a shelf – to collect dust – when I have finished reading it, but I know there are others who find it almost heartbreaking. However, my unromantic life as an ereader goes both ways: I am very much aware that the Kindle is my first – but not my last – ebook reader, and I am beginning to envy those who have a Nook, the ebook reader from Barnes & Noble. The Nook can add a number of social dimensions to reading as, in addition to the mobile network, it con-nects to Wi-Fi. Barnes & Noble is basically a chain of physical stores, and it is taking full advantage of this fact with the Nook. Thus, if you go into a Barnes & Noble store and you have your Nook with you, you will be greeted with information about special discounts and you will be able to browse that specific store using your Nook. Also, Barnes & Noble offers a feature which enables you to lend books to friends by sending them by wireless to any phone or computer with the free Barnes & Noble eReader software downloaded on it. In addition, you can expand the memory of your Nook to hold up to 17,500 books. There is no doubt that the Nook is a more social product whose purpose is in the real rather than the digital world.

However, the fact that I live 800 kilometres, as the crow flies, from the nearest Barnes & Noble soon dampens my envy – and I have my Kindle and 390,000 books right here in my hands.

mOBile BOOk reAderAfter some weeks I discover the real truth about Kindle: it is not a gadget – it is the bridge between having your library and your reading pattern anchored in the physical world or in the virtual world. With the introduction of Kindle’s software for both iPhone, PC and Mac, it is easy to switch devices, reading a bit on my computer, a bit on my phone and a bit on my Kindle. Each platform knows my entire library and the last page I was on in each of my books. As an old friend of mine always says, it is availability that creates the need –

and Amazon knows that: its virtual shelves are brimming with books, and now Amazon is offering me access everywhere I look.

This fact is hard on my Kindle. Suddenly it lies on my desk for days. I forget to charge it, and before long it is not part of my reality any longer – why carry a heavier gadget with me when my mobile phone has the same features? In less than three months, my Kindle evolves from a physical product into a digital concept – and the chrysalis from which the butterfly emerges is my Kindle gadget, which is left lying empty on my desk.

But there are also other serpents in paradise. Thus, I am green with envy when Apple launches its iPad. As is usually the case when Apple launches a new product, the iPad is well thought-out – and just gorgeous. The iPad is a sports car in a world of Russian tanks, and the first time I hold an iPad in my hand, I know that this is going to be my next gadget of love. It has a touch screen, and this is what makes it so different. What do you do with people you love? You caress them, and this is exactly how you operate an iPad: gently, softly and calmly.

Therefore, Apple can afford to be up against many self-imposed odds: Apple’s books are about one-third more expensive than Ama-zon’s because Apple is heavily married to the publishers, while Amazon has tried to put pressure on publishers regarding pricing. In fact, for a long period of time Amazon sold its ebooks for less than it had paid for them in order to force prices down. In addition, Apple does not have nearly as many books as Kindle, but on the other hand, the publishers are more in love with iPad – for the very reason that books for iPad are more expensive.

Therefore, the six big American publishers are threatening to stop supplying books for Kindle if Amazon does not raise its prices, and then the assortment will probably change quickly. And then there is the screen. The iPad’s screen is backlit, while the Kindle’s screen does not use backlighting but works by darkening certain areas and using the light that falls on the screen to display the page, the same way a paper book works.

the experience of reading a book is best on a kindle, while magazines and newspapers – where of course pictures and layout play an important role – look greatest on an ipad.

[ereader]

FrOm reAdertO ereAder

the first time i hold an ipad in my hand, i know that this is going to be my next gadget of love. it has a touch screen, and this is what makes it so different. What do you do with people you love? you caress them, and this is exactly how you operate an ipad: gently, softly and calmly.

57 Blink#1[ereader]

ipadApple could sell the iPad embedded in concrete that you would have to chop away yourself – I would still buy it. But that is irrelevant, because we are not facing a war be-tween Kindle and iPad. This is not about two gadgets – or two types of gadget, each with its benefits and drawbacks. This is a shift from a cultural heritage that started with stone tablets and is now published on thin paper – to one which started with the graphical user interface and the mouse in the sixties in California and is published in our heads, behind our eyes.

We know the latter will win – because it is un-derstood in the same place where the reading experience takes place: in our imagination.

We don’t read an ebook, we create it in our heads, in the same way as we create every single creak, face or smile we read about in a paper book. The physical experience is easy to explain: the experience of reading a book is best on a Kindle, while magazines and newspapers – where of course pictures and layout play an important role – look greatest on an iPad. But this is by no means the central point now. The platforms are not – and have never been – the experience, because regard-less of whether you read your next book on your mobile, your Kindle, your tablet, your computer or even your watch, it is the words you read and the way your brain unfolds them that make all the difference.

[ereader]

FrOm reAder tO ereAder

in less than three months,

my kindle evolves from a

physical product into a digital

concept

58 Blink#1 [ereader]

H arvey chute is a book-worm. He will read at airports and on planes. He will read at night by the light of his bedside lamp. – He will read at the slightest opportunity. He devours book after book and has done so for a large part of his 47-year-old life. Harvey chute is not the kind of guy you would expect to replace his paper books with an electronic book reader. and it was not on the cards that chute would be one of the driving forces behind the most active internet forum for Kindle owners. “my first, instinctive, reaction to Kindle was similar to many book lovers: an interest in it, mixed with some scepticism about the ebook experience. i love the physical feel of paper books, even the smell of them,” chute tells Blink. But on a trip to atlanta, Georgia, he met the future in a coffee bar. “i saw a lady using an original Kindle and asked her about it. she was enthusiastic and insisted that i give it a try. it was my first time viewing an e-ink screen, and it didn’t take long for me to ‘get it’. i knew at that point that, for me, this was going to be the preferred way to do long-form reading.”

HArvey CHute WAs sOld on a new way of reading. amazon’s electronic book reader had entered his life, and today the chute family are the proud owners of no less than three Kindles. “my wife has an original Kindle; and i have the current

6” Kindle (‘Kindle 2’) as well as a Kindle dX,” says chute. He continues: “Kindle has definitely changed my reading habits for the better. i find it much easier to dis-cover new books and convenient to down-load those books right from my Kindle. all of our Kindles are on the same amazon account, so when my wife recommends a book to me that she has downloaded, i can immediately get it on my Kindle without having to pay again for it.” chute is by no means the only Kindle fan. at christmas 2009, ebook sales overtook sales of physi-cal books on amazon, and the surge seems unstoppable. The evolution from paper to pixel is taking place at lightning speed. on its peak day, 14 december 2009, amazon shipped 9.5 million Kindles – the equivalent of almost 110 per second – to expectant readers worldwide, according to an official announcement from Jeff Bezos, founder and ceo of amazon.

But kindle is muCH more than just a success for amazon – there is also a community and an ecosystem of related products emerging around the device. an example is Harvey chute's KindleBoards.com, the largest independent website aimed at anyone with an interest in Kindle. since november 2007, 8,000 members have made more than 300,000 posts be-tween them, and the number of page views has exceeded 22 million “our members use our forums to express their passion in

By pAtriCk BAy dAmsted / pHOtOgrApHy mAttOn

behind the screen

[ereader]

BOOkWOrmsBeHind tHe sCreen

BOOkWOrmsBeHind tHe sCreen

[content]

59 Blink#1[ereader]

terms of ebook recommendations, ebook clubs, tips on ebook bargains and reviews of Kindle accessories,” says chute, who founded KindleBoards because this was the perfect combination of his two interests, gadgets and books. There is no doubt in his mind why his site has become so successful: it is not about ebooks or ereaders in general – it is exclusively about the reading experi-ence associated with a Kindle. “i think our focus on Kindle has been a benefit for us. Kindle has quickly moved to a prominent position in the ereader mar-ket, and there are a lot of Kindle owners out there now. When they have questions or comments, they usually want to address those to people familiar with Kindle, not to ereaders or tech-gadget fans in general. That focus has also helped us generate a high level of expertise on Kindle. our moderators, and many of our members, are deeply familiar with Kindle usage, troubleshooting and other tips. so for a Kindle owner, it’s a natural one-stop,” he says.– indeed a one-stop which is also a starting point for authors, both established and unknown, who now have new opportunities for getting readers for their books thanks to Kindle and the community around it. a number of unknown authors are self-publishing their books as free or paid downloads on the amazon platform. in addition, a substantial number of books which are so old that nobody owns the rights any longer can be downloaded to the Kindle. as reported by the Los angeles times at the end of december 2009, 64 of amazon’s top 100 Kindle titles were priced at usd 0.00. to the book industry, a price of usd 0.00 sounds shocking, but for an unknown author, an ebook priced at usd 0.00 could launch a very lucrative career. “in fact, one author, Boyd morrison, who self-published his book ‘The ark’ on Kindle, became very popular on KindleBoards and was subsequently signed to a publishing deal from a subsidiary of simon & schuster,” says Harvey chute. The book and its sequel are scheduled for release in 16 countries so far in 2010.tHe evOlutiOn tOWArds digital distribution and

storage of books is unstoppable. The sales figures for amazon’s ereader are phenomenal. The community and the ecosystem around amazon’s Kindle are impressive and growing day by day. However, all of this is driven by the spiritual union which evolves between author and reader as the story unfolds. Thus, when Harvey chute goes to bed at night in Bellingham, Washington, he will switch on his bedside lamp and his Kindle to immerse himself in a book because, as he concludes the interview, “to use a bad pun, it really has rekindled my enjoyment of good books.”

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60 Blink#1 [ereader]

Interest in eReaders among U.S. consumers has seen a slow, steady climb. When early models were first introduced as far back as 1998, they failed to create demand. It wasn’t until Amazon – the largest on-line book retailer in the U.S.—introduced its eReader Kindle in 2007 that interest began to build. Perhaps it’s not surprising that it took a behemoth like Amazon to create demand for the new technology. Leveraging an estimated 65 million monthly visitors (Forrester), Amazon targeted Kindle to its core following of heavy book buyers, who were obviously comfortable with technology and with purchasing books on-line.

Until last year, Amazon’s only major competitor in the eReader space was Sony’s Reader Digi-tal Book. At last count, Amazon still holds a 60% share of the eReader market in the U.S., while Sony holds 35% (Forrester). However, change is coming quickly. The eReader market is becoming increasingly crowded with new players and new technologies—including most notably, and most recently, the Apple iPad. Perhaps because of this new competition, and both the paid marketing and organic buzz that followed, familiarity and interest in eReaders is growing among U.S. consumers. In the latter half of 2008, almost 40% of Americans had never even heard of electronic book devices, compared to just 17% in 2009 (Forrester). Sales are also on the rise. By the end of 2008, Kindle and Sony combined had sold approxi-mately 1 million units. According to Forrester projections, total eReader sales were expected to top 3 million by the end 2009, and jump to 13 million by 2013. New and better technologies are certainly contributing to the increase in eReader popularity, including larger screens that duplicate the print reading experience; the ability to download eBooks to other devices; growing availability of eBook and periodical titles, and sharing ca-

eReaders in the u.S. are gaining in popularity. But Will They ever

A year ago, many Americans had never heard of an ereader, and an even larger number had never seen one. But 2009 was the year when several new players entered the market, retailers stocked their shelves for holiday sales, and eread-ers received increasing press from both traditional outlets and from consumers themselves, spreading the word via blogs and social networks. Where the market is headed and its ultimate successes are still to be determined, but the race for market dominance is clearly on.

By mediACOm u.s. edited By miCHele skettinO

[ereader]

Will ereAdersACHieve mAss AppeAl?

in a World of Convergence?

61 Blink#1[ereader]

pabilities. But changes in consumers’ media and purchasing habits are also likely driving demand. Simply put, consum-ers may fi nally be ready. With mobile and on-line media consumption now commonplace, immediacy has become the norm. We want to read what we want, when we want, where we want, at the touch of a bottom. Waiting for a book to come in the mail, or traveling to the store to buy it, is almost becoming quaint. And with thousands of songs now available on our iPods, we are also accustomed to unlimited options. eReaders allow you to carry your entire library with you—so choice is no longer limited to the number of books you can squeeze into your bag.

WHO’s reAlly using tHe ereAder?As eReader sales and awareness grow, their user profi le is changing as well. As Forrester Research suggests, the early adoptors of eReaders were gadget-loving, frequent book buying, technology enthusiasts –a group that at most accounts for about 5 million U.S. homes. Th ey were primarily older males, with higher than average incomes, thus rendering the relatively high price of eReaders less of an issue. And since this demographic also tends to have a longer commute and travel more for business, the inherent appeal of the eReader was a given.

As with most technologies, as eReader popularity grows, the consumer base is becoming more refl ective of the overall population. While once heavily male-skewed, today’s eReader consumers have gotten younger, include a growing number of women, and are less tech-savvy than the early adopters. Th is shifting consumer base will have implications on sales trends. It is likely that this second wave of consumers will be

less concerned with having the “latest” technology, and more concerned with price.

In fact, price sensitivity may be the strongest factor limiting the widespread adoption of eReader technology: they are still relatively expensive. At the high-end, the larger model Kindle DX is priced near $500 U.S. while the small Sony Reader eBook “Pocket” Edition at the lower end of the price spectrum is priced around $200 U.S. –still a relatively large investment for a single-use device. Forrester research suggests that the majority of online adults (60%) would not purchase an eReader unless it was less than $100 U.S.

Future OF tHe ereAder still unCleArWhile we know that interest in eReaders is clearly growing in the U.S., the future of the market still leaves many questions.For instance, beyond avid readers and frequent book pur-chasers, does the average American consumer care enough

about reading to purchase a single-purpose device? Or, will the reading experience off ered by other already owned devices, such as laptops, netbooks, iPhones, be “good enough” for the average con-sumer? Alternately, if purchasing a new device, will consumers be motivated to spend a bit more for the “tablet” or “slate” devices that off er much of the same benefi ts as the eReader, but also off er additional uses? If initial sales of the iPad are any indication—having sold over 2 million units in the U.S. in little over two months—the answer seems to point toward “yes.” In fact, already it’s reported that 5 million books have been download-ed from the digital iBooks bookshelf, again in only about 70 days.

Following these trends, most experts would probably agree that eReaders will eventually follow the trend of all technology which points toward greater convergence. Perhaps a dedicated reader, such as the Kindle, was needed to create initial interest in eBooks, but moving forward e Books can probably survive without an independ-ent reading device. For instance, Amazon is already allowing its Kindle users to sync content with other devices, such as the iPhone.

Th is being said, however, convergence will take time, and eRead-ers are still likely to gain considerable penetration in the coming years. After all, as stated earlier, sales are projected to grow from 3 million to 13 million by 2013. Th ere are also a number of factors that could bolster sales. For instance, the lucrative textbook market and business markets have yet to be tapped, and global distribution of eReaders is in its early stages. In addition, if the newspaper and magazine industries are successful in promoting eReadership with new subscription and content distribution models, and/or with direct invest-ment in subsidised electronic reading devices, usage fi gures could rise signifi cantly. Or not.

Th e truth is, no one really yet knows how big the eReader market will grow, or who will emerge as the winners. For the time being though, as some ma-jor U.S. retailers are hoping, there is likely a growing swell of Americans who simply will not be able to resist taking home another shiny new gadget.

the latter half of 2008, almost 40% of Americans had never even heard of electronic book devices, compared to just 17% in 2009 (Forrester). We want to read what we want, when we want, where we want, at the touch of a bottom.

[ereader]

Will erAders ACHieve mAss AppeAl?

Insights from the study were distilled into a book entitled, Species: A User's Guide to Young Men, published in September 2008 and shared with media owners, advertisers and journalists. A male segmentation was also produced resulting in the creation of four broad typologies, three of which can be further subdivided. The insights uncovered then are still relevant today and by applying our segmentation algorithm to all proprietary projects since we first published Species, we continue to develop and further cement our vast knowledge of what is going on in the hearts and minds of young men and how they are coping with today’s pressures.

Additionally, the Discovery Insights team continue to keep the study alive through various initia-tives. First a web 2.0 application was created called FYI Species. Over 200 Discovery personnel contribute to the site by tagging relevant articles about young men and their lifestyles, all of which help keep the study alive and fresh.

In 2009 Discovery developed another aspect to the study. Based on the foundation of Species a Planning Tool was developed. Discovery surveyed 8,000 men,

1,000 across each of the 8 markets. Results can be evaluated using the male typologies first uncovered in September 2008. The purpose of doing so was to enable Discovery to align brand attributes to Species typologies and then to Discovery content, providing advertisers with a model that enables them to effec-tively connect with highly targeted viewers in a manner they haven’t been able to do so before.

The four broad Species typologies are: Pressured Providers, Modern & In Control, All About Me and Non-Committals. Across the Nordics, the most common type of young man is Modern & In Control except in Finland where the All About Me mindset prevails.

The Species Planning Tool offers a wealth of valuable and flexible information which allows advertis-ers to gain a deeper understanding of their brands and the young men who consume them.In essence, by helping a brand en-hance its positioning with current consumers it can steal market share from close competitors through positioning its brand messaging in a relevant and engaging environ-ment.

In order to discuss the breadth and depth of information available

some of you may recall that in 2008, the discovery Channel launched the most com-prehensive study into male attitudes and behaviours ever undertaken. the study

reached out to every corner of europe and beyond, from sweden to romania, from russia to France, encompassing 19 markets and over 14,000 young men.

By ClAire O’COnnOr, emeA direCtOr, insigHts & innOvAtiOns, disCOvery And AlexAnder p. nielsen, nOrdiC reseArCH direCtOr, disCOvery

A User’s Guide To YouNg MeN introducing its Planning Tool

62 Blink#1

within the Species Planning Tool we will look specifi cally at Norway, Denmark and Sweden focusing on the brand strategies of Hugo Boss and, in summary, Nokia.

One of the fi rst questions which can be ad-dressed by the Species Planning Tool is the popularity of a brand within a market. Hugo Boss is very popular across the three Nordic markets, particularly in Norway and Denmark where it is the 2nd most used brand with 14% and 16% of young men respectively. In Sweden, Hugo Boss is the 5th most used brand amongst 7% of young men. Despite this good perfor-mance there is room for growth – especially in Sweden. In the telecoms sector, Nokia is also a successful brand across the three countries, being the most used brand in Norway (36%) and Denmark (46%). In Sweden, Nokia is the 2nd most used brand with 19%, Sony Ericsson being the market leader.

One of the major benefi ts of the Species Plan-ning Tool is its ability to match a brand to a particular segment of young men and identify relevant Discovery content to help position advertising message s or inspire brand partner-ship opportunities.

tips FOr using tHe tOOl:HugO BOss in nOrWAy

step 1Understand brand usage by each Species typol-ogy. Non-Committals are regular users of Hugo Boss: Norway (Index 124), Denmark (Index 130) and Sweden (Index 126). Th e brand may want to consider either further enhancing its re-lationship with Non-Committals or increasing its popularity amongst a typology where usage is lower (eg. All About Me : Norway (Index 89) and Denmark (Index 81)). For these purposes, we suggest strenghtening the brand's relation-ship with Non-Committals.

step 2:Of the top 10 motivational factors for buying grooming products, we know that Non-com-mittals over-index on “It helps me look and feel like a successful man” (112) and “Because I like others to notice me and my looks” (108). We also know that Non-Committals in Norway consider themselves to be particularly “Expert, skilled” (125) and “Up to date on latest trends” (120). Hugo Boss could aim to incorporate these statements and values in their brand com-munications if not already done so.

step 3:Identify which of the 16 attributes outlined in the study are shared by Non-Committals and the Hugo Boss brand.

Th e highest ranking attributes for both that are common include: ‘A Leader’, ‘Smart & Cleaver’. By leveraging these attributes in its communication / creative execution, the emotional connection Hugo Boss will have amongst these Non-Committal type of young men even further.

step 4:Understand how the top ranking. Discovery shows amongst Non-Committals align with Hugo Boss’ attributes. Associating the brand with these programmes ensures Hugo Boss sits in an environment where there is already an emotional connection. Th is increases the likeli-hood of ad recall and brand message transfer-ence. The show Dirty Jobs, for instance, is con-sidered by Non-Committals to be ‘Entertaining & Funny’, ‘Strong & Brave’ and ‘Masculine’. If Hugo Boss was to convey these attributes in its communications, the brand would see higher levels of engagements by Dirty Jobs viewers.

On a diff erent note, in Denmark, the Nokia brand is most popular with: Modern & In Control men sharing the traits ‘Handy & Practical’ and ‘Clear & Easy to Understand’.

However, close competitor Sony Ericsson is closely linked to the attribute ‘Likes Excite-ment’. If Nokia wanted to extend its market share here, it might consider establishing an association with the Discovery Channel’s Destroyed in Seconds, a show which indexes quite highly with the attribute ‘Likes Excite-ment’. In contrast, if Nokia wanted to focus on its own strong attributes, it might consider associating itself with Discovery Channel’s How It’s Made, a programme in which the ‘Clear & Easy to Understand’ attribute ranks very highly. Depending on what Nokia wants to do – steal share from its closest rival or enhance its pen-etration with its consumers – Discovery Chan-nel content can help the brand support either strategy with relevant and engaging content.

In our 2009 study, we explored several brands across 4 product categories in the Nordic region. Please get in touch if you would like to know how your brand could better connect with a young male audience. In 2010, we plan to explore the usage of more brands. If you would like to infl uence which brands should be included, again please don’t hesitate to get in touch and let us know.

3 of the 18 species mindsets that all young men across emeA share in their lives but to varying degrees

extract from book 1 of the 18 mindsets from the book

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