April 2009 Archives

Check out my interview with Ronny Gorlicki of Comsys an israeli semiconductor company specializing in communications, who details the benefits of using his company's chips in WiMAX devices. Gorlicki shows off a number of interesting Comsys-powered WiMAX gadgets which are at different price points and aimed at different markets. One thing he touted to me about his company's solutions are that they are truly integrated FMC devices which integrate radio access seamlessly allowing you to network hop easily.
 

The mobile video opportunity grows by leaps and bounds and with bigger mobile screens and faster wireless broadband networks, we can expect larger amounts of revenue to be derived from mobile video by carriers and content providers.

Dilithium Networks (www.dilithiumnetworks.com), founded in Sydney, Australia, offers converged video solutions, with customers in 60 countries on five continents. The company grew out of the participation on the ITU-T H.324/H.324M workgroup by Dr. Marwan Jabri, a company founder and CTO. Jabri spent nearly 20 years developing intelligent signal processing multimedia coding and transcoding algorithms, as well as some early protocol stack implementations of the H.324/H.324M standard. Today Jabri's company, Dilithium carries on and has brought his work to commercial fruition, as it provides pioneering mobile video solutions for network operators, content owners, and aggregators across 2G, 3G, and WiFi networks. They're the global market share leader in terms of their 3G-324M/H.324M/H.324 Protocol Stack and inventive Unicoding technology for high performance intelligent media transcoding. Indeed, Dilithium pioneered the field of 3G mobile video. There software can be found in many phones.

At CTIA Wireless recently, I ran into Paul Zuber, is the founding CEO of Dilithium. He told me that Dilithium is enjoying 400 percent growth year-over-year in the areas of mobile, broadband, Internet, mobile video and surveillance applications. 85 percent of their business occurs outside of the U.S. Some readers may know Dilithium as a world leader in multimedia gateways (said to be a 60 percent global market share) including their The DTG 3000 Multimedia Gateway family that provides a multimedia solution for cellular, IP, and PSTN convergence as networks evolve towards the IMS (IP Multimedia Subsystem) architecture. Others may be familiar with their Video Ringback Tone Solution, VT-Ring, or their Integrated multimedia gateway and service creation environment, ViVAS, or their QoS Video Telephony Probe for QoS, or perhaps their Video Refresh technology that can eliminate video corruption in mobile networks.

Zuber says there's been increasing demand for anything related to supporting video and services, and social networks are starting to have an impact, as is the craze for user-generated content. Dilithium supports content adaptation so any content can travel to and be experienced via any codec to any device - it's all an outgrowth of their transcoding, transrating, and transizing expertise. They have end-to-end solutions for 3G networks and a powerful service creation platform -- Zuber says they can roll new services in just six weeks. This is pretty remarkable, especially when you consider that the modern network is a jumble of differing standards, codecs and bit rates. Dilithium's technological expertise also extends from mobile (2.5G, 3G, EDGE, Smartphones, WiFi) to set-top boxes. The customers themselves, of course, are agnostic to access methodology, they just want somebody like Dilithium to make it easy for them to access content, and for it to be a high-quality experience, regardless of whether it's delivered by H.264, H.263, Flash, Windows Media, Quicktime, or what have you.

"We enable protocol translation," says Zuber, "but bringing IP to the mobile world is a tougher proposition. The U.S. is still an emerging market. Things are more advanced on the Internet than on wireless. Still, we've had wins with many Internet aggregators and carriers, and they're starting to launch services. We've helped Vodafone, for example, as well as China Telecom, SingTel, and so forth. Pricing plans and business models are starting to take shape. Our cash flow is positive and we're profitable."
 

I got a chance to demo the technology on an iPhone and was blown away by the quality of the stream over the AT&T 3G network. I happened to be driving in a portion of Connecticut with poor cellphone coverage and was surprised that the stream kept playing in areas where I remember having problems talking. I would imagine most users would be impressed with this technology as well and pay serious money for the ability to stream live TV to their cellphones. Obviously this capability exists today but the screen size of an iPhone makes it an especially compelling viewing experience and I would imagine AT&T should be in a big rush to roll this out to the masses.

I would of course precede all programming with a stern warning about the dangers of watching TV as you drive which as you can imagine can be quite distracting as it was to me.

Who is the best potential acquirer of Joost, the web-based TV service which was launched by Skype founders Janus Friis and Niklas Zennstrom? The cable companies of course and although you would imagine the cablecos would be all over this deal, so far they have opted out of buying the company that is supposedly shopping itself. As this article points out, Joost lost momentum and does not have a great deal of traffic. A cable company however could certainly boost the traffic with content deals and promotion through its various vehicles.

The question is, why not start from scratch if you are a cable company and are doing so much of the work?

I guess if no cable companies come to the table there is always eBay.

 

If you are interested in seeing how much a website is worth - especially one that takes advertisements, check out Pufip, a site which summarizes a great deal of information on backlinks and other important metrics from various sources onto a single page. The site approximates how much advertising revenue websites generate as well. I question it's accuracy though as I haven't been able to figure out how it generates proprietary pricing information and other private details it would need to know like percentage of inventory sold, etc.

So from this perspective it does not seem accurate enough to use for anything official but it may be a helpful place for aggregated content such as Google Page Rank, Alexa and Compete charts, etc.

TMCnet's Michael Dinan writes a great article about Bump, a new app (app store link) which you can use to send contact info you specify via WiFi by simply bumping fists with another iPhone or iPod touch user. For testing purposes, Michael used me and my iPhone as Guinea Pig and a few moments later we had shared info with one another. It was very compelling and it's worth mentioning the devices do not need to be in physical contact to interchange data. The software does need to be running though.

This app could become popular at trade shows and other gathering places and if it does become the standard for live information interchange it could become a natural extension of social networking in live gatherings.

While talk of doom and gloom permeates the news, some recent good news worth sharing is a ribbon cutting ceremony in Clifton, NJ for a new Telx data center. It is refreshing to see growth and news jobs being created and congratulations to Telx on this new facility... It's fourth in the NY Metro area.

Here is a video with the details.

Cablevision has released its 100 Mbps service in Long Island, NY termed Optimum Online Ultra. 100 Mbps is the download speed while upload speed is rated at 15 Mbps. While I agree with Om Malik that Cablevision is doing things differently than many other cable companies who are effectively fighting with customers by implementing broadband caps... A little known secret about Cablevision broadband is heavy users are effectively restricted to a penalty box which drastically reduces their upload and download speed until they upgrade their service level or call and have the service reset.

Still, I consider the company's broadband service to be among the best values in broadband access in the country and have nothing but praise for a company that not only provides broadband at $1/Mbps but throws in free WiFi to boot.

Be sure to check out TMC's Cable Technology site for more news on the cable market.

Seriously? The US has the most technologically advanced administration we have ever had in the White House and the military has to fly jets to specific locations to take a photo? This is really not a joke? Having an airplane trailed by jet fighters flying low in New York City didn't seem like it would bother anyone?

It seems a good use for some of those stimulous funds would be to write some checks to Adobe for Photoshop licenses. The good news its a lot greener to retouch than fly three airplanes.

Thanks to TMC VP of Marketing Mike Genaro for pointing this out.

Although Portfolio was a truly fantastic magazine -- one of the best financial resources around, it was obvious to me that a startup magazine which had over $100 million invested in it would have a tough time weathering the dual storm of print advertising decline and  financial crisis. Sadly today is the day of the official demise of this publication and website. I was a happy subscriber to this publication which had a total of just under 450,000 subscribers according to Folio.

The similarities the media business is facing is very similar to what is happening in communications. Just as newspaper and magazine owners are trying to figure out how to make a living in a web dominated world of free information, many telecom companies are trying to figure out how to make a living in a world where VoIP can be had for free.

For media companies though the problem is one of timing. By now the web needed to be a more substantial revenue source than it currently is for most companies. It is very late to start a serious internet advertising strategy. This needed to be done in 2002-4.

Getting back to telecom, as carriers have seen their PSTN revenues decline, many have focused more on wireless, broadband and IPTV. But it is unclear how the media business in general can follow a similar migration path. Certainly Amazon's Kindle offers some hope but I for one think it is silly to think the majority of people will pay for content on a device when they can get it free on other devices.

It will be interesting to see how print publishers adapt to the web. The transformation is happening faster than most expected and there is less investment money floating around so my concern is more quality print publications will fold before they get a chance to explore alternatives online.

Update: April 27, 2009 6:00 PM:

Here is a great article from a former staffer on the magazine. It is great because it is detailed but it paints a picture of poor quality editorial which doomed the publication. But the quality of the publication was good. I can't speak to how efficient the company's editorial team was but it seems tough to imagine that poor editorial quality and other editorial decisions are the major reason for the publication's demise.

Google is the scariest company in the world from the perspective of knowing the future. The information the company sits on - especially all those search queries and toolbars, not to mention Gmail, etc is enough to know what the world is thinking far before anyone else. The acquisition of Blogger and YouTube were aided in large part by competitive intelligence others just didn't have.

Now Blogger is the 8^th most popular site in the world and YouTube is 3^rd according to Alexa.

But in a world where Twitter, social networks and blogs are treasure chests full of information about the thoughts of the global population, are there other ways to tap into the global psyche? Yes. According to Jodange, they can scour the web and perform opinion and sentiment analytics. Here are more details from the company's site:

The technology behind Jodange's Top of Mind service uses linguistic analysis to extract opinion data from documents and identify the opinion holder and topic each opinion expression. The relationship between Opinion Holder, Opinion, and Topic is the central theme underlying all our applications. By identifying and isolating peoples' opinions and sentiments about key topics over time, we are able to understand who is worth listening to and how best to correlate their opinions to outcomes over time. We ignore any sentence or phrase deemed to be factual, and instead focus on phrases that are subjective in order to determine the sentiment (positive, neutral, or negative) of the subjective statement.

The wealth of information that can be extracted from documents using Jodange's technology for identifying opinion holder, opinion, and topic can be used to answer questions such as:

• What do CEO's worldwide think about subprime lending?
• What companies mentioned research and development in their earnings reports last quarter?
• What does Steve Jobs have to say on the topic of innovation?

The company just received funding of $1.2 million dollars and while this isn't a bank-breaking number it sets a positive tone for tech investing and shows innovation will get funded.

But Jodange is a company that few have heard of and in order to get the word out about itself it should probably put out regular statements about what the global population thinks. Weekly swine flu and political alerts would be smart. How about some tea party sentiment alerts? Is the webosphere for or against these gatherings and in what numbers?

There is a lot of potential for this company to become a big player as the public conduit of information gleaned from the web... Hopefully some of these funds will be used for profile raising activities.

Talk of serious Apple discussions regarding the iPhone running on Verizon Wireless should and will scare the dickens out of AT&T. IMHO the new Ma Bell needs to do anything and everything to keep exclusivity of this device. Especially in light of recent earnings.

Oh, and here is an interesting thought -- remember I mentioned AT&T may have to embrace Skype if it loses its lock on the iPhone? Well, the time to start embracing Skype may be today as Verizon Wireless already allows Skype use on its network regardless of device.

Imagine the appeal of the iPhone on a superior wireless network with not only faster access but better coverage and as a kicker, the ability to use VoIP when there is no WiFi. Then again, Verizon may have to pay so much money to have access to the iPhone that they may change their policy about VoIP calls as well.

See Also:

ZDnet, Larry Dignan
GigaOm, Om Malik
VoIP Watch, Andy Abramson

In times of crisis when cool heads need to prevail, is Twitter just a spreader of incorrect information? Apparently yes.

Then again, is Twitter any different than the internet and life in general? You need to know who you can trust and who you can't.

I would like to welcome back Patrick Barnard to the TMC editorial team. Patrick has covered a number of different editorial areas at TMC over the years and recently left TMC to work on Multichannel Merchant. He is now back and his return is just a continuing reinforcement of how TMC is continually investing in its editorial talent -- just as we are constantly evolving our web technology, graphics, analytics, reporting and more.

Thanks to influential readers like you TMC has been blessed with hundreds of advertisers and exhibitors each year who partner with TMC to grow -- even in the face of challenging economic conditions.

We take sponsor and reader loyalty seriously -- looking to constantly improve to provide you with the best products we can.

Recently I detailed how a single device - the iPhone changed the fortunes of AT&T Wireless. Every wireless carrier is looking for a way to have that one amazing gadget that drives traffic and reduces churn. But what if another way to achieve a similar goal is to enable free Skype calling on your network? It may sound stupid that I would suggest such a thing but Skype execs argue that you generate more revenue by Skype-enabling your wireless network than you do by blocking it. So far 3 UK seems to be one of the leading wireless carriers actively touting unlimited free Skype to Skype calling on their network for less than the price of a cup of coffee as they put it.

But what if this move by the carrier is the equivalent of getting a killer gadget that everyone wants?

I find that there is tremendous irony in this concept because recently AT&T went on record saying Skype is a competitor which of course they are. But what if Skype is right and allowing its usage on your network - even if you are AT&T will reduce churn and increase ARPU? And what if AT&T loses the lock on the iPhone it has now? Can you see a world where AT&T is forced to allow Skype use to get customers back? I can.

But while they have iPhone exclusivity this won't happen. It will be very interesting to watch if other wireless carriers decide to become more Skype friendly in the mean time and whether or not AT&T throws an olive branch to Skype or even buys a few shares of their potential IPO.

Wow -- technology has evolved to a point where a single text message can end a marriage. Check out this CNN video which shows men but not women can start a divorse with a  single text message.