http://odeo.com/channels/4483-GigaOM GigaOM no Business, Internet, Technology & Strategy Business, Internet, Technology & Strategy Business, Internet, Technology & Strategy en 40 Fri, 13 Nov 2009 17:05:21 -0800 Fri, 13 Nov 2009 17:05:21 -0800 http://odeo.com/episodes/25448633-Soon-It-Will-Be-Cheaper-to-Compute-Than-to-Cache At the NewTeeVee Live conference in San Francisco yesterday, I interviewed Sam Blackman, co-founder and CEO of Elemental Technologies, about trends on computing and storage costs. Elemental makes software that takes advantage of graphics processors to provide super fast transcoding, which is the process by which video content is formatted for different devices. The idea of storing one copy of a piece of content and formatting it on the fly makes intuitive sense when compared to storing four or five copies of that content and then delivering it only when needed. But for now the cost of storing multiple copies is actually cheaper than doing the transcoding in real time. That difference in cost has been a barrier keeping some service providers from buying products that offer capabilities such as those of Elemental’s new server, which launched yesterday. However, Blackman believes that will change within the next three years as prices for processing fall faster than the price of s... At the NewTeeVee Live conference in San Francisco yesterday, I interviewed Sam Blackman, co-founder and CEO of Elemental Technologies, about trends on computing and storage costs. Elemental makes software that takes advantage of graphics processors to provide super fast transcoding, which is the process by which video content is formatted for different devices. The idea of storing one copy of a piece of content and formatting it on the fly makes intuitive sense when compared to storing four or five copies of that content and then delivering it only when needed. But for now the cost of storing multiple copies is actually cheaper than doing the transcoding in real time. That difference in cost has been a barrier keeping some service providers from buying products that offer capabilities such as those of Elemental’s new server, which launched yesterday. However, Blackman believes that will change within the next three years as prices for processing fall faster than the price of storage. A similar trend is enabling people to store more of their data online, rather than on their hard drives. The cost of bandwidth is so low that folks don’t mind either streaming content or looking it up online rather than downloading it and keeping it on their computers. Check out Blackman’s comments in the video below. At the NewTeeVee Live conference in San Francisco yesterday, I interviewed Sam Blackman, co-founder and CEO of Elemental Technologies, about trends on computing and storage costs. Elemental makes software that takes advantage of graphics processors to provide super fast transcoding, which is the process by which video content is formatted for different devices. The idea of storing one copy of a piece of content and formatting it on the fly makes intuitive sense when compared to storing four or five copies of that content and then delivering it only when needed. But for now the cost of storing multiple copies is actually cheaper than doing the transcoding in real time. That difference in cost has been a barrier keeping some service providers from buying products that offer capabilities such as those of Elemental’s new server, which launched yesterday. However, Blackman believes that will change within the next three years as prices for processing fall faster than the price of storage. A similar trend is enabling people to store more of their data online, rather than on their hard drives. The cost of bandwidth is so low that folks don’t mind either streaming content or looking it up online rather than downloading it and keeping it on their computers. Check out Blackman’s comments in the video below. tag:odeo.com,2009-11-13,25448633 Fri, 13 Nov 2009 17:05:21 -0800 no GigaOM infrastructure, transcoding, Elemental Technologies, Sam Blackman http://odeo.com/episodes/25448635-Thanks-to-Our-GigaOM-Sponsors We’d like to say thanks to this week’s GigaOM sponsors: PEER 1: Fully Scalable Hosting Solutions Concentric: Hosted IT Services Mozy: Simple, Automatic, Secure Online Backup SoftLayer: SoftLayer delivers on-demand virtual data center services and solutions. Salesforce: Force.com Cloud Platform PayPal: Innovate 09 – The Intersection of Ideas and Money We’d like to say thanks to this week’s GigaOM sponsors: PEER 1: Fully Scalable Hosting Solutions Concentric: Hosted IT Services Mozy: Simple, Automatic, Secure Online Backup SoftLayer: SoftLayer delivers on-demand virtual data center services and solutions. Salesforce: Force.com Cloud Platform PayPal: Innovate 09 – The Intersection of Ideas and Money We’d like to say thanks to this week’s GigaOM sponsors: PEER 1: Fully Scalable Hosting Solutions Concentric: Hosted IT Services Mozy: Simple, Automatic, Secure Online Backup SoftLayer: SoftLayer delivers on-demand virtual data center services and solutions. Salesforce: Force.com Cloud Platform PayPal: Innovate 09 – The Intersection of Ideas and Money tag:odeo.com,2009-11-13,25448635 Fri, 13 Nov 2009 17:00:54 -0800 no GigaOM sponsorthanks, @Not for Syndication http://odeo.com/episodes/25448638-Cupertino-You-Have-a-Problem If you’re a baseball fan like I am, then you know that it in order to win, teams need more than just marquee stars. The role players, pinch hitters and relievers — all have to contribute in order for a team to win. A weak link can blow a game. Same goes for companies — every member of the team has a role to play. Why do I bring this up? Apple’s iTunes App Store and its murky and muddled policies. Apple’s designers and engineers have done a good job putting together what is an iconic product, the iPhone. Its software gurus have helped foster the app revolution. But it when it come to the App Store approval process, Apple is blowing it. Let me put it in terms Apple and its management can understand: The foggy and opaque App Store approval process is as big a disaster as Dell’s DJ MP3 Player. For months now, I have watched the twists and turns of the Apple App Store drama with a degree of bemusement. After all, the rejection (or approval) of quirky and pointless apps ... If you’re a baseball fan like I am, then you know that it in order to win, teams need more than just marquee stars. The role players, pinch hitters and relievers — all have to contribute in order for a team to win. A weak link can blow a game. Same goes for companies — every member of the team has a role to play. Why do I bring this up? Apple’s iTunes App Store and its murky and muddled policies. Apple’s designers and engineers have done a good job putting together what is an iconic product, the iPhone. Its software gurus have helped foster the app revolution. But it when it come to the App Store approval process, Apple is blowing it. Let me put it in terms Apple and its management can understand: The foggy and opaque App Store approval process is as big a disaster as Dell’s DJ MP3 Player. For months now, I have watched the twists and turns of the Apple App Store drama with a degree of bemusement. After all, the rejection (or approval) of quirky and pointless apps aimed at hormone-challenged post-pubescent boys weren’t of concern to me. I couldn’t get upset over Google Voice fiasco, but that was understandable (not acceptable) because it was coming in the way of the carrier voice service.  But lately, things have gotten a bit out of control. The irrational approval process and reasons behind it given by the apparatchiks of Cupertino are driving developers to extreme frustration — especially those who have been Apple loyalists for years. Earlier this week, Joe Hewitt, a well-known programmer and a Facebook employee, threw up his hands in frustration over Apple’s App Store approval process and said he wants to work on a different project. (Check out my video interview with Joe Hewitt.) No, Facebook isn’t killing its iPhone app — it is a corporation, after all, and will bend over backwards to appease Apple — but Hewitt is someone who’s made many vital contributions toward turning the iPhone into a major platform. He was carrying Apple’s water long before the rest of the 100,000 apps showed up, which is just one of the reasons why he was nominated to GigaOM’s Top 15 Mobile Influencers List earlier this year. When he speaks, I listen — plain and simple. And he expressed his anger in 140 characters. Today, Rogue Amoeba, a company that is well-known within the Apple community for its audio-focused products, is publicly beating its head against the Great Wall of Cupertino. Rogue Amoeba wanted to ship a bug fix for their app, Airfoil Speakers, but it took the better part of four months to get it approved. It was an arduous process, one that made the inner workings of the government bureaucracies look like a model of efficiency. The net-net, as described by company CEO Paul Kafasis in a blog post, is this: First, be aware that Apple is acting as a gatekeeper, and preventing you from getting the software that developers such as ourselves are trying to provide you. We wanted to ship a simple bug fix, and it took almost four months of slow replies, delays, and dithering by Apple. All the while, our buggy, and supposedly infringing version, was still available. There’s no other word for that but “broken.” Right now, however, the platform is a mess. The chorus of disenchanted developers is growing and we’re adding our voices as well. Rogue Amoeba no longer has any plans for additional iPhone applications, and updates to our existing iPhone applications will likely be rare. Others, such as programmer Jeff LaMarche, disagree with the disenchanted developers and have come to the defense of Apple. But I’m more inclined to side with Kafasis, as this is a problem that flares up more often than California wildfires. John Gruber, who pens the Daring Fireball blog and is one of the most respected Mac-related writers out there, offers a very balanced view of the situation — and finds Apple at fault. “At a certain point good developers are just going to say, ‘I don’t need this,’” Gruber writes. Gruber, as we’ve seen in the past, has the ear of the senior management at Apple. So perhaps his fair and balanced assessment is going to help Apple wake up from its stupor. Apple has a very serious problem on its hands, one that can derail its grand plan. It needs to fix this as quickly as possible. Otherwise the company is going to blow the game in the bottom of the ninth — much like the Phillies in Game 4 of the 2009 World Series. If you’re a baseball fan like I am, then you know that it in order to win, teams need more than just marquee stars. The role players, pinch hitters and relievers — all have to contribute in order for a team to win. A weak link can blow a game. Same goes for companies — every member of the team has a role to play. Why do I bring this up? Apple’s iTunes App Store and its murky and muddled policies. Apple’s designers and engineers have done a good job putting together what is an iconic product, the iPhone. Its software gurus have helped foster the app revolution. But it when it come to the App Store approval process, Apple is blowing it. Let me put it in terms Apple and its management can understand: The foggy and opaque App Store approval process is as big a disaster as Dell’s DJ MP3 Player. For months now, I have watched the twists and turns of the Apple App Store drama with a degree of bemusement. After all, the rejection (or approval) of quirky and pointless apps aimed at hormone-challenged post-pubescent boys weren’t of concern to me. I couldn’t get upset over Google Voice fiasco, but that was understandable (not acceptable) because it was coming in the way of the carrier voice service.  But lately, things have gotten a bit out of control. The irrational approval process and reasons behind it given by the apparatchiks of Cupertino are driving developers to extreme frustration — especially those who have been Apple loyalists for years. Earlier this week, Joe Hewitt, a well-known programmer and a Facebook employee, threw up his hands in frustration over Apple’s App Store approval process and said he wants to work on a different project. (Check out my video interview with Joe Hewitt.) No, Facebook isn’t killing its iPhone app — it is a corporation, after all, and will bend over backwards to appease Apple — but Hewitt is someone who’s made many vital contributions toward turning the iPhone into a major platform. He was carrying Apple’s water long before the rest of the 100,000 apps showed up, which is just one of the reasons why he was nominated to GigaOM’s Top 15 Mobile Influencers List earlier this year. When he speaks, I listen — plain and simple. And he expressed his anger in 140 characters. Today, Rogue Amoeba, a company that is well-known within the Apple community for its audio-focused products, is publicly beating its head against the Great Wall of Cupertino. Rogue Amoeba wanted to ship a bug fix for their app, Airfoil Speakers, but it took the better part of four months to get it approved. It was an arduous process, one that made the inner workings of the government bureaucracies look like a model of efficiency. The net-net, as described by company CEO Paul Kafasis in a blog post, is this: First, be aware that Apple is acting as a gatekeeper, and preventing you from getting the software that developers such as ourselves are trying to provide you. We wanted to ship a simple bug fix, and it took almost four months of slow replies, delays, and dithering by Apple. All the while, our buggy, and supposedly infringing version, was still available. There’s no other word for that but “broken.” Right now, however, the platform is a mess. The chorus of disenchanted developers is growing and we’re adding our voices as well. Rogue Amoeba no longer has any plans for additional iPhone applications, and updates to our existing iPhone applications will likely be rare. Others, such as programmer Jeff LaMarche, disagree with the disenchanted developers and have come to the defense of Apple. But I’m more inclined to side with Kafasis, as this is a problem that flares up more often than California wildfires. John Gruber, who pens the Daring Fireball blog and is one of the most respected Mac-related writers out there, offers a very balanced view of the situation — and finds Apple at fault. “At a certain point good developers are just going to say, ‘I don’t need this,’” Gruber writes. Gruber, as we’ve seen in the past, has the ear of the senior management at Apple. So perhaps his fair and balanced assessment is going to help Apple wake up from its stupor. Apple has a very serious problem on its hands, one that can derail its grand plan. It needs to fix this as quickly as possible. Otherwise the company is going to blow the game in the bottom of the ninth — much like the Phillies in Game 4 of the 2009 World Series. tag:odeo.com,2009-11-13,25448638 Fri, 13 Nov 2009 16:49:22 -0800 no GigaOM Mobile, featured http://odeo.com/episodes/25448640-BlackBerry-Will-Remain-Market-Leader-Through-2014-Analyst Google’s Android OS-based phones and Apple’s iPhone maybe get all the media love, but one analyst firm believes that it will be RIM’s BlackBerry that will be the smartphone king of the U.S. market in five years. Pyramid Research expects the device to be the biggest beneficiary of the move to smartphones. According to their research, smartphones represented 31 percent of the new handsets sold in the U.S. in 2009, more than double from 15 percent in 2007. They expect 60 percent of the new handsets to be sold in 2014 to be smartphones. The BlackBerry, which currently has 50 percent of the total U.S. smartphone market, will see that share decline to 37 percent, but the increase in terms of total smartphone sales is going to keep it ahead. Google’s Android OS-based phones and Apple’s iPhone maybe get all the media love, but one analyst firm believes that it will be RIM’s BlackBerry that will be the smartphone king of the U.S. market in five years. Pyramid Research expects the device to be the biggest beneficiary of the move to smartphones. According to their research, smartphones represented 31 percent of the new handsets sold in the U.S. in 2009, more than double from 15 percent in 2007. They expect 60 percent of the new handsets to be sold in 2014 to be smartphones. The BlackBerry, which currently has 50 percent of the total U.S. smartphone market, will see that share decline to 37 percent, but the increase in terms of total smartphone sales is going to keep it ahead. Google’s Android OS-based phones and Apple’s iPhone maybe get all the media love, but one analyst firm believes that it will be RIM’s BlackBerry that will be the smartphone king of the U.S. market in five years. Pyramid Research expects the device to be the biggest beneficiary of the move to smartphones. According to their research, smartphones represented 31 percent of the new handsets sold in the U.S. in 2009, more than double from 15 percent in 2007. They expect 60 percent of the new handsets to be sold in 2014 to be smartphones. The BlackBerry, which currently has 50 percent of the total U.S. smartphone market, will see that share decline to 37 percent, but the increase in terms of total smartphone sales is going to keep it ahead. tag:odeo.com,2009-11-13,25448640 Fri, 13 Nov 2009 12:57:12 -0800 no GigaOM iphone, RIM, android, Mobile, Blackberry, smartphone, mobile phones http://odeo.com/episodes/25447166-NewTeeVee-Live-Thank-You-All-for-the-Show Kevin Lynch, CTO of Adobe Systems one of our speakers. Photo by James Duncan Davidson, who snapped a whole bunch of photos that are available over on Flickr. Unlike the spritely young team members of NewTeeVee, I am dragging my feet after what was an intense day yesterday. Well actually I was having too much fun at our third consecutive sold-out NewTeeVee Live conference in San Francisco. Great speakers, great attendees and great curators — that is our magic formula for our events. I wanted to take a moment and thank everyone who attended the event for making it a success.   I enjoyed meeting many of you in person, and those of you I missed, well I’m only an email away. Thank you to our sponsors and our media partners for helping us with the event. A big shout-out to Lindsay Campbell, former host of “WallStrip,” for being the gracious MC. Lindsay Campbell, Former Host, WallStrip I also want to thank our friends at LiveStream for making the video availabl... Kevin Lynch, CTO of Adobe Systems one of our speakers. Photo by James Duncan Davidson, who snapped a whole bunch of photos that are available over on Flickr. Unlike the spritely young team members of NewTeeVee, I am dragging my feet after what was an intense day yesterday. Well actually I was having too much fun at our third consecutive sold-out NewTeeVee Live conference in San Francisco. Great speakers, great attendees and great curators — that is our magic formula for our events. I wanted to take a moment and thank everyone who attended the event for making it a success.   I enjoyed meeting many of you in person, and those of you I missed, well I’m only an email away. Thank you to our sponsors and our media partners for helping us with the event. A big shout-out to Lindsay Campbell, former host of “WallStrip,” for being the gracious MC. Lindsay Campbell, Former Host, WallStrip I also want to thank our friends at LiveStream for making the video available over the web and on the iPhone. I’ve never regretted partnering with such a great streaming service — they are the gold standard for live event video. We served up nearly 30,000 unique streams yesterday and today. Total time spent watch the stream: 671,000 minutes. Thank you Engadget, Comcast and Hacking Netflix for embedding our video stream. Liz & Chris have published a CliffNotes version of the day’s events and links to extensive media coverage generated by NewTeeVee Live, which has now become the must-attend gathering for the online video industry. Kevin Lynch, CTO of Adobe Systems one of our speakers. Photo by James Duncan Davidson, who snapped a whole bunch of photos that are available over on Flickr. Unlike the spritely young team members of NewTeeVee, I am dragging my feet after what was an intense day yesterday. Well actually I was having too much fun at our third consecutive sold-out NewTeeVee Live conference in San Francisco. Great speakers, great attendees and great curators — that is our magic formula for our events. I wanted to take a moment and thank everyone who attended the event for making it a success.   I enjoyed meeting many of you in person, and those of you I missed, well I’m only an email away. Thank you to our sponsors and our media partners for helping us with the event. A big shout-out to Lindsay Campbell, former host of “WallStrip,” for being the gracious MC. Lindsay Campbell, Former Host, WallStrip I also want to thank our friends at LiveStream for making the video available over the web and on the iPhone. I’ve never regretted partnering with such a great streaming service — they are the gold standard for live event video. We served up nearly 30,000 unique streams yesterday and today. Total time spent watch the stream: 671,000 minutes. Thank you Engadget, Comcast and Hacking Netflix for embedding our video stream. Liz & Chris have published a CliffNotes version of the day’s events and links to extensive media coverage generated by NewTeeVee Live, which has now become the must-attend gathering for the online video industry. tag:odeo.com,2009-11-13,25447166 Fri, 13 Nov 2009 11:54:30 -0800 no GigaOM Om's Stuff, newteevee live 2009 http://odeo.com/episodes/25447104-Using-Public-Wi-Fi-Hop-Into-a-Free-VPN-Tunnel-First I spent several hours during yesterday’s NewTeeVee Live conference at San Francisco’s Mission Bay Conference Center sitting at the press table with tech writers from various publications who were connecting to the open Wi-Fi network. Before I connected to the center’s hotspot, I loaded a VPN (virtual private network) application, which provides a secure, encrypted tunnel within which I use public Wi-Fi. The one I use happens to be custom and proprietary, and takes about 15 seconds to establish a connection that will keep me completely secure on an open network. I noticed, though, that while many of the writers at the conference were probably using firewalls, hardly any of them used VPNs to keep their Wi-Fi sessions completely secure. And these were tech writers. That’s a shame, because there are a lot of good, completely free VPN applications available. One of the best choices out there is OpenVPN, an open-source, cross-platform VPN solution. The freeware wor... I spent several hours during yesterday’s NewTeeVee Live conference at San Francisco’s Mission Bay Conference Center sitting at the press table with tech writers from various publications who were connecting to the open Wi-Fi network. Before I connected to the center’s hotspot, I loaded a VPN (virtual private network) application, which provides a secure, encrypted tunnel within which I use public Wi-Fi. The one I use happens to be custom and proprietary, and takes about 15 seconds to establish a connection that will keep me completely secure on an open network. I noticed, though, that while many of the writers at the conference were probably using firewalls, hardly any of them used VPNs to keep their Wi-Fi sessions completely secure. And these were tech writers. That’s a shame, because there are a lot of good, completely free VPN applications available. One of the best choices out there is OpenVPN, an open-source, cross-platform VPN solution. The freeware world, too, includes many VPN applications that users swear by, such as iPig from iOpus and the free version of LogMeIn’s Hamachi. Cisco’s cross-platform VPN client is also widely used, although note that it’s incompatible with some firewalls. Hotspot Shield is also well-liked by many Windows and Mac users. Windows 7 actually comes with a built-in Agile VPN client, but it’s not said to be as easy as many of the free, time-tested clients. Snow Leopard Server also offers VPN functionality, and previous versions of the Mac OS have included it. For many users, though, especially ones who don’t have access to help from an IT department, simple, free downloadable VPN solutions–which usually have intuitive interfaces–are great choices. VPN applications couldn’t be easier to use. Once installed, you simply sign in to them, and your online communications are routed through encrypted tunnels. Problems with particular VPN clients are typically the result of firewall-related conflicts, but you can easily find an app that works for you. As is always true with security software solutions, user apathy is the biggest problem of all. So the next time you use public Wi-Fi, make sure you hop into a secure VPN tunnel first. Do you use a VPN application that you like? I spent several hours during yesterday’s NewTeeVee Live conference at San Francisco’s Mission Bay Conference Center sitting at the press table with tech writers from various publications who were connecting to the open Wi-Fi network. Before I connected to the center’s hotspot, I loaded a VPN (virtual private network) application, which provides a secure, encrypted tunnel within which I use public Wi-Fi. The one I use happens to be custom and proprietary, and takes about 15 seconds to establish a connection that will keep me completely secure on an open network. I noticed, though, that while many of the writers at the conference were probably using firewalls, hardly any of them used VPNs to keep their Wi-Fi sessions completely secure. And these were tech writers. That’s a shame, because there are a lot of good, completely free VPN applications available. One of the best choices out there is OpenVPN, an open-source, cross-platform VPN solution. The freeware world, too, includes many VPN applications that users swear by, such as iPig from iOpus and the free version of LogMeIn’s Hamachi. Cisco’s cross-platform VPN client is also widely used, although note that it’s incompatible with some firewalls. Hotspot Shield is also well-liked by many Windows and Mac users. Windows 7 actually comes with a built-in Agile VPN client, but it’s not said to be as easy as many of the free, time-tested clients. Snow Leopard Server also offers VPN functionality, and previous versions of the Mac OS have included it. For many users, though, especially ones who don’t have access to help from an IT department, simple, free downloadable VPN solutions–which usually have intuitive interfaces–are great choices. VPN applications couldn’t be easier to use. Once installed, you simply sign in to them, and your online communications are routed through encrypted tunnels. Problems with particular VPN clients are typically the result of firewall-related conflicts, but you can easily find an app that works for you. As is always true with security software solutions, user apathy is the biggest problem of all. So the next time you use public Wi-Fi, make sure you hop into a secure VPN tunnel first. Do you use a VPN application that you like? tag:odeo.com,2009-11-13,25447104 Fri, 13 Nov 2009 11:05:34 -0800 no GigaOM wi-fi, Mobile, hotspots, vpn, hamachi, openvpn, Hotspot Shield, iPig http://odeo.com/episodes/25447105-Smartbooks-Have-to-Design-Their-Own-Market Qualcomm-powered Lenovo smartbook Qualcomm earlier this year introduced us to the smartbook concept. On paper, such a device sounds like the perfect bridge between a small smartphone and a clunky notebook — all-day battery life, a full keyboard and integrated data connectivity in an easy-to-carry package. Unfortunately, the best-laid plans often go awry, and the first expected smartbook looks like nothing more than an ARM-powered netbook running Linux. In order to carve out a market, smartbooks should offer the best features of the two devices they fit between. Smartbooks need all-day runtime, instant-on and smartphone connectivity melded with the keyboard and usability of a netbook. But at the same time, a successful smartbook must offer an advantage over these two devices — it must be usable, but not too big. Make the device too large and it will compete poorly against netbooks, which offer x86 program compatibility and nearly all-day runtime. That’s exactly what... Qualcomm-powered Lenovo smartbook Qualcomm earlier this year introduced us to the smartbook concept. On paper, such a device sounds like the perfect bridge between a small smartphone and a clunky notebook — all-day battery life, a full keyboard and integrated data connectivity in an easy-to-carry package. Unfortunately, the best-laid plans often go awry, and the first expected smartbook looks like nothing more than an ARM-powered netbook running Linux. In order to carve out a market, smartbooks should offer the best features of the two devices they fit between. Smartbooks need all-day runtime, instant-on and smartphone connectivity melded with the keyboard and usability of a netbook. But at the same time, a successful smartbook must offer an advantage over these two devices — it must be usable, but not too big. Make the device too large and it will compete poorly against netbooks, which offer x86 program compatibility and nearly all-day runtime. That’s exactly what I see in the first smartbook design — a netbook form factor that fails to take advantage of using a lower-powered ARM processor in a pocketable package. Image courtesy of Liliputing Qualcomm-powered Lenovo smartbook Qualcomm earlier this year introduced us to the smartbook concept. On paper, such a device sounds like the perfect bridge between a small smartphone and a clunky notebook — all-day battery life, a full keyboard and integrated data connectivity in an easy-to-carry package. Unfortunately, the best-laid plans often go awry, and the first expected smartbook looks like nothing more than an ARM-powered netbook running Linux. In order to carve out a market, smartbooks should offer the best features of the two devices they fit between. Smartbooks need all-day runtime, instant-on and smartphone connectivity melded with the keyboard and usability of a netbook. But at the same time, a successful smartbook must offer an advantage over these two devices — it must be usable, but not too big. Make the device too large and it will compete poorly against netbooks, which offer x86 program compatibility and nearly all-day runtime. That’s exactly what I see in the first smartbook design — a netbook form factor that fails to take advantage of using a lower-powered ARM processor in a pocketable package. Image courtesy of Liliputing tag:odeo.com,2009-11-13,25447105 Fri, 13 Nov 2009 10:30:27 -0800 no GigaOM hardware http://odeo.com/episodes/25447106-Will-We-See-Chrome-Devices-This-Holiday-Season Google continues to pursue its ambitious Chrome agenda, confirming it will release a beta version of the Chrome browser for Mac in the next few weeks and reportedly preparing to make the OS available via download within days. The question for on-the-go tech geeks, though, is what kind of devices  we’ll see for the downloadable OS, and when. Google has said it’s working on Chrome OS with a host of hardware vendors including Acer, Hewlett-Packard, Lenovo, Qualcomm, Texas Instruments and Toshiba. And as James noted several weeks ago (GigaOM Pro, subscription req.), the platform  is being developed specifically for the netbook segment, leveraging a bare-bones interface optimized for performance — not frills. Google said earlier this year that netbooks running the OS wouldn’t be available until the second half of 2010, but that it would open source the code for download by the end of 2009. Despite all the hype surrounding Chrome — and the heavy-hitters teami... Google continues to pursue its ambitious Chrome agenda, confirming it will release a beta version of the Chrome browser for Mac in the next few weeks and reportedly preparing to make the OS available via download within days. The question for on-the-go tech geeks, though, is what kind of devices  we’ll see for the downloadable OS, and when. Google has said it’s working on Chrome OS with a host of hardware vendors including Acer, Hewlett-Packard, Lenovo, Qualcomm, Texas Instruments and Toshiba. And as James noted several weeks ago (GigaOM Pro, subscription req.), the platform  is being developed specifically for the netbook segment, leveraging a bare-bones interface optimized for performance — not frills. Google said earlier this year that netbooks running the OS wouldn’t be available until the second half of 2010, but that it would open source the code for download by the end of 2009. Despite all the hype surrounding Chrome — and the heavy-hitters teaming with Google on the project — the OS is likely to make a quiet debut and be targeted at a small number of devices. But Acer and Lenovo are rumored to be preparing to launch Chrome OS devices, Nvidia is working on Chrome OS Tegra devices, and as TechCrunch suggested, Eee PC netbooks could be endorsed by Google as Chrome-ready. If the Chrome OS’ debut comes off without a hitch, there’s a chance we could even see some hardware support for it in time for the holidays. Google continues to pursue its ambitious Chrome agenda, confirming it will release a beta version of the Chrome browser for Mac in the next few weeks and reportedly preparing to make the OS available via download within days. The question for on-the-go tech geeks, though, is what kind of devices  we’ll see for the downloadable OS, and when. Google has said it’s working on Chrome OS with a host of hardware vendors including Acer, Hewlett-Packard, Lenovo, Qualcomm, Texas Instruments and Toshiba. And as James noted several weeks ago (GigaOM Pro, subscription req.), the platform  is being developed specifically for the netbook segment, leveraging a bare-bones interface optimized for performance — not frills. Google said earlier this year that netbooks running the OS wouldn’t be available until the second half of 2010, but that it would open source the code for download by the end of 2009. Despite all the hype surrounding Chrome — and the heavy-hitters teaming with Google on the project — the OS is likely to make a quiet debut and be targeted at a small number of devices. But Acer and Lenovo are rumored to be preparing to launch Chrome OS devices, Nvidia is working on Chrome OS Tegra devices, and as TechCrunch suggested, Eee PC netbooks could be endorsed by Google as Chrome-ready. If the Chrome OS’ debut comes off without a hitch, there’s a chance we could even see some hardware support for it in time for the holidays. tag:odeo.com,2009-11-13,25447106 Fri, 13 Nov 2009 10:00:25 -0800 no GigaOM google, hardware, infrastructure, oses, Chrome http://odeo.com/episodes/25447107-Verizon-May-Cozy-Up-to-the-RIAA Verizon may be joining the ranks of Internet service providers that send subscribers who illegally download or upload music files notices on behalf of the Recording Industry of America, according to sources who spoke with CNet. Verizon has not responded to my questions on this issue, but the CNet story says the letters will only notify subscribers that they may have erred; it will not threaten them with disconnection. We covered this trend last March when AT&T began experimenting with these letters: AT&T reached out today to let me know that it doesn’t issue take-down notices to its subscribers, but merely forwards the notice from the copyright owner along with an AT&T cover letter. The cover letter informs the subscriber without actually accusing them of illegal activity how they might find themselves in the position of receiving such a letter, and reminds them of AT&T’s terms of service that prohibit sharing copyrighted material. If Verizon does plan to send notice... Verizon may be joining the ranks of Internet service providers that send subscribers who illegally download or upload music files notices on behalf of the Recording Industry of America, according to sources who spoke with CNet. Verizon has not responded to my questions on this issue, but the CNet story says the letters will only notify subscribers that they may have erred; it will not threaten them with disconnection. We covered this trend last March when AT&T began experimenting with these letters: AT&T reached out today to let me know that it doesn’t issue take-down notices to its subscribers, but merely forwards the notice from the copyright owner along with an AT&T cover letter. The cover letter informs the subscriber without actually accusing them of illegal activity how they might find themselves in the position of receiving such a letter, and reminds them of AT&T’s terms of service that prohibit sharing copyrighted material. If Verizon does plan to send notices on behalf of the RIAA or other rights organizations, it’s most likely because the ISP wants to get on the good side of content owners that it needs to make deals with in order to offer compelling content via its IPTV and even its broadband products. Is this the beginning of a three-strikes policy, whereby those accused of pirating content may find themselves disconnected, or is this is merely an effort to placate content owners? Verizon may be joining the ranks of Internet service providers that send subscribers who illegally download or upload music files notices on behalf of the Recording Industry of America, according to sources who spoke with CNet. Verizon has not responded to my questions on this issue, but the CNet story says the letters will only notify subscribers that they may have erred; it will not threaten them with disconnection. We covered this trend last March when AT&T began experimenting with these letters: AT&T reached out today to let me know that it doesn’t issue take-down notices to its subscribers, but merely forwards the notice from the copyright owner along with an AT&T cover letter. The cover letter informs the subscriber without actually accusing them of illegal activity how they might find themselves in the position of receiving such a letter, and reminds them of AT&T’s terms of service that prohibit sharing copyrighted material. If Verizon does plan to send notices on behalf of the RIAA or other rights organizations, it’s most likely because the ISP wants to get on the good side of content owners that it needs to make deals with in order to offer compelling content via its IPTV and even its broadband products. Is this the beginning of a three-strikes policy, whereby those accused of pirating content may find themselves disconnected, or is this is merely an effort to placate content owners? tag:odeo.com,2009-11-13,25447107 Fri, 13 Nov 2009 09:14:29 -0800 no GigaOM verizon, Broadband, riaa, t, at&t, VZ http://odeo.com/episodes/25447108-What-to-read-on-the-GigaOM-network Practical H1N1 prevention strategies for web workers (WebWorkerDaily) Droid grabs chunk of U.S. mobile Internet usage at launch (jkOnTheRun) Photos: Coda gets feisty, gives electric sedan a minor makeover (Earth2Tech) Linux advisory board elects new members (OStatic) Apple launches iTunes Preview (TheAppleBlog) NewTeeVee Live: The CliffsNotes version (NewTeeVee) Practical H1N1 prevention strategies for web workers (WebWorkerDaily) Droid grabs chunk of U.S. mobile Internet usage at launch (jkOnTheRun) Photos: Coda gets feisty, gives electric sedan a minor makeover (Earth2Tech) Linux advisory board elects new members (OStatic) Apple launches iTunes Preview (TheAppleBlog) NewTeeVee Live: The CliffsNotes version (NewTeeVee) Practical H1N1 prevention strategies for web workers (WebWorkerDaily) Droid grabs chunk of U.S. mobile Internet usage at launch (jkOnTheRun) Photos: Coda gets feisty, gives electric sedan a minor makeover (Earth2Tech) Linux advisory board elects new members (OStatic) Apple launches iTunes Preview (TheAppleBlog) NewTeeVee Live: The CliffsNotes version (NewTeeVee) tag:odeo.com,2009-11-13,25447108 Fri, 13 Nov 2009 09:12:27 -0800 no GigaOM GigaNET http://odeo.com/episodes/25447109-comcastcares-Dishes-on-His-Top-Twitter-Apps Om and Frank Eliason of Comcast Om and I met Wednesday night with Frank Eliason of Comcast, better known as the person behind @comcastcares. Eliason is a genuinely cool guy who started out as the person solely responsible for handling Comcast complaints on Twitter, and who now has a staff of 10. Each day, he and his staff look over some 10,000 blog posts, handle countless tweets — and then seek to do something about any problems. Since he’s such a Twitter power user, I asked him what his favorite applications for the micromessaging site were. He said the original Twitter web site is his favorite, but he’s also a fan of Simply Tweet on his iPhone because he likes the push notifications. PeopleBrowsr, an app that helps businesses mine information from Twitter, is another one he uses heavily. As for CoTweet, which is in the news right now for charging businesses $1,500 a month to find information on the service, he said he wasn’t initially a fan, but that ever s... Om and Frank Eliason of Comcast Om and I met Wednesday night with Frank Eliason of Comcast, better known as the person behind @comcastcares. Eliason is a genuinely cool guy who started out as the person solely responsible for handling Comcast complaints on Twitter, and who now has a staff of 10. Each day, he and his staff look over some 10,000 blog posts, handle countless tweets — and then seek to do something about any problems. Since he’s such a Twitter power user, I asked him what his favorite applications for the micromessaging site were. He said the original Twitter web site is his favorite, but he’s also a fan of Simply Tweet on his iPhone because he likes the push notifications. PeopleBrowsr, an app that helps businesses mine information from Twitter, is another one he uses heavily. As for CoTweet, which is in the news right now for charging businesses $1,500 a month to find information on the service, he said he wasn’t initially a fan, but that ever since the company has modified the application to keep track of conversations between two users over time, he’s been turning to it more frequently. The ubiquitous TweetDeck isn’t something Eliason uses, but he says some of his staff love it. Our conversation was brief as he had to rush off to meet some of his Comcast customers (he notified them of his presence in San Francisco via Twitter) — a reminder that while online interactions are a nice way to initiate relationships, face-to-face meetings are still necessary to cement them. Om and Frank Eliason of Comcast Om and I met Wednesday night with Frank Eliason of Comcast, better known as the person behind @comcastcares. Eliason is a genuinely cool guy who started out as the person solely responsible for handling Comcast complaints on Twitter, and who now has a staff of 10. Each day, he and his staff look over some 10,000 blog posts, handle countless tweets — and then seek to do something about any problems. Since he’s such a Twitter power user, I asked him what his favorite applications for the micromessaging site were. He said the original Twitter web site is his favorite, but he’s also a fan of Simply Tweet on his iPhone because he likes the push notifications. PeopleBrowsr, an app that helps businesses mine information from Twitter, is another one he uses heavily. As for CoTweet, which is in the news right now for charging businesses $1,500 a month to find information on the service, he said he wasn’t initially a fan, but that ever since the company has modified the application to keep track of conversations between two users over time, he’s been turning to it more frequently. The ubiquitous TweetDeck isn’t something Eliason uses, but he says some of his staff love it. Our conversation was brief as he had to rush off to meet some of his Comcast customers (he notified them of his presence in San Francisco via Twitter) — a reminder that while online interactions are a nice way to initiate relationships, face-to-face meetings are still necessary to cement them. tag:odeo.com,2009-11-13,25447109 Fri, 13 Nov 2009 08:00:23 -0800 no GigaOM web, twitter, Startups, comcast, CMCSA, peoplebrowsr, Co-Tweet, Frank Eliason http://odeo.com/episodes/25447110-Dell-Wisely-Chooses-Emerging-Markets-for-Smartphone-Play Dell Mini 3 Dell has finally made its smartphone play official, saying it will target users in Brazil and China with a new Android-based handset dubbed the Mini 3 by the end of the year. It’s a smart strategy — the company’s existing presence in both countries could make for a smooth entry into the cutthroat smartphone space. The Round Rock, Texas-based computer vendor said it will release the Mini 3 through China Mobile later this month; the phone will be available through the Brazilian operator Claro by the end of the year. The announcement ends two years of rumors of a Dell smartphone. The company offered few details about the handset other than the fact that it rocks a three-and-a-half-inch high-definition screen and forgoes a physical keyboard in favor of a touchscreen. While a move into mobile is overdue, Dell faces a daunting task in differentiating itself from the increasingly crowded Android bandwagon. But the company is wise to enter the difficult Chinese... Dell Mini 3 Dell has finally made its smartphone play official, saying it will target users in Brazil and China with a new Android-based handset dubbed the Mini 3 by the end of the year. It’s a smart strategy — the company’s existing presence in both countries could make for a smooth entry into the cutthroat smartphone space. The Round Rock, Texas-based computer vendor said it will release the Mini 3 through China Mobile later this month; the phone will be available through the Brazilian operator Claro by the end of the year. The announcement ends two years of rumors of a Dell smartphone. The company offered few details about the handset other than the fact that it rocks a three-and-a-half-inch high-definition screen and forgoes a physical keyboard in favor of a touchscreen. While a move into mobile is overdue, Dell faces a daunting task in differentiating itself from the increasingly crowded Android bandwagon. But the company is wise to enter the difficult Chinese market with China Mobile, which claims 500 million subscribers and — more importantly — with which it already has an established relationship. Dell earlier this year became the first mobile PC manufacturer to embed China Mobile’s 3G technology and services into its netbooks and, according to the company, has become the leading seller of netbooks through retail outlets in China. Dell also has a longstanding presence in Brazil, where it opened a $100 million-plus plant two years ago. The relationship with China Mobile will be particularly crucial as Dell enters the smartphone space. China’s position as the world’s largest mobile market is well documented, but the region is teaming with potential pitfalls, including an active gray market and heavy government regulation. Apple is quickly — and painfully — becoming familiar with such hurdles via the Chinese launch of the iPhone. If Dell can leverage its existing relationships in China, the company could quickly establish a foothold in a massive market. And that foothold could be the first step in building a global presence in the increasingly competitive smartphone segment. Dell Mini 3 Dell has finally made its smartphone play official, saying it will target users in Brazil and China with a new Android-based handset dubbed the Mini 3 by the end of the year. It’s a smart strategy — the company’s existing presence in both countries could make for a smooth entry into the cutthroat smartphone space. The Round Rock, Texas-based computer vendor said it will release the Mini 3 through China Mobile later this month; the phone will be available through the Brazilian operator Claro by the end of the year. The announcement ends two years of rumors of a Dell smartphone. The company offered few details about the handset other than the fact that it rocks a three-and-a-half-inch high-definition screen and forgoes a physical keyboard in favor of a touchscreen. While a move into mobile is overdue, Dell faces a daunting task in differentiating itself from the increasingly crowded Android bandwagon. But the company is wise to enter the difficult Chinese market with China Mobile, which claims 500 million subscribers and — more importantly — with which it already has an established relationship. Dell earlier this year became the first mobile PC manufacturer to embed China Mobile’s 3G technology and services into its netbooks and, according to the company, has become the leading seller of netbooks through retail outlets in China. Dell also has a longstanding presence in Brazil, where it opened a $100 million-plus plant two years ago. The relationship with China Mobile will be particularly crucial as Dell enters the smartphone space. China’s position as the world’s largest mobile market is well documented, but the region is teaming with potential pitfalls, including an active gray market and heavy government regulation. Apple is quickly — and painfully — becoming familiar with such hurdles via the Chinese launch of the iPhone. If Dell can leverage its existing relationships in China, the company could quickly establish a foothold in a massive market. And that foothold could be the first step in building a global presence in the increasingly competitive smartphone segment. tag:odeo.com,2009-11-13,25447110 Fri, 13 Nov 2009 07:07:21 -0800 no GigaOM android, dell, China, smartphones, mobile phones http://odeo.com/episodes/25447111-Apple-Has-Sold-30-000-iPhones-So-Far-in-China Apple is expected to ship 11 million million iPhones this quarter, and is banking on China for continued growth, according to an analyst note issued today. Daniel Amir, director and senior research analyst of semiconductors at Lazard Capital Markets, cited China Unicom as sayings it’s sold some 30,000 iPhones in the country since the iconic handset’s launch there on Oct. 30. However, in light of the phone’s high price tag, he isn’t so sanguine about Apple’s prospects in China going forward. From the note: In October, iPhone shipment to China reached 700K units even though sell-through has been much lower largely due to the high price point. Apple is likely to continue diverting 10% of the iPhone build to the Chinese market, as the opportunity for China could be significant to future growth of the iPhone. … Overall, in our opinion, the high price point remains a barrier for further iPhone adoption and the current run rate is below expectations. Eve... Apple is expected to ship 11 million million iPhones this quarter, and is banking on China for continued growth, according to an analyst note issued today. Daniel Amir, director and senior research analyst of semiconductors at Lazard Capital Markets, cited China Unicom as sayings it’s sold some 30,000 iPhones in the country since the iconic handset’s launch there on Oct. 30. However, in light of the phone’s high price tag, he isn’t so sanguine about Apple’s prospects in China going forward. From the note: In October, iPhone shipment to China reached 700K units even though sell-through has been much lower largely due to the high price point. Apple is likely to continue diverting 10% of the iPhone build to the Chinese market, as the opportunity for China could be significant to future growth of the iPhone. … Overall, in our opinion, the high price point remains a barrier for further iPhone adoption and the current run rate is below expectations. Even if Apple can’t keep growing sales significantly through China, it need only wait until its exclusivity agreements are over to keep its sales on the up and up. Apple is expected to ship 11 million million iPhones this quarter, and is banking on China for continued growth, according to an analyst note issued today. Daniel Amir, director and senior research analyst of semiconductors at Lazard Capital Markets, cited China Unicom as sayings it’s sold some 30,000 iPhones in the country since the iconic handset’s launch there on Oct. 30. However, in light of the phone’s high price tag, he isn’t so sanguine about Apple’s prospects in China going forward. From the note: In October, iPhone shipment to China reached 700K units even though sell-through has been much lower largely due to the high price point. Apple is likely to continue diverting 10% of the iPhone build to the Chinese market, as the opportunity for China could be significant to future growth of the iPhone. … Overall, in our opinion, the high price point remains a barrier for further iPhone adoption and the current run rate is below expectations. Even if Apple can’t keep growing sales significantly through China, it need only wait until its exclusivity agreements are over to keep its sales on the up and up. tag:odeo.com,2009-11-13,25447111 Fri, 13 Nov 2009 07:00:44 -0800 no GigaOM iphone, apple, Mobile, aapl, Lazard http://odeo.com/episodes/25443797-Say-Hello-to-Devicescape-Wi-Fi-for-Nokia-Android Devicescape is hoping to meet smartphone users’ increasing demand for Wi-Fi access by broadening support for its Easy Wi-Fi Network to include Nokia and Android-based handsets — beyond currently supported platforms such as iPhone OS, Windows Mobile, Windows and Mac OS X. Given Nokia’s impressive worldwide footprint and Android’s newfound momentum, the move, announced today, should help Devicescape build its customer base in a big way — which will be crucial as the company goes after hardware vendors. Devicescape said users can download an app from the Android Market or Nokia’s Ovi to access hundreds of thousands of free Wi-Fi hotspots; the app also includes a map view for locating Easy Wi-Fi locations. The San Bruno, Calif.-based startup, which launched its network last month, competes with service providers such as Boingo Wireless and iPass. Unlike its competition, though, the startup is hoping to cash in on the increasing demand for seamless con... Devicescape is hoping to meet smartphone users’ increasing demand for Wi-Fi access by broadening support for its Easy Wi-Fi Network to include Nokia and Android-based handsets — beyond currently supported platforms such as iPhone OS, Windows Mobile, Windows and Mac OS X. Given Nokia’s impressive worldwide footprint and Android’s newfound momentum, the move, announced today, should help Devicescape build its customer base in a big way — which will be crucial as the company goes after hardware vendors. Devicescape said users can download an app from the Android Market or Nokia’s Ovi to access hundreds of thousands of free Wi-Fi hotspots; the app also includes a map view for locating Easy Wi-Fi locations. The San Bruno, Calif.-based startup, which launched its network last month, competes with service providers such as Boingo Wireless and iPass. Unlike its competition, though, the startup is hoping to cash in on the increasing demand for seamless connectivity by targeting the makers of smartphones, netbooks, digital readers and other connected devices. Devicescape is hoping to meet smartphone users’ increasing demand for Wi-Fi access by broadening support for its Easy Wi-Fi Network to include Nokia and Android-based handsets — beyond currently supported platforms such as iPhone OS, Windows Mobile, Windows and Mac OS X. Given Nokia’s impressive worldwide footprint and Android’s newfound momentum, the move, announced today, should help Devicescape build its customer base in a big way — which will be crucial as the company goes after hardware vendors. Devicescape said users can download an app from the Android Market or Nokia’s Ovi to access hundreds of thousands of free Wi-Fi hotspots; the app also includes a map view for locating Easy Wi-Fi locations. The San Bruno, Calif.-based startup, which launched its network last month, competes with service providers such as Boingo Wireless and iPass. Unlike its competition, though, the startup is hoping to cash in on the increasing demand for seamless connectivity by targeting the makers of smartphones, netbooks, digital readers and other connected devices. tag:odeo.com,2009-11-12,25443797 Thu, 12 Nov 2009 14:52:14 -0800 no GigaOM wi-fi, Mobile, Devicescape http://odeo.com/episodes/25443798-Netflix-Is-the-iPod-of-Broadband Netflix CEO Reed Hastings shed a little light on the actual costs of streaming, speaking at the NewTeeVee Live conference today in San Francisco, and put to lie the idea that ISPs are suffering from higher costs to deliver video to end users. When asked about his bandwidth costs and the price of delivering steaming media, he didn’t disclose the costs, but said they were falling thanks to the effect of Moore’s law. He pointed out that Amazon charges about 5 cents a gigabyte for bandwidth — or about a nickel a movie — as proof of the low costs. “What we’ve seen is bandwidth costs falling exponentially in the last five years. What’s funding the whole system is the users paying $40 to $60 a month,” Hastings said. He was referring to the monthly subscription fees charged by broadband service providers. Hastings also pointed out that Netflix may compete with cable and IPTV video providers on the video side, but that services like his streami... Netflix CEO Reed Hastings shed a little light on the actual costs of streaming, speaking at the NewTeeVee Live conference today in San Francisco, and put to lie the idea that ISPs are suffering from higher costs to deliver video to end users. When asked about his bandwidth costs and the price of delivering steaming media, he didn’t disclose the costs, but said they were falling thanks to the effect of Moore’s law. He pointed out that Amazon charges about 5 cents a gigabyte for bandwidth — or about a nickel a movie — as proof of the low costs. “What we’ve seen is bandwidth costs falling exponentially in the last five years. What’s funding the whole system is the users paying $40 to $60 a month,” Hastings said. He was referring to the monthly subscription fees charged by broadband service providers. Hastings also pointed out that Netflix may compete with cable and IPTV video providers on the video side, but that services like his streaming video offering are driving demand for cable’s high-speed Internet products. Calling it a halo effect, and comparing it to Apple’s ability to sell more Macs after folks snapped up iPods, Hastings said the primary reason for anyone to subscribe to 20Mbps service is to watch video, not send emails faster. This prompted Om to ask, “So, is Netflix the iPod of broadband?” Netflix CEO Reed Hastings shed a little light on the actual costs of streaming, speaking at the NewTeeVee Live conference today in San Francisco, and put to lie the idea that ISPs are suffering from higher costs to deliver video to end users. When asked about his bandwidth costs and the price of delivering steaming media, he didn’t disclose the costs, but said they were falling thanks to the effect of Moore’s law. He pointed out that Amazon charges about 5 cents a gigabyte for bandwidth — or about a nickel a movie — as proof of the low costs. “What we’ve seen is bandwidth costs falling exponentially in the last five years. What’s funding the whole system is the users paying $40 to $60 a month,” Hastings said. He was referring to the monthly subscription fees charged by broadband service providers. Hastings also pointed out that Netflix may compete with cable and IPTV video providers on the video side, but that services like his streaming video offering are driving demand for cable’s high-speed Internet products. Calling it a halo effect, and comparing it to Apple’s ability to sell more Macs after folks snapped up iPods, Hastings said the primary reason for anyone to subscribe to 20Mbps service is to watch video, not send emails faster. This prompted Om to ask, “So, is Netflix the iPod of broadband?” tag:odeo.com,2009-11-12,25443798 Thu, 12 Nov 2009 13:37:32 -0800 no GigaOM Media, Amazon, netflix, AMZN, NTFL http://odeo.com/episodes/25443799-With-iTunes%E2%80%99-Variable-Pricing-Fewer-Hit-Song-Sales-Still-Mean-More-Money-For-Apple When it comes to selling a song online, 30 cents means a lot. Sales of hit songs in Apple’s iTunes store have dipped 6 percent since April, in part due to a new variable song pricing structure that has driven up the price of most hits to $1.29, data from a new study by Billboard’s Glenn Peoples shows. But popular tracks by Lady GaGa, Miley Cyrus and their ilk are keeping their market share in comparison with the remainder of the music market, and Apple’s revenue from sales of the more expensive hit songs appears to be rising faster than consumers are turning away. For Apple and other retailers testing variable pricing in the digital music marketplace, the early returns suggest that their six-month-long experiment is succeeding — and generating more revenue for labels and rights holders as well. Hit songs account for more of the overall music marketplace today than they did five years ago, with the top 200 songs now making up more than one-sixth of digital tra... When it comes to selling a song online, 30 cents means a lot. Sales of hit songs in Apple’s iTunes store have dipped 6 percent since April, in part due to a new variable song pricing structure that has driven up the price of most hits to $1.29, data from a new study by Billboard’s Glenn Peoples shows. But popular tracks by Lady GaGa, Miley Cyrus and their ilk are keeping their market share in comparison with the remainder of the music market, and Apple’s revenue from sales of the more expensive hit songs appears to be rising faster than consumers are turning away. For Apple and other retailers testing variable pricing in the digital music marketplace, the early returns suggest that their six-month-long experiment is succeeding — and generating more revenue for labels and rights holders as well. Hit songs account for more of the overall music marketplace today than they did five years ago, with the top 200 songs now making up more than one-sixth of digital track sales, Peoples writes in his extensive piece concerning sales patterns of hit records vs. works by less popular “long tail” artists. But the advent of variable pricing, which has boosted the price of most hit songs from 99 cents to $1.29 in Apple’s store, seems to have affected sales of hit songs over the past few months. “Higher prices have depressed sales of hits — in terms of units, not revenue,” he says. (Think of  a teenager using up a $25 gift card, and receiving 19 hit songs instead of 25.) Ultimately, he writes, “many music fans aren’t shunning hits because they don’t like them but because the price rose by 30 cents.” A little quick math implies that Apple is reaping larger rewards by increasing the price of hit songs by about 30 percent. By my count, only 2 of the current top 50 songs, and 26 of the top 200, in the iTunes Store are still priced at 99 cents, with the remainder at $1.29. If the average price of a top-200 hit is therefore about $1.25, and track sales among the top 200 have fallen by 6 percent, sales revenue from hit songs would still be up by at least 18 percent compared with an all 99-cent store. Apple also reduced the price of another subset of its songs in its store to 69 cents in April, and has seen a bump in overall transactions per user since that time, so its experiment may be working on both ends. (The majority are still priced at 99 cents.) Other retailers such as Amazon.com, RealNetworks’ Rhapsody and Lala.com have begun using variable pricing in their MP3 stores as well, and Lala CEO Geoff Ralston mentioned to me recently that the company would consider variable pricing for its “web songs,” permanent streaming songs that now cost 10 cents apiece. The data suggests that even if some frustrated consumers are tuning out on higher-priced songs, Apple is still gaining more than it loses from the new pricing structure. When it comes to selling a song online, 30 cents means a lot. Sales of hit songs in Apple’s iTunes store have dipped 6 percent since April, in part due to a new variable song pricing structure that has driven up the price of most hits to $1.29, data from a new study by Billboard’s Glenn Peoples shows. But popular tracks by Lady GaGa, Miley Cyrus and their ilk are keeping their market share in comparison with the remainder of the music market, and Apple’s revenue from sales of the more expensive hit songs appears to be rising faster than consumers are turning away. For Apple and other retailers testing variable pricing in the digital music marketplace, the early returns suggest that their six-month-long experiment is succeeding — and generating more revenue for labels and rights holders as well. Hit songs account for more of the overall music marketplace today than they did five years ago, with the top 200 songs now making up more than one-sixth of digital track sales, Peoples writes in his extensive piece concerning sales patterns of hit records vs. works by less popular “long tail” artists. But the advent of variable pricing, which has boosted the price of most hit songs from 99 cents to $1.29 in Apple’s store, seems to have affected sales of hit songs over the past few months. “Higher prices have depressed sales of hits — in terms of units, not revenue,” he says. (Think of  a teenager using up a $25 gift card, and receiving 19 hit songs instead of 25.) Ultimately, he writes, “many music fans aren’t shunning hits because they don’t like them but because the price rose by 30 cents.” A little quick math implies that Apple is reaping larger rewards by increasing the price of hit songs by about 30 percent. By my count, only 2 of the current top 50 songs, and 26 of the top 200, in the iTunes Store are still priced at 99 cents, with the remainder at $1.29. If the average price of a top-200 hit is therefore about $1.25, and track sales among the top 200 have fallen by 6 percent, sales revenue from hit songs would still be up by at least 18 percent compared with an all 99-cent store. Apple also reduced the price of another subset of its songs in its store to 69 cents in April, and has seen a bump in overall transactions per user since that time, so its experiment may be working on both ends. (The majority are still priced at 99 cents.) Other retailers such as Amazon.com, RealNetworks’ Rhapsody and Lala.com have begun using variable pricing in their MP3 stores as well, and Lala CEO Geoff Ralston mentioned to me recently that the company would consider variable pricing for its “web songs,” permanent streaming songs that now cost 10 cents apiece. The data suggests that even if some frustrated consumers are tuning out on higher-priced songs, Apple is still gaining more than it loses from the new pricing structure. tag:odeo.com,2009-11-12,25443799 Thu, 12 Nov 2009 12:49:24 -0800 no GigaOM music, apple, variable pricing http://odeo.com/episodes/25442567-How-to-Watch-NewTeeVee-Live-From-Your-iPhone Livestreaming is all the rage today, be it from a handset or home computer with a webcam. But one of the major challenges is how to view that live content on a handset. Wouldn’t it be nice if a company could provide a method for livestreaming to mobiles without a lengthy re-encoding process? Lo and behold, enter Livestream, which today announced its Procaster beta application for Mac and PC at NewTeeVee Live, our annual online video industry conference. Using the iPhone’s native H.264 HTTP streaming, Procaster allows for near-instant broadcasting to iPhones — there’s roughly a 20-second delay from live broadcast to the devices, and multiple handsets can tune into the same stream. Watch NTV Live by clicking here or going to iphone.livestream.com. Here’s a video demo to see how Procaster works: I took the Procaster software for a short test drive, and I was broadcasting live from my Mac in under five minutes using an integrated webcam and microphone. Proc... Livestreaming is all the rage today, be it from a handset or home computer with a webcam. But one of the major challenges is how to view that live content on a handset. Wouldn’t it be nice if a company could provide a method for livestreaming to mobiles without a lengthy re-encoding process? Lo and behold, enter Livestream, which today announced its Procaster beta application for Mac and PC at NewTeeVee Live, our annual online video industry conference. Using the iPhone’s native H.264 HTTP streaming, Procaster allows for near-instant broadcasting to iPhones — there’s roughly a 20-second delay from live broadcast to the devices, and multiple handsets can tune into the same stream. Watch NTV Live by clicking here or going to iphone.livestream.com. Here’s a video demo to see how Procaster works: I took the Procaster software for a short test drive, and I was broadcasting live from my Mac in under five minutes using an integrated webcam and microphone. Procaster can use any attached webcam or microphone, so you don’t have to limit yourself to integrated audio or video capture devices. Once my broadcast was live, I simply pointed the Safari browser on my iPhone to http://iphone.livestream.com where I saw my personal channel. Tapping it opened up QuickTime where I saw a near real-time, high-quality view of my  broadcast. Even better: As a broadcaster, I was able to toggle between my camera setup and my desktop, a solution I envision as being useful for real-time training and presentations. While there are other ways to view video on the iPhone, most involve a lengthy re-encoding effort. Livestream has cut that down to under a half-minute. And the best part? Procaster is simply using the native functions that Apple already provides to the platform. That’s a killer feature right there because it means people can begin to live stream to iPhones without any software installs on the handset. Livestreaming is all the rage today, be it from a handset or home computer with a webcam. But one of the major challenges is how to view that live content on a handset. Wouldn’t it be nice if a company could provide a method for livestreaming to mobiles without a lengthy re-encoding process? Lo and behold, enter Livestream, which today announced its Procaster beta application for Mac and PC at NewTeeVee Live, our annual online video industry conference. Using the iPhone’s native H.264 HTTP streaming, Procaster allows for near-instant broadcasting to iPhones — there’s roughly a 20-second delay from live broadcast to the devices, and multiple handsets can tune into the same stream. Watch NTV Live by clicking here or going to iphone.livestream.com. Here’s a video demo to see how Procaster works: I took the Procaster software for a short test drive, and I was broadcasting live from my Mac in under five minutes using an integrated webcam and microphone. Procaster can use any attached webcam or microphone, so you don’t have to limit yourself to integrated audio or video capture devices. Once my broadcast was live, I simply pointed the Safari browser on my iPhone to http://iphone.livestream.com where I saw my personal channel. Tapping it opened up QuickTime where I saw a near real-time, high-quality view of my  broadcast. Even better: As a broadcaster, I was able to toggle between my camera setup and my desktop, a solution I envision as being useful for real-time training and presentations. While there are other ways to view video on the iPhone, most involve a lengthy re-encoding effort. Livestream has cut that down to under a half-minute. And the best part? Procaster is simply using the native functions that Apple already provides to the platform. That’s a killer feature right there because it means people can begin to live stream to iPhones without any software installs on the handset. tag:odeo.com,2009-11-12,25442567 Thu, 12 Nov 2009 09:45:02 -0800 no GigaOM Media, iphone, livestream, procaster, livestreaming http://odeo.com/episodes/25442568-TV-Everywhere-Live-Stream-of-NewTeeVee-Live The race to bring the flexibility and variety of online video delivery to the comfort of your couch was taken to a whole new level in 2009 — soon, the content you want to watch will be accessible wherever and whenever you want. With that in mind, the theme of our third annual NewTeeVee Live event is TV Everywhere. Join us today here at the Mission Bay Conference Center in San Francisco  as we talk to some of the industry’s key players to learn about the future of this increasingly exciting industry. Our live-stream — which includes a chat feature — will start at 9 am PT, and we will be live-blogging the onstage sessions throughout the day. You can watch it on your iphone as well. The Twitter hashtag is #ntvl. Enjoy! Live blogs of today’s sessions: What’s the Next Big Thing in Video? Get Ready for the Boxee Box YouTube Star Ryan Higa Doesn’t Think He’s Famous Xbox Live to get More Social Nov. 17 The race to bring the flexibility and variety of online video delivery to the comfort of your couch was taken to a whole new level in 2009 — soon, the content you want to watch will be accessible wherever and whenever you want. With that in mind, the theme of our third annual NewTeeVee Live event is TV Everywhere. Join us today here at the Mission Bay Conference Center in San Francisco  as we talk to some of the industry’s key players to learn about the future of this increasingly exciting industry. Our live-stream — which includes a chat feature — will start at 9 am PT, and we will be live-blogging the onstage sessions throughout the day. You can watch it on your iphone as well. The Twitter hashtag is #ntvl. Enjoy! Live blogs of today’s sessions: What’s the Next Big Thing in Video? Get Ready for the Boxee Box YouTube Star Ryan Higa Doesn’t Think He’s Famous Xbox Live to get More Social Nov. 17 The race to bring the flexibility and variety of online video delivery to the comfort of your couch was taken to a whole new level in 2009 — soon, the content you want to watch will be accessible wherever and whenever you want. With that in mind, the theme of our third annual NewTeeVee Live event is TV Everywhere. Join us today here at the Mission Bay Conference Center in San Francisco  as we talk to some of the industry’s key players to learn about the future of this increasingly exciting industry. Our live-stream — which includes a chat feature — will start at 9 am PT, and we will be live-blogging the onstage sessions throughout the day. You can watch it on your iphone as well. The Twitter hashtag is #ntvl. Enjoy! Live blogs of today’s sessions: What’s the Next Big Thing in Video? Get Ready for the Boxee Box YouTube Star Ryan Higa Doesn’t Think He’s Famous Xbox Live to get More Social Nov. 17 tag:odeo.com,2009-11-12,25442568 Thu, 12 Nov 2009 08:45:20 -0800 no GigaOM featured, events, NewTeeVee Live http://odeo.com/episodes/25443800-TV-Everywhere-Livestream-of-NewTeeVee-Live The race to bring the flexibility and variety of online video delivery to the comfort of your couch was taken to a whole new level in 2009 — soon, the content you want to watch will be accessible wherever and whenever you want. With that in mind, the theme of our third annual NewTeeVee Live event is TV Everywhere. Join us today here at the Mission Bay Conference Center in San Francisco  as we talk to some of the industry’s key players to learn about the future of this increasingly exciting industry. Our livestream — which includes a chat feature — will start at 9 am PT, and we will be live-blogging the onstage sessions throughout the day. You can watch it on your iphone as well. The Twitter hashtag is #ntvl. Enjoy! Live blogs of today’s sessions: How Obama, CNN and Facebook Brought Change to Social TV Will Broadband TVs Connect With Consumers? YouTube Adds Support for 1080p Videos Quincy Smith’s Official Exit Interview Auto-Tune the News to Hook U... The race to bring the flexibility and variety of online video delivery to the comfort of your couch was taken to a whole new level in 2009 — soon, the content you want to watch will be accessible wherever and whenever you want. With that in mind, the theme of our third annual NewTeeVee Live event is TV Everywhere. Join us today here at the Mission Bay Conference Center in San Francisco  as we talk to some of the industry’s key players to learn about the future of this increasingly exciting industry. Our livestream — which includes a chat feature — will start at 9 am PT, and we will be live-blogging the onstage sessions throughout the day. You can watch it on your iphone as well. The Twitter hashtag is #ntvl. Enjoy! Live blogs of today’s sessions: How Obama, CNN and Facebook Brought Change to Social TV Will Broadband TVs Connect With Consumers? YouTube Adds Support for 1080p Videos Quincy Smith’s Official Exit Interview Auto-Tune the News to Hook Up With Sony Nielsen Eyes Extended Screens Adobe CTO: HTML 5 Is “Trying To Do What Flash Already Does” Netflix CEO: Why Netflix Is the Killer App for Broadband Comcast’s On-Demand Online to Be Ready by Hanukkah Cisco Sees Video as a Market in Transition How NFL.com Scores With Fantasy Football Comedy Central Gets 500,000 Online Viewers From HuffPost What’s the Next Big Thing in Video? Get Ready for the Boxee Box YouTube Star Ryan Higa Doesn’t Think He’s Famous Xbox Live to get More Social Nov. 17 The race to bring the flexibility and variety of online video delivery to the comfort of your couch was taken to a whole new level in 2009 — soon, the content you want to watch will be accessible wherever and whenever you want. With that in mind, the theme of our third annual NewTeeVee Live event is TV Everywhere. Join us today here at the Mission Bay Conference Center in San Francisco  as we talk to some of the industry’s key players to learn about the future of this increasingly exciting industry. Our livestream — which includes a chat feature — will start at 9 am PT, and we will be live-blogging the onstage sessions throughout the day. You can watch it on your iphone as well. The Twitter hashtag is #ntvl. Enjoy! Live blogs of today’s sessions: How Obama, CNN and Facebook Brought Change to Social TV Will Broadband TVs Connect With Consumers? YouTube Adds Support for 1080p Videos Quincy Smith’s Official Exit Interview Auto-Tune the News to Hook Up With Sony Nielsen Eyes Extended Screens Adobe CTO: HTML 5 Is “Trying To Do What Flash Already Does” Netflix CEO: Why Netflix Is the Killer App for Broadband Comcast’s On-Demand Online to Be Ready by Hanukkah Cisco Sees Video as a Market in Transition How NFL.com Scores With Fantasy Football Comedy Central Gets 500,000 Online Viewers From HuffPost What’s the Next Big Thing in Video? Get Ready for the Boxee Box YouTube Star Ryan Higa Doesn’t Think He’s Famous Xbox Live to get More Social Nov. 17 tag:odeo.com,2009-11-12,25443800 Thu, 12 Nov 2009 08:45:20 -0800 no GigaOM featured, events, NewTeeVee Live http://odeo.com/episodes/25442569-Qualcomm-Breaks-the-Gigahertz-Barrier-on-Smartphones Qualcomm has just released a new chip family focused on smartphones, including one that breaks the gigahertz barrier. The chips’ capabilities make clear that the line between phones and low-end notebooks are blurring. They’re based on the Scorpion CPU that is at the heart of Snapdragon chipsets and uses an 800 MHz to 1 GHz custom ARM-based CPU. This new chip family, the horribly named MSM7×30, can do 720p HD video (encode/decode), 2-D and 3-D graphics, and has surround sound, integrated GPS and a 12-Megapixel camera as well as all the usual trimmings like Bluetooth and Wi-fi and FM Radio 3G (both flavors). On the multimedia front, Qualcomm is playing catch-up Texas Instruments and Nvidia. The new chips work with all smartphone operating systems except Apple’s iPhone OS. They will be launched sometime next year and are optimized for the web experience. Qualcomm has just released a new chip family focused on smartphones, including one that breaks the gigahertz barrier. The chips’ capabilities make clear that the line between phones and low-end notebooks are blurring. They’re based on the Scorpion CPU that is at the heart of Snapdragon chipsets and uses an 800 MHz to 1 GHz custom ARM-based CPU. This new chip family, the horribly named MSM7×30, can do 720p HD video (encode/decode), 2-D and 3-D graphics, and has surround sound, integrated GPS and a 12-Megapixel camera as well as all the usual trimmings like Bluetooth and Wi-fi and FM Radio 3G (both flavors). On the multimedia front, Qualcomm is playing catch-up Texas Instruments and Nvidia. The new chips work with all smartphone operating systems except Apple’s iPhone OS. They will be launched sometime next year and are optimized for the web experience. Qualcomm has just released a new chip family focused on smartphones, including one that breaks the gigahertz barrier. The chips’ capabilities make clear that the line between phones and low-end notebooks are blurring. They’re based on the Scorpion CPU that is at the heart of Snapdragon chipsets and uses an 800 MHz to 1 GHz custom ARM-based CPU. This new chip family, the horribly named MSM7×30, can do 720p HD video (encode/decode), 2-D and 3-D graphics, and has surround sound, integrated GPS and a 12-Megapixel camera as well as all the usual trimmings like Bluetooth and Wi-fi and FM Radio 3G (both flavors). On the multimedia front, Qualcomm is playing catch-up Texas Instruments and Nvidia. The new chips work with all smartphone operating systems except Apple’s iPhone OS. They will be launched sometime next year and are optimized for the web experience. tag:odeo.com,2009-11-12,25442569 Thu, 12 Nov 2009 08:42:30 -0800 no GigaOM Mobile, qualcomm, Semiconductors, Texas Instruments http://odeo.com/episodes/25442570-Intel-and-AMD-Kiss-and-Make-Up Intel and AMD today settled all of their various patent and antitrust disputes, with the top chipmaker paying out $1.25 billion to settle more than two decades of litigation. The two companies will also cross-license their technology over the next five years. The move helps Intel far more than AMD, as Intel is likely to retain its dominant position in the chip market. But Intel will continue to face government antitrust investigations over its pricing practices, and there’s still an intellectual property suit with Nvidia to deal with. However, Intel can’t really afford to let AMD die because it then becomes a monopoly, and governments love to interfere with monopolies. So in a sense, Intel is propping AMD up only to knock it down again in the competitive market. Intel and AMD today settled all of their various patent and antitrust disputes, with the top chipmaker paying out $1.25 billion to settle more than two decades of litigation. The two companies will also cross-license their technology over the next five years. The move helps Intel far more than AMD, as Intel is likely to retain its dominant position in the chip market. But Intel will continue to face government antitrust investigations over its pricing practices, and there’s still an intellectual property suit with Nvidia to deal with. However, Intel can’t really afford to let AMD die because it then becomes a monopoly, and governments love to interfere with monopolies. So in a sense, Intel is propping AMD up only to knock it down again in the competitive market. Intel and AMD today settled all of their various patent and antitrust disputes, with the top chipmaker paying out $1.25 billion to settle more than two decades of litigation. The two companies will also cross-license their technology over the next five years. The move helps Intel far more than AMD, as Intel is likely to retain its dominant position in the chip market. But Intel will continue to face government antitrust investigations over its pricing practices, and there’s still an intellectual property suit with Nvidia to deal with. However, Intel can’t really afford to let AMD die because it then becomes a monopoly, and governments love to interfere with monopolies. So in a sense, Intel is propping AMD up only to knock it down again in the competitive market. tag:odeo.com,2009-11-12,25442570 Thu, 12 Nov 2009 08:30:30 -0800 no GigaOM INTC, NVDA, AMD, Intel, nvidia, Semiconductors http://odeo.com/episodes/25442571-Palm-Pre-Sales-in-%E2%80%9CSubstantial-Decline%E2%80%9D-Analyst Palm’s bet on webOS isn’t paying many dividends, according to a research note issued by Northeast Securities analyst Ashok Kumar this morning. Domestic sell-through checks point to a “substantial decline” in recent sales of the Pre, Kumar said, and slashing the price to $99 hasn’t helped much. Nor is the upcoming launch of the Pixi likely to reverse the trend. Those slowing sales are whittling away at the prospects for webOS, which Palm had positioned as a worthy competitor to the iPhone, Android and BlackBerry platforms. From the note: “As a fading brand, carriers are likely to see better returns on their promotional and advertising dollars with other vendors…WebOS has negligible smartphone OS share, 0.2 percent per Gartner estimates, and is unlikely to attract any meaningful third-party application support. Palm has bet the farm on webOS and there is a real possibility that they may not achieve critical mass.” The Pre failed to live ... Palm’s bet on webOS isn’t paying many dividends, according to a research note issued by Northeast Securities analyst Ashok Kumar this morning. Domestic sell-through checks point to a “substantial decline” in recent sales of the Pre, Kumar said, and slashing the price to $99 hasn’t helped much. Nor is the upcoming launch of the Pixi likely to reverse the trend. Those slowing sales are whittling away at the prospects for webOS, which Palm had positioned as a worthy competitor to the iPhone, Android and BlackBerry platforms. From the note: “As a fading brand, carriers are likely to see better returns on their promotional and advertising dollars with other vendors…WebOS has negligible smartphone OS share, 0.2 percent per Gartner estimates, and is unlikely to attract any meaningful third-party application support. Palm has bet the farm on webOS and there is a real possibility that they may not achieve critical mass.” The Pre failed to live up to expectations out of the gate — thanks largely to Sprint’s unwillingness to heavily market the gadget (GigaOM Pro, subscription req.) — and Palm’s next best hope for webOS appeared to be an upcoming launch with Verizon Wireless early next year. But as Verizon’s Droid initiative demonstrates, the Google OS has captured the attention of the nation’s largest carrier. If it overlooks the Pre in favor of the Droid, that could put one more nail in Palm’s coffin. Palm’s bet on webOS isn’t paying many dividends, according to a research note issued by Northeast Securities analyst Ashok Kumar this morning. Domestic sell-through checks point to a “substantial decline” in recent sales of the Pre, Kumar said, and slashing the price to $99 hasn’t helped much. Nor is the upcoming launch of the Pixi likely to reverse the trend. Those slowing sales are whittling away at the prospects for webOS, which Palm had positioned as a worthy competitor to the iPhone, Android and BlackBerry platforms. From the note: “As a fading brand, carriers are likely to see better returns on their promotional and advertising dollars with other vendors…WebOS has negligible smartphone OS share, 0.2 percent per Gartner estimates, and is unlikely to attract any meaningful third-party application support. Palm has bet the farm on webOS and there is a real possibility that they may not achieve critical mass.” The Pre failed to live up to expectations out of the gate — thanks largely to Sprint’s unwillingness to heavily market the gadget (GigaOM Pro, subscription req.) — and Palm’s next best hope for webOS appeared to be an upcoming launch with Verizon Wireless early next year. But as Verizon’s Droid initiative demonstrates, the Google OS has captured the attention of the nation’s largest carrier. If it overlooks the Pre in favor of the Droid, that could put one more nail in Palm’s coffin. tag:odeo.com,2009-11-12,25442571 Thu, 12 Nov 2009 08:03:08 -0800 no GigaOM palm, Mobile, Pre, smartphones, WebOS, smartphone OSes http://odeo.com/episodes/25440188-With-Video-Conferencing-Deals-Polycom-in-Sharp-Focus First Cisco Systems decided to buy Norwegian video conferencing equipment maker Tandberg for about $3 billion. Yesterday, Logitech, a Swiss computer peripherals maker acquired LifeSize, an Austin, Texas-based private company for about $405 million in cash. The two deals have brought the fast-growing but often-overlooked video conferencing market into sharp focus. And that is good news for Polycom, a Pleasanton, Calif.-based conferencing equipment maker, CEO Bob Hagerty boasts. Here is why: Hagerty said he thinks his company’s independent status will make it a preferred partner for giants such as Microsoft, IBM, Avaya and Hewlett-Packard, as they duke it out with Cisco and Logitech. The stock market seems to agree with him: Polycom stock is up 9 percent this month and up 77 percent for the year to date. When I asked Hagerty if this makes him takeover bait, he predictably dodged my question. The simultaneous growth of pervasive broadband, improved compression codecs, distributed workf... First Cisco Systems decided to buy Norwegian video conferencing equipment maker Tandberg for about $3 billion. Yesterday, Logitech, a Swiss computer peripherals maker acquired LifeSize, an Austin, Texas-based private company for about $405 million in cash. The two deals have brought the fast-growing but often-overlooked video conferencing market into sharp focus. And that is good news for Polycom, a Pleasanton, Calif.-based conferencing equipment maker, CEO Bob Hagerty boasts. Here is why: Hagerty said he thinks his company’s independent status will make it a preferred partner for giants such as Microsoft, IBM, Avaya and Hewlett-Packard, as they duke it out with Cisco and Logitech. The stock market seems to agree with him: Polycom stock is up 9 percent this month and up 77 percent for the year to date. When I asked Hagerty if this makes him takeover bait, he predictably dodged my question. The simultaneous growth of pervasive broadband, improved compression codecs, distributed workforces and shrinking travel budgets are brewing a perfect storm for the video conferencing market. “Bandwidth today is adequate, and we will soon be able to make HD video calls on a 500 kbps connection,” he said. Hagerty believes that is going to help explode the use of video conferencing. For a company like Polycom, the future might involve offering cloud-based services that could handle video originating from multiple locations using a central service. From low cost end-points to high end telepresence systems, video-based collaboration is going to be a standard, he argued. And this is good news, not just for him but also for his rivals. Hagerty didn’t pull any punches in his comments about Cisco. “Cisco is a lot of words but it is not much clarity on what products they will focus on,” he said in an interview earlier today. While Tandberg’s offerings are more standards-based, Cisco’s flagship telepresence products are proprietary in nature, Hagerty said. “In the collaboration space, we are a great brand,” he said. “Frankly, it is great to be us… we are the last standing independent company of scale.” He is betting his close relationships with Avaya, Microsoft and others such as IBM — all enemies of Cisco — are going to help the company. In addition, Polycom thinks working with service providers, including phone companies, is a good way to make video conferencing available as a service. Despite his bravado, Hagerty needs to worry about both Cisco and Logitech. These are two companies with deep pockets and deeper salesforces. They are desperate to make a splash in this market and are going to aggressively compete with Polycom. As I am one of those folks who always expects the worst — it must be my age — I believe that when there are multiple parties competing for domination of the same market, someone is left bleeding. Polycom is betting that the company’s friends will prevent it from being laid out on the mat. First Cisco Systems decided to buy Norwegian video conferencing equipment maker Tandberg for about $3 billion. Yesterday, Logitech, a Swiss computer peripherals maker acquired LifeSize, an Austin, Texas-based private company for about $405 million in cash. The two deals have brought the fast-growing but often-overlooked video conferencing market into sharp focus. And that is good news for Polycom, a Pleasanton, Calif.-based conferencing equipment maker, CEO Bob Hagerty boasts. Here is why: Hagerty said he thinks his company’s independent status will make it a preferred partner for giants such as Microsoft, IBM, Avaya and Hewlett-Packard, as they duke it out with Cisco and Logitech. The stock market seems to agree with him: Polycom stock is up 9 percent this month and up 77 percent for the year to date. When I asked Hagerty if this makes him takeover bait, he predictably dodged my question. The simultaneous growth of pervasive broadband, improved compression codecs, distributed workforces and shrinking travel budgets are brewing a perfect storm for the video conferencing market. “Bandwidth today is adequate, and we will soon be able to make HD video calls on a 500 kbps connection,” he said. Hagerty believes that is going to help explode the use of video conferencing. For a company like Polycom, the future might involve offering cloud-based services that could handle video originating from multiple locations using a central service. From low cost end-points to high end telepresence systems, video-based collaboration is going to be a standard, he argued. And this is good news, not just for him but also for his rivals. Hagerty didn’t pull any punches in his comments about Cisco. “Cisco is a lot of words but it is not much clarity on what products they will focus on,” he said in an interview earlier today. While Tandberg’s offerings are more standards-based, Cisco’s flagship telepresence products are proprietary in nature, Hagerty said. “In the collaboration space, we are a great brand,” he said. “Frankly, it is great to be us… we are the last standing independent company of scale.” He is betting his close relationships with Avaya, Microsoft and others such as IBM — all enemies of Cisco — are going to help the company. In addition, Polycom thinks working with service providers, including phone companies, is a good way to make video conferencing available as a service. Despite his bravado, Hagerty needs to worry about both Cisco and Logitech. These are two companies with deep pockets and deeper salesforces. They are desperate to make a splash in this market and are going to aggressively compete with Polycom. As I am one of those folks who always expects the worst — it must be my age — I believe that when there are multiple parties competing for domination of the same market, someone is left bleeding. Polycom is betting that the company’s friends will prevent it from being laid out on the mat. tag:odeo.com,2009-11-11,25440188 Wed, 11 Nov 2009 22:00:23 -0800 no GigaOM HPQ, VoIP, Cisco, MSFT, Voice, ibm, CSCO, logitech, Video Conferencing, TANDBERG, Polycom, lifesize http://odeo.com/episodes/25439103-Online-Video-Rights-Why-Technology-Isn%E2%80%99t-Enough-to-Bring-About-Change This morning’s Video Rights Roundtable was, as we hoped, a rare opportunity for online video industry players to talk about their conflicts and collaborations in the wild — not in a courtroom or conference room.  In a (more than) two-hour discussion, the nearly 50 attendees shared their perspectives on the increasingly complex world of rights, responsibility and opportunities surrounding online video content. Complete liveblog coverage is available at GigaOM Pro (subscription required), and Ryan Lawler was on-site with some additional event coverage at NewTeeVee. More links below the fold (and full event video coming soon!).   In Round One, Ethan Applen, director of technology and business strategy for Warner Bros., talked about copyright enforcement as video content shifts online. While the DVD business was threatened by the emergence of digital piracy, he said that online distribution is even more vulnerable. To approach the problem, he said, the first line of defense is to ... This morning’s Video Rights Roundtable was, as we hoped, a rare opportunity for online video industry players to talk about their conflicts and collaborations in the wild — not in a courtroom or conference room.  In a (more than) two-hour discussion, the nearly 50 attendees shared their perspectives on the increasingly complex world of rights, responsibility and opportunities surrounding online video content. Complete liveblog coverage is available at GigaOM Pro (subscription required), and Ryan Lawler was on-site with some additional event coverage at NewTeeVee. More links below the fold (and full event video coming soon!).   In Round One, Ethan Applen, director of technology and business strategy for Warner Bros., talked about copyright enforcement as video content shifts online. While the DVD business was threatened by the emergence of digital piracy, he said that online distribution is even more vulnerable. To approach the problem, he said, the first line of defense is to make illegal consumption of content online more difficult. “That’s what we need to tackle,” he added (subscription required). In Round Two, Liz Gannes brought Michael Seibel, CEO of Justin.TV, and Yangbin Wang, from Vobile, up to discuss rights issues specific to real-time/live-streaming video content (subscription required). The two companies are partnering to automate unauthorized content detection and takedown. Ryan has the full scoop at NewTeeVee. In Round Three, Betsy Zedek, content protection counsel, Fox Group Legal, fielded questions about the future of copyright law in the digital age (sub. required), and the audience discussed the sticky issue of fair use. Paul Sweeting takes a deeper look at these issues at GigaOM Pro. The final section of the event was an open discussion among the audience (sub. required), which touched on the challenges posed by BitTorrent (Ryan recaps this discussion over at NewTeeVee), opportunities to monetize online content in new ways, and the future of medium-budget movies. This morning’s Video Rights Roundtable was, as we hoped, a rare opportunity for online video industry players to talk about their conflicts and collaborations in the wild — not in a courtroom or conference room.  In a (more than) two-hour discussion, the nearly 50 attendees shared their perspectives on the increasingly complex world of rights, responsibility and opportunities surrounding online video content. Complete liveblog coverage is available at GigaOM Pro (subscription required), and Ryan Lawler was on-site with some additional event coverage at NewTeeVee. More links below the fold (and full event video coming soon!).   In Round One, Ethan Applen, director of technology and business strategy for Warner Bros., talked about copyright enforcement as video content shifts online. While the DVD business was threatened by the emergence of digital piracy, he said that online distribution is even more vulnerable. To approach the problem, he said, the first line of defense is to make illegal consumption of content online more difficult. “That’s what we need to tackle,” he added (subscription required). In Round Two, Liz Gannes brought Michael Seibel, CEO of Justin.TV, and Yangbin Wang, from Vobile, up to discuss rights issues specific to real-time/live-streaming video content (subscription required). The two companies are partnering to automate unauthorized content detection and takedown. Ryan has the full scoop at NewTeeVee. In Round Three, Betsy Zedek, content protection counsel, Fox Group Legal, fielded questions about the future of copyright law in the digital age (sub. required), and the audience discussed the sticky issue of fair use. Paul Sweeting takes a deeper look at these issues at GigaOM Pro. The final section of the event was an open discussion among the audience (sub. required), which touched on the challenges posed by BitTorrent (Ryan recaps this discussion over at NewTeeVee), opportunities to monetize online content in new ways, and the future of medium-budget movies. tag:odeo.com,2009-11-11,25439103 Wed, 11 Nov 2009 17:42:13 -0800 no GigaOM Media, fox, justin.tv, Warner Bros, NTVL, Vobile, NewTeeVee Live 09 http://odeo.com/episodes/25439104-Is-Infochimps%E2%80%99-Aggregated-Data-a-Boon-to-Researchers-or-a-Privacy-Nightmare A pair of slices from a massive scrape of Twitter’s API could be of great use to programmers and researchers alike — as long as users don’t mind. The company behind the mining effort, Infochimps, is trying to demonstrate and promote its data aggregation service while offering up some useful information to interested parties. At the end of last year, Infochimps posted a heftier version of its scrape of Twitter, which was taken down at the behest of the micro-messaging site over user privacy concerns. By releasing curated, anonymized chunks of data, the company may avoid most of the user privacy concerns that arose last time around. Then again, it may not. One of the sets, a “token count,” adds up the number of particular tokens (individual hashtags, smileys and URLs) that have been tweeted since March 2006. The other links the ID strings between Twitter’s Search API and the standard Twitter API. The two APIs issue different ID numbers to users, whi... A pair of slices from a massive scrape of Twitter’s API could be of great use to programmers and researchers alike — as long as users don’t mind. The company behind the mining effort, Infochimps, is trying to demonstrate and promote its data aggregation service while offering up some useful information to interested parties. At the end of last year, Infochimps posted a heftier version of its scrape of Twitter, which was taken down at the behest of the micro-messaging site over user privacy concerns. By releasing curated, anonymized chunks of data, the company may avoid most of the user privacy concerns that arose last time around. Then again, it may not. One of the sets, a “token count,” adds up the number of particular tokens (individual hashtags, smileys and URLs) that have been tweeted since March 2006. The other links the ID strings between Twitter’s Search API and the standard Twitter API. The two APIs issue different ID numbers to users, which makes it annoying, if not impossible, for developers to link data across both services to one user. Infochimps says it hopes “to send a signal that this data is valuable and useful to real-time search engines, Twitter apps, and social media researchers.” It also hopes to “start a conversation about where value really lies in this type of data, [and] the various ownership and privacy issues that arise.” Given the complaints from Twitter the first time data was posted, it’s a smart move on the part of Infochimps to add this disclosure and thoroughly anonymize the data. The company very much wants to avoid any sort of ill will or backlash from the Twitterati over the release of the data sets. Back in 2006, AOL Research released 20 million search keywords attached to user IDs for researchers to use. A number of individuals were identified as a result of the “anonymized” data, leading to a number of concerns over what sorts of data are kosher to be released. Ownership and privacy aside, Infochimps is offering the “tokens” data set broken out by month for free, and $9,500 for a version broken out by hour. The “ID/API mapping” data set is being offered for $6,000. A pair of slices from a massive scrape of Twitter’s API could be of great use to programmers and researchers alike — as long as users don’t mind. The company behind the mining effort, Infochimps, is trying to demonstrate and promote its data aggregation service while offering up some useful information to interested parties. At the end of last year, Infochimps posted a heftier version of its scrape of Twitter, which was taken down at the behest of the micro-messaging site over user privacy concerns. By releasing curated, anonymized chunks of data, the company may avoid most of the user privacy concerns that arose last time around. Then again, it may not. One of the sets, a “token count,” adds up the number of particular tokens (individual hashtags, smileys and URLs) that have been tweeted since March 2006. The other links the ID strings between Twitter’s Search API and the standard Twitter API. The two APIs issue different ID numbers to users, which makes it annoying, if not impossible, for developers to link data across both services to one user. Infochimps says it hopes “to send a signal that this data is valuable and useful to real-time search engines, Twitter apps, and social media researchers.” It also hopes to “start a conversation about where value really lies in this type of data, [and] the various ownership and privacy issues that arise.” Given the complaints from Twitter the first time data was posted, it’s a smart move on the part of Infochimps to add this disclosure and thoroughly anonymize the data. The company very much wants to avoid any sort of ill will or backlash from the Twitterati over the release of the data sets. Back in 2006, AOL Research released 20 million search keywords attached to user IDs for researchers to use. A number of individuals were identified as a result of the “anonymized” data, leading to a number of concerns over what sorts of data are kosher to be released. Ownership and privacy aside, Infochimps is offering the “tokens” data set broken out by month for free, and $9,500 for a version broken out by hour. The “ID/API mapping” data set is being offered for $6,000. tag:odeo.com,2009-11-11,25439104 Wed, 11 Nov 2009 17:22:22 -0800 no GigaOM web, twitter, Startups, infochimps http://odeo.com/episodes/25439105-My-Video-Interview-With-Joe-Hewitt-Facebook%E2%80%99s-iPhone-App-Guru Much of Facebook’s success on the iPhone has come courtesy of Joe Hewitt, an ace programmer who joined the world’s largest social networking site when it acquired Parakey, a company he co-founded with Firefox kid Blake Ross. Hewitt has now decided to shift his focus away from the iPhone. In a tweet sent out earlier today he said, “Time for me to try something new. I’ve handed the Facebook iPhone app off to another engineer, and I’m onto a new project.” Joe was named to GigaOM’s Top 15 Mobile Influencers list earlier this year for his contributions to the iPhone app ecosystem — in particular, for single-handedly turning Facebook into a major force on the iconic Apple device. I recently gave him a hard time over the delays in launching Facebook 3.0, which prompted Joe to stop by our office and take part in an impromptu video chat. Here are the excerpts from that conversation. Much of Facebook’s success on the iPhone has come courtesy of Joe Hewitt, an ace programmer who joined the world’s largest social networking site when it acquired Parakey, a company he co-founded with Firefox kid Blake Ross. Hewitt has now decided to shift his focus away from the iPhone. In a tweet sent out earlier today he said, “Time for me to try something new. I’ve handed the Facebook iPhone app off to another engineer, and I’m onto a new project.” Joe was named to GigaOM’s Top 15 Mobile Influencers list earlier this year for his contributions to the iPhone app ecosystem — in particular, for single-handedly turning Facebook into a major force on the iconic Apple device. I recently gave him a hard time over the delays in launching Facebook 3.0, which prompted Joe to stop by our office and take part in an impromptu video chat. Here are the excerpts from that conversation. Much of Facebook’s success on the iPhone has come courtesy of Joe Hewitt, an ace programmer who joined the world’s largest social networking site when it acquired Parakey, a company he co-founded with Firefox kid Blake Ross. Hewitt has now decided to shift his focus away from the iPhone. In a tweet sent out earlier today he said, “Time for me to try something new. I’ve handed the Facebook iPhone app off to another engineer, and I’m onto a new project.” Joe was named to GigaOM’s Top 15 Mobile Influencers list earlier this year for his contributions to the iPhone app ecosystem — in particular, for single-handedly turning Facebook into a major force on the iconic Apple device. I recently gave him a hard time over the delays in launching Facebook 3.0, which prompted Joe to stop by our office and take part in an impromptu video chat. Here are the excerpts from that conversation. tag:odeo.com,2009-11-11,25439105 Wed, 11 Nov 2009 16:00:13 -0800 no GigaOM iphone, Mobile, Facebook, iPhone Apps, Joe Hewitt http://odeo.com/episodes/25439106-The-Crunchies-Are-Back-for-Round-3 The Crunchies, after two successful years, are back to celebrate the entrepreneurs and startups that make technology such an exciting industry. As always, we will be co-hosting the awards — for which nominations are now being accepted — with VentureBeat and TechCrunch. (Check out the photos from last year.) Details of the event can be found here. The awards ceremony will be held Friday, Jan. 8 at 7:30 pm at the Herbst Theater in San Francisco and will be followed by an after-party across the street in City Hall’s Grand Rotunda. The nominations for the third annual awards ceremony honoring the best technology achievements of 2009 will remain open through midnight PST on Friday, Dec. 4th. The Crunchies Committee will select five finalists for each of the 18 award categories; final votes will be cast between Dec. 12th and midnight PST on Jan. 6th. The Crunchies, after two successful years, are back to celebrate the entrepreneurs and startups that make technology such an exciting industry. As always, we will be co-hosting the awards — for which nominations are now being accepted — with VentureBeat and TechCrunch. (Check out the photos from last year.) Details of the event can be found here. The awards ceremony will be held Friday, Jan. 8 at 7:30 pm at the Herbst Theater in San Francisco and will be followed by an after-party across the street in City Hall’s Grand Rotunda. The nominations for the third annual awards ceremony honoring the best technology achievements of 2009 will remain open through midnight PST on Friday, Dec. 4th. The Crunchies Committee will select five finalists for each of the 18 award categories; final votes will be cast between Dec. 12th and midnight PST on Jan. 6th. The Crunchies, after two successful years, are back to celebrate the entrepreneurs and startups that make technology such an exciting industry. As always, we will be co-hosting the awards — for which nominations are now being accepted — with VentureBeat and TechCrunch. (Check out the photos from last year.) Details of the event can be found here. The awards ceremony will be held Friday, Jan. 8 at 7:30 pm at the Herbst Theater in San Francisco and will be followed by an after-party across the street in City Hall’s Grand Rotunda. The nominations for the third annual awards ceremony honoring the best technology achievements of 2009 will remain open through midnight PST on Friday, Dec. 4th. The Crunchies Committee will select five finalists for each of the 18 award categories; final votes will be cast between Dec. 12th and midnight PST on Jan. 6th. tag:odeo.com,2009-11-11,25439106 Wed, 11 Nov 2009 15:00:22 -0800 no GigaOM NotForSyndication, The Crunchies http://odeo.com/episodes/25439107-HP-Buys-3Com-to-Play-Cisco%E2%80%99s-Server-Game Updated: HP said today that it plans to buy router and switching gear maker 3Com for $2.7 billion — a deal that seeks to put HP on better competitive footing against Cisco and its server efforts. HP and the rest of the computing industry have struggled to come up with an answer to what Cisco calls unified computing systems, which combine servers and networking into one box, and in doing so have tended to lean on partnerships with networking providers such as Brocade and Juniper. With its No. 2 line of Pro Curve networking gear, HP  was seen by the industry as being in the best position to compete, so this deal looks like an admission from HP that it has some holes in its networking portfolio that Cisco could exploit.  The boards of both companies have approved the deal. HP will pay $7.90 per share in cash for 3Com. My question is: Why didn’t it buy Brocade? Update: Cisco has posted a comment in response to the deal, basically saying that HP is welcome to follow its indus... Updated: HP said today that it plans to buy router and switching gear maker 3Com for $2.7 billion — a deal that seeks to put HP on better competitive footing against Cisco and its server efforts. HP and the rest of the computing industry have struggled to come up with an answer to what Cisco calls unified computing systems, which combine servers and networking into one box, and in doing so have tended to lean on partnerships with networking providers such as Brocade and Juniper. With its No. 2 line of Pro Curve networking gear, HP  was seen by the industry as being in the best position to compete, so this deal looks like an admission from HP that it has some holes in its networking portfolio that Cisco could exploit.  The boards of both companies have approved the deal. HP will pay $7.90 per share in cash for 3Com. My question is: Why didn’t it buy Brocade? Update: Cisco has posted a comment in response to the deal, basically saying that HP is welcome to follow its industry leadership in unified computing. Update2: Dan Primack over at peHUB has raised some legitimate questions about the price HP paid, and noted how 3Com’s stock has been steadily rising in the last couple of weeks. He pulled some Bloomberg data that shows how trading volume shot up today before the deal was announced, leading him and other blogs to suspect insider trading may be at work. Updated: HP said today that it plans to buy router and switching gear maker 3Com for $2.7 billion — a deal that seeks to put HP on better competitive footing against Cisco and its server efforts. HP and the rest of the computing industry have struggled to come up with an answer to what Cisco calls unified computing systems, which combine servers and networking into one box, and in doing so have tended to lean on partnerships with networking providers such as Brocade and Juniper. With its No. 2 line of Pro Curve networking gear, HP  was seen by the industry as being in the best position to compete, so this deal looks like an admission from HP that it has some holes in its networking portfolio that Cisco could exploit.  The boards of both companies have approved the deal. HP will pay $7.90 per share in cash for 3Com. My question is: Why didn’t it buy Brocade? Update: Cisco has posted a comment in response to the deal, basically saying that HP is welcome to follow its industry leadership in unified computing. Update2: Dan Primack over at peHUB has raised some legitimate questions about the price HP paid, and noted how 3Com’s stock has been steadily rising in the last couple of weeks. He pulled some Bloomberg data that shows how trading volume shot up today before the deal was announced, leading him and other blogs to suspect insider trading may be at work. tag:odeo.com,2009-11-11,25439107 Wed, 11 Nov 2009 13:51:38 -0800 no GigaOM HPQ, dell, Cisco, hardware, hp, CSCO, infrastructure, juniper, 3com, Brocade, COMS http://odeo.com/episodes/25437654-Verizon-to-Launch-an-iPhone-Next-Year The mobile space has long buzzed with rumors of a Verizon Wireless version of the iPhone, and according to Northeast Securities, the device may finally arrive next year. Citing its supply-chain checks, the financial services firm said in a research note issued today that Apple will launch a WCDMA/CDMA2000-enabled version of the device — not an LTE version — through Verizon by the summer of 2010. Northeast Securities’ note jibes with a new report from OTR Global via AppleInsider, which claims that Apple plans to roll out a hybrid iPhone — enabling the Cupertino company to sell a single global handset “to all carriers” — by the third quarter of next year. Similar to Northeast Securities, OTR Global said the phone would use a new hybrid chip produced by Qualcomm that would allow the iPhone to support Verizon’s network in addition to retaining compatibility with UMTS 3G networks. As Sebastian noted last month, Apple could benefit greatly f... The mobile space has long buzzed with rumors of a Verizon Wireless version of the iPhone, and according to Northeast Securities, the device may finally arrive next year. Citing its supply-chain checks, the financial services firm said in a research note issued today that Apple will launch a WCDMA/CDMA2000-enabled version of the device — not an LTE version — through Verizon by the summer of 2010. Northeast Securities’ note jibes with a new report from OTR Global via AppleInsider, which claims that Apple plans to roll out a hybrid iPhone — enabling the Cupertino company to sell a single global handset “to all carriers” — by the third quarter of next year. Similar to Northeast Securities, OTR Global said the phone would use a new hybrid chip produced by Qualcomm that would allow the iPhone to support Verizon’s network in addition to retaining compatibility with UMTS 3G networks. As Sebastian noted last month, Apple could benefit greatly from loosening AT&T’s stranglehold on the iPhone in the U.S., and Verizon would surely love to kick out a key pillar of AT&T’s growth from the past year. While Verizon’s former lone-wolf strategy wouldn’t play well with Apple’s tightly controlled App Store, the nation’s largest carrier seems to have softened its go-it-alone stance as it embraces Google with its Droid initiative. A Verizon/Apple tie-up might have been unthinkable to many of us a year ago, but it’s looking more and more like an inevitability. The mobile space has long buzzed with rumors of a Verizon Wireless version of the iPhone, and according to Northeast Securities, the device may finally arrive next year. Citing its supply-chain checks, the financial services firm said in a research note issued today that Apple will launch a WCDMA/CDMA2000-enabled version of the device — not an LTE version — through Verizon by the summer of 2010. Northeast Securities’ note jibes with a new report from OTR Global via AppleInsider, which claims that Apple plans to roll out a hybrid iPhone — enabling the Cupertino company to sell a single global handset “to all carriers” — by the third quarter of next year. Similar to Northeast Securities, OTR Global said the phone would use a new hybrid chip produced by Qualcomm that would allow the iPhone to support Verizon’s network in addition to retaining compatibility with UMTS 3G networks. As Sebastian noted last month, Apple could benefit greatly from loosening AT&T’s stranglehold on the iPhone in the U.S., and Verizon would surely love to kick out a key pillar of AT&T’s growth from the past year. While Verizon’s former lone-wolf strategy wouldn’t play well with Apple’s tightly controlled App Store, the nation’s largest carrier seems to have softened its go-it-alone stance as it embraces Google with its Droid initiative. A Verizon/Apple tie-up might have been unthinkable to many of us a year ago, but it’s looking more and more like an inevitability. tag:odeo.com,2009-11-11,25437654 Wed, 11 Nov 2009 11:56:02 -0800 no GigaOM mobile phones, world iphone http://odeo.com/episodes/25437603-Video-Industry-to-Gather-Tomorrow-for-NewTeeVee-Live It’s been an exciting week here at GigaOM HQ. We’ve been busy putting the final touches on the third edition of NewTeeVee Live, our annual online video industry conference that we’re holding in San Francisco tomorrow, Nov. 12th. I’ve been preparing for my conversations with Quincy Smith, the outgoing CEO of CBS Interactive, and Reed Hastings, CEO of Netflix. Adobe Systems’ CTO Kevin Lynch is going to chat with Sebastian Rupley, our editor in chief. Expect some fireworks during our conversations about the future of video and video delivery. Liz Gannes and Chris Albrecht, co-editors of NewTeeVee, have put together an all star line-up of speakers for what promises to be an information- and insight-packed event. They will be talking onstage with (see schedule) senior executives from Adobe Systems, Facebook and YouTube along with folks from Comcast, Microsoft’s XBox Live, CNN Interactive, Cisco, Boxee, Roku and Redbox. The focus of this year’s co... It’s been an exciting week here at GigaOM HQ. We’ve been busy putting the final touches on the third edition of NewTeeVee Live, our annual online video industry conference that we’re holding in San Francisco tomorrow, Nov. 12th. I’ve been preparing for my conversations with Quincy Smith, the outgoing CEO of CBS Interactive, and Reed Hastings, CEO of Netflix. Adobe Systems’ CTO Kevin Lynch is going to chat with Sebastian Rupley, our editor in chief. Expect some fireworks during our conversations about the future of video and video delivery. Liz Gannes and Chris Albrecht, co-editors of NewTeeVee, have put together an all star line-up of speakers for what promises to be an information- and insight-packed event. They will be talking onstage with (see schedule) senior executives from Adobe Systems, Facebook and YouTube along with folks from Comcast, Microsoft’s XBox Live, CNN Interactive, Cisco, Boxee, Roku and Redbox. The focus of this year’s conference is on three major themes that will dominate the video industry over the next 12 months: TV Everywhere, Social TV and the Over-the-Top Video. The event will also include a thrilling series of vignettes that will feature products and startups that are building the Next Big Thing. Expect some interesting news to come out of these NBT vignettes. Lindsay Campbell, ex-host of WallStrip, is going to be our MC for the day. I hope you can join us for the event tomorrow — we still have about 12 tickets left for sale — hopefully you can grab them soon. We will be giving the attendees of NewTeeVee Live a free copy of our recently released GigaOM Pro research report, “TV Everywhere: Everything You Need To Know.” Others can access the report by subscribing to GigaOM Pro directly. It’s been an exciting week here at GigaOM HQ. We’ve been busy putting the final touches on the third edition of NewTeeVee Live, our annual online video industry conference that we’re holding in San Francisco tomorrow, Nov. 12th. I’ve been preparing for my conversations with Quincy Smith, the outgoing CEO of CBS Interactive, and Reed Hastings, CEO of Netflix. Adobe Systems’ CTO Kevin Lynch is going to chat with Sebastian Rupley, our editor in chief. Expect some fireworks during our conversations about the future of video and video delivery. Liz Gannes and Chris Albrecht, co-editors of NewTeeVee, have put together an all star line-up of speakers for what promises to be an information- and insight-packed event. They will be talking onstage with (see schedule) senior executives from Adobe Systems, Facebook and YouTube along with folks from Comcast, Microsoft’s XBox Live, CNN Interactive, Cisco, Boxee, Roku and Redbox. The focus of this year’s conference is on three major themes that will dominate the video industry over the next 12 months: TV Everywhere, Social TV and the Over-the-Top Video. The event will also include a thrilling series of vignettes that will feature products and startups that are building the Next Big Thing. Expect some interesting news to come out of these NBT vignettes. Lindsay Campbell, ex-host of WallStrip, is going to be our MC for the day. I hope you can join us for the event tomorrow — we still have about 12 tickets left for sale — hopefully you can grab them soon. We will be giving the attendees of NewTeeVee Live a free copy of our recently released GigaOM Pro research report, “TV Everywhere: Everything You Need To Know.” Others can access the report by subscribing to GigaOM Pro directly. tag:odeo.com,2009-11-11,25437603 Wed, 11 Nov 2009 10:55:34 -0800 no GigaOM Media, events, NewTeeVee Live http://odeo.com/episodes/25437604-Are-the-Symbian-Foundation%E2%80%99s-Open-source-Plans-DOA “When Nokia announced that it was launching the Symbian Foundation to great fanfare,” writes John Mark Walker on OStatic, “it had within its grasp that rarest of opportunities to move swiftly and become the dominant open-source mobile platform. Alas, just one and a half years later, Nokia and the foundation have seemingly ceded that position to Android. Instead of recognizing the threat from Android and making strategic changes to counter, they instead criticized Google’s closed-door development of the OS before releasing a line of code themselves.” Can the Symbian Foundation and Nokia recover quickly and deliver on their important open-source promises and goals?  OStatic tackles that question today, here. “When Nokia announced that it was launching the Symbian Foundation to great fanfare,” writes John Mark Walker on OStatic, “it had within its grasp that rarest of opportunities to move swiftly and become the dominant open-source mobile platform. Alas, just one and a half years later, Nokia and the foundation have seemingly ceded that position to Android. Instead of recognizing the threat from Android and making strategic changes to counter, they instead criticized Google’s closed-door development of the OS before releasing a line of code themselves.” Can the Symbian Foundation and Nokia recover quickly and deliver on their important open-source promises and goals?  OStatic tackles that question today, here. “When Nokia announced that it was launching the Symbian Foundation to great fanfare,” writes John Mark Walker on OStatic, “it had within its grasp that rarest of opportunities to move swiftly and become the dominant open-source mobile platform. Alas, just one and a half years later, Nokia and the foundation have seemingly ceded that position to Android. Instead of recognizing the threat from Android and making strategic changes to counter, they instead criticized Google’s closed-door development of the OS before releasing a line of code themselves.” Can the Symbian Foundation and Nokia recover quickly and deliver on their important open-source promises and goals?  OStatic tackles that question today, here. tag:odeo.com,2009-11-11,25437604 Wed, 11 Nov 2009 10:20:22 -0800 no GigaOM nokia, android, Mobile, Open Source, symbian, mobile phones, @Not for Syndication, Symbian Foundation http://odeo.com/episodes/25437605-Live-streaming-Event-Video-Rights-Roundtable Today, at the GigaOM HQ here in San Francisco, key players of the web video industry will gather to talk about the approaches they’re taking when it comes to monitoring, regulating, spreading and monetizing content online — and what form they expect such activities to take over the long term. We will be live streaming the event, starting at 9:30 am PT, for two hours. We hope you can join us — please leave your thoughts as to what’s being discussed in the comments section. And for those who want to talk about it online, the Twitter hash tag is #NTVL. ? To follow along via liveblog and get access to post-game analysis and video interviews with attendees, head over to GigaOM Pro. Sign up today with the discount code “BUNKERNTVL? to get an additional $20 off our $79 annual subscription price. Today, at the GigaOM HQ here in San Francisco, key players of the web video industry will gather to talk about the approaches they’re taking when it comes to monitoring, regulating, spreading and monetizing content online — and what form they expect such activities to take over the long term. We will be live streaming the event, starting at 9:30 am PT, for two hours. We hope you can join us — please leave your thoughts as to what’s being discussed in the comments section. And for those who want to talk about it online, the Twitter hash tag is #NTVL. ? To follow along via liveblog and get access to post-game analysis and video interviews with attendees, head over to GigaOM Pro. Sign up today with the discount code “BUNKERNTVL? to get an additional $20 off our $79 annual subscription price. Today, at the GigaOM HQ here in San Francisco, key players of the web video industry will gather to talk about the approaches they’re taking when it comes to monitoring, regulating, spreading and monetizing content online — and what form they expect such activities to take over the long term. We will be live streaming the event, starting at 9:30 am PT, for two hours. We hope you can join us — please leave your thoughts as to what’s being discussed in the comments section. And for those who want to talk about it online, the Twitter hash tag is #NTVL. ? To follow along via liveblog and get access to post-game analysis and video interviews with attendees, head over to GigaOM Pro. Sign up today with the discount code “BUNKERNTVL? to get an additional $20 off our $79 annual subscription price. tag:odeo.com,2009-11-11,25437605 Wed, 11 Nov 2009 08:47:33 -0800 no GigaOM featured, events http://odeo.com/episodes/25437606-What-to-read-on-the-GigaOM-network Why open source for the smart grid needs a kick-start (Earth2Tech) Android: Linux, only different (OStatic) Apple’s atomic war (TheAppleBlog) Supergroup Them Crooked Vultures streams music on YouTube (NewTeeVee) My first month with Google Wave: can’t even stand on the board (WebWorkerDaily) REDFLY for the BlackBerry: not the solution you were looking for (jkOnTheRun) Why open source for the smart grid needs a kick-start (Earth2Tech) Android: Linux, only different (OStatic) Apple’s atomic war (TheAppleBlog) Supergroup Them Crooked Vultures streams music on YouTube (NewTeeVee) My first month with Google Wave: can’t even stand on the board (WebWorkerDaily) REDFLY for the BlackBerry: not the solution you were looking for (jkOnTheRun) Why open source for the smart grid needs a kick-start (Earth2Tech) Android: Linux, only different (OStatic) Apple’s atomic war (TheAppleBlog) Supergroup Them Crooked Vultures streams music on YouTube (NewTeeVee) My first month with Google Wave: can’t even stand on the board (WebWorkerDaily) REDFLY for the BlackBerry: not the solution you were looking for (jkOnTheRun) tag:odeo.com,2009-11-11,25437606 Wed, 11 Nov 2009 08:37:55 -0800 no GigaOM GigaNET http://odeo.com/episodes/25437607-Google-CEO-Schmidt-Why-We-Bought-AdMob Google earlier this week said it was buying AdMob, a mobile advertising network, for $750 million in stock — clearly an attempt to get a running start in the mobile advertising business. Together, according to some estimates, the two companies control 30-40 percent of the mobile ad market. What wasn’t said was that without AdMob, it would take a long time for Google to get thousands of apps to use its ad service as that would involve re-tweaking thousands of iPhone apps that were using AdMob’s network. Google didn’t have time for that, as CEO Eric Schmidt explained in an interview with Bloomberg: “AdMob is clearly the best of its ilk for applications monetization…We think that’s as strategic as search monetization, which, of course, we’re very good at…One the key success points for the iPhone was this enormous development of apps, and particularly free apps, which are advertising supported…Now that we have our Android platform coming o... Google earlier this week said it was buying AdMob, a mobile advertising network, for $750 million in stock — clearly an attempt to get a running start in the mobile advertising business. Together, according to some estimates, the two companies control 30-40 percent of the mobile ad market. What wasn’t said was that without AdMob, it would take a long time for Google to get thousands of apps to use its ad service as that would involve re-tweaking thousands of iPhone apps that were using AdMob’s network. Google didn’t have time for that, as CEO Eric Schmidt explained in an interview with Bloomberg: “AdMob is clearly the best of its ilk for applications monetization…We think that’s as strategic as search monetization, which, of course, we’re very good at…One the key success points for the iPhone was this enormous development of apps, and particularly free apps, which are advertising supported…Now that we have our Android platform coming out, and really with some serious partners behind it, it will also be important to have that be true for Android as well as the others.” Ian Schafer, CEO of Deep Focus, a marketing agency, puts it all in context: With the acquisition of AdMob, Google now has access to usage data of many of the most popular mobile apps–especially the apps in the iTunes App Store. For iPhones. If Google is taking on Apple for mobile OS market share, they just scored a huge competitive advantage. Google will know more details than ever about how people are using iPhone apps, how they are engaging with advertising within those apps, and users’ loyalty to those apps. Dashboards like the above only provide a window into the beginning of the mining that Google is likely about to do on their mobile handset competition. Get the complete lowdown on mobile app stores, including details on who is doing what, in this special report, which is included in the annual subscription of GigaOM Pro. Subscribe to GigaOM Pro for $79 a year, get this report. Google has been worried sick about the rise of the app economy because it undermines its ad-based search paradigm. As Andy Abramson explained: If your business is built on things like web based technology (search), cloud based technology (Apps) and advertising from traffic that goes to and through your search engine or when people are looking at their content in the apps, the concept of many app stores has to be very, very scary for a few reasons. Well nothing like a bit of fear to loosen the purse strings. AdMob is Google’s second-largest advertising-related acquisition to date, behind DoubleClick, for which it paid $3.2 billion. The company also paid $1.6 billion for YouTube. Notably, Schmidt said he doesn’t view AdMob-sized deals as the norm for future deals. Photo courtesy of Charles Haynes via Flickr. Google earlier this week said it was buying AdMob, a mobile advertising network, for $750 million in stock — clearly an attempt to get a running start in the mobile advertising business. Together, according to some estimates, the two companies control 30-40 percent of the mobile ad market. What wasn’t said was that without AdMob, it would take a long time for Google to get thousands of apps to use its ad service as that would involve re-tweaking thousands of iPhone apps that were using AdMob’s network. Google didn’t have time for that, as CEO Eric Schmidt explained in an interview with Bloomberg: “AdMob is clearly the best of its ilk for applications monetization…We think that’s as strategic as search monetization, which, of course, we’re very good at…One the key success points for the iPhone was this enormous development of apps, and particularly free apps, which are advertising supported…Now that we have our Android platform coming out, and really with some serious partners behind it, it will also be important to have that be true for Android as well as the others.” Ian Schafer, CEO of Deep Focus, a marketing agency, puts it all in context: With the acquisition of AdMob, Google now has access to usage data of many of the most popular mobile apps–especially the apps in the iTunes App Store. For iPhones. If Google is taking on Apple for mobile OS market share, they just scored a huge competitive advantage. Google will know more details than ever about how people are using iPhone apps, how they are engaging with advertising within those apps, and users’ loyalty to those apps. Dashboards like the above only provide a window into the beginning of the mining that Google is likely about to do on their mobile handset competition. Get the complete lowdown on mobile app stores, including details on who is doing what, in this special report, which is included in the annual subscription of GigaOM Pro. Subscribe to GigaOM Pro for $79 a year, get this report. Google has been worried sick about the rise of the app economy because it undermines its ad-based search paradigm. As Andy Abramson explained: If your business is built on things like web based technology (search), cloud based technology (Apps) and advertising from traffic that goes to and through your search engine or when people are looking at their content in the apps, the concept of many app stores has to be very, very scary for a few reasons. Well nothing like a bit of fear to loosen the purse strings. AdMob is Google’s second-largest advertising-related acquisition to date, behind DoubleClick, for which it paid $3.2 billion. The company also paid $1.6 billion for YouTube. Notably, Schmidt said he doesn’t view AdMob-sized deals as the norm for future deals. Photo courtesy of Charles Haynes via Flickr. tag:odeo.com,2009-11-11,25437607 Wed, 11 Nov 2009 08:12:29 -0800 no GigaOM iphone, android, google, apple, Mobile, smartphones, Eric Schmidt http://odeo.com/episodes/25437608-If-Mobile-Carriers-Don%E2%80%99t-Address-Demand-for-Wi-Fi-Ad-Supported-Services-Will Mobile network operators must find better — and cheaper — ways of incorporating Wi-Fi access into their data plans, according to a new study conducted by two companies with skin in the game. The study from mobile broadband gateway provider Stoke and international Wi-Fi access provider Trustive found that more than 64 percent of the 300 business users polled said they use Wi-Fi for data roaming — apparently favoring the technology over cellular access — and 42 percent of respondents said they plan their Wi-Fi usage in advance of traveling so they know where and how they can access the Internet. And price is largely driving their decisions about how they access the web. An overwhelming 86 percent of the 300 business users polled said price was the most important factor in selecting a Wi-Fi access provider, and 72 percent of respondents paid for their own Wi-Fi access. Meanwhile, the survey also found nearly two-thirds of users relied on being connected, with 65... Mobile network operators must find better — and cheaper — ways of incorporating Wi-Fi access into their data plans, according to a new study conducted by two companies with skin in the game. The study from mobile broadband gateway provider Stoke and international Wi-Fi access provider Trustive found that more than 64 percent of the 300 business users polled said they use Wi-Fi for data roaming — apparently favoring the technology over cellular access — and 42 percent of respondents said they plan their Wi-Fi usage in advance of traveling so they know where and how they can access the Internet. And price is largely driving their decisions about how they access the web. An overwhelming 86 percent of the 300 business users polled said price was the most important factor in selecting a Wi-Fi access provider, and 72 percent of respondents paid for their own Wi-Fi access. Meanwhile, the survey also found nearly two-thirds of users relied on being connected, with 65 percent of respondents accessing the network when they need to download materials rather than carry their information with them. That demand — coupled with the rise in Wi-Fi usage due to the traction of WiFi-enabled phones — indicates a need for mobile operators to embrace the technology more effectively in their data plans, said Barry Hill, vice president of sales and marketing for Stoke. “The survey demonstrates widespread dissatisfaction with mobile operators,” Hill said in a prepared statement. “On the plus side, it indicates that due to high and unpredictable data roaming charges, Wi-Fi is the wireless broadband preference for workers when traveling. Users expect operators to bundle affordable worldwide Wi-Fi access together with cellular data plans. Increasingly, they will select operators based on the mixed wireless access experience.” But the figures also highlight the opportunities that exist in using free Wi-Fi as a marketing tool, as Stacey and Om pointed out yesterday. Business users feel they must be connected as often as possible wherever they travel, but are footing the bills themselves. If carriers can’t find ways to deliver data plans that incorporate Wi-Fi for road warriors, many ad-supported services such as those funded by sponsors like Google, Microsoft and Yahoo will try to meet that demand. Mobile network operators must find better — and cheaper — ways of incorporating Wi-Fi access into their data plans, according to a new study conducted by two companies with skin in the game. The study from mobile broadband gateway provider Stoke and international Wi-Fi access provider Trustive found that more than 64 percent of the 300 business users polled said they use Wi-Fi for data roaming — apparently favoring the technology over cellular access — and 42 percent of respondents said they plan their Wi-Fi usage in advance of traveling so they know where and how they can access the Internet. And price is largely driving their decisions about how they access the web. An overwhelming 86 percent of the 300 business users polled said price was the most important factor in selecting a Wi-Fi access provider, and 72 percent of respondents paid for their own Wi-Fi access. Meanwhile, the survey also found nearly two-thirds of users relied on being connected, with 65 percent of respondents accessing the network when they need to download materials rather than carry their information with them. That demand — coupled with the rise in Wi-Fi usage due to the traction of WiFi-enabled phones — indicates a need for mobile operators to embrace the technology more effectively in their data plans, said Barry Hill, vice president of sales and marketing for Stoke. “The survey demonstrates widespread dissatisfaction with mobile operators,” Hill said in a prepared statement. “On the plus side, it indicates that due to high and unpredictable data roaming charges, Wi-Fi is the wireless broadband preference for workers when traveling. Users expect operators to bundle affordable worldwide Wi-Fi access together with cellular data plans. Increasingly, they will select operators based on the mixed wireless access experience.” But the figures also highlight the opportunities that exist in using free Wi-Fi as a marketing tool, as Stacey and Om pointed out yesterday. Business users feel they must be connected as often as possible wherever they travel, but are footing the bills themselves. If carriers can’t find ways to deliver data plans that incorporate Wi-Fi for road warriors, many ad-supported services such as those funded by sponsors like Google, Microsoft and Yahoo will try to meet that demand. tag:odeo.com,2009-11-11,25437608 Wed, 11 Nov 2009 07:55:33 -0800 no GigaOM wi-fi, Mobile, Broadband, mobile carriers http://odeo.com/episodes/25437609-P4P-May-Be-Coming-to-a-Network-Near-You   Several Internet service providers in the U.S. and around the world (including a large Chinese ISP) are currently implementing P4P technologies on their networks to help alleviate congestion caused by peer-to-peer files, and they will soon be joined by other ISPs doing the same. Indeed, P4P efforts that were showcased in August 2008 are taking on more relevance as broadband demand escalates and the FCC tries to regulate the principles by which carriers can deal with congestion on their networks. In the August 2008 tests, which were performed by Comcast, Verizon, Yale and Pando Networks, users reported seeing see an 80 percent improvement in speed for P2P files using the technology, while it reduced traffic on the ISP network by 34 percent. That’s nothing to scoff at considering P2P traffic still accounts for 38 percent of global Internet traffic. So after more than a year of relative quiet, I checked in to see where the much-vaunted P4P efforts currently are. The good news i...   Several Internet service providers in the U.S. and around the world (including a large Chinese ISP) are currently implementing P4P technologies on their networks to help alleviate congestion caused by peer-to-peer files, and they will soon be joined by other ISPs doing the same. Indeed, P4P efforts that were showcased in August 2008 are taking on more relevance as broadband demand escalates and the FCC tries to regulate the principles by which carriers can deal with congestion on their networks. In the August 2008 tests, which were performed by Comcast, Verizon, Yale and Pando Networks, users reported seeing see an 80 percent improvement in speed for P2P files using the technology, while it reduced traffic on the ISP network by 34 percent. That’s nothing to scoff at considering P2P traffic still accounts for 38 percent of global Internet traffic. So after more than a year of relative quiet, I checked in to see where the much-vaunted P4P efforts currently are. The good news is that P4P is alive and well and several researchers and ISPs are testing its use for P2P downloads such as BitTorrent as well as for P2P streaming, which could help alleviate two of the largest anticipated sources of congestion on the web.  Some popular P2P streaming applications consumers may have encountered are Spotify, the UK music service, and Octoshape, the company that streamed the Obama inauguration and still works with CNN. The P4P standards-setting process is still underway at the IETF (the topic will be discussed at a meeting in Hiroshima this week) so there’s no official P4P protocol to report on yet, but we’re “halfway through a 2-3-year process,” said Marty Lafferty, the CEO of the Distributed Computing Industry Association, which works with the P4P working group. The lack of an industry standard isn’t stopping anyone from testing out P4P technology in their own networks, however. Robert Levitan, CEO of Pando Networks, which participated in the August trials, says companies are already coming to Pando to implement P4P-like technologies. One large U.S. and one international ISP are using P4P technology commercially on their networks, he said, and a Chinese ISP is testing it as well. However, the technology has its difficulties, namely how it might be used. Peer-to-peer file sharing is pretty much code for pirating content, and rights organizations aren’t keen on losing ISPs as an ally in their fight against P2P file-sharing. Another issue is the coming net neutrality debate in the U.S. Lafferty says that ISPs are so focused on fighting these rules that they have little time  to collaborate on solving network congestion problems through technologies such as P4P. There’s also a question as to whether prioritizing P2P files as P4P does would violate future net neutrality principles. However, at a time when network congestion is already a topic of federal debate, getting more information out about ways to relieve it can only be a good thing.   Several Internet service providers in the U.S. and around the world (including a large Chinese ISP) are currently implementing P4P technologies on their networks to help alleviate congestion caused by peer-to-peer files, and they will soon be joined by other ISPs doing the same. Indeed, P4P efforts that were showcased in August 2008 are taking on more relevance as broadband demand escalates and the FCC tries to regulate the principles by which carriers can deal with congestion on their networks. In the August 2008 tests, which were performed by Comcast, Verizon, Yale and Pando Networks, users reported seeing see an 80 percent improvement in speed for P2P files using the technology, while it reduced traffic on the ISP network by 34 percent. That’s nothing to scoff at considering P2P traffic still accounts for 38 percent of global Internet traffic. So after more than a year of relative quiet, I checked in to see where the much-vaunted P4P efforts currently are. The good news is that P4P is alive and well and several researchers and ISPs are testing its use for P2P downloads such as BitTorrent as well as for P2P streaming, which could help alleviate two of the largest anticipated sources of congestion on the web.  Some popular P2P streaming applications consumers may have encountered are Spotify, the UK music service, and Octoshape, the company that streamed the Obama inauguration and still works with CNN. The P4P standards-setting process is still underway at the IETF (the topic will be discussed at a meeting in Hiroshima this week) so there’s no official P4P protocol to report on yet, but we’re “halfway through a 2-3-year process,” said Marty Lafferty, the CEO of the Distributed Computing Industry Association, which works with the P4P working group. The lack of an industry standard isn’t stopping anyone from testing out P4P technology in their own networks, however. Robert Levitan, CEO of Pando Networks, which participated in the August trials, says companies are already coming to Pando to implement P4P-like technologies. One large U.S. and one international ISP are using P4P technology commercially on their networks, he said, and a Chinese ISP is testing it as well. However, the technology has its difficulties, namely how it might be used. Peer-to-peer file sharing is pretty much code for pirating content, and rights organizations aren’t keen on losing ISPs as an ally in their fight against P2P file-sharing. Another issue is the coming net neutrality debate in the U.S. Lafferty says that ISPs are so focused on fighting these rules that they have little time  to collaborate on solving network congestion problems through technologies such as P4P. There’s also a question as to whether prioritizing P2P files as P4P does would violate future net neutrality principles. However, at a time when network congestion is already a topic of federal debate, getting more information out about ways to relieve it can only be a good thing. tag:odeo.com,2009-11-11,25437609 Wed, 11 Nov 2009 07:00:48 -0800 no GigaOM verizon, Broadband, comcast, P4P, CMCSA, VZ http://odeo.com/episodes/25434952-How-Much-is-Twitter-Worth-Less-Than-You-Think Twitter, the San Francisco-based micro-messaging start-up, recently raised about $98 million dollars from T. Rowe Price, Insight Venture Partners, Spark Capital and Institutional Venture Partners. valuing the company at a whopping $1.1 billion. NeXt Up Research, the firm founded by veteran financial analyst, Michael Moe, disagrees with that post money valuation, and instead values Twitter at about $526-to-$674 million. NeXt Up’s research report is offered to users of SharesPost, a Santa Monica, Calif.-based private online exchange that allows the sale of shares of private companies to willing buyers. Most of their concern is coming from the lack of revenues and worries that any diversification into money-making services could alienate the Twitter user base. According to the report, Twitter has over 70 million users. The company‘s revenue model has yet to be tested. We believe that most revenue generation options available to the company have the potential to alienate at least ... Twitter, the San Francisco-based micro-messaging start-up, recently raised about $98 million dollars from T. Rowe Price, Insight Venture Partners, Spark Capital and Institutional Venture Partners. valuing the company at a whopping $1.1 billion. NeXt Up Research, the firm founded by veteran financial analyst, Michael Moe, disagrees with that post money valuation, and instead values Twitter at about $526-to-$674 million. NeXt Up’s research report is offered to users of SharesPost, a Santa Monica, Calif.-based private online exchange that allows the sale of shares of private companies to willing buyers. Most of their concern is coming from the lack of revenues and worries that any diversification into money-making services could alienate the Twitter user base. According to the report, Twitter has over 70 million users. The company‘s revenue model has yet to be tested. We believe that most revenue generation options available to the company have the potential to alienate at least some of Twitter‘s user base. Twitter may not have adequate time to revise its models before it loses its critical mass and reputation. Our estimated valuation of $526M – $674M is below the recent preferred funding round at a $1.1B valuation. However, we note that the preferred shares benefit from liquidation preference that limit the downside. We expect common share valuation to be driven by the company‘s revenue growth and profitability potential over the next 3 – 5 years. They are estimating that Twitter will make between $114-to-$134 million in 2013 and between $126-to-$148 million in 2014. I bet these numbers don’t take into account the gobs of money Twitter is going to be making by licensing its data to both Microsoft and Google. No one really knows how much the two giants are ponying up for the Twitter fire hose. Nevertheless, the report points out that Twitter has a special appeal for marketers. Twitter can share in the revenues generated by big brands. We estimate that Twitter‘s opt-in feature allows for one of the most cost effective approaches for direct marketers. The cost of an effective message through Twitter, in our estimate, is likely to be (depending on how Twitter chooses to price it) less than $0.50, far lower than other approaches such as telemarketing or direct mail, which can cost an order of magnitude more. For instance, Dell has indicated that it generated $3M in revenues from June 2007 to June 2009, of which $1M were in the last six months. The followers of Dell (who have opted in to receive messages) soared from 11k in December 2008 to 1.3 million in October 2009. We believe there are hundreds of businesses which have the potential to generate over $1M in revenues, allowing Twitter to claim a share for referral. This type of marketing approach is no different than the Fan Pages being established by large brands on Facebook. In both cases, users have to opt-in to participate in various marketing efforts, essentially making them more valuable than recipients of say, random email newsletter-based offers. There are some other tidbits in the report about Twitter that might be of some interest to you. * US has the largest number of Twitter users 57.4 percent, followed by UK with 8.2 percent, Canada (5.9 percent), Australia (2.9 percent), Brazil (2.1 percent), Germany (1.6 percent) and Netherlands (1.3 percent.) * Nearly 28 percent of Twitter users are above the age of 45, while 26 percent users are between the ages of 15-24. * About 18.4 percent Tweets emerge from Tweetdeck, while Tweetie accounts for 9.1 percent and Seesmic is at 6 percent of the total. Web interface accounts for 17.8 percent of total tweets. Twitter, the San Francisco-based micro-messaging start-up, recently raised about $98 million dollars from T. Rowe Price, Insight Venture Partners, Spark Capital and Institutional Venture Partners. valuing the company at a whopping $1.1 billion. NeXt Up Research, the firm founded by veteran financial analyst, Michael Moe, disagrees with that post money valuation, and instead values Twitter at about $526-to-$674 million. NeXt Up’s research report is offered to users of SharesPost, a Santa Monica, Calif.-based private online exchange that allows the sale of shares of private companies to willing buyers. Most of their concern is coming from the lack of revenues and worries that any diversification into money-making services could alienate the Twitter user base. According to the report, Twitter has over 70 million users. The company‘s revenue model has yet to be tested. We believe that most revenue generation options available to the company have the potential to alienate at least some of Twitter‘s user base. Twitter may not have adequate time to revise its models before it loses its critical mass and reputation. Our estimated valuation of $526M – $674M is below the recent preferred funding round at a $1.1B valuation. However, we note that the preferred shares benefit from liquidation preference that limit the downside. We expect common share valuation to be driven by the company‘s revenue growth and profitability potential over the next 3 – 5 years. They are estimating that Twitter will make between $114-to-$134 million in 2013 and between $126-to-$148 million in 2014. I bet these numbers don’t take into account the gobs of money Twitter is going to be making by licensing its data to both Microsoft and Google. No one really knows how much the two giants are ponying up for the Twitter fire hose. Nevertheless, the report points out that Twitter has a special appeal for marketers. Twitter can share in the revenues generated by big brands. We estimate that Twitter‘s opt-in feature allows for one of the most cost effective approaches for direct marketers. The cost of an effective message through Twitter, in our estimate, is likely to be (depending on how Twitter chooses to price it) less than $0.50, far lower than other approaches such as telemarketing or direct mail, which can cost an order of magnitude more. For instance, Dell has indicated that it generated $3M in revenues from June 2007 to June 2009, of which $1M were in the last six months. The followers of Dell (who have opted in to receive messages) soared from 11k in December 2008 to 1.3 million in October 2009. We believe there are hundreds of businesses which have the potential to generate over $1M in revenues, allowing Twitter to claim a share for referral. This type of marketing approach is no different than the Fan Pages being established by large brands on Facebook. In both cases, users have to opt-in to participate in various marketing efforts, essentially making them more valuable than recipients of say, random email newsletter-based offers. There are some other tidbits in the report about Twitter that might be of some interest to you. * US has the largest number of Twitter users 57.4 percent, followed by UK with 8.2 percent, Canada (5.9 percent), Australia (2.9 percent), Brazil (2.1 percent), Germany (1.6 percent) and Netherlands (1.3 percent.) * Nearly 28 percent of Twitter users are above the age of 45, while 26 percent users are between the ages of 15-24. * About 18.4 percent Tweets emerge from Tweetdeck, while Tweetie accounts for 9.1 percent and Seesmic is at 6 percent of the total. Web interface accounts for 17.8 percent of total tweets. tag:odeo.com,2009-11-10,25434952 Tue, 10 Nov 2009 20:06:46 -0800 no GigaOM web, twitter, Nextup research, Sharepost http://odeo.com/episodes/25437610-How-Much-Is-Twitter-Worth-Less-Than-You-Think Twitter, the San Francisco-based micro-messaging startup, recently raised about $98 million dollars from T. Rowe Price, Insight Venture Partners, Spark Capital and Institutional Venture Partners, valuing the company at a whopping $1.1 billion. NeXt Up Research, the firm founded by veteran financial analyst Michael Moe, disagrees with that post-money valuation, and instead values Twitter at about $526-$674 million. NeXt Up’s research report is offered to users of SharesPost, a Santa Monica, Calif.-based private online exchange that allows the sale of shares of private companies to willing buyers. Most of their concern is coming from the lack of revenues and worries that any diversification into money-making services could alienate the Twitter user base. According to the report, Twitter has over 70 million users. The company‘s revenue model has yet to be tested. We believe that most revenue generation options available to the company have the potential to alienate at least some ... Twitter, the San Francisco-based micro-messaging startup, recently raised about $98 million dollars from T. Rowe Price, Insight Venture Partners, Spark Capital and Institutional Venture Partners, valuing the company at a whopping $1.1 billion. NeXt Up Research, the firm founded by veteran financial analyst Michael Moe, disagrees with that post-money valuation, and instead values Twitter at about $526-$674 million. NeXt Up’s research report is offered to users of SharesPost, a Santa Monica, Calif.-based private online exchange that allows the sale of shares of private companies to willing buyers. Most of their concern is coming from the lack of revenues and worries that any diversification into money-making services could alienate the Twitter user base. According to the report, Twitter has over 70 million users. The company‘s revenue model has yet to be tested. We believe that most revenue generation options available to the company have the potential to alienate at least some of Twitter‘s user base. Twitter may not have adequate time to revise its models before it loses its critical mass and reputation. Our estimated valuation of $526M – $674M is below the recent preferred funding round at a $1.1B valuation. However, we note that the preferred shares benefit from liquidation preference that limit the downside. We expect common share valuation to be driven by the company‘s revenue growth and profitability potential over the next 3 – 5 years. They are estimating that Twitter will make between $114 million and $134 million in 2013 and between $126 million and $148 million in 2014. I bet these numbers don’t take into account the gobs of money Twitter is going to be making by licensing its data to both Microsoft and Google. No one really knows how much the two giants are ponying up for the Twitter fire hose. Nevertheless, the report points out that Twitter has a special appeal for marketers. Twitter can share in the revenues generated by big brands. We estimate that Twitter‘s opt-in feature allows for one of the most cost effective approaches for direct marketers. The cost of an effective message through Twitter, in our estimate, is likely to be (depending on how Twitter chooses to price it) less than $0.50, far lower than other approaches such as telemarketing or direct mail, which can cost an order of magnitude more. For instance, Dell has indicated that it generated $3M in revenues from June 2007 to June 2009, of which $1M were in the last six months. The followers of Dell (who have opted in to receive messages) soared from 11k in December 2008 to 1.3 million in October 2009. We believe there are hundreds of businesses which have the potential to generate over $1M in revenues, allowing Twitter to claim a share for referral. This type of marketing approach is no different than the Fan Pages being established by large brands on Facebook. In both cases, users have to opt in to participate in various marketing efforts, essentially making them more valuable than recipients of, say, random email newsletter-based offers. Here are some other tidbits in the report about Twitter that might be of interest: The U.S. has the largest number of Twitter users at 57.4 percent, followed by the UK with 8.2 percent, Canada (5.9 percent), Australia (2.9 percent), Brazil (2.1 percent), Germany (1.6 percent) and the Netherlands (1.3 percent.) Nearly 28 percent of Twitter users are above the age of 45, while 26 percent users are between the ages of 15-24. About 18.4 percent of tweets emerge from Tweetdeck, while Tweetie accounts for 9.1 percent and Seesmic is at 6 percent of the total. Its web interface accounts for 17.8 percent of total tweets. Twitter, the San Francisco-based micro-messaging startup, recently raised about $98 million dollars from T. Rowe Price, Insight Venture Partners, Spark Capital and Institutional Venture Partners, valuing the company at a whopping $1.1 billion. NeXt Up Research, the firm founded by veteran financial analyst Michael Moe, disagrees with that post-money valuation, and instead values Twitter at about $526-$674 million. NeXt Up’s research report is offered to users of SharesPost, a Santa Monica, Calif.-based private online exchange that allows the sale of shares of private companies to willing buyers. Most of their concern is coming from the lack of revenues and worries that any diversification into money-making services could alienate the Twitter user base. According to the report, Twitter has over 70 million users. The company‘s revenue model has yet to be tested. We believe that most revenue generation options available to the company have the potential to alienate at least some of Twitter‘s user base. Twitter may not have adequate time to revise its models before it loses its critical mass and reputation. Our estimated valuation of $526M – $674M is below the recent preferred funding round at a $1.1B valuation. However, we note that the preferred shares benefit from liquidation preference that limit the downside. We expect common share valuation to be driven by the company‘s revenue growth and profitability potential over the next 3 – 5 years. They are estimating that Twitter will make between $114 million and $134 million in 2013 and between $126 million and $148 million in 2014. I bet these numbers don’t take into account the gobs of money Twitter is going to be making by licensing its data to both Microsoft and Google. No one really knows how much the two giants are ponying up for the Twitter fire hose. Nevertheless, the report points out that Twitter has a special appeal for marketers. Twitter can share in the revenues generated by big brands. We estimate that Twitter‘s opt-in feature allows for one of the most cost effective approaches for direct marketers. The cost of an effective message through Twitter, in our estimate, is likely to be (depending on how Twitter chooses to price it) less than $0.50, far lower than other approaches such as telemarketing or direct mail, which can cost an order of magnitude more. For instance, Dell has indicated that it generated $3M in revenues from June 2007 to June 2009, of which $1M were in the last six months. The followers of Dell (who have opted in to receive messages) soared from 11k in December 2008 to 1.3 million in October 2009. We believe there are hundreds of businesses which have the potential to generate over $1M in revenues, allowing Twitter to claim a share for referral. This type of marketing approach is no different than the Fan Pages being established by large brands on Facebook. In both cases, users have to opt in to participate in various marketing efforts, essentially making them more valuable than recipients of, say, random email newsletter-based offers. Here are some other tidbits in the report about Twitter that might be of interest: The U.S. has the largest number of Twitter users at 57.4 percent, followed by the UK with 8.2 percent, Canada (5.9 percent), Australia (2.9 percent), Brazil (2.1 percent), Germany (1.6 percent) and the Netherlands (1.3 percent.) Nearly 28 percent of Twitter users are above the age of 45, while 26 percent users are between the ages of 15-24. About 18.4 percent of tweets emerge from Tweetdeck, while Tweetie accounts for 9.1 percent and Seesmic is at 6 percent of the total. Its web interface accounts for 17.8 percent of total tweets. tag:odeo.com,2009-11-10,25437610 Tue, 10 Nov 2009 20:06:46 -0800 no GigaOM web, twitter, Nextup research, Sharepost http://odeo.com/episodes/25433840-Former-eBay-CEO-Meg-Whitman-Defends-Skype-Buy Meg Whitman, former chief executive officer of eBay,  defended her decision to buy Skype in a radio interview with KTKZ’s Capitol Hour featuring Eric Hogue. Whitman is running for the office of the Governor of California on a Republican ticket, and is currently leading in the Republican primaries. Here is what she had to say on the show. Hogue noted that “one of your opponents, Steve Poizner, referred to the fact that it was you as CEO of eBay that spent $2.1 billion on Skype, and that didn’t work, and he’s drawing the comparison here. Is that a fair or unfair comparison here, Meg?” She answered: You know, we made so many acquisitions at eBay, so many of which were absolutely terrific. PayPal, a lot of our classified sites. And actually I think Skype will prove to be a good acquisition for eBay. You probably read that the company just sold about two-thirds of the interest in Skype to an investor group, kept a portion, and got almost all the money back, and I think Skype ... Meg Whitman, former chief executive officer of eBay,  defended her decision to buy Skype in a radio interview with KTKZ’s Capitol Hour featuring Eric Hogue. Whitman is running for the office of the Governor of California on a Republican ticket, and is currently leading in the Republican primaries. Here is what she had to say on the show. Hogue noted that “one of your opponents, Steve Poizner, referred to the fact that it was you as CEO of eBay that spent $2.1 billion on Skype, and that didn’t work, and he’s drawing the comparison here. Is that a fair or unfair comparison here, Meg?” She answered: You know, we made so many acquisitions at eBay, so many of which were absolutely terrific. PayPal, a lot of our classified sites. And actually I think Skype will prove to be a good acquisition for eBay. You probably read that the company just sold about two-thirds of the interest in Skype to an investor group, kept a portion, and got almost all the money back, and I think Skype will be very effective. So I am very proud of my tenure at eBay. You know we took eBay from 30 individuals, 30 employees to 15,000, from $4.7 million in revenues to nearly $8 billion in revenues. So I’m very proud of the record and proud of the acquisition record. I commend her for riding the eBay rocket ship, but when it comes to Skype, we all know she blew it. And once again, she dodged the question. How can she defend overlooking and not buying the JoltID technology from Skype co-founders Niklas Zennstrom and Janus Friis? That decision cost eBay another 5 percent of Skype when the auction giant had to settle with the two co-founders. Meg Whitman, former chief executive officer of eBay,  defended her decision to buy Skype in a radio interview with KTKZ’s Capitol Hour featuring Eric Hogue. Whitman is running for the office of the Governor of California on a Republican ticket, and is currently leading in the Republican primaries. Here is what she had to say on the show. Hogue noted that “one of your opponents, Steve Poizner, referred to the fact that it was you as CEO of eBay that spent $2.1 billion on Skype, and that didn’t work, and he’s drawing the comparison here. Is that a fair or unfair comparison here, Meg?” She answered: You know, we made so many acquisitions at eBay, so many of which were absolutely terrific. PayPal, a lot of our classified sites. And actually I think Skype will prove to be a good acquisition for eBay. You probably read that the company just sold about two-thirds of the interest in Skype to an investor group, kept a portion, and got almost all the money back, and I think Skype will be very effective. So I am very proud of my tenure at eBay. You know we took eBay from 30 individuals, 30 employees to 15,000, from $4.7 million in revenues to nearly $8 billion in revenues. So I’m very proud of the record and proud of the acquisition record. I commend her for riding the eBay rocket ship, but when it comes to Skype, we all know she blew it. And once again, she dodged the question. How can she defend overlooking and not buying the JoltID technology from Skype co-founders Niklas Zennstrom and Janus Friis? That decision cost eBay another 5 percent of Skype when the auction giant had to settle with the two co-founders. tag:odeo.com,2009-11-10,25433840 Tue, 10 Nov 2009 17:14:26 -0800 no GigaOM skype, VoIP, eBay, Voice, Meg Whitman http://odeo.com/episodes/25433842-Broadcom-Goes-Open-Source-to-Push-HD-Voice Broadcom is hoping to lower the price of high-definition VoIP services by taking its BroadVoice codecs open source. But even if this move lowers the price for HD voice, will consumers pay even a marginal premium for a better quality call? The Irvine, Calif.-based company’s BroadVoice family of voice codecs comprises two variants: BroadVoice32 for wideband speech sampled at 16 kHz, and BroadVoice16 for narrowband telephone-bandwidth speech sampled at 8 kHz. Both will be made available as C source code in an effort to lower the price for broadband operators looking to upgrade the audio quality of subscribers’ calls. Higher-quality calls are a good thing, of course, and may be a selling point for service providers looking to stand out from the crowd. (Whether they can actually save wireline is far from certain, though.) But quality has often been a less-important feature for consumers, as cell phones (with their mobility) and VoIP (with their lower cost) have demonstrated. ... Broadcom is hoping to lower the price of high-definition VoIP services by taking its BroadVoice codecs open source. But even if this move lowers the price for HD voice, will consumers pay even a marginal premium for a better quality call? The Irvine, Calif.-based company’s BroadVoice family of voice codecs comprises two variants: BroadVoice32 for wideband speech sampled at 16 kHz, and BroadVoice16 for narrowband telephone-bandwidth speech sampled at 8 kHz. Both will be made available as C source code in an effort to lower the price for broadband operators looking to upgrade the audio quality of subscribers’ calls. Higher-quality calls are a good thing, of course, and may be a selling point for service providers looking to stand out from the crowd. (Whether they can actually save wireline is far from certain, though.) But quality has often been a less-important feature for consumers, as cell phones (with their mobility) and VoIP (with their lower cost) have demonstrated. Broadcom’s move to open source may result in cheaper HD voice services, but until those prices are nearly indistinguishable from traditional services HD is likely to remain a small market. Broadcom is hoping to lower the price of high-definition VoIP services by taking its BroadVoice codecs open source. But even if this move lowers the price for HD voice, will consumers pay even a marginal premium for a better quality call? The Irvine, Calif.-based company’s BroadVoice family of voice codecs comprises two variants: BroadVoice32 for wideband speech sampled at 16 kHz, and BroadVoice16 for narrowband telephone-bandwidth speech sampled at 8 kHz. Both will be made available as C source code in an effort to lower the price for broadband operators looking to upgrade the audio quality of subscribers’ calls. Higher-quality calls are a good thing, of course, and may be a selling point for service providers looking to stand out from the crowd. (Whether they can actually save wireline is far from certain, though.) But quality has often been a less-important feature for consumers, as cell phones (with their mobility) and VoIP (with their lower cost) have demonstrated. Broadcom’s move to open source may result in cheaper HD voice services, but until those prices are nearly indistinguishable from traditional services HD is likely to remain a small market. tag:odeo.com,2009-11-10,25433842 Tue, 10 Nov 2009 17:00:47 -0800 no GigaOM VoIP, Voice, Broadcom http://odeo.com/episodes/25433843-Logitech-Takes-on-Cisco-to-Buy-LifeSize-for-405M Logitech, a Swiss maker of peripherals for computers and digital consumer devices, is buying 6-year-old Austin, Texas-based video conferencing device maker LifeSize Communications for $405 million in cash. LifeSize has raised $80 million in funding from Norwest, Austin Ventures, Norwest Venture Partners, Redpoint Ventures, Sutter Hill Ventures and Pinnacle Ventures. It makes high-definition video conferencing systems that use standard broadband connections and IP technologies to connect distributed offices and locations. The deal will put Logitech in direct competition with Cisco Systems in the hotly contested video conferencing equipment market. LifeSize is a competitor to Cisco Systems and Tandberg, a Norwegian video conferencing company that Cisco wants to buy for some $3 billion. LifeSize currently has over 9,000 customers and is sold across the world. In a previous post, Stacey pointed out that Cisco’s Telepresence gear “provides an immersive HD experience, is expen... Logitech, a Swiss maker of peripherals for computers and digital consumer devices, is buying 6-year-old Austin, Texas-based video conferencing device maker LifeSize Communications for $405 million in cash. LifeSize has raised $80 million in funding from Norwest, Austin Ventures, Norwest Venture Partners, Redpoint Ventures, Sutter Hill Ventures and Pinnacle Ventures. It makes high-definition video conferencing systems that use standard broadband connections and IP technologies to connect distributed offices and locations. The deal will put Logitech in direct competition with Cisco Systems in the hotly contested video conferencing equipment market. LifeSize is a competitor to Cisco Systems and Tandberg, a Norwegian video conferencing company that Cisco wants to buy for some $3 billion. LifeSize currently has over 9,000 customers and is sold across the world. In a previous post, Stacey pointed out that Cisco’s Telepresence gear “provides an immersive HD experience, is expensive, and is aimed squarely at the high end of the market, where it competes with services such as HP’s Halo. Tandberg gear, on the other hand, is cheaper and aimed at the middle market.” Tandberg’s biggest competitor is LifeSize. Logitech also owns SightSpeed, a software-based video conferencing product that works with most PC cameras. While SightSpeed and Skype are good for low-end, free video conferencing, most companies want something larger, but don’t want to spend millions. LifeSize fits into that sweet spot, which is why I liked them in the first place. I first wrote about LifeSize in 2005, when the company was being incubated inside the offices of Norwest Venture Partners, LifeSize’s biggest investor. Norwest partner Vab Goel is a co-founder of the company that’s spearheaded by Craig Malloy. As part of the deal, Malloy will stay at the helm of LifeSize, which will in turn become a division of Logitech. I was impressed by the company and what it had been able to do. “Using off-the-shelf components, and adding some magical software sauce, these guys have worked out a way to stream HD signals over a one-megabit-per-second connection. I think these are the types of applications which are going to push the demand for broadband,” is what I wrote at the time. The video conferencing market has exploded since then. Cisco in particular has been touting its vision of telepresence. In his column for GigaOM, Cisco CEO John Chambers said: “High-speed networking enables new human collaboration at a profound level, and such collaboration will radically change the way we think.” Video is part of that change, which is why he spending billions of dollars trying to buy Tandberg. Logitech, a Swiss maker of peripherals for computers and digital consumer devices, is buying 6-year-old Austin, Texas-based video conferencing device maker LifeSize Communications for $405 million in cash. LifeSize has raised $80 million in funding from Norwest, Austin Ventures, Norwest Venture Partners, Redpoint Ventures, Sutter Hill Ventures and Pinnacle Ventures. It makes high-definition video conferencing systems that use standard broadband connections and IP technologies to connect distributed offices and locations. The deal will put Logitech in direct competition with Cisco Systems in the hotly contested video conferencing equipment market. LifeSize is a competitor to Cisco Systems and Tandberg, a Norwegian video conferencing company that Cisco wants to buy for some $3 billion. LifeSize currently has over 9,000 customers and is sold across the world. In a previous post, Stacey pointed out that Cisco’s Telepresence gear “provides an immersive HD experience, is expensive, and is aimed squarely at the high end of the market, where it competes with services such as HP’s Halo. Tandberg gear, on the other hand, is cheaper and aimed at the middle market.” Tandberg’s biggest competitor is LifeSize. Logitech also owns SightSpeed, a software-based video conferencing product that works with most PC cameras. While SightSpeed and Skype are good for low-end, free video conferencing, most companies want something larger, but don’t want to spend millions. LifeSize fits into that sweet spot, which is why I liked them in the first place. I first wrote about LifeSize in 2005, when the company was being incubated inside the offices of Norwest Venture Partners, LifeSize’s biggest investor. Norwest partner Vab Goel is a co-founder of the company that’s spearheaded by Craig Malloy. As part of the deal, Malloy will stay at the helm of LifeSize, which will in turn become a division of Logitech. I was impressed by the company and what it had been able to do. “Using off-the-shelf components, and adding some magical software sauce, these guys have worked out a way to stream HD signals over a one-megabit-per-second connection. I think these are the types of applications which are going to push the demand for broadband,” is what I wrote at the time. The video conferencing market has exploded since then. Cisco in particular has been touting its vision of telepresence. In his column for GigaOM, Cisco CEO John Chambers said: “High-speed networking enables new human collaboration at a profound level, and such collaboration will radically change the way we think.” Video is part of that change, which is why he spending billions of dollars trying to buy Tandberg. tag:odeo.com,2009-11-10,25433843 Tue, 10 Nov 2009 14:58:23 -0800 no GigaOM Broadband, Cisco, hardware, logitech, Norwest Venture Partners, telepresence, lifesize http://odeo.com/episodes/25433844-Adobe-Laying-Off-680-Employees It’s official — following several tweets today from Adobe employees, a company spokesperson confirmed for us that Adobe “filed an 8-K this afternoon [that]  reports a company restructuring which will result in a 9 percent reduction in the company’s work force (approximately 680 employees).” You can read the filing here. “Adobe is restructuring its business to align costs with its fiscal 2010 operating plan and budget, the company’s three-year strategic priorities and the realities of the business environment, as well as to ensure its ability to continue investing in long-term growth opportunities,” the spokesperson continued. The advisory we received also noted that at the close of its acquisition of Omniture, Adobe reduced the Web analytics firm’s work force by 9 percent. These are tough times for some folks in the software industry. Adobe’s announcement comes right on the heels of Microsoft laying off 800 employees. It’s official — following several tweets today from Adobe employees, a company spokesperson confirmed for us that Adobe “filed an 8-K this afternoon [that]  reports a company restructuring which will result in a 9 percent reduction in the company’s work force (approximately 680 employees).” You can read the filing here. “Adobe is restructuring its business to align costs with its fiscal 2010 operating plan and budget, the company’s three-year strategic priorities and the realities of the business environment, as well as to ensure its ability to continue investing in long-term growth opportunities,” the spokesperson continued. The advisory we received also noted that at the close of its acquisition of Omniture, Adobe reduced the Web analytics firm’s work force by 9 percent. These are tough times for some folks in the software industry. Adobe’s announcement comes right on the heels of Microsoft laying off 800 employees. It’s official — following several tweets today from Adobe employees, a company spokesperson confirmed for us that Adobe “filed an 8-K this afternoon [that]  reports a company restructuring which will result in a 9 percent reduction in the company’s work force (approximately 680 employees).” You can read the filing here. “Adobe is restructuring its business to align costs with its fiscal 2010 operating plan and budget, the company’s three-year strategic priorities and the realities of the business environment, as well as to ensure its ability to continue investing in long-term growth opportunities,” the spokesperson continued. The advisory we received also noted that at the close of its acquisition of Omniture, Adobe reduced the Web analytics firm’s work force by 9 percent. These are tough times for some folks in the software industry. Adobe’s announcement comes right on the heels of Microsoft laying off 800 employees. tag:odeo.com,2009-11-10,25433844 Tue, 10 Nov 2009 14:28:31 -0800 no GigaOM News, layoffs, Adobe, employees, Work Force http://odeo.com/episodes/25433845-Droid%E2%80%99s-Opening-Weekend-Solid-But-Not-in-iPhone-Territory Unless you’ve been hiding under a rock for the past several weeks, you’ve no doubt been bombarded with the heavy marketing surrounding the new Droid smartphone. Today, TheAppleBlog has a good analysis of the first weekend of sales for the Droid — in which 100,000 units moved — compared with the weekend openings of the iPhone, the iPhone 3G, the iPhone 3GS, and the Palm Pre. In short, the Droid did well, but nowhere near the iPhone releases. The numbers are collected in the chart below. Check Stacey’s thoughts from earlier today as well as TheAppleBlog’s analysis here. Unless you’ve been hiding under a rock for the past several weeks, you’ve no doubt been bombarded with the heavy marketing surrounding the new Droid smartphone. Today, TheAppleBlog has a good analysis of the first weekend of sales for the Droid — in which 100,000 units moved — compared with the weekend openings of the iPhone, the iPhone 3G, the iPhone 3GS, and the Palm Pre. In short, the Droid did well, but nowhere near the iPhone releases. The numbers are collected in the chart below. Check Stacey’s thoughts from earlier today as well as TheAppleBlog’s analysis here. Unless you’ve been hiding under a rock for the past several weeks, you’ve no doubt been bombarded with the heavy marketing surrounding the new Droid smartphone. Today, TheAppleBlog has a good analysis of the first weekend of sales for the Droid — in which 100,000 units moved — compared with the weekend openings of the iPhone, the iPhone 3G, the iPhone 3GS, and the Palm Pre. In short, the Droid did well, but nowhere near the iPhone releases. The numbers are collected in the chart below. Check Stacey’s thoughts from earlier today as well as TheAppleBlog’s analysis here. tag:odeo.com,2009-11-10,25433845 Tue, 10 Nov 2009 13:45:36 -0800 no GigaOM android, verizon, Mobile, motorola, smartphones, mobile phones, @Not for Syndication, droid http://odeo.com/episodes/25433846-TiE-Entrepreneur-Week TiE Entrepreneur Week will be held over a four-day period from Monday, Nov. 16 to Thursday, Nov. 19. Entrepreneur Week will consist of four intensive one-day sessions, each of which will focus on one segment: wireless, software, cleantech and Internet. The week will conclude with a wrap-up session to bring all of the participants together with the broader TiE audience. Each one-day session during Entrepreneur Week will bring together a group of TiE Charter Members, members, and other entrepreneurs with interest and experience around their chosen industry segment. Much like the sessions held at TiEcon 2009, each day will have a more intimate “PowerConnect” gathering around a specific topic of interest, as well as a panel of industry luminaries who will discuss and debate trends and issues that are relevant to the audience. Event hosts for E-Week are Visa, Sybase, and the San Jose Redevelopment Agency. Register now. TiE Entrepreneur Week will be held over a four-day period from Monday, Nov. 16 to Thursday, Nov. 19. Entrepreneur Week will consist of four intensive one-day sessions, each of which will focus on one segment: wireless, software, cleantech and Internet. The week will conclude with a wrap-up session to bring all of the participants together with the broader TiE audience. Each one-day session during Entrepreneur Week will bring together a group of TiE Charter Members, members, and other entrepreneurs with interest and experience around their chosen industry segment. Much like the sessions held at TiEcon 2009, each day will have a more intimate “PowerConnect” gathering around a specific topic of interest, as well as a panel of industry luminaries who will discuss and debate trends and issues that are relevant to the audience. Event hosts for E-Week are Visa, Sybase, and the San Jose Redevelopment Agency. Register now. TiE Entrepreneur Week will be held over a four-day period from Monday, Nov. 16 to Thursday, Nov. 19. Entrepreneur Week will consist of four intensive one-day sessions, each of which will focus on one segment: wireless, software, cleantech and Internet. The week will conclude with a wrap-up session to bring all of the participants together with the broader TiE audience. Each one-day session during Entrepreneur Week will bring together a group of TiE Charter Members, members, and other entrepreneurs with interest and experience around their chosen industry segment. Much like the sessions held at TiEcon 2009, each day will have a more intimate “PowerConnect” gathering around a specific topic of interest, as well as a panel of industry luminaries who will discuss and debate trends and issues that are relevant to the audience. Event hosts for E-Week are Visa, Sybase, and the San Jose Redevelopment Agency. Register now. tag:odeo.com,2009-11-10,25433846 Tue, 10 Nov 2009 13:43:04 -0800 no GigaOM partnerpost, @Not for Syndication http://odeo.com/episodes/25433847-Only-One-More-Chance-to-Ask-Uncle-Sam-for-Broadband-Bucks The two government agencies responsible for distributing the $7.2 billion in broadband stimulus grants said today that they’ve consolidated the two remaining funding rounds into one, and have asked for more input to improve the application process. The stimulus program, which closed the first round of applications in August, and will distribute the $4 billion in initial funds a little later than planned, has so far been a hit with about 2,200 applicants asking for more than $28 billion. However, the process of scoring applications and getting the money out the door has been slow, so the agencies, under a Sept. 10, 2010 deadline to get the full $7.2 billion deployed, are streamlining the process. The two government agencies responsible for distributing the $7.2 billion in broadband stimulus grants said today that they’ve consolidated the two remaining funding rounds into one, and have asked for more input to improve the application process. The stimulus program, which closed the first round of applications in August, and will distribute the $4 billion in initial funds a little later than planned, has so far been a hit with about 2,200 applicants asking for more than $28 billion. However, the process of scoring applications and getting the money out the door has been slow, so the agencies, under a Sept. 10, 2010 deadline to get the full $7.2 billion deployed, are streamlining the process. The two government agencies responsible for distributing the $7.2 billion in broadband stimulus grants said today that they’ve consolidated the two remaining funding rounds into one, and have asked for more input to improve the application process. The stimulus program, which closed the first round of applications in August, and will distribute the $4 billion in initial funds a little later than planned, has so far been a hit with about 2,200 applicants asking for more than $28 billion. However, the process of scoring applications and getting the money out the door has been slow, so the agencies, under a Sept. 10, 2010 deadline to get the full $7.2 billion deployed, are streamlining the process. tag:odeo.com,2009-11-10,25433847 Tue, 10 Nov 2009 12:30:49 -0800 no GigaOM Broadband, stimulus, broadband grants http://odeo.com/episodes/25432324-Apple-Shoots-Past-Nokia-As-World%E2%80%99s-Most-Profitable-Handset-Vendor Apple became the world’s most profitable handset vendor in the third quarter of this year, reports Strategy Analytics. “We estimate Apple’s operating profit for its iPhone handset division stood at $1.6 billion in the third quarter of 2009,” wrote analyst Alex Spektor. That means Apple overtook Nokia, whose operating profit came in at just $1.1 billion. As Spektor noted, “With strong volumes, high wholesale prices and tight cost controls, the PC vendor has successfully broken into the mobile phone market in just two years.” Well I don’t know if Apple can accurately be described as a “PC vendor,” but I do know that it’s seen unprecedented success with its App Store, that Nokia’s share of the smartphone market continues to slide, and that, going forward, Google’s Android may represent the real competition for Apple. The iPhone’s success has everything to do with the huge and healthy ecosystem of great applications available f... Apple became the world’s most profitable handset vendor in the third quarter of this year, reports Strategy Analytics. “We estimate Apple’s operating profit for its iPhone handset division stood at $1.6 billion in the third quarter of 2009,” wrote analyst Alex Spektor. That means Apple overtook Nokia, whose operating profit came in at just $1.1 billion. As Spektor noted, “With strong volumes, high wholesale prices and tight cost controls, the PC vendor has successfully broken into the mobile phone market in just two years.” Well I don’t know if Apple can accurately be described as a “PC vendor,” but I do know that it’s seen unprecedented success with its App Store, that Nokia’s share of the smartphone market continues to slide, and that, going forward, Google’s Android may represent the real competition for Apple. The iPhone’s success has everything to do with the huge and healthy ecosystem of great applications available for it. Strategy Analytics’ estimates only highlight how many ways Nokia, by comparison, has dropped the ball. For example, the company announced plans to focus on a new, open-source version of the Symbian operating system more than a year ago. Fast-forward to today, and the Symbian Foundation has only recently open sourced the operating system’s microkernel. Meanwhile, Nokia reported terrible financial results for its latest quarter, capped by a 31 percent decline in North American sales. If the Finnish handset maker had a more fleet-footed, organized operating system and application strategy, it might have avoided having its lunch eaten by Apple. Meanwhile, with both the Windows Mobile and BlackBerry line of devices are being forced to confront the power of Android, and the  open source operating system is likely to provide some significant competition for the iPhone as well. As Stacey pointed out this morning, Verizon and Motorola moved more than 100,000 Droid phones this weekend. It’s especially worth noting the comment made by Motorola’s Sanjay Jha, who said: “We estimate each Android unit contributes 4x the gross profit of a feature phone unit and that 10 million Android units will contribute nearly half of the gross profits in MOT’s handset division.” Indeed, from a profitability standpoint, Apple and the Android-based handset players are becoming the ones to watch. Apple became the world’s most profitable handset vendor in the third quarter of this year, reports Strategy Analytics. “We estimate Apple’s operating profit for its iPhone handset division stood at $1.6 billion in the third quarter of 2009,” wrote analyst Alex Spektor. That means Apple overtook Nokia, whose operating profit came in at just $1.1 billion. As Spektor noted, “With strong volumes, high wholesale prices and tight cost controls, the PC vendor has successfully broken into the mobile phone market in just two years.” Well I don’t know if Apple can accurately be described as a “PC vendor,” but I do know that it’s seen unprecedented success with its App Store, that Nokia’s share of the smartphone market continues to slide, and that, going forward, Google’s Android may represent the real competition for Apple. The iPhone’s success has everything to do with the huge and healthy ecosystem of great applications available for it. Strategy Analytics’ estimates only highlight how many ways Nokia, by comparison, has dropped the ball. For example, the company announced plans to focus on a new, open-source version of the Symbian operating system more than a year ago. Fast-forward to today, and the Symbian Foundation has only recently open sourced the operating system’s microkernel. Meanwhile, Nokia reported terrible financial results for its latest quarter, capped by a 31 percent decline in North American sales. If the Finnish handset maker had a more fleet-footed, organized operating system and application strategy, it might have avoided having its lunch eaten by Apple. Meanwhile, with both the Windows Mobile and BlackBerry line of devices are being forced to confront the power of Android, and the  open source operating system is likely to provide some significant competition for the iPhone as well. As Stacey pointed out this morning, Verizon and Motorola moved more than 100,000 Droid phones this weekend. It’s especially worth noting the comment made by Motorola’s Sanjay Jha, who said: “We estimate each Android unit contributes 4x the gross profit of a feature phone unit and that 10 million Android units will contribute nearly half of the gross profits in MOT’s handset division.” Indeed, from a profitability standpoint, Apple and the Android-based handset players are becoming the ones to watch. tag:odeo.com,2009-11-10,25432324 Tue, 10 Nov 2009 12:04:05 -0800 no GigaOM iphone, nokia, android, apple, Mobile, smartphones, mobile phones http://odeo.com/episodes/25432263-What-the-N900-Means-to-Nokia Nokia is hoping to recapture some of its lost glory in the smartphone space with the N900, the flagship device that began shipping today. The long-awaited handset runs Nokia’s new Maemo 5 operating system and boasts some pretty impressive features, including 32GB on onboard memory, multitasking functionality, and a 5-megapixel camera with video capability. While the N900 may not be the iPhone-killer Nokia would love to produce — as Om opined last month — it has received positive reviews, thanks largely to Maemo 5’s web browser. Maemo-based Internet tablets have fared poorly in the U.S., but with Symbian gathering dust — and losing customers — Maemo increasingly appears to be Nokia’s best hope for catching up to its rivals in the superphone era. As Fjord’s Christian Lindholm told Om last week (see the clip below), a typical mobile operating system has a shelf life of about 10 years, and building a mobile OS from scratch is a daunting ta... Nokia is hoping to recapture some of its lost glory in the smartphone space with the N900, the flagship device that began shipping today. The long-awaited handset runs Nokia’s new Maemo 5 operating system and boasts some pretty impressive features, including 32GB on onboard memory, multitasking functionality, and a 5-megapixel camera with video capability. While the N900 may not be the iPhone-killer Nokia would love to produce — as Om opined last month — it has received positive reviews, thanks largely to Maemo 5’s web browser. Maemo-based Internet tablets have fared poorly in the U.S., but with Symbian gathering dust — and losing customers — Maemo increasingly appears to be Nokia’s best hope for catching up to its rivals in the superphone era. As Fjord’s Christian Lindholm told Om last week (see the clip below), a typical mobile operating system has a shelf life of about 10 years, and building a mobile OS from scratch is a daunting task. If Nokia can find much of an audience with its N900 and Maemo 5, it may be a first step in reversing its fortunes. While its Symbian platform remains atop the smartphone space in terms of market share, Nokia is in desperate need of a high-end, web-friendly handset that can compete with the iPhone. The manufacturer continues to lose ground in the vital U.S. market and has watched its dominance erode in its home market of Western Europe as Apple, Research In Motion and others close the gap. And Nokia will surely lose substantial ground to Android in the next few months as Google’s mobile OS gains traction in North America and Europe. The Finnish manufacturer must continue to support its massive base of Symbian customers, of course, but Nokia’s best hope for the long-term appears to be Maemo 5. Nokia is hoping to recapture some of its lost glory in the smartphone space with the N900, the flagship device that began shipping today. The long-awaited handset runs Nokia’s new Maemo 5 operating system and boasts some pretty impressive features, including 32GB on onboard memory, multitasking functionality, and a 5-megapixel camera with video capability. While the N900 may not be the iPhone-killer Nokia would love to produce — as Om opined last month — it has received positive reviews, thanks largely to Maemo 5’s web browser. Maemo-based Internet tablets have fared poorly in the U.S., but with Symbian gathering dust — and losing customers — Maemo increasingly appears to be Nokia’s best hope for catching up to its rivals in the superphone era. As Fjord’s Christian Lindholm told Om last week (see the clip below), a typical mobile operating system has a shelf life of about 10 years, and building a mobile OS from scratch is a daunting task. If Nokia can find much of an audience with its N900 and Maemo 5, it may be a first step in reversing its fortunes. While its Symbian platform remains atop the smartphone space in terms of market share, Nokia is in desperate need of a high-end, web-friendly handset that can compete with the iPhone. The manufacturer continues to lose ground in the vital U.S. market and has watched its dominance erode in its home market of Western Europe as Apple, Research In Motion and others close the gap. And Nokia will surely lose substantial ground to Android in the next few months as Google’s mobile OS gains traction in North America and Europe. The Finnish manufacturer must continue to support its massive base of Symbian customers, of course, but Nokia’s best hope for the long-term appears to be Maemo 5. tag:odeo.com,2009-11-10,25432263 Tue, 10 Nov 2009 11:15:16 -0800 no GigaOM nokia, Mobile, smartphones, maemo, smartphone OSes http://odeo.com/episodes/25432264-4-Scenarios-for-Android-Minus-the-Phones When the Mobile World Congress conference happened at the beginning of  this year, Fabrizio Capobianco, CEO of Funambol, a mobile application company, described the Android operating system as “a shocking no-show.” Hardly any smartphones there were based on it. That, of course, has radically changed as we approach the end of the year. There is, in fact, so much action surrounding Android on smartphones (GigaOM Pro, subscription required) that its non-phone prospects are being overshadowed. Android has the potential to be disruptive on many types of hardware platforms, and here are four scenarios for what the OS might do beyond phones. Usher in Next-Gen Navigation Devices. I recently asked Chris DiBona, Open Source Program Manager at Google and one of the overseers of Android, what he thought of the new Droid phone during a casual, non-interview conversation. He immediately answered that he really liked the new, free Google Maps Navigation for Android 2.0 features, and ma... When the Mobile World Congress conference happened at the beginning of  this year, Fabrizio Capobianco, CEO of Funambol, a mobile application company, described the Android operating system as “a shocking no-show.” Hardly any smartphones there were based on it. That, of course, has radically changed as we approach the end of the year. There is, in fact, so much action surrounding Android on smartphones (GigaOM Pro, subscription required) that its non-phone prospects are being overshadowed. Android has the potential to be disruptive on many types of hardware platforms, and here are four scenarios for what the OS might do beyond phones. Usher in Next-Gen Navigation Devices. I recently asked Chris DiBona, Open Source Program Manager at Google and one of the overseers of Android, what he thought of the new Droid phone during a casual, non-interview conversation. He immediately answered that he really liked the new, free Google Maps Navigation for Android 2.0 features, and made some citations that let me know for sure he wasn’t just feeding me a press release. He especially appreciates the fact that you can just pop your Droid into a cradle in your car and it will go straight into the navigation and mapping environment. jkOnTheRun has given the navigation features rave reviews, too, and suggested that they make break new ground for Android in the overall GPS space. Become the Most Flexible e-Book Platform. The looming battle between Amazon’s Kindle eBook device and Barnes & Noble’s Nook could “portend the next wave of Android disruption,” Joel West recently noted, hitting the nail on the head. Having Android on the Nook opens the device up to the fast-growing ecosystem of Android applications — potentially a major advantage over the Kindle. It’s puzzling, though, why Barnes & Noble hasn’t included a browser on the Nook device, which would make it even more flexible. Bring Intelligence to Digital Entertainment Devices. MIPS Technologies, which provides processors and architectures for home entertainment, portable multimedia, and communications devices, is moving ahead with a number of initiatives focused on the Android operating system.  It has its own Android port that it has open sourced for players in the digital entertainment space to work with. Blu-ray players, set-top boxes, and digital TVs are just some of the hardware devices that MIPS is targeting with its Android port, as EETimes has reported. MIPS has already demonstrated Android running on a home media player and other devices. Archos also has its Archos 5 — a slick video player based on Android, and possibly a hot seller over the holidays. It’s shown at left. Biggest Non-Phone Prospects Arrive From Japan. The Open Embedded Software Foundation (OESF) doesn’t get a lot of press in the U.S. and Europe, but it is extremely focused on bringing Android to non-phone platforms, as OStatic covered here. Many heavy-hitting companies are working with Japan’s OESF to take Android to non-phone devices, including ARM, KDDI, Japan Cable Laboratories, Alpine Electronics and Fujitsu Software Technologies. OESF working groups are also collaborating with MIPS on its non-phone Android plans. It’s hard to believe that as recently as April of this year, many observers were wondering if Android had already failed. Fast-forward to today, and we’re seeing approximately 20 Android handsets arrive before year’s end — and numerous promising prospects for the OS on non-phone platforms. When the Mobile World Congress conference happened at the beginning of  this year, Fabrizio Capobianco, CEO of Funambol, a mobile application company, described the Android operating system as “a shocking no-show.” Hardly any smartphones there were based on it. That, of course, has radically changed as we approach the end of the year. There is, in fact, so much action surrounding Android on smartphones (GigaOM Pro, subscription required) that its non-phone prospects are being overshadowed. Android has the potential to be disruptive on many types of hardware platforms, and here are four scenarios for what the OS might do beyond phones. Usher in Next-Gen Navigation Devices. I recently asked Chris DiBona, Open Source Program Manager at Google and one of the overseers of Android, what he thought of the new Droid phone during a casual, non-interview conversation. He immediately answered that he really liked the new, free Google Maps Navigation for Android 2.0 features, and made some citations that let me know for sure he wasn’t just feeding me a press release. He especially appreciates the fact that you can just pop your Droid into a cradle in your car and it will go straight into the navigation and mapping environment. jkOnTheRun has given the navigation features rave reviews, too, and suggested that they make break new ground for Android in the overall GPS space. Become the Most Flexible e-Book Platform. The looming battle between Amazon’s Kindle eBook device and Barnes & Noble’s Nook could “portend the next wave of Android disruption,” Joel West recently noted, hitting the nail on the head. Having Android on the Nook opens the device up to the fast-growing ecosystem of Android applications — potentially a major advantage over the Kindle. It’s puzzling, though, why Barnes & Noble hasn’t included a browser on the Nook device, which would make it even more flexible. Bring Intelligence to Digital Entertainment Devices. MIPS Technologies, which provides processors and architectures for home entertainment, portable multimedia, and communications devices, is moving ahead with a number of initiatives focused on the Android operating system.  It has its own Android port that it has open sourced for players in the digital entertainment space to work with. Blu-ray players, set-top boxes, and digital TVs are just some of the hardware devices that MIPS is targeting with its Android port, as EETimes has reported. MIPS has already demonstrated Android running on a home media player and other devices. Archos also has its Archos 5 — a slick video player based on Android, and possibly a hot seller over the holidays. It’s shown at left. Biggest Non-Phone Prospects Arrive From Japan. The Open Embedded Software Foundation (OESF) doesn’t get a lot of press in the U.S. and Europe, but it is extremely focused on bringing Android to non-phone platforms, as OStatic covered here. Many heavy-hitting companies are working with Japan’s OESF to take Android to non-phone devices, including ARM, KDDI, Japan Cable Laboratories, Alpine Electronics and Fujitsu Software Technologies. OESF working groups are also collaborating with MIPS on its non-phone Android plans. It’s hard to believe that as recently as April of this year, many observers were wondering if Android had already failed. Fast-forward to today, and we’re seeing approximately 20 Android handsets arrive before year’s end — and numerous promising prospects for the OS on non-phone platforms. tag:odeo.com,2009-11-10,25432264 Tue, 10 Nov 2009 11:06:35 -0800 no GigaOM android, Mobile, OS, navigation, e-books, OESF http://odeo.com/episodes/25432265-The-Clear-Dilemma Clearwire, as expected, said today that it’s managed to cajole $1.56 billion out of most of its previous investors to continue its buildout of the Clear WiMAX network. However, those doubling down on WiMAX (see chart) as the ideal fourth-generation wireless technology are likely throwing good money after bad. Even if we ignore the incredible writedowns these companies have had to make related to their first bet on Clearwire and WiMAX, the potential for return on the latest investment is still low. Why? Because Clearwire’s Clear service is stuck between a rock and hard place. Who Chipped In: Sprint Nextel for $1.176 billion Comcast for $196 million Time Warner Cable for $103 million Intel for $50 million Eagle River for $20 million Bright House Networks for $19 million The Rock Knowing that mobile broadband demand will continue to skyrocket, both Sprint and Clearwire  elected to build out WiMAX-based networks under the assumption that they could roll out nationwide mobile... Clearwire, as expected, said today that it’s managed to cajole $1.56 billion out of most of its previous investors to continue its buildout of the Clear WiMAX network. However, those doubling down on WiMAX (see chart) as the ideal fourth-generation wireless technology are likely throwing good money after bad. Even if we ignore the incredible writedowns these companies have had to make related to their first bet on Clearwire and WiMAX, the potential for return on the latest investment is still low. Why? Because Clearwire’s Clear service is stuck between a rock and hard place. Who Chipped In: Sprint Nextel for $1.176 billion Comcast for $196 million Time Warner Cable for $103 million Intel for $50 million Eagle River for $20 million Bright House Networks for $19 million The Rock Knowing that mobile broadband demand will continue to skyrocket, both Sprint and Clearwire  elected to build out WiMAX-based networks under the assumption that they could roll out nationwide mobile broadband before the cellular carriers could. But given that Verizon plans to cover 100 million people with a 4G Long Term Evolution network by the end of 2010 with AT&T to follow two years later, the WiMAX experience for many will be weighed against the cellular experience. And Clearwire can’t provide LTE for two more years, even it if wanted to. To compete, Clearwire, the cable providers reselling the service, and Sprint will have to create compelling packages and services that the cellular providers aren’t offering. People can debate the propagation qualities of the WiMAX spectrum, but for the average person choosing a mobile broadband provider, the services and the devices will be the selling point, not the network. Right now, Clearwire and crew are selling basic broadband with relatively few devices. And the larger strategy of providing connectivity to devices like e-readers is pretty risky given that WiMAX isn’t available nationwide. Sprint even lost out on providing mobile broadband for the Amazon Kindle recently when the e-reader went international. Amazon is instead using AT&T, which has a GSM network and arrangements to ensure the e-reader works around the world. When it comes to device connectivity, global standards and large coverage areas win. The Hard Place With Clearwire fighting the cellular carriers to provide true mobile broadband connectivity for consumer data plans and for M2M deals, some believe it has an opportunity to provide local mobile broadband for folks who want to travel in their towns, but aren’t real road warriors going from city to city. This is a fairly compelling case as it doesn’t require total nationwide coverage, and Comcast, which has begun to offer WiMAX subscriptions as part of its service bundles, has seen strong interest from consumers. But Clearwire faces strong competition in this market from Wi-Fi. Both AT&T and Verizon offer their customers free Wi-Fi for subscribers of their high-speed Internet services. Those with cable subscriptions may also have access to free Wi-Fi, and for those that don’t, there are plenty of sponsored hotspots and just a few hoops to jump through at places like your local Starbucks. If you’re going to be lugging your laptop around (and so far, that’s what most WiMAX modems are aimed at), you might as well find a place with Wi-Fi. Of course, for some people, WiMAX will be a credible option, possibly as a replacement for wired access (although I’m not excited about that opportunity). My husband, for example, is eager to see how well it works in Austin (coming in mid-November) as he can’t get DSL or cable service at his office, and existing cellular speeds are lousy. Clearwire is also part of an agreement attempting to use WiMAX as the network for utilities’ smart grids, although how Clearwire would monetize that is uncertain. However, given the billions it’s costing Clearwire and its backers to build out its network, I’m not sure the space between the rock and the hard place is large enough for a multibillion-dollar company to thrive. Clearwire, as expected, said today that it’s managed to cajole $1.56 billion out of most of its previous investors to continue its buildout of the Clear WiMAX network. However, those doubling down on WiMAX (see chart) as the ideal fourth-generation wireless technology are likely throwing good money after bad. Even if we ignore the incredible writedowns these companies have had to make related to their first bet on Clearwire and WiMAX, the potential for return on the latest investment is still low. Why? Because Clearwire’s Clear service is stuck between a rock and hard place. Who Chipped In: Sprint Nextel for $1.176 billion Comcast for $196 million Time Warner Cable for $103 million Intel for $50 million Eagle River for $20 million Bright House Networks for $19 million The Rock Knowing that mobile broadband demand will continue to skyrocket, both Sprint and Clearwire  elected to build out WiMAX-based networks under the assumption that they could roll out nationwide mobile broadband before the cellular carriers could. But given that Verizon plans to cover 100 million people with a 4G Long Term Evolution network by the end of 2010 with AT&T to follow two years later, the WiMAX experience for many will be weighed against the cellular experience. And Clearwire can’t provide LTE for two more years, even it if wanted to. To compete, Clearwire, the cable providers reselling the service, and Sprint will have to create compelling packages and services that the cellular providers aren’t offering. People can debate the propagation qualities of the WiMAX spectrum, but for the average person choosing a mobile broadband provider, the services and the devices will be the selling point, not the network. Right now, Clearwire and crew are selling basic broadband with relatively few devices. And the larger strategy of providing connectivity to devices like e-readers is pretty risky given that WiMAX isn’t available nationwide. Sprint even lost out on providing mobile broadband for the Amazon Kindle recently when the e-reader went international. Amazon is instead using AT&T, which has a GSM network and arrangements to ensure the e-reader works around the world. When it comes to device connectivity, global standards and large coverage areas win. The Hard Place With Clearwire fighting the cellular carriers to provide true mobile broadband connectivity for consumer data plans and for M2M deals, some believe it has an opportunity to provide local mobile broadband for folks who want to travel in their towns, but aren’t real road warriors going from city to city. This is a fairly compelling case as it doesn’t require total nationwide coverage, and Comcast, which has begun to offer WiMAX subscriptions as part of its service bundles, has seen strong interest from consumers. But Clearwire faces strong competition in this market from Wi-Fi. Both AT&T and Verizon offer their customers free Wi-Fi for subscribers of their high-speed Internet services. Those with cable subscriptions may also have access to free Wi-Fi, and for those that don’t, there are plenty of sponsored hotspots and just a few hoops to jump through at places like your local Starbucks. If you’re going to be lugging your laptop around (and so far, that’s what most WiMAX modems are aimed at), you might as well find a place with Wi-Fi. Of course, for some people, WiMAX will be a credible option, possibly as a replacement for wired access (although I’m not excited about that opportunity). My husband, for example, is eager to see how well it works in Austin (coming in mid-November) as he can’t get DSL or cable service at his office, and existing cellular speeds are lousy. Clearwire is also part of an agreement attempting to use WiMAX as the network for utilities’ smart grids, although how Clearwire would monetize that is uncertain. However, given the billions it’s costing Clearwire and its backers to build out its network, I’m not sure the space between the rock and the hard place is large enough for a multibillion-dollar company to thrive. tag:odeo.com,2009-11-10,25432265 Tue, 10 Nov 2009 10:14:19 -0800 no GigaOM sprint, Mobile, Broadband, s, wimax, t, LTE, at&t, clearwire, CLWR, Verizon VZ http://odeo.com/episodes/25432266-What-to-read-on-the-GigaOM-network Has Microsoft suddenly awakened to open source? (OStatic) Amazon delivers Kindle for PC — works great on a netbook (jkOnTheRun) Battery startup ActaCell lassos cool $1M from Texas (Earth2Tech) 6 tips for using Google Wave on your first project (WebWorkerDaily) Qik does DVD-quality capture on Droid (NewTeeVee) MacBook vs. MacBook Pro: Which should you buy? (TheAppleBlog) Has Microsoft suddenly awakened to open source? (OStatic) Amazon delivers Kindle for PC — works great on a netbook (jkOnTheRun) Battery startup ActaCell lassos cool $1M from Texas (Earth2Tech) 6 tips for using Google Wave on your first project (WebWorkerDaily) Qik does DVD-quality capture on Droid (NewTeeVee) MacBook vs. MacBook Pro: Which should you buy? (TheAppleBlog) Has Microsoft suddenly awakened to open source? (OStatic) Amazon delivers Kindle for PC — works great on a netbook (jkOnTheRun) Battery startup ActaCell lassos cool $1M from Texas (Earth2Tech) 6 tips for using Google Wave on your first project (WebWorkerDaily) Qik does DVD-quality capture on Droid (NewTeeVee) MacBook vs. MacBook Pro: Which should you buy? (TheAppleBlog) tag:odeo.com,2009-11-10,25432266 Tue, 10 Nov 2009 09:35:43 -0800 no GigaOM GigaNET