User generated content changing carrier’s perspectives
February 23, 2007
User generated content (UGC) has been a mythical creature of awe and wonder for many companies. Whilst these organisations can see great examples on the web of UGC in action, such as jewels in the crown Youtube.com & Flickr.com, they are still confused as to how to differentiate this success into their own businesses.
Telco 2.0 has a good overview of this issue from some telco speakers at 3GSM. Whilst there is some mythology around why UGC is so important, this article shows how carriers are deploying UGC successfully and more importantly with good planning. The Telco 2.0 article case studies some recent UK mobile products and lessons learnt from their deployment.
Major UGC sites on the web are foundations for the web 2.0 craze of the New World order of online interactivity, many are still wondering what all the Web 2.0 fuss is about, but in the end it’s about users and how they want a dynamic and interactive online environment that they can be apart of versus something they watch from afar.
Posted by Shane Williamson.
3 Comments
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Universal Convergence 
Hey Shane,As an employee of a company that\’s working on user generated content for cell phones, the thing I find most exciting is really creating a new way to communicate that\’s tailored to the mobile phone. We\’ve gone to some crazy lengths to make traditional websites workable on mobile (check out http://mini.mobileplay.com to see what I\’m talking about), but ultimately it\’s just recreating something we already have. It might be convenient for traveling, or make your bus ride a little less boring, but it isn\’t going to change the way you really interact with people. We\’re releasing our UGC service in the next two weeks, and I\’m really excited about the idea that we might be the one\’s who really help people communicate more easily, more cheaply, or with people they don\’t talk to a lot. It just feels like you might be improving people\’s lives in a bigger way than bringing them more of the same media.-Marc "In awe of the mythical creature" Blinder
Marc,
thanks for the info about your product and all the best for your UGC project! Let me know when you launch it as I\’ll be keen to see what you\’ve created.
Shane
Hey Shane,We\’ve launched our Beta. Check out http://www.expressitmobile.com it\’s free to use – and really intuitive.-Marc