The two articles carry reports on firstly how Conde Nast have come out with an
initial list of five of its most famous magazines , including GQ and The New Yorker ,
that will have iPad version created , presumably with more to come.

The previous weeks article in tauw had given a long list of books that were
being touted as the first real iPad books.

Whilst its not unexpected for the iPad to be an e-reader or carry magazines , what is  important
is  the sense that one of  the main uses of the iPad could well turn out to be that of a specialist
vehicle for publishing books , magazines , newspapers etc.

Its quite probable that publishers will feel they can charge for an ‘iPad version’ of their product
and get people to pay for it in a way that proves very difficult to get people to pay for online
papers and magazines.

It may well be that people won’t have the same objection to paying for an iPad version of a newspaper
as they do to suddenly being asked to pay for something they used to get for free.
The iPad could be  a game changer by positioning itself not just as a new product , but as a new medium
for a number of specialist areas who can charge for their content in a completely new way.

http://reviews.cnet.com/4321-6454_7-6663288.html

The FT is hugely authoritative in its own right and its recent musings have been widely circulated on-line.In summary it says that Apple will launch a tablet PC this year , ideally in time for the xmas spend fest.
It will likely be a giant ( relatively ) ipod touch with a ten inch screen . This would make a lot of sense as apple already have the infrastructure in iTunes in place and have a really established brand in the iPod to build on.

The logic for developing a tablet is that it will move sales in two distinct areas .One is movie and tv content and the other is cd sales ( apparently people just buy single tacks on iTunes ) and associated freebies like album covers and lyrics etc.

Apart from the fact that this makes total sense , it  lets Apple really get into  serious content at an early stage and effectively sow up the market for a time at least.That may raise  competition issues , but you gotta ask what the competition is doing to challenge apple – dreaded zune is about the best that anyone has come up with.

One of the more interesting ones is Citysense , which is designed to collect peoples personal data and then anonymously aggregate it and use it to feed back to people where other people with similar interest are congregating so they can all meet up ! ( currently only available for San Francisco )

The main selling point is night life . so that people can know where the 'happening' places are and then go along  ( personally I'd do the complete opposite and go somewhere where everyone else isn't ! ). issues of privacy are of course huge  , but people have to opt in to this , so presumably know what they're doing and are ok with it.

Perhaps its main point of interest is in how its how the innovative way cell phone scan be used and is yet another pointer to how the development of the mobile web will be determined by what practical uses it can actually  be put to.

Citysense available with iPhone , iPod touch and Blackberry

Google ( inevitably ) really cracked online advertising with pay per click ads and really allowed sites to make money in very specific ways.

The mobile internet is still very much in its infancy  and its development is still a bit of a chicken and egg situation ( for want of a better cliche ) in terms of devices and availability. What is also developing is how to put advertising on sites in an effective , yet unobtrusive way.

Really good article in Business Week has a case study of  Pandora , an online music store that allows people to choose and stream their own radio stations.

What is really interesting is that companies are trying different approaches to customers , depending on their products , i.e Domino's run an ad urging people to call for a pizza from their phone , Dockers offer a twenty percent discount if you enter the word Pandora as a promotional code on their site.Kraft uses an iFood Assistant with recipe tips and Nike has a training club with workout suggestions.

Companies are really being challenged to find ways of relating to potential customers that are useful. That's nothing new in advertising .

What is quite new is that the ways companies use advertising on phones and other devices will have to be very specific and will have to be tailored precisely to how people decide to access the internet , whilst on the move. That's still a whole new ball game.

This would be quite impressive , given the current economic climate and the general stagnation in cell phone sales and manufacturing.

His view seems to be endorsed by ARM , the microprocessor manufacturer , who estimate a ten percent growth in the smartphone market in 2009.

There could be two main reasons for this : China and the good old principle that however bad the economy is . people love new toys.

Expansion into China is currently Apples big challenge , highlighting the problems of how they keep control of their content in the first place and then how they monetize that content in a very different market to others they operate in.

The new toys principle is always pretty sound. According to market research company TNS , new devices have a product development cycle of  between twelve and eighteen months , implying new phones or at least new versions of phones will come around with this cycle.

TNS also argue , convincingly ,  that smartphones drive the wireless market in the US , and as people become more picky about being able to access email , sms and internet on the move , smartphones will be developed to meet peoples demands , hence growth.

According to their Wikipedia entry , Symbian has about 47% of market share of smartphone operating systems , whilst Apple has about 17% , RIm about 15% and Microsoft 13%.

Lets hope they come up with something better than Zune !

Codenamed Pink , the device is likely be launched early next year , with Verizon Wireless as the carrier in the US. .

The phone itself will probably be made by a  third party , as Google does with Android. Microsoft will  concentrate on developing the software , as well as developing its own app store , which has proved such a huge boost for the iPhone.

One interesting  development to watch for is around carrier. Apple has an exclusive contract with AT&T in the US , and other carriers around the world.

Verizon is keen to develop its own mobile application store and  also develop closer links with Apple.

It will be interesting to see if carriers across the world are happy to carry on with exclusivity deals that obviously work for companies like Apple and Microsoft , but tie them to specific products , when they may well want to be involved in other areas as well.

Firefox has made huge inroads into Explorer's market share on so called desktop browsers and is well poised to have  a prominent position on MID's .

Its probably worth flagging up that the mobile internet isn't simply a smaller version of whats already available on mainstream computers , it is pretty much a different medium altogether , in terms of device ,  content and accessibility.

One thing that means is that although it is a hugely evolving market and no-one seems quite sure where it will go , no-one has  a built in advantage to overcome , its all up for grabs -  given how crucial it is to be able to load quickly and see clearly on an MID , how quickly good browsers are developed will be key to the future development of the mobile net.

Review : vnunet

Its currently touting its latest version , which will be released later this year -  opera mobile 9.7 beta  including opera turbo !

what does sound particularly important is that it claims opera turbo will reduce bandwidth consumption by up to eighty percent , allowing a considerable improvement in the time it takes to load  websites

-  seems impressive and frankly , anything that seriously improves looking at web sites on a smart-phone , either by design or speed is to be  warmly welcomed.

photo opera

Firstly does anyone really  need another social networking site – I guess the answer to that will depend on what Buzzwire offer that isn't on other sites and how many people it will attract.

What follows on from that is how it will make the site pay – this is a really difficult question for all social networking sites , and probably even more so for mobile internet ones. Research by comscore suggests around nine percent of mobile subscribers access social networking sites , but it is also a rapidly growing area,

The other question is whether ot not there is a tipping point beyond which these sites just don't work.Each site is self contained in terms of membership and non transferable.Whilst people can join any number of sites , they need to continuously check each one for activity.There may just be too many for people to bother with , unless someone develops a way to effectively aggregate membership of sites , in a manner similar to how rss feeds work.

Buzzwire may come up against this problem , but its success will to an extent depend initially more on the type and substance of content that it offers , and the people it attracts as a result of that

buzzwire

buzzwire mobile