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Windows Phone 7

Sat, 06 Mar 2010 07:33:07 -0500

Windows Phone 7 is a post from Chris Pirillo

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First, if you have any questions for the Windows Phone 7 Series team, I'd be more than happy to ask on your behalf (as I do live around the corner from Redmond's campus and will be meeting with the team again at some point in the future). Post a comment and/or video response.

I was invited to a behind the scenes look at elements of the Windows Phone 7 Series developer platform. At Mobile World Congress (covered earlier in this channel), Microsoft provided a first look at Windows Phone 7 Series and I'm pleased to offer you the opportunity to see a live demonstration up close.

Yes, I got to play with the phone, too. It works as advertised even as a prototype. Unfortunately, we could not adjust the brightness settings in this particular device. The Metro interface is a bucket of win in my book.

Charlie Kindel partner group program manager, Windows Phone App Platform & Developer Experience was hosting an intimate reception this evening in San Francisco. I wasn't able to make it, but Microsoft arranged a somewhat more private meeting with Greg Sullivan from the Windows Phone team a little closer to home.

I met Greg a few years ago through the Longhorn Labs project (back when Microsoft Windows team leads worked actively with their most vocal community supporters). I'm not sure if I can reveal any more device details at this point, but suffice it to say

I want one.

talk up at the University of Washington delivered even more saucy info than we were initially led to believe. In a transcript of the subsequent Q&A session, Steve is shown to have delivered the following statement on the topic of large-screen televisions and Microsoft's related hardware strategy:

For that big screen device ... there's no diversity. You get exactly the Xboxes that we build for you. We may have more form factors in the future that are designed for various price points and options, but we think it's going to [be] important.

It's safe to assume new form factors point to a smaller rather than larger 360 chassis, though the price points and further options he mentions are wide open for speculation. It wouldn't be unreasonable to forecast Microsoft pushing out its own slimmed-down console to match up with Sony's PS3 Slim, but we also shouldn't discount the idea of an Xbox 360 with Project Natal hardware integrated into its shell. In other words, we really don't know what Steve has going on under that shiny dome of his, we just hope it's as exciting as he makes it sound.
Steve Ballmer teases new Xbox 360 form factors, price points and options originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 06 Mar 2010 05:21:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Tags: steve points options factors price

What Tech Do You Want?

Tue, 16 Feb 2010 07:03:31 -0500

What Tech Do You Want? is a post from Chris Pirillo

Earlier, I posted a video asking which format you prefer our YouTube videos to be recorded in. Going a step further, I can't help but wonder what it is that will make the community one big happy bundle of joy. What do you want to see? What directions do envision our community taking?

For instance, if I post an article or video related to Apple, the Windows fans go ballistic. Likewise, whenever I posted something Windows-related, the Mac fanboys blow a gasket. It's like there's no happy medium these days. I cannot possibly make everyone happy all at once. I'm not even going to try!

However, I DO strongly believe that what we're doing is about the community, not just for the community. So I want to know what YOU think. What do you want to see more of in the coming months? What things can you live without? Leave a follow-up comment here, or drop me an email with your thoughts.

Don't forget to stop by our software center to see what new deals we have for you today!

Tags: lt gt li href pirillo

Will One Company Become the Dominant Player in Cloud Computing?

Mon, 15 Feb 2010 23:42:00 -0500

With each new milestone in technological evolution we've seen a company emerge as the clear leader. In the current landscape, we observe this happening in several key parts of the marketplace including networking, search and operating systems.

Cloud computing is a new disruptive force that makes us ask the question whether we'll see the future of the cloud dominated by a single company. In this multi-part series, we'll take a look at a handful companies and envision what the world might look like, if, in fact, they win it all. We'll also analyze what it will take for a new company to rise up and claim the leadership role in this chapter of computing.

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Dominance Happens: A Bit of Recent History

There has been a love/hate relationship with companies that dominate markets. On one hand, it's us consumers that make it happen. But when they become giants we cheer as governement regulators and competitors knock them down.

Microsoft has faced this issue perhaps more than any company in the past few decades. When the browser battles were in full swing in the late 1990s, Microsoft was taken to court by the Department of Justice for antitrust violations.

In this note released in 2000 - Technology, Market Changes, and Antitrust Enforcement -Microsoft evaluated the idea of whether it was consistent with public welfare for a company to "win" a technology market, and what it means to have a network effect in technology.

Microsoft makes the point that no technology company will hold a dominant position for long if it doesn't innovate and expand the market definition. Additionally, if a company doesn't find the right balance of trust and pricing between its customers new technologies will find a way into the market and cause customers to defect.

Point: A Dominant Vendor Will Emerge in the Cloud

Taking these factors into consideration, we believe there are several points that can support the argument that a dominant player in cloud computing in the future. Due to the nature of market forces a single vendor will emerge as the clear leader in offering cloud solutions.

First mover advantage: We're already seeing amazing things happen at first-movers like Amazon that are defining product and pricing. This gives them an advantage in fueling further growth and by learning and iterating the solutions in the market. Being first in an infrastructure-driven business will help them reach scale that others just can not reach easily - and potentially price it where others can't match.
Vendor lock: Once you get started with an infrastructure provider it becomes interwoven into business operations. By the current nature of the cloud (e.g. little standards, a lot of innovation) being first with leading solutions adds more momentum to the first-mover that wins strategic customers.
Strategic synergies: When we look at the combination of cloud computing and collaboration, we see a natural fit in services that meet more needs and take more market share. It may just work out that bundling works also in the cloud and creates the network effect that Microsoft is famous for. Cisco is also partnering across the landscape, with a focus on preparing the network for the cloud. By making it easier to manage your cloud with Cisco gear, it will provide IT leaders a reason to expand their relationships today, and stay tomorrow.
Acquisitions and Partnerships: Companies that buy their way into the market will be a big factor in putting momentum behind their offerings. Companies to watch: VMware, Cisco, Oracle. These companies are already showing that the race is on to win the cloud through aggregation of capabilities. Cisco has a blog dedicated to Cloud Computing, Oracle is going on tour sharing its ambitions for the cloud

Counterpoint: A Dominant Company Will Not Emerge in the Cloud

Perhaps no single organization will have the ability to create a dominant foundation in cloud computing. Instead, we'll see many types of solutions as equal peers in the market.

In a way, this runs against the grain of existing technology landscape and our history with successful innovations. Maybe that is why we love the idea of the cloud itself?

It's too big to own: One big reason to doubt a single dominant force in the cloud is that it feels like owning the Internet. Even Cisco with its strengths can't make such a claim. Perhaps the cloud is the perfect market, where the barriers of entry are low enough that continual evolution will occur.
It's a movement, not a layer: Another argument against the cloud having a dominant player is its fuzzy definition. There are many parts and pieces to it, and it's not clear today what it would mean to "win" the cloud computing market.
Portability will keep vendors in check: If customers demand solutions where they can move from vendor to vendor freely, it will impact the landscape. Companies with cloud solutions in the marketplace could be required by these customers to remove barriers to moving data and services between different entities. Additionally, standards and best practices may emerge that allow companies and individuals to move freely between providers. In this world, it will become a fluid market that prevents vendor lock and promotes pricing and trust as brand differentiators.

A Glimpse at Potential Futures

We've compiled a list of companies worth reviewing as candidates as possible dominant players in cloud computing. We'll be looking at their brand and the available assets that could be leveraged to achieve this position. Finally, we'll take a fresh look at what it might feel like if they succeed and shape the brave new world of cloud computing.

The list of candidates we're analyzing includes: Google, Microsoft, Apple, VMware, IBM, HP, Cisco, Amazon, Salesforce, Facebook, and our favorite, Insert new startup to our list by adding a comment below.

Please let us know what you hopes and fears are with the cloud computing marketplace. Any companies we should we add to our list (or remove)? What's your take: Is there one company today that is best positioned to win the cloud?

Photo credit: reddodo & savingfutures

Discuss

Tags: cloud market computing company dominant

Remains of the Day: Windows Phone 7 Looks Great, the Video Edition [For What It's Worth]

Tue, 16 Feb 2010 00:00:00 -0500

Microsoft new Windows Phone operating system looks pretty snazzy, Adobe AIR is on its way to smartphones, and one diligent self-measuring math teacher delivers his 2009 annual report.

Windows Phone 7: First Videos
Closer look at what you can expect from a Windows Phone 7 experience. [Gizmodo]
Apple to wrap digital books in FairPlay copy protection [Clarified]
Remember FairPlay, the DRM scheme Apple mostly dropped after years of locking users into a crappy DRM scheme? Well it's staging a comeback in e-books. [LA Times]
Malware Peddlers Look to Exploit Olympic Luge Tragedy
Same old trick. Find what users are searching for, then fake 'em out! [Mashable]
My 2009 Annual Report
Math teacher Dan Meyer puts a year's worth of personal metrics into the incredible video below. [dy/dan]
The Smarter You Are, The Less You Click
But then you probably already knew that, didn't you smartypants. [RWW]
Sciencefeed
It's like Friendfeed for Science! [via TechCrunch]
Wi-Fi Turns Rowdy Bus Into Rolling Study Hall
Internet on a school bus means students stop all that noisy horseplay! [NYT]
Adobe AIR for Smartphones Wants to Be One Platform to Rule Them All
Adobe's cross-platform desktop runtime AIR is on its way to mobile devices, starting with Android. [Gizmodo]
Apple drops the ban hammer on iPhone hackers
If you develop for the iPhone and App Store proper, Apple's not going to reward your spare-time hacking. [Boy Genius Report]

Tags: apple windows phone air report

4 Critical Steps to Turning Around a Team

Fri, 05 Feb 2010 17:00:54 -0500

The big project fails, the company begins to struggle and before you know it, the board of directors replaces the management team. Sound familiar? But crisis doesn't have to spell the end of the company itself.

Most companies and teams in turnaround situations focus on the obvious and important factors of balance sheet, cash flow and net income health. Teams also usually get to work quickly on market analysis that ultimately results in new product and business strategies. These actions are almost always necessary, just not always sufficient. Here are four often overlooked tactics that, if successfully employed, are critical to rapidly and successfully turning around a struggling enterprise:

1. Facilitate Closure - When a team has been through an extended period of hardship, it needs a sense of closure before it can start moving forward again, and closure is often best facilitated through a cathartic event that symbolizes the end of the perilous and painful journey. But while closure commonly necessitates letting a person or team go, don't rush to find a fall guy. Be very precise about identifying what was holding the company back it could just as easily have come in the form of an ineffective process or out-of-date strategy. Approach its removal the way you would a tumor: Excise carefully, and be wary of damaging any healthy surrounding tissue.

2. Set a Vision - According to intentional change theory, there are five steps to achieving sustained desired change. The first is to identify the ideal self, which for an organization is usually embodied in a collective vision consisting of its members' dreams (to be recognized as the best in the industry? world domination?), their desired future (market penetration? profitability?), and their strengths or values (high quality? extraordinary customer care?) Identify these in order to establish a shared vision that resonates with each team member on a deep, even emotional, level.

3. Find an Enemy - The easiest way to solidify an us is to identify a them. As Tajfel and Turner's social identity theory makes clear, people need to be part of a group, but in a company the result is often conflict between groups. The conflict that most often occurs in a crisis is affective and role-based and therefore often negative and value-destroying. There is no better way to rally the troops than to embody the fight with an external nemesis. Identify for your team an enemy outside the company and focus on beating or staying ahead of it, using everything from its press releases to its product launches to spur the team into action.

4. Tend the Garden - In our recently published book, The Art of Scalability, we talk at length about how leadership is like gardening. Leaders must hire or seed the team with the right people and mentor its members just as gardeners feed their plants. And when team members aren't working out, they need to be weeded out.

The time period between Microsoft's release of its XP desktop operating system and Vista marked the longest in the company's history between product launches. Jim Allchin, Microsoft's co-president, admitted in a Wall Street Journal interview to telling Bill Gates at one point that It's not going to work, describing the development as crashing to the ground due to haphazard methods of feature integration.

To recover from this, Microsoft enlisted the help of senior executive Amitabh Srivastava, who rooted out the process that was holding the project back. He then had a team of architects establish a development process that enforced high levels of code quality and reduced interdependencies. Once the new process was in place, the vision was set for what was ultimately a successful product launch, at least in terms of getting the product out the door and meeting the expected sales volumes.

There are entire books and domains of research dedicated to turning around failed projects and distressed teams. This list is in no way all-encompassing but if you are ever faced with the daunting task of turning around a team, these four tasks will be critical to its success.

Tags: team company product often closure

Amazon Hires Mike Nash from Microsoft to Work on Kindle

Fri, 05 Feb 2010 12:30:12 -0500

If the acquisition of Touchco wasn't enough of an indication that Amazon is preparing for a skirmish with the Apple iPad, this should make it perfectly clear. Mike Nash, a man who has quite a history of accomplishments at Microsoft for the past two decades, is leaving the company to work on the Kindle business for Amazon.

Before leaving Microsoft, Mike was the Corporate Vice President of Windows Platform Strategy and was responsible for pieces of Windows business strategy, ecosystem engagement, consumer security, Internet Explorer, and emerging markets, according to his bio on Microsoft's Web site.

In addition to his most recent role, Nash has had a string of historic positions at Big M including a role as the first product manager on the original Windows NT marketing team; the Corporate Vice President of the Security Technology Unit; and a driver of a number of Microsoft acquisitions in the security space.

There's been no official announcement yet from Amazon so we're unsure of Nash's focus within the Amazon team.

[Mary Jo Foley, ZDNet] [Amazon Kindle]

Disclosure of Material Connection: http://dsclszr.us/5

My Thoughts On Techcrunch And Daniel Brusilovsky - 1938 Media

Sat, 06 Feb 2010 18:52:51 -0500

My Thoughts On Techcrunch And Daniel Brusilovsky

By Loren Feldman, on February 5th, 2010

This was going to be a video, but frankly I'm too upset and I don't want my sentiments to be lost while you stare at my good looks and get hypnotized by my command of language and performance.

We are at a crossroads on the web and social media. It's time to start looking at ourselves with an honest eye. Today's topic is journalism and transparency.

I'm in no way a journalist but here's my transparency. I had a falling out last year with ManCrunch founder Michael Arrington. I honestly adored him, and would vigorously defend his general dickish and insane behavior to anyone who ever asked which was essentially everyone. I would say Mike is just like me, you just don't get his humor. I would do anything for him, he's been great to me.

Then Mike called to cancel his speaking appearance at The Audience Conference. Yeah I was in the car driving to the event when he called, but I tried to laugh it off. I knew all along he was gonna bail, and frankly being a friend and knowing that Mike can be Mike I really didn't care and was willing to let it slide, even though this was the second time he screwed up. He apologized the first time and we were cool. The second time he wrote some silly post on ManCrunchNotes about friendship and puppies. I like dogs too and considered the matter closed.

Then I watched him do the same thing, only worse and at a much larger scale, to another friend of mine. And then another. Then I heard some other stuff, which everyone else is mumbling about. Then I thought back to the way he treats his staff and realized that even though it makes for great puppet videos that nobody watches, It's just not my style to hang with a guy like that.

But that was months ago. My thoughts about TechCrunch in this post are not part of some revenge plot between an internet puppeteer who gets a few hundred views per YouTube video and a bigtime lawyer who claims millions of readers yet only generates a few dozen clicks each of the 20 times I've been on the front page of his site.

Daniel Brusilovsky, the latest character in the sad tale of TechCrunch, is 17 years old. Excluding Mike's puppy, this makes him the youngest contributor to the site.

Other TechCrunch contributors include Sarah Lacy, who earned her chops getting laughed off the stage interviewing Mark Zuckerberg of Facebook, and fellow auteur Paul Carr, who documented his unethical behaviors in a book you can download for free on TechCrunch. Paul's other hobbies include Foursquare checkins, and delaying writing the words he's under contract to write.

One of Sarah's more popular TechCrunch posts was talking about a juice diet product that costs $95 per day, which she totally paid for herself, which may or may not be repped by people close to Mike and companies that Mike invested in. Paul Carr tried it too. Even Mike gave the juice a go, or at least the puppet did I forget. Sarah also travels a lot which you can tell by the deep international flavor of her TechCrunch coverage and analysis. Or at least the pictures she posts on other sites.

There are other people at TechCrunch that I dig. I'm still mad that Hendrickson left because that threw off my puppet gag. And Schoenfeld did a great job filling in as master of ceremonies for Mike after Mike threw a tantrum and disappeared three hours before his own award show. I did a quick Google and he didn't call Arrington a total jackass even once for it. So props for that. There are others too but I'll spare them Mike's wrath by not mentioning them.

Bringing up the rear is Steve Gillmor who is the oldest TechCrunch employee at 157 years old. He's basically known for his unique talent for speaking in tongues. Tech style y'all. Yesterday Steve broadcast himself screaming at his assistant while being unable to use the copycat audio/video technology he bought for himself to compete with Leo, after he uh, left Leo's network amicably.

Since you haven't heard about Gillmor Gang let me tell you what it is.

The Gillmor Gang may or may not be a TechCrunch production. It consists of non-technical people yelling at each other about technology and runs for what feels like eleven hours. Visuals focus on odd angles of nostril hair, bad cell phone call-in audio, and lighting that makes them look like lizards. Their most popular video is a 90 second YouTube clip where keyboard cat plays jazz organ after Mike acts like an idiot, a Google employee throws his Skype headset down in disgust, and I roll my eyes uncomfortably.

This four screen picture-in-picture view was made possible by Leo's mastery of the tech that Gillmor still hasn't figured out how to use. You probably won't be able to find the site in Google since it changes URLs every ten minutes but you can probably find the keyboard cat clip on YouTube. If you bump into Leo Laporte, don't mention that you've seen it.

Unofficial TechCrunch employees include Robert Scoble, ex-camera salesman and Microsoft Vista evangelist. Today Scoble is again throwing around his journalism credentials (he dropped out of j-school) in defense of Daniel and Mike. I'll just point out that if you have to constantly tell people you're a journalist, there might be something lacking from your body of work. Even in this jaded age people tend to be able to smell actual reporting and it's not coming from building 43 at the Rackspace headquarters. Although it was fun to watch the Rackspace head of social media flop around on Friendfeed after the latest Gillmor Gang episode blew up. Cool site that Friendfeed. Somebody big should buy it and really fix up that community. And way to pick a winner in Scoble, Rackspace. Haven't seen a play this brilliant since you screwed up Slicehost.

But back to reporting. Closest Scoble ever got to a story was interviewing the guy who sells yogurt to Steve Jobs. Scoble reported that Steve Jobs was in great health. Jobs left Apple four days later for a liver transplant. Scoble was also on the private jet the day John Edwards announced his run for the Presidency, shooting video three feet away from the other video blogger who was John Edwards mistress and who mothered his child. Didn't pick up on that vibe either I guess. He sure has his thumb on the pulse.

So on the one hand I want to give Daniel Brusilovsky a pass. The kid is 17 and look at the environment he's working in and the idiots he's surrounded by. I'm tempted to blame the parents, but hey, there's no way they'd know this stuff.

Let's pretend for a moment that Dan is not some privileged little schmuck and that his parents aren't connected to Silicon Valley in some convenient way for Mike and/or Scoble. Let's imagine that the parents actually performed due diligence and took five minutes to Google the people their kid would be spending time with.

Wow. Well-adjusted, social, popular people. With lots of friends. And friendly Wikipedia entries. And they all love tech!

We all know this is utter bullshit. This is the world we've created on the web.

So before you yell at Dan, look at yourself. I know personally that lots of you know lots of things and you don't say the Stuff That Matters.

It's okay to call people idiots, or dopes, or morons, or liars when they are. This is part of the process of transparency.

Although it's probably not that helpful, you can even get away with being mean for no good reason. Here goes. Robert Scoble really is fucking stupid. Every smart person I know thinks so. Shel Israel really is a nasty prick. If you've actually tried to work with him, you know this. See? The internet didn't just collapse.

And yeah, TechCrunch has become a joke.

It's okay to say this stuff. In fact we have to say this stuff if we want to improve. You'll badmouth a restaurant for lukewarm fries on Yelp but you won't say that Rackspace Spokesman Scoble is a fool for thinking a VPN is a Virtual Public Network? One time is a slip of the tongue and we all make mistakes, but this guy has been on the wrong side of history going back a decade and clearly doesn't know anything.

It's also okay to promote other people who do great work. I don't care if it's Follow Friday or Tumblr Tuesday or ManCrunch Monday, take a minute next time and really find and promote Someone Who Matters. And if you can't find that someone, perhaps reflect on the web of connections you built and why you're wasting your time with them. Let alone endorsing them by keeping them in that little grid of profile pictures you're so proud of.

So yeah, I want to give Dan Brusilovsky a pass given the entire environment. But I can't.

I've met him several times and thought he was a smug little prick. Some kids are kids, some adults like Mike are kids, and some 17 year old kids know exactly what's up. My opinion is that Dan is a Man and falls into the last category. He knew what he was doing and deserves the consequences.

Should Mike have done a better job mentoring him? Absolutely. But look at Mike. He can't take care of himself in any way or even show up to the parties and conference circle jerks he throws himself. He seems to do an okay job with the puppies but I wouldn't trust him with an up-and-coming 17 year old tech reporter.

Mike's transparency post also deserves a little attention. It says nothing. It doesn't mention the company or companies involved in the alleged laptop-for-coverage scandal. I'm sure it'll all get figured out eventually, and it might even be a company that's a friend or sponsor of mine. But in the spirit of saying Stuff That Matters, I'll close with this:

If you bought a MacBook Air in order to get a 17 year old to write a post on TechCrunch, and you thought this would in any way improve your business, you're an absolute, total dope.

Tags: mike techcrunch scoble even video

BBC News - Facebook dominates UK mobile use

Fri, 05 Feb 2010 15:10:34 -0500

Shared by Kristopher
BBC News - Facebook dominates UK mobile use

Facebook dominates UK mobile use

Facebook is changing the design of its homepage

Facebook dominates the lives of mobile internet users in the UK, according to figures from a mobile industry body.

The social network accounts for nearly half of all the time people in the UK spend going online using their phones.

The data, from the GSM Association (GSMA), showed that people in the UK spent around 2.2bn minutes browsing the social network during December alone.

The true number may be even higher as the data was only collected from three of the five UK networks.

The data, which will eventually be collected from all five networks, showed that 16 million people in the UK accessed the internet from their mobile phones in December 2009.

Together, they viewed a total of 6.7 billion pages and spent more than 4.8 billion minutes (60 million hours) online during the month.

MOBILE MINUTES SPENT ONLINE

Facebook; 2.2bn minutes

Google sites; 395m minutes

Microsoft sites; 165m minutes

Orange sites; 138m minutes

AOL (and Bebo); 106m minutes

Apple; 104m minutes

Vodafone; 89m minutes

BBC sites; 83m minutes

Flirtomatic; 54m minutes

Yahoo sites; 48m minutes

Source: GSMA/Comscore

Facebook dominated the statistics, racking up the most unique visitors (5 million), the most number of pages viewed (2.6 million) and the most time spent on the site.

Google sites were second in the list with around with 4.57 million unique users. However, they spent on average less than one-fifth of the time on its sites, compared to Facebook.

Others sites that appeared in the top ten - which accounted for 70% of usage - included Yahoo, eBay and Microsoft.

Facebook is currently the largest social network on the web, with around 350 million users.

The six-year-old site is rolling out a new homepage design which focuses more on chat and search.

Tags: minutes facebook m sites uk

Steve Jobs Is Not Happy With Google, Adobe

Mon, 01 Feb 2010 09:23:21 -0500

What a time we're living in. You can't even make fun of your competitors at your own company meeting without your words leaking out to the internet.

Apparently, this has happened to Steve Jobs, who lashed out at Google and Adobe at Apple's Town Hall company meeting held at their One Infinite Loop headquarters. Speaking to Apple employees, Steve Jobs voiced his expression with buggy Flash, lazy Adobe, and Google's fakery in the don't be evil department.

Although these words have not been (and will never be) officially confirmed, multiple anonymous people from the audience confirmed their authenticity to Wired.

Here's a couple of Steve's (inexact) quotes from the meeting: Adobe is lazy. Apple does not support Flash because it is so buggy. Whenever a Mac crashes more often than not it's because of Flash. No one will be using Flash. The world is moving to HTML5.

When it comes to Google, Jobs is mad at them for trying to kill the iPhone. We did not enter the search business, he said. They entered the phone business. Make no mistake: they want to kill the iPhone. We won't let them.

Finally, his most interesting quote is about Google's don't be evil mantra. According to Daring Fireball, Jobs simply said: it's a load of crap.

Yes, I think we can safely say we were right when we said that a) the iPad and the iPhone aren't getting full Flash support anytime soon, and b) Google is now Apple's greatest enemy.

Reviews: Google

Tags: adobe, apple, Flash, Google, steve jobs, trending

Tags: google jobs flash steve apple

The iPad Vs. The Kindle: How Should Amazon Respond?

Wed, 27 Jan 2010 23:05:16 -0500

Editor's note: This a guest post written by Joff Redfern. Redfern is the co-founder of FlattenMe.com, a site for creating personalized storybooks. He was formerly a vice president of product at Yahoo, where he managed Yahoo Buzz and Toolbar.

Amazon Kindle: The Road Ahead

I'm a recent Kindle fan boy. I like the instant access to earth-friendly books, the paper-like display and the way it fits in my hand like a paperback. I've also deeply admired the crispness of the Kindle visionany book, any language, in minutes. But with Apple's iPad announcement the playing field on which the Kindle competes shifts and the disruptive technology itself gets disrupted.

If I were running the Kindle I would answer this question today: Are we innovating the publishing or the entertainment industry? Is the Kindle just for my reading entertainment or is it for watching, listening, gaming, browsing, sharing photos, and communicating with friends & family too? Ultimately the answer is shaped by consumer preference, competitors and time measured in years.

As a product guy this is a really intriguing question to try to unravelwhich path should Amazon choose? Over time this is what may push the Kindle into being more than just a reader . . .

For the same price, more is better

Will consumers prefer a multi-purpose entertainment tablet over a single-purpose reading device as their prices converge? This is a religious question; sides will be drawn. I look to the evolution of my own personal technology habits for the answer.

When I wanted to manage my contacts I started with a paper-based Address Book, upgraded to a Digital Rolodex, upgraded to a Palm V, upgraded to a Blackberry, then upgraded to an iPhone. Fundamentally I was trying to solve how I manage and communicate with my contacts. With each upgrade I got more functionality yet the price point for each device was not radically different.

If consumers can eventually get an entertainment tablet that also has the core features of a great reader (screen, content catalog, ease of purchasing) at under $200 they'll want more.

Prices drop. Over time, price won't be a factor in the purchase decision.

Today, Kindle enjoys a price advantage over the iPad. It is nearly half the price, starting at $260 versus $500 for the iPad, although the cheapest Kindle DX with an equivalent 9.7 inch screen is $489. That is pretty close already. What happens when the price of iPad-like devices trend down to a point of consumer indifference?

Moore's Law and business model innovation will drive the iPad-like devices to sub-$200 pricing. Unrealistic? The retail price of the iPhone 8GB dropped ~83% in 3 years from $599 to $99.

Also keep in mind that entertainment tablets are using different math from the Kindle. The device pricing will be subsidized by multiple revenue streamsdownloads of books, music, movies, games, apps, advertising, and more. Today I can get a cell phone device for free, will my iPad be free some day?

Competitors are playing a platform war. Is Kindle?

Apple, Google and Microsoft have massive investments in their respective mobile platforms. In particular, Apple is king of the mobile mountain. As Jobs declared today, Apple is now the largest mobile device company in the world.

This Apple sizzle has drawn 100,000+ developers and publishers to its iPhone (and now iPad) ecosystem. These apps are already available to entertain us in all sorts of ways on the iPad beyond what Apple exec Scott Forstall showed today.

Amazon knows this. Last week they announced a developer API is coming. So the question remains how robust is the API and will the developer community bite, or is it game over?

What would you do if you ran the Kindle?

CrunchBase Information

Information provided by CrunchBase

Tags: kindle ipad apple price amazon

Our CES 2010 Top Picks

Tue, 12 Jan 2010 23:08:59 -0500

By Senior Editor Kris Smith (@croncast)

The world was shown a lot of new electronic products this year at CES.

This is a list of the top 5 products that are actually usable or will be in the near future when they are released.

These are what we wish we could pick up at the store today.

Enjoy the videos as well.

5. Sprint Overdrive

This is MiFi on steroids with 3G and 4G coverage. This beast is ready today. However, it is limited to certain cities and metro areas in the states. See if you're on the list and if you are, drop that cable company or DSL provider like they're hot.