Re: The next big thing

From: Brandi Jasmine <brandi_at_brandijasmine.com>
Date: Tue 13 Feb 2001 17:45:06 -0600

KIM BROOKS <kbrooks_at_bardo-brooks.com> WROTE:
> Oy, I'm gettin' tired of that example of passing a
> Starbucks and getting a coupon for a cheap latte. It's
> just not real, and won't be for years if ever.

That was part of my point. The other part, which you
missed entirely is that there is a greater amount of
hype for making money from WAP portals. Now far be it
from me to trash wireless portals, since one of my best
customers is a wireless portal. I sell horoscopes to a
Canadian cell phone company. It's the cell phone
company who will make the money, and maybe folks like
me to a (much) smaller degree ... but *not* from
selling advertising over this thing. Not now, or for
the forseeable future. I don't think they even really
plan anything like that (though I don't speak for them,
standard disclaimers apply). I haven't seen any "trial
balloons" in this area.

> for the full text of the FCC's e911 location detection
> requirements.

Does this apply in Canada? What does the CRTC have to
say about this, I wonder. Probably 18 months behind it
as usual.

> Let me wax irritable on this location-based
> advertising hype

Knock yourself out. :)

> just about the only hype that keeps recurring in wireless
> conversations since web-based models have proven
> dismally useless...

Uhm ... noooo - there is a lot more hype to be had. At
Internet World and Comdex there were a lot of little
WAP companies selling the idea of "making your own WAP
portal" and by extension "making a lot of money selling
products and advertising on it". And I wasn't hyping (I
really object to that characterization). I only pointed
out that it may be the only realistic way to leverage
this market in the short term, and I DID point out its
limitations.

And while I myself have given up on making money
through web-based advertising sales, I know some folks
raking it in hand over fist who might beg to differ
with the "dismally useless" characterization. It's only
useless if you are under 2 million page views a month.
Let's not blame the model for our failure to be able to
leverage it. There are sectors where it is pulling in
some decent income. It's just not the money-tree some
people were hoping for. You have to (gasp) work at it,
and you have to (gasp) have some decent traffic. It
never ceases to amaze me how some people think any
level of profitiability is useless if it is under the
hundreds of billions. If you are making money, then
it's worth doing at some level. Hell if I could pay the
mortgage with it, I'd call it incredibly useful. It's
not working for *me* at this point. But I used to work
for TUCOWS ... when you have 50 million page views a
month you can make it work. If it's "dismally useless"
what are we doing here talking about it?

> not a) customer-driven; b) realistic; c) acceptable to
> most cell users; d) useful to advertisers. So it's an
> odd strategy.

I think if you'll re-read my statement you'll find I
wasn't overly enthusiastic for it myself. It's one
possible way to leverage the resource - not one I'd
consider optimal. It's certainly not one that would be
useful to most businesses - for the reason I pointed
out - customers have to opt into it. In other words
it's for retention/service/(maybe branding .. maybe),
not really for advertising.

> you have the internet at home and at work, how many
> people need it on their phone? From the looks of it,
> maybe 1 in 20? So 5% of the population that can will
> use wireless web.

I figure news, information, games, and entertainment
services (horoscopes) will do well enough to make the
cell phone companies happy.

> I'm amazed that so many analysts, marketers,
> media buyers, creative agencies, and dot-coms are
> putting so much credence behind the idea of wireless
> advertsing pushes.

So am I. That was my point. A lot of people are acting
like this is the "next big thing" because they are
hoping for another big bubble in the stock market to
take over for the vacuum left when the dot.com bubble
burst. It's really that simple. Basic greed and
psychology.

> Wireless web has value when it lets users access tiny
> bits of time-critical, user-specific, important
> information. Stock quotes. Account balances. Shipping
> status. Emergency notices ...

... and horoscopes <g>. Don't underestimate the value
of games, entertainment and distractions. There will be
money to be made in providing these services too. Of
course we won't be advertising them via cell phone any
time soon <g> ... and as always, those of us in this
end of the business will be picking up crumbs for the
most part, not raking in billiions of dollars and
having IPO parties (though the idea of being the first
astrologer to "go public" has some grin appeal for me).

.... mind you it HAS dawned on me that there is one way
to do it. They are doing it with pagers now. You give
away free cell phones to people who are willing to be
force-fed ads every time they use the phone. That model
*might* work ... it's been generally less than
overwhelming in the pager/free ISP market, but there
are some niches where people are doing all right with
it. At least, they are still in business anyway. But
again, the only companies in the position to leverage
this will be the cell phone companies themselves.

... and, all this will change when there are portable
devices with larger screens - "tablet computers" that
are wireless-enabled (like the Star Trek-like device
Microsoft is working on). THAT will change things
dramatically - but in a sense it will be like coming
full circle for e-businesses, since the device will use
the Internet as a normal computer would. Now that is
something I am happy to "hype" - I really want a toy
like that, myself.

Regards,

Brandi Jasmine
Writer, Digital Photographer, Illustrator
http://www.brandijasmine.com/writer/
www.astrology.ca - www.twostar.com





Received on Tue Feb 13 2001 - 17:45:06 CST