mTrends - mobile media lifestyle trends - m-trends.org

2007 was a very prosperous and exciting year for mobile technology in general, still we’re just at the beginning of a new era of more magic to come in the mobile and web convergent area’s. So, traditionally I’m writing down 10 Mobile Trends for the coming year, always a good personal excercise how close one is predicting mobile market trends and an indicator of what I think will matter in 2008.

Read my Mobile and Wireless Trends for 2007 and check for yourself my gut feeling on what happened yet and what is still to come. It seems very obvious and easy but predicting trends can be tricky, just try it for yourself! Check also my del.icio.us for some interesting predictions from other technology blogs I bookmarked during holidays. One of my favorite readings during holidays is still Carlo Longino’s and Russell Buckley’s yearly predictions at Mobhappy. Do check them out!

So here are my Mobile and Wireless Trends for 2008:

1. Google’s Android and the Open Handset Alliance will definately take off in 2008. While the iPhone is doing probably the best job embracing mobile and web convergence, the Apple OS is still a closed system and used by a rather small market segment of users. Nokia’s Nseries - though all remarkeable devices - didn’t produce any breakthrough Symbian OS changes last year and is still too buggy to go mass-market - I don’t see my sister or father perform a device software update; which leaves the opportunity for Google and the Open Handset Alliance to get the new Linux-based operating system Android on several cutting-edge smartphones before year-end. Mobile OS, a truely competitive space in 2008!
   
2. The Rise of the Mobile Social Networks. M:Metrics released some promising data mid-2007 on the rise of the Mobile Social Networks. With the big social media networks all going mobile in 2007 (Facebook, MySpace, YouTube and Bebo, …), this trend will continue to rise in 2008, sustained by more flat rate introductions on different markets.
   
3. Apple will be seriously attacked by the music industry on its own, once disruptive, iTunes business model. 2008 will be the year of further downfall of DRM and the raise of watermarked audio-files. With Sony BMG planning to drop DRM - the last of the Big Four record labels with Warner Music Group, Universal Music Group and EMI Music, to throw in the towel on digital rights management. The end of DRM might embolden a host of new, online download venues initiated by the Big Four in its searches for a successful digital strategy. Note also the rise of new business models (!) giving away DRM-free, ad-supported music downloads, like the recently founded Rcrd Lbl by Peter Rojas. Read my DRM Free at Last! for a recent overview and links to previous posts on this topic.
4. Telefonica will introduce the 3G iPhone. To be announced at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona in February?
5. The return of the Location-Based Services. Since Nokia introduced the Nseries N95 with built in GPS, Location-Based Services are becoming exciting again. A new wave of mobile services and applications build on the location of the user (cell-ID and/or GPS) will see the light this year, driven by the open Google Maps API and flickr’s geotagged photo function. Read also my early 2005 coverage on the formerly known MoSoSos.
6. First iPhone competitors coming to market. Nokia will introduce a serious competitor for the iPhone. It has the hardware manufacturing intelligence and knowledge to come up with its own multi-touch screen interface. Biggest challenge for Nokia (and other manufacturers) will be to keep the OS user-experience as simple as the iPhone. Expect some great innovating devices from HTC too in 2008! (checkout the HTC Touch Dual).
7. Mobile Video Blogging starting to taking off. Though still to be used by early adopters, mobile video blogging tools such as Kyte.tv mobile are already doing a great job with Floobs and KaZiVu also looking very promising (both still in beta), not to forget about YouTube Mobile. All eyes will be on Seesmic however that has the right start-up vibe - instigated daily by its impressive experienced shareholders (and web 2.0 icons) and its very active beta-testers community. Imagining Seesmic to be used on your mobile phone is an easy one, the challenges for Seesmic are to bypass the complex technical issues and delivery of its great idea.
8. Mobile search, as already predicted last year will continue to be one of the most important and most used mobile applications. I keep this one in my list adding that some new players might disrupt the big Search market players, not having figured out the real mobile search issues such as accuracy, context, relevance, latency and the correct display of local and niche results.
9. PRM (Personal Rights Management) and Privacy policies and procedures will be high on the agenda for every entreprise and conscious connected individuals. Already talk of the connected crowds at LeWeb3, opening the Social Graphs might appear cool in your social media community but has to be done right! As a starter, check out Dataportability.org and watch Robert Scoble explaining his recent portability issues with Facebook.
10. Twitter and the breakthrough of the ultimate Mobile Presence Tool. Yes, Twitter is the utlimate mobile presence tool, since it’s the easiest to use (through SMS and mobile web access), and most accurate to stay connected at any time from anywhere… Jaiku has a definately a richer client but Twitter is the most easily integrated into most of your social networks, checkout MoodBlast that can simultaneously update multiple chat clients and web services presence tools. 2008 will also see the rise of lifestreaming apps like Tumblr, surprisingly simple on the web and looks great on your mobile phone.

Some of the downers of 2007:

- the sudden death of great blogger Marc Orchant - my deepest sympathies to Marc’s family.

- the whole blognation’s saga - one nation, many bugs…
- and just recently Om Malik’s heart attack - wish him strength, get well soon, Om!

Definately an urge for all bloggers not to forget about their daily excercise, no less!

I wish all my readers a great and magic 2008!

2008, 3G, 3g iphone, Analysis, Android, apple, bebo, convergence, Cool Devices, drm, emi, facebook, floobs, google, htc, innovation, iphone, itunes, kazivu, kyte, kyte.tv, leweb3, location based, Mashup, mobile, mobile 2.0, Mobile Advertising, Mobile Apps, Mobile Blog, Mobile Content, Mobile Games, Mobile Lifestyle, mobile marketing, mobile music, Mobile OS, Mobile RSS, Mobile Search, mobile video, mobile video blogging, mobile web, mobile world congress, mobileweb, mowser, Multi Touch Screen, myspace, NFC, nokia, Open Handset Alliance, Operators, os, personal rights management, Predictions, prm, rcrdlbl, seesmic, social media, sony bmg, startups, taptu, telefonica, touch dial, Trends, universal, user experience, warner, watermark, web 2.0, wireless, youtube

For the ones like me who appreciate the sound difference between a flat 128kbps music file (AAC, mp3, mp4, wmv or other formats) and a 320kbps quality of a normal CD, the news this week that EMI Music launches DRM-free superior sound quality downloads across its entire digital repertoire is great news, not only because major record companies will (finally!) be offering downloadable music files without DRM encoding - the stuff which makes it nearly impossible to move purchased songs from one computer or music player or mobile phone to another. It’s extra nice because major players in the music industry will start to offer songs that will sound a lot better.

As a passionate music lover, the listening experience of for example Petroushka by Igor Stravinsky on a good quality sound system is not comparable with the same music crapped into a 128kbps mp3 or mp4 file, whatever the soundsystem may be you’re going to play that file on. I remember lively the first time I heard Petroushka on vinyl performed by the legendary Moscow Radio Symphony Orchestra on a good sound system blew me completely away. With digital music surrounding us everyday, you’d almost forget about the quality of a listening experience - just try to mix some mp3 songs with a vinyl recording and you’ll see what I hear
But any good music deserves a great quality listening experience whether it’s Philip Glass, Devotchka or the Cold War Kids, I’m listening to while writing this. So what does this weeks’ anouncement means for consumers and the business?

EMI Group’s announcement of February 14 - revenues for the financial year ending 31 March 2007 expected to decline by around 15% and Steve Jobs’ Thoughts on Music might have accelerated the need for change but Eric Nicoli, CEO of the EMI Group is now taking the lead in what we digital music consumers have been waiting for for quite a while now. In only a couple of weeks time, EMI Music announced a multi-product content partnership with last.fm, the deal with Apple’s iTunes this week, and also announced “The Good, The Bad & The Queen” to become the first EMI album to be made available for download in a new DRM-free, high quality MP3 format. The first major record label listening to its’ consumers?

At CTIA, Nicoli listed a 3-step test that all consumer products should be able to pass, and that he thought was lacking in the wireless world (source GigaOM):

1. Give them something that is good value for money
2. Make something that is functional and works on practical level
3. Make something that is simple to use and easy to understand

Something the operators should have figured out by now but it’s where Apple is seeing the opportunity with the iPhone (to be released in June in US). Now is the Apple’s anouncement of Higher Quality DRM-Free Music from EMI Available on iTunes another leap ahead for Silicon Valley’s “rebel with a cause” Steve Jobs? The recent anouncement of Microsoft’s Mobile DRM system ‘PlayReady‘ - that will allow the use of commercial content on multiple different devices for a single fee comes basically way too late. Steve sets the tone, once again since he entered the music business.

Regular M-Trends readers know my early rants on this subject, for newbies read About digital music distribution to family targets and Mobile Music For Families. No thanks! both written in 2005. Knowing this, one can imagine I was really excited to try out my first DRM FREE download. Also I have been stopping to buy songs on iTunes lately since I just could not play them on my Nokia Nseries phones and wanted to make sure the DRM free and higher quality downloads were not only working as a multi-service or platform but also multi-device, you know the real thing we have been looking for. I downloaded a 320kbps mp3 file straight from The Good, The Bad & The Queen website, beamed from my laptop to our home PC and to my Nokia N80i and it works, hurray!

And where do we leave the independent record labels? EMI and Apple knew that progressive independant labels were already offering DRM free higher quality songs on their portal and that’s exactly where new opportunities lie for the smaller labels such as Sonar Kollektiv. I’m buying regularely music from their online shop since I cannot find it elsewhere and it has a lot of music of my taste. Smaller labels can build around their brand image and create a different added value to their audience.

Anyway, this decision is going to dramatically change the digital music landscape and may hopefully encourage other major labels to abandon DRM. This is not killing business, it is changing the way we do business. Consumers will be the winners. Free at last!

aac, Analysis, digital music distribution, drm, emi, itunes, mobile music, mp3, mp4, Music, stevejobs, Trends, wmv