Gillmor Gang: Don’t Cli...

The Gillmor Gang — Robert Scoble, John Taschek, Gabe Rivera, Kevin Marks, and Steve Gillmor — play toe jam football in the shadow of the Facebook IPO. Try as we might, we can’t shake the weight of Facebook’s dominance of Techmeme and maybe the fate of the global economy. Greece, move over. @gaberivera joins near the 30 minute mark. @scobleizer tries a reverse Statue of Liberty play around the forthcoming Samsung phone and the threat to Apple (nonexistent) but our hearts aren’t in it. I fail in a weak attempt to roll up everything under push notification. Face it: our hopes and dreams are now tied to our jobs as feeders of the Facebook Empire  Please Twitter. Save us. @stevegillmor, @gaberivera, @scobleizer, @kevinmarks, @jtaschek Produced and directed by Tina Chase Gillmor @tinagillmor

The Free Ride Is Over F...

Comcast’s plans to do away with its 250 GB data cap and charge users based upon usage marks the end of an era for cable TV providers, and for the online video industry. No longer will users be able to endlessly stream all the content their hearts desire. Not just that, but the fact that usage-based pricing is arriving at the same time that more, higher-quality content is appearing online could have a dampening effect on demand for services like Netflix or Hulu Plus. Comcast, of course, says that its new, usage-based pricing policy is pro-consumer, and to a certain extent it is. The average broadband subscriber — those who only use up about 8 GB or 10 GB of data a month — shouldn’t necessarily pay the same as those whose usage goes above 300 GB in the same period of time. But for those of us who are avid streaming video users, usage-based pricing models could change the overall value proposition of watching video on the Internet. Can streaming video be a TV replacement? I’m a subscriber to Netflix, Hulu Plus, and MLB.tv. I have a Roku box and an Apple TV, and I frequently purchase season passes to shows like Mad Men, Justified, and Sons of Anarchy. Even though I don’t pay for cable, I take advantage of access to TV Everywhere applications from the likes of Showtime and HBO, from my family’s Xfinity TV account, as well as test accounts that I occasionally get from some of the cable networks to check out their new services. In other words, I watch streaming video in the same way a lot of other people watch regular TV. But instead of recording shows and watching them from a DVR, I watch them on-demand online. I’m also a Comcast broadband subscriber, and I’m probably what the company would consider a heavy data user. While I’ve never bumped up against the 250GB cap, I’ve definitely started to come close over the last several months. In April I racked up 160 GB of data usage, and about halfway through May, I’ve already used 90 GB. That might be atypical for the average Comcast broadband subscriber, but I think that type of usage is becoming a lot more common, particularly for highly connected people like me. More importantly, the amount of data I’m using has rapidly increased over the last year or so. It wasn’t so long ago that I was typically using less than 100 GB a month. And I expect it to continue increasing, to the point where I wouldn’t be surprised if I hit and surpass Comcast’s new 300 GB data limit at some point over the next 12-18 months. Part of that is due to me just watching more stuff — I’ve been re-watching old episodes from The Wire, for instance, in addition to a regular slate of weekly shows. And with baseball season up and running, I’m streaming a lot more MLB.tv as well. But part of it is also due to more bandwidth being used by higher bit rate streams, as services like Netflix improve the video quality of their products. Putting things into perspective But what about data usage for everyone else? The average video on Netflix uses up about 1 GB of data per hour, but most of those streams aren’t in full HD. The highest quality setting for Netflix, which is what most viewers would like to stream to their TVs, uses more than twice as much data per hour. According to Nielsen, the average TV viewer consumes about five hours of video a day , or about 150 hours of video per month. For those keeping track at home, that means that you’d have to watch even more video online than your typical TV watcher if you ever plan to max out Comcast’s 300 GB allotment. Of course, that’s where things are now, but video quality continues to improve for all of these services, and that means higher bit rates and more data streamed per movie or TV show. What happens as these services improve, as more content and higher-quality content makes its way online? And what happens as more people tune into those services? Today, about 30 percent of users have streamed a video to their TVs, either because they own a so-called “smart TV” that came with access to streaming video services, or because they’ve connected a game console or streaming box (and in some cases a PC) to a dumb TV. What happens when that hits 50 percent? Or 75 percent? Hell, what happens when Apple’s mythical iTV gets released and users suddenly have access to a whole new set of streaming applications in 1080p? That will change the value proposition of online video dramatically. For me, between all the different subscription VOD services and the cost of 8-10 season passes that I buy every year, I’m probably already paying more for streaming services than I would pay for TV if I just purchased a basic cable package. But then, I wouldn’t have the convenience of on-demand access to most of the content that I want from a number of different services and devices. And I also wouldn’t have the pleasure of watching most of that content without ads. For now, it’s a trade-off I’m willing to make. But in the future, if I have to pay an additional $10 for every 50 GB of video I consume over a 300 GB limit, though? Then I’m not so sure it’s worth it. That’s the world we’re about to enter. What Comcast’s moves are really about For me, the debate over Comcast’s treatment of its streaming Xbox Live app isn’t even about net neutrality or whether it treats the traffic of online competitors any differently than it treats its own. What it really comes down to is, do you want to pay for a TV and VOD service that you can stream to your Xbox or an iPad, computer, or connected TV… Or do you want to piece together an alternative solution from a variety of different streaming services? It’s a judgment between the current value of online video offerings versus what you can get from TV. Due to the relatively cheap nature of most online video services, that made the choice easy for people like me. You could pay $100 for an HD cable package and DVR, or you could pay a couple of different services less than $10 a month each for a lot of similar content on-demand. And you could get those streams on pretty much any device you wanted to access them on. But things are changing rapidly. With the introduction of Comcast’s Xbox app, as well as new applications coming on devices like Samsung Connected TVs and other devices, the cable company is making its service a lot more attractive to potential customers. At the same time, the implementation of usage-based pricing changes the potential cost of online video services and makes bundled pay TV and broadband services a lot more attractive as a result. That’s not to say that the recent moves by Comcast are going to kill the online video industry — I think that Netflix, YouTube and others are beginning to create enough value on their own through device access and new original programming to begin offering a real alternative to cable. But it could make people think twice about how they choose to access content and through what services, if it means additional broadband charges down the line.

Marketing Lessons Start...

Editor’s note:  This is a guest post by Neil Patel, co-founder of  KISSmetrics  and blogger at  QuickSprout.com . You may have seen it by now… Google’s concept video about its new Project Glass . These glasses will do what your smart phone will do only without having to hold anything…you actually see your options at the side of your view. You can get directions, send and receive texts, make calls, schedule tasks and even share your view with another person. It’s a really exciting idea…especially if you love technology. But the actual product is easily years out from becoming a reality. Was Google wise to release an idea so early ? And should startups do the same? Concept videos give you constructive criticism At this stage Project Glass is nothing but a video…and may not be a reality for a long time. Augmented reality experts point out that there are huge hurdles the Google has to overcome . So why did Google unveil so early? It all boils down to the fact that they wanted feedback on the product. Google wanted to learn the good and bad things people had to say about the glasses. The video currently has gotten over 15 million views which suggests that there is a lot of curiosity in the product… but not necessarily interested buyers. It’s just like when Drew Houston released his Dropbox video . There was no coding…just a screen cast of how Dropbox would work. While Dropbox was certainly fishing for feedback on how to improve its product more importantly it was looking for how many people would adopt and use it. The Digg community responded : But more importantly, there were thousands of people who signed up to be notified for the release of the actual product on the first day of the video’s release. And then thousands more after that. Clearly Drew learned that there was a huge need out there that DropBox could fulfill. Concept videos gauge interest You’ll more than likely get in-depth comments from the innovators and early adopters . The early and late majority will typically just vote up or down on it. While the input from the first group is critical for building a better product…hearing from the second group is critical to knowing if you are creating a product that will have mass adoption. But don’t get discouraged if you only hear from the first group during the first round of your prototype video. While keeping costs low, make the suggested changes from the first group to the product and then release a second video. However, if you don’t hear from the second group the second time around…then you may have a product that nobody wants. Concept videos build your brand Another reason for doing a concept video is to make your company look like it’s a company that is on the cutting edge and is doing cool things in secret. The concept video is a powerful marketing strategy for companies that have long production time tables between products…like cars or iPads. Apple will release concept videos like this one on the iPad 3 that keep people in anticipation of the real product. Otherwise they may fade into background and no longer seem like the cool technology company it is. This is also why Google released their concept video. Remember, however, that this strategy doesn’t always work with small businesses. It’s a lot more risky for a startup to engage in a concept video if the technology is years out from entering the market. The startup without an established reputation or brand is better off just building a superior product behind closed doors . A concept video that gets a poor reception could easily sink their reputation. When should a start up use a concept video? A concept video is a great idea for a start up when two conditions are met: You can keep costs down – Google’s Project Glass video is a high-quality production that probably costs thousands to produce from the sheer man hours alone. Your video doesn’t have to be that slick. Drew Houston achieved his results with something a whole heck of a lot cheaper. You want feedback from focus group – If you are a startup building a killer product behind closed doors you will definitely at some point want to get feedback from real live users and learn from their suggestions . You can do this with a concept video that you only share in private. This will protect you from pre-mature scrutiny from the public. Make sure though you use testers who you trust and can be confident they won’t leak your product early. So how do you create a successful concept video? Here are some tips. Involve the viewers In my opinion the genius of the Google Glasses concept video was in that it shows you exactly what the product could do for you by putting the viewer into the lead role of the video. From the start of the video the camera moves around like it is you looking out from these glasses. This is a great example of allowing someone to demo a product without actually having the product! Highlight the benefits of the features The basic purpose of a concept video is to show potential users how its features will make the life of the user better. This means you have to give examples of ways your product can make the user smarter, more efficient or happier. The DropBox video gave tons of examples on stuff people could store. But then it went on to give scenarios of how DropBox could be used to solve common storage problems people have. Isolate the new features If you have an existing product like the iPad…then how can a concept video help you? In this case most people will be familiar with the general features of the product. What Apple’s concept video needed to do was show off the new features. This could be done without any narration as the action communicated clearly what a person could do with new features like connecting two iPads together, a holograph display of movies and an augmented reality keyboard. Tell a story Another reason the Google video was a success is that it told a story. It was a simple story of a day in someone’s life. It showed him eating breakfast, trying to catch the subway, meeting a friend for coffee and playing the ukulele for his girlfriend…and how Google Glasses was involved the whole time. That narrative…and how seamless Google Glasses fit into that narrative…keeps you glued to the screen! It’s critical to understand that your product must fit seamlessly into the story. If it feels crammed or out of place then this approach won’t work. Create a mechanism to capture leads Finally, if you are going to create a concept video then you need to create a way to capture the leads that you generate, which usually involves driving them to a unique landing page… This is what I think was Google’s biggest failure. They missed…and are missing…an opportunity to capture something like 14 million possible leads of interest. If anything by capturing leads with a basic field that allows someone to join a list of updates on Project Glass will help them to see how many potential customers there are, which would give you quantifiable data to determine if it will be a profitable market. For the startup who doesn’t have the financial resources that a Google has this is an absolute must. Create a mechanism to capture an email address. Final thoughts The concept video is a wonderful marketing tool on some many levels. However, it may not be the best approach for every start up. You need to evaluate your needs, your resources and what you are trying to accomplishing before jumping in with both feet. However, if and when you do decide, I truly believe that it’s a great way to help you save money and reputation…leading to a killer product in the end! What other advantages are there to using a concept video?

Personalization Is Not ...

Editor’s note: Scott Brave is the CTO and co-founder, Baynote . We’ve all watched from the sidelines as companies have come out in a burst of glory, and then, two years later, spent their venture capital, lost their user base, and failed to monetize. This begs the question – what are the factors that drive a company’s survival, differentiate it, and ultimately make it a winner? In today’s online world, personalization is increasingly making or breaking companies. The companies that win are the ones making personalization a key company value – not just a feature. In the early days of the web, consumers were happy just to gain access to information. However, as technology became more sophisticated, and as more consumers and companies came online, we quickly moved out of the access age and into a state of information overload, often leaving consumers frustrated and confused. Companies that helped consumers cut through the clutter to reveal relevant information had a critical and sustainable competitive advantage in their respective areas. The concept of relevance is critical to the success of Google, for example. Personalization is not new. Popularized by Amazon and Netflix more than a decade ago, personalization is the practice of tailoring information to people based on what they are looking for, what they have found interesting in the past, what their friends have engaged with, or based on explicit inputs like their interests. Personalization has gotten a lot of positive attention recently because it can be used to great effect to organize the web’s information overflow into relevant, meaningful experiences. Winning companies approach personalization as a core value of how they do business – a “customer-centric” philosophy – rather than an add-on “feature.” As proof, here are some examples of companies that have built their businesses around personalization and the competition that they left in their wake. News: Flipboard vs. Yahoo! News In 2001, Yahoo! launched Yahoo! News , providing a repository for news articles that became the first-ever most-emailed page on the web. However, Yahoo! News neglected to treat personalization as a core value – and in so doing missed out on the opportunity to tap into the social graph of personal information to personalize and curate content for users based on their interests. With Yahoo! treating personalization as a feature and not a core value, by 2010, consumers moved on to new, more personalized content curation services that were specifically designed for consuming media. One example of such a personalized news source is Flipboard , which works across Apple devices, and allows users to “flip” through their social networking feeds and feeds from partner websites to find the news articles that are most interesting to them. Within a year of its founding, Flipboard had amassed a $200 million valuation. Today, the company’s valuation and user base continues to skyrocket, while Yahoo!’s continues to hemorrhage. Flipboard won because it applied personalization to consumer choice for news articles that other news providers hadn’t accounted for, sparking the beginning of the content curation boom. Interestingly, Yahoo! recently announced plans to eliminate many of its online properties in order to focus on its most popular ones and make the content on those sites personalized to the user. It seems Yahoo! has finally caught on to the fact that users like personalized content and will engage with brands and services that provide content tailored to their interests. Music: Pandora vs. Internet radio This example seems counter-intuitive – wouldn’t people want to listen to their favorite radio station online? This just never took off. Why? Internet radio contained way too much content – it wasn’t focused or specific enough. Consumers had to work too hard to find the music they liked. Once consumers were introduced to a better way to curate and listen to music, they were never going back. When Pandora allowed users to input their music preferences through both explicit selections and implicit actions to help shape their content stream, it changed the listening experience. Pandora made listening to music online personal. After Pandora, just listening to the radio online seemed like a waste of time. Dining: Alfred (Google) vs. Opentable OpenTable provides a free service that lets users make reservations online. The company first came on the scene in 1998, and has steadily built up its business – today over 25,000 restaurants are signed up with the service. While OpenTable provides restaurant recommendations along the side of the screen based on location, it is a feature rather than being core to the experience. Alfred, on the other hand, is a mobile app developed by Clever Sense (purchased by Google in December) that delivers dining recommendations based exclusively on your inputs and your Facebook check-ins and profile. By offering recommendations for restaurants that are personalized to consumer’s inputs and behavior Google could become a leading provider of time-critical dining data, and a big player in the multi-billion dollar restaurant industry. These examples have all shown how companies that embrace personalization as a core value, and not just a feature can win. In today’s consumer-driven society companies that don’t pay attention to what people want most at any given moment risk losing significant market share to competitors that have built a culture around delighting customers with a highly personalized experience at every turn.

Microsoft Announces Its...

Microsoft, just like Apple, usually runs a major back-to-school promotion every summer that is meant to give students (and their parents) some extra incentives to buy a new computer. The company’s just-announced back-to-school deal for the U.S. and Canada is pretty much the same as last year’s. A year ago, Microsoft gave students who bought a new PC and Xbox 360 and this year it’s doing exactly the same. There are some differences to last year’s program, though. This time around, Microsoft isn’t just partnering with Best Buy in the U.S., but also with Dell.com, Fry’s Electronics, HPDirect and NewEgg.com (its own Microsoft stores , of course, will also honor this promotion. In Canada, students can buy their PCs from Best Buy, Dell.ca, Future Shop, Staples and The Source. The program is scheduled to start on May 20 in the U.S and May 18 in Canada. To be eligible, students need to buy a Windows PC worth at least $699 ($599 in Canada). Apple vs. Microsoft Apple also used free products like an iPod touch as an incentive for shoppers. Last year, however, it switched to handing out $100 gift cards to its digital stores instead . Apple usually announces its annual back-to-school promotion in June. By the end of last year’s summer promotions, some analysts noted that Apple handily beat Microsoft 8 to 2, with around 80% of incoming students opting for Macs instead of a Windows machine. This year, Microsoft hopes that Ultrabooks like the Samsung Series 5 ULTRA and the Dell XPS 13 will make students think twice about buying a Mac.