Image source: EW.com

I’m in San Francisco, for short project, this week. On some downtime, I told Florian that in my next place I live, I want to get a landline, a real copper wire one, not VOIP. He turned and said he completely agreed.

Every so often, I think about the days when I enjoyed talking on the phone.  When I lived in Seattle in the 90s after college, I would call people in New York or where ever the landed.  There were several people I would call a couple of times a month, for conversations over half an hour on a crystal clear and reliable landline connection. These calls were a rich and valued experience. These days, mobile phones and VOIP are a constant battle. Having a telephone call where both sides are clear and audible seem like a victory instead of the standard.

Rates on mobiles are cheaper, but I wonder if there will be a return back to landlines for their reliable service and clear conntections.

Is part of the reason I SMS more now because talking on the mobile phones is often a futile exercise of shouting, deciphering lost syllables, and walking around looking for the best signal?

Well, I am finally posting. Work and life got a little crazy, and something had to give. That something was side projects, like blogging. However, I’m back from a week in Seoul and I’m almost adjusted to this time zone. When I travel, people always seems to tell me to take lots of pictures, which I enviably never do. However, I did manage this time around. Here’s a map of an underground mall in Seoul. These malls and subway stations are sprawling and can cover a few city blocks. Like in Tokyo, directions to a location often tell you the specific exit, which are numbered, you need to take. Getting from one end of the station to another can take twenty minutes to walk on the street, which makes using the correct exit rather important.

On my free day, I took the Circle Line (formerly called Line 2) all the way around. I was going from City Hall to the Coex Mall at the Samseong station, which is not quite half way around. So I went there and returned going the same direction. (Counter clockwise if you’re curious.) Being non-rush hour, it was quite relaxing, and the people watching is always good. It was also much warmer than cold Korean winter air outside.

I decided to forgo the standard shot of a teenager watching television (DMB) or talking on their mobile in the subway. Flickr is full of photo displaying Koreans using the high bandwidth in the subway that we dream about back home. Thankfully, earbuds are always used. Conversations are at low volume, with one hand holding the phone and the other covering the mouth to limit the noise to others.  After a week of seeing it, I started doing it myself. I’m not sure New Yorkers would be so polite, when mobile phones finally work on the MTA. It’s striking how the culture of use evolved differently here.

Things just got really interesting in the mobile / wireless world. Verizon announced that they will over two categories of service by the end of 2008. One will continue to be its bundled handset service, and the other will be open to any device. This change brings Verizon Wireless in-line with the open networks that are available in Europe and Asia. The move will force T-Mobile, Sprint, and AT&T to consider offering similar services. (T-Mobile is already experimenting with allows users to make WiFi calls.) This announcement also may affect the upcoming 700MHz spectrum auction, as the FCC did not require open networks. I’m hoping that it will spur more innovation in the mobile space. Changes could happen quickly, we’ll have to wait and find out. I’m trying to stay optimistic.

Update: Techcrunch and GigaOM weigh in on the issue. A lot can happen in a year, and GigaOM is correct to be skeptical.

After months of complaints since the launch of the iPhone, Apple just announced the a Software Developer’s Kit will be released in February. Mac Rumors noted that the letter from Jobs suggested that they might use a digital signature to control who can develope applications, a strategy the Nokia is using.

For this reason, and the iPhone’s relatively small user base, I’m not sure that we’ll see the applications on the scale of Facebook. However, I’m looking forward to what software developers can come up with.

That being said, iPhone apps might be more profitable, because people are getting more used to downloading and paying for apps and content to mobile phones.

A recent Telephia report on mobile applications, found that in Q2 2007, 5% or 13 million mobile users downloaded a mobile app, which generated $USD 118 million. Compare that with Business Week reporting the estimate that the entire monthly Facebook revenue from widget advertising is less than $USD 1 million, or $USD4 million for the quarter.

Image source: nytimes.com

New York Times reported that Nokia is priming a relaunch of the N-Gage after two failed attempts at providing a portable phone and gaming platform. Following two attempts to market the N-Gage in 2003 and 2004, Nokia pulled the line of devices from Europe and North America in 2005, after lukewarm sales, well below their sales targets. Not giving up, Nokia hired the legendary design firm IDEO, for a user-centric design approach for the next iteration. Now, the new N-Gage will allow people to play games with their friends and strangers, and try-out and purchase games from their phones. They will also know more about the skill levels of the other people they are playing against, so they can find people of similar abilities, which was a user need that was discovered through IDEO research. If the re-launch is successful, the N-Gage could become a textbook example of user need driven product design.

Combining a portable gaming device and a phone seems like a no brainer, but success has still been elusive. Besides Nokia, the other obvious places to look have been slow in making progress as well. Sony presents yet another example of the Japanese giant having a difficult time getting their individual arms to work together, but it looks like they are starting to work it out. After years of rumors, Sony has filed a patent on a mobile gaming platform that will combine the PSP with Sony Ericsson phone technology. Seeing that the patent was only filed in May 31, 2007, seeing a product to market in the US, could take time. However, as unwired review notes, if it can play PSP games, it could have immediate impact.

Putting aside the success of the DS line and the Wii console, Nintendo is still strangely silent, despite filing a similar mobile phone gaming patent way back in 2001.

Of course, Sony, Nokia, and Nintendo will also have to deal with the US carriers, who lean heavily toward restrictions on their ondeck services, as they too want to earn revenue from the mobile gaming market. It’s not clear to me, how the N-Gage will integrate with US mobile carrier services. I’m definitely going to follow up on the agreements that will be made, and how the services will play out. The complexity of the current system definitely makes it even more clear that, the FCC mandate of device and software interoperability for 700 MHz auction was important, even if some people think the FCC compromised too much.

I went to another fine event tonight put up by the fine folks at Mobile Monday New York, “Beyond Scores. Sports Brands & Their Mobile Game Plan.”

The panel discussion was packed with good representatives from the content side as well as infrastructure. The line up included:
- Oke Okaro, ESPN
- Bhavesh Patel, NBA
- Lincoln Hochberg, MLB
- Rich LaBarca, Clearspring
- Moderator: Evan Neufeld, VP and senior analyst, M:Metrics

I appreciated that candor and openness to the responses from the panelists. The discussion lived up to its name and covered more than reading scores in an SMS message. Topics ranged from integrated marketing (an industry standard), carrier support (still a bottleneck), interface standardizations (still impeding mobile growth), and working with OEMs (they can only do so much). I’m a bit tired today, so I’ll keep it short with the best take aways.

On successful mobile initiatives:
“Boredom is a key driver.” - Lincoln Hochberg, MLB

On the mobile killer app:
“It may not be tv on your mobile… I can see things like breaking news video alerts [being the killer app]…” - Lincoln Hochberg, MLB

On mobile experimentation:
“Stick with what you know.” - Oke Okaro, ESPN

On the iPhone:
“But, it’s a closed system.” (several times) - Rich LaBarca

And the best line came from the moderator….
“… and now comes the part where we complain about the carriers…”