Think Forward

Motorola Bluetooth Keyboard

When I first saw this product from Motorola I thought it was cool but that was about it. After I have thought about it more I am pretty excited about the usefulness of it. One of the problems I have with mobile devices is that I am a slave to e-mail on my mobile phone but have to have a keyboard for it to be useful. So I have been using Treo's for longest while because they are the best devices with keyboards. However this limits the amount of devices I can use. I have come across some very cool devices that I wish I could have used but never did because of the lack of keyboard. Enter the Motorola Bluetooth keyboard and now any phone with BT can be just as useful. Now I feel like all the cool devices I want like the Samsung i310 can now also be a productivity tool with this product. Thus giving me the ability to use any phone I want whether or not it has a keyboard.

Interactivity will be a KEY feature of IPTV

I have spent much time thinking about IPTV these past few month's. It seems just about all of my clients have been asking some very interesting questions about IPTV and sent me out on a quest to gather all the relevant info. This is good timing to be doing some forward thinking thought around IPTV because a lot of people still don't really understand what it is or what the value will be. I myself had been digging for a series of features that would actually draw me away from cable and over to IPTV. We are still a ways out from a pure IPTV solution. Even the mild offerings we will see from AT&T and others are light on the IPTV side and heavy on the Satellite side. So as I have been watching TV lately I have been asking myself, if I this were IPTV what would be different. I came up with a lot of answers, which I will outline in a later post. One of the differences that I am particularly excited about is around sports. I am a pretty big sports fan and like to know as much about what is happening in the sporting world as possible. I am also a big fantasy sports player and like to know precisely how my fantasy team is doing at that moment in time with real time updates. One of the things I think will be great around sports will be the ability to watch the sporting event but simultaneously be able to navigate sports news, fantasy updates and any number of things I am interested in while still watching the game of my choice. This is particularly interesting in the slower sports like baseball, which is my favorite, where this is a lot of dead time. To be able to get highlights, news updates, fantasy updates, scores updates and more would be terrific. As well as be able to quickly dig deeper on any bit of information you wish to know more about or even watch it. The beauty of these new set top boxes around Sat and IPTV is that just that is possible. So the scenario is, and this is just one of many, that I am watching the SF Giants game on my TV. My set top box is feeding me personalized sports info every little bit. Similar to the ESPN sports tracker that continually runs scores and updates but this info is personalized to me. I use the Internet to set up my preferences, which would include players on my fantasy teams and leagues. All of this info would be fed to me on my TV, because I want it to, and I would have the ability to dig into any info I want and even watch my fantasy player highlights. All while the game I was watching either paused or minimized if it was a commercial, etc. This level of interactivity deeply enhances my TV watching experience. As new models of TV viewing are rolled out by cable companies, Satco’s and Teleco’s we can not expect to see actually TV shows distributed through the Internet to replace Satellite and Cable any time soon but we can expect to have levels of interactivity and compelling information that is user specified to enhance our TV watching experience. They will use the Internet for what is was created for which is information and interactivity. These first rollouts will use the Internet more as a way to acquire content services like Movielink, MovieBeam or Cinema Now and enhance users experiences rather then actually distribute TV over the Internet. I actually think this is good and will clearly outline the benefits in ways consumers can understand and in the end leads to better competition.

ABC to Stream TV shows for free

ABC announced yesterday that they will be launching a service call MyABC where people will be able to download TV shows from ABC for free and with some ads. The recent success of the online March Madness shows that there is monster demand for TV content on the Internet. With broadband penetration up over 60% now in the US there is a cry for quality content on the Internet. An interesting question about this new model however is how will it affect the ABC shows sold on iTunes? The value to the iTunes shows is that they are commercial free. I am curious if a commercial free show is worth $1.99 to everyday people. This will be an interesting development to watch however I am sure that more TV networks will start to distribute more content in this manner. The big thing still missing from both iTunes and the free download is the quality of the content. The TV shows for free on MyABC and on iTunes are still very low quality. Where as I can, and I am not saying I do, go to BitTorrent or Limewire and download a very high resolution episode of any TV show I want and stream it from my computer to my big screen and watch it in close to HD quality all for free and without the ads. HMMMM.

The Consumer Conundrum

I recently had a stark reality re-confirmed about consumers. This reality literally defies all that we work for in the technology sector, which is why I am calling it the consumer conundrum. The reality in which I am referring to is that most consumers are content with their current technology. Whether it is their cell phone, TV, DVD player, laptop or desktop you name it, most of them are content. This reality was re-confirmed when I was showing a friend of mine, who is a Youth Pastor and has very little to no interest in technology, my digital home lab where I am doing all sorts of great stuff like moving HD video from room to room, pausing a DVD I was watching in the living room and then picking it up where I left off in my bedroom, accessing my living room DVR shows from my bedroom, etc. When I asked him what he thought of the whole thing his response was an un-energetic “it’s cool.” I honestly can’t comprehend this response because to me this stuff is fantastic. When I asked him if he would use a set up like it he said no. He is happy with his current setup. My wife is the same way she likes the way our house is set up and thinks it is convenient but would she ever spend money on it, no way. The bottom line is most people are content with what they currently have. Consumers just aren’t driven to find the latest and greatest technologies. They don’t sit around like me and think about how ridiculous it is that my recorded TV shows are stuck in my living room. So we as an industry have to drive the real value of these products before we can expect the everyday non-techie consumer to spend actual money on them. The conundrum may be as well that we are not sure what the value is because for us there are a number of valuable things about these products. In the end it may only be one that gets consumers to spend money. I think what I am getting at is that the likely hood of the digital home, all though entirely possible today, is still a long way off.

My Beef with MVNO's

At CTIA I spent a lot of time looking at all the MVNO’s and I found a fundamental flaw with their offering. What I love about MVNO’s is the unique feature set they bring around their phones. Look at ESPN Mobile for example that service is fantastic however the phone is not very cool. Which points out a flaw in MVNO’s and that is the devices they run on. Unlike a carrier that has a large selection of usually pretty good phones MVNO’s are hoping to lure customers based on their features not necessarily the device. Disney flat out came out and said at their keynote that they knew the phone looked like everyone else’s but they want a consist device for a family that works great and is useful in a family setting. Well the Disney service was cool and great for families. I would use just like I would use ESPN Mobile but there is a reason I have the device I have and that is because it is useful for me in my everyday life. Disney and ESPN are good examples of what I am talking about. Imagine a family walks in the store to buy phones and they look at the Disney Mobile phones and conclude that they features around family tracking, family alerts and more are right down the alley of what the family wants. However the problem is the young daughter in the family wants the pink Razor and they teenage boy wants the ESPN phone. Well then they are SOL because Disney Mobile doesn’t work on those phones. My point is that the MVNO service is very good and full of useful features. However it would have been a better implementation for be to first pick my device and then pick my service. I would absolutely pay $10 bucks a month to have all the features of ESPN mobile on my Treo 700w. Just let me launch the app and enjoy all the sports goodness, then launch the Disney Mobile app and check find where my family is and send them some alerts about the weekend. Then launch Helio’s app and do a little MySpace surfing. I know I am dreaming however this would have been the most efficient way for these services to exist. But why should they create something with the good of the consumers and ease of use in mind. Simply because THEY want to own the customer.

How Apple's Boot Camp can help sell more computers

Apple's stock is up over the past few days clearly because people think the recent announcement of Boot Camp will help them sell more PC's. Well that is exactly what will happen and these are the reason's I believe it will make a difference.

1. It will compel more people to go into Apple stores, even though a lot do already, and check out Windows running on a Mac. The result will be more consumers getting to see how great Apple products really are.

2. For consumers many family members go to work and use Windows machines and then just use Windows at home because they are used to it. Yet at home many people, especially younger ones are wanting Mac's at home for the great entertainment applications for creating and consuming content that exist. This will allow a family to have the best of both worlds.

3. Lastly, and I feel this is a significant one. People's two biggest reason's to not own Mac's are because they don't run Windows and because they are too expensive. Well the first has changed but the price will not. However I believe one can now justify the slightly more expensive Mac because it will run both Windows and OSX. So it adds significantly more value thus giving the consumers the reason to pay the higher price. Where else can you get the best of both worlds in the best-designed laptops on the market? Only on a Mac.

What was hot at CTIA

For me CTIA Wireless 2006 was a bit uneventful. The parties were great, Motorola’s in particular because I got to see John Legend perform. So even with the lack of excitement at the show there were a few key takeaways that I think describe some trends happening with the wireless industry. The first is an added emphasis on design by all handset manufactures. It appears that Apple has reminded everyone that design is as important as features and functionality and were showing off some incredibly designed devices that looked incredible. I was particular intrigued with one in particular and that is Samsung. Samsung showed off some amazing products from 10 mega-pixel camera phones to 8 GB hard drive phones with amazing sound quality to the thinnest phone in the world. Overall I was very impressed with the design of many of Samsung’s phones that will be in the US market in the short term. As usual Motorola had great phones to show and I am still anxiously awaiting the Q. Motorola also showed off a new campaign they are calling “Follow me.” Something that will allow Motorola set top box owners to sync their Motorola cell phones with their set top box and take recorded DVR content with them. It is very interesting to say the least.

Mobile gaming is still lacking, I was yet to find a game on a mobile device I would actually use. Mobile video was still lacking in quality and I am still waiting for halfway decent video pushed by my carrier that might compel me to even consider looking at some video. Cingular came the closest with some of the content deals they put in place. I think I will still stick to watching my Sling Box on my Treo 700. DVB-H is still lacking and I heard some disturbing rumors about its lack of support in other countries. One thing I noticed about every single DVB-H phone running Media Flo and that was it was incredibly hot to the touch. These devices were very very warm to where it hurt to hold in my hand. So clearly these chips run a little hot. I don’t expect these to make much dent in the US market any time soon. Overall out of the last few years all news from CTIA was basically overshadowed by Apple’s announcement of Boot Camp.