7 steps to better handheld browsing
CollyLogic has a great 7 step guide to building mobile sights, but the real gem there is the link to the extensive research that Jim Wilkinson has put together, that has excellent resources for anyone looking at creating access to their web site for mobile viewers.
China #2 broadband market in the world!
Just read a report in the Australian Communication Day newsletter by UK analyst Point Topic, about the 2004 worldwide Broadband market rankings. Incredibly, China is the second largest Broadband market in the world just behind the US. At 25.7 million Broadband lines (ADSL & Cable modems), China grew 35% in the last half of the 2004.
China’s broadband penetration of their population is currently at 2%, whereas the US is 12%. Interestingly, the country with the highest Broadband penetration is Korea (#4) at 25%.
So, at this rate of growth, China will overtake the US in 2005 in total broadband connections.
The report also showed Australia has, for the first time, just snuck into the top 15 of the world’s largest broadband markets.
Digital identity and Kim Cameron’s Identity weblog
I’ve been lost in Kim Cameron’s Identity weblog for some time, watching the conversations in his market about digital identity and the laws/rules that should form around it. Kim’s blog is what blogging is all about, the ability to cut straight into the topic of interest and listen in or participate in it directly.
This recent post puts some grounding for those interested in understanding this topic further, from a more all encompassing view.
I believe one of the most important battles looming on the horizon for the connected world we will live in, will be that of digital identities and how they are implemented & controlled. This could become the key to unlock the next level of whatever we will all interact through.
On a side note, I think it is humorous that people for years have been concerned & fighting against being numbered/identifiied by controlled ID regims, yet everyone has within them a distinct numbered code that is their unique "person print", their DNA.
What feeds the monster…. oh we do.
Th ridiculous amount of press here in Australia about the poor US Florida woman Terri Schiavo who has been in a persistent vegetative state for 15 years and whether or not she should die or live, has had me stumped as this is not something new.
Then after seeing this article by Jon Carrol from Doc Searl’s site, it hit me. The media monster is hungry.
A quote from Jon’s article:
"Did any of them care about Terri Schiavo for the first 14.5 years of her vegetative state? They did not. Did they offer to pay for the extraordinary expense of keeping her alive? They did not. Did they sit by her bedside, read her books, play her music, bathe her bedsores? They did not. There’s nothing to be gained from unpublicized compassion"
Knowing that Markets are Conversations, don’t you think that it is scary that conversations can be started without any relevance or relativity.
All Terri Schiavo needs now, is prayer. That doesn’t need press or mass publicity.
Korean Government licenses land based mobile TV services
The Korean government has recently instigated a spectrum competition for land-based mobile television services. This will allow the country’s three main carriers to extend TV programmes to handsets.
Korean officials have dubbed mobile TV services as Digital Media Broadcasting (DMB). These services are designed to beam TV, audio, and data broadcasts to handheld devices via satellite or land-based TV airwaves.
A government run institute claims that it expects 400,000 customers in the first year of operation of these services. Subscription to these services will grow by 191% annually, gaining a total of 10.3 Million subscribers by 2010.
An interesting twist to this tale is that currently the Korean government broadcasting laws prevent TV stations for charging customers for accessing land-based broadcast signals, therefore the service will be free on mobile devices. Of course the incumbents are challenging this.
Industry watchers claim that the BMD services will attract a larger audience than its rival standard!
Photo blogging with Buzznet
Oliver Weidlich from Ideal Interfaces recommended I look at Buzznet which is yet another great photo blog site.
Some of their features
- Post images to the site with a single e-mail either via your desktop or mobile device.
- Syndicate your site via RSS
- Simple domain name access eg swilliamson.buzznet.com
- Has published APIs for developers to make their apps attach to the service.
- Ability to syndicate your galleries to other websites.
Great for keeping family & friends up to date, highly recommended.
HSDPA becomes reality in US
First pictures from PCMag of 3 new HSDPA devices for Cingular in the US.
2 of the handheld devices are from LG & Samsung. The data card from Sierra Wireless.
HSDPA will be launched by Cingular in the 3rd quarter of this year.
Phone + camcorder = Pantech Curitel’s PH-L4000V
From the "what will they think of next" category, A Korean company has slammed together a mobile phone, FM radio, MP3 player & video camcorder into one device. Very sexy too. Won’t be long before we get a coffee machine in there too!
The new media digital domain strikes back!
Cameron Reilly of The Podcast Network has issued a press release about recent news items regarding Australian radio barrons bemoaning the lack of government protection in transtioning their business from analogue to digital radio technology.
Quotes from lobby groups really outline the luddite mentality of taking Australian tax payer’s money to prop up & protect old world media……..
"Peak industry lobby group Commercial Radio Australia said it was increasingly difficult for analogue, free-to-air radio to compete for advertising revenue against interactive digital technologies like the internet."
Reilly draws his line in the sand.
“This is about the democratisation of radio. Traditionally, radio has been the domain of large companies and now they are trying to hide behind mother’s skirt, having recognised the threat they face from new media companies. They are waking up to the realisation that new technologies such as podcasting are serious competition with the ability to undermine their market share,” Mr Reilly said.
Hopefully others will take up their stance on this issue too……. in an online new media way 
I picked this up from 3GPortal this morning that ITFacts has some stats from recent Forrester Research:
- 1.5 Billion mobile telecom users worldwide
- 78% use GSM, 14% CDMA & 6% TDMA
- 5 Billion are within range of a public cellular network.
- 80% of the world’s population is covered by mobile networks.
- 25% of the world’s population are mobile users.
Now that’s a lot of mobilites!
Universal Convergence 