Universal Convergence

Trip Hawkins of Digital Chocolate (ex founder of Electronic Arts) did an interview with the BBC that "most of the companies making games for mobile phones have got it wrong". Well, I think Hawkins has a few things wrong too.

I agree totally that gamers are looking for more of the "social side of the experience" versus the graphics side at the moment. The growing connected world of PC & consoles with their in game ranking & communication systems, clan ladders & external log sites that track individual performance against everyone else that has played too (eg Unreal Torunament, Halo 2 etc) are evidence of the community aspects of gaming coming forth.

But Hawkins views about single player gaming with "tamagotchi-type creatures" and "caring for castles they build" seem very boring indeed. Damn, but someone needs to give him a 3G phone with multiplayer games, so he can see where the huge increases in mobile user’s game spending are heading.

He talks a bit about the connected world we live in, but completely misses the huge connected realms where we can use our mobiles to do things like:

• Using the mobile device to access MMPORPG characters to maintain small aspects of the character whilst away from the PC/console to "buff" the character with new abilities or use their creative skills to build tools/weapons/merchandise.
• Watch over your online realms and to be alerted of attacks or events that effect your online entities. (eg Get MMS videos or pictures showing the action.)
• Trading virtual items. The mobile device has the ability for gamers to meet and transfer via bluetooth/e-mail/Internet other inventory items from the online game or even characters.
• Mobile gaming versus PC & console games.
• Access online rankings with live updates
• Watch online game tornaments as a spectator

As we move into the huge HD Era as Mr J Allard of Microsoft likes to put it, you need to think big Mr Hawkins, very big.

I blogged about Mobile TV earlier this year that carriers cannot keep ignoring this technolgy and working on the when to implement not the if to implement.

Already some recent positive press about momentum in Australia with certain telcos investigating doing trials with DVB-H too.

Electronic News has an article about an IDS report however, that shows some research on the future US market quoting figures such as 30 million subscribers using the services by 2009.

The article states that "IDC believes network services must be designed to better streamline the activation and on-going use of video/TV content and live TV. For instance, a hybrid delivery model that supports live TV and video content as well as on-demand clips is likely to be the most effective long-term approach."

So it comes back down to, giving the user what they want, when they want it and in a simple to use form factor.

I agree with Carlo Longino over at The Feature on making Podcasting available to mobiles. Longino’s comments on the issues around costs & carrier involvement are spot on.

3G carriers need to jump into this technolgy by using user created content as the driver, whilst removing the barriers of bit data charging and switch to per download or subscription charging and the users will create their own content, but more importantly, users will pay to listen/view it.

Luddites who look at Blogging & Podcasting as a fad aren’t seeing the power behind these services which are the revolutionary technologies that power them. The concepts of permalinks, syndication, search, peer validation/rating and user created content are the building blocks to some powerful consumer and business applications/services.

The Reality TV mass market has shown us that the general public like to watch and listen to other people’s "real" lives. Mobile devices are like mini broadcast systems with their ability to capture audio, still pictures and video. Life blogging with videoblog/podcast capabilities & the ability for users to rank these would be a whole new world of living with your mobile.

Make it easy to use META tags, search & catagorise these and it’s not long before you can see the business use as well.

Telecoms.com News has an article about latest research from Visiongain prediciting the Chinese 3G market growth in the next few years. Visiongain claim that their research shows growth in the 3G markets by 2010 to be above 580 million subscribers.

As China is soon to begin it’s 3G licensing auctions, the new technology will drive penetration of more high speed data devices.

Visiongain is obviosuly looking for some press with predictions like this, but the market is a primary focus for a lot of large companies who are now moving their regional headquarters to within its borders.

The real question is then; Is your company planning for the Chinese language market, both inside and outside of mainland China?