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Big Data and a Critique of Geek Culture
We are fascinated here at ReadWriteWeb about Hadoop. It can be used in so many ways. It gives you that sense of excitement that shows how big data can open up all kinds of possibilities.
So we got a tad excited tonight when we ran across a post by Mike Pearce about "10 Hadoopable Problems: or in other words, 10 things you can do with Hadoop. But excitement turned to disappointment when it reminded us of how limiting we can be when thinking about big data in standard terms.
We won't go into detail about each of the 10 ways Hadoop can be used. You can go check out the post yourself. Instead, we'll highlight a few and provide our own little view about big data, the failings of geek culture and the role information plays in our interface culture.
Hadoop is a transforming technology that through its analytic capabilities, can change the way we interface with the world. We use the term interface in deference to Interface Culture, the book by Steven Johnson that explored the Web's interactive elements and technology interfaces. He looked at buttons, links and metaphors such as the desktop and traced them back to medieval planning, Victorian novels, early cinema and the rise of our modern culture.
The interface culture we develop out of big data will spawn new works that help guide us into unfamiliar spaces as much as novels helped the Victorian era make sense of the new, industrial world.
Hadoop is a tool increasingly used to make sense of a new world that automatically creates data in overwhelming amounts. We manually create our own data through gestures on Facebook, from the images we post to Flickr and the tweets we post religiously. But data is also created automatically by intelligent agents who do the work on our behalf, sending information from machine-to-machine, analyzing itself along the way, increasing in intelligence through APIs or forking into new realms as its manipulated and turned into apps, recommendation engines and the rest.
Transforming data helps us make sense of an information universe, By analyzing it we create our own interface culture and in the process, better understand our world. New art, new intellectual movements and new societies will emerge from the data we are just starting to learn how to chisel into new shapes, new scuptures if you will that tells stories about who we are.
Unfortunately, the 10 examples (from a Cloudera presentation) don't draw us into a new world of possibilities. Sure, fraud detection (number seven) is important. Goodness knows how often we hear about it. I am sure there are lots of surveillance geeks out there who love the idea of monitoring trade with Hadoop as pointed out in number 8. Ad targeting comes in the four spot. That's a familiar topic. Search quality is ninth. More yawns. You get the picture.
All of these examples explore what we have become accustomed to in geek culture. Possibilities for how big data can be used in a strictly commercial sense or as a way to optimize processes or the technologies we have already developed.
It's implausible to believe that we will see any kind of diversity in geek culture if we continue grinding down this technically oriented view of the data around us. Focusing on incremental improvements in processes has been done for generations. It will make people a lot of money but its impact is minimal in the world we live. It will create jobs. We will without a doubt see a new generation of data analysts but there is more to this big data, right?
Perhaps it is too early to expect a renaissance. It's like we are medieval artists who are struggling to move beyond the concept of flat images. We are too consumed in the technological marvels of what we have created to fully understand the implications of what we have discovered and with it what we can create.
We will admit it is getting simpler to develop technologies and easier for people to use. More people are making apps. We have a new generation of developers who have taught themselves by following the principles of the view-source culture. More women are making inroads. We can thank open standards for that.
It's the software that mixes and cooks up that data which will truly transform our world. When that data is as accessible as flour is for baking or clay for sculpting then Hadoop and other analytics technologies like it will have real meaning.
And perhaps it is the ability to discover data and perform tricks with it that opens up this marvelous world. A world made from the big data we shape into images that help us realize an interface culture of a new modern era.
DiscussA Quick Look at ORM for PHP
If you have ever pulled your hair out over maintaining SQL statements intermingled with your PHP project code you might not be alone. Perhaps you considered abstraction or wished your database had an API. You might have even heard of an Object Relational Mapper (ORM).
Let's take a quick look at ORM for your next PHP project.
The Perfect (st)ORMThe ORM offerings for PHP projects have come a long way. A query on stackoverflow returns over 100 hits on php+orm. With that in mind, focusing on one PHP ORM might be helpful as you to consider your next PHP project.
As with any solution in the PHP community you can expect to see several contenders for the best mousetrap prize. While no ORM is perfect, each will cater to specific needs and have varied levels of integration or consideration for PHP frameworks. Features can range from simplified abstraction to code generation to support for various underlying databases such as MySQL, PostgreSQL, SQLite, Firebird to IBM DB2, Microsoft SQL Server, and Oracle.
Doctrine was mentioned recently in the RWH review of zfKit as part of its easy out-of-the-box Zend Framework experience. You may also find features in the Doctrine 2.0 release to be of interest if you need caching or support for writing your own interfaces and abstract classes for when your database of choice is not supported at the time of a stable release.
A recent presentation highlighted Doctrine 2.0 as being a fresh take on the expansion of the PHP ORM options showing up in sourceforge, github, and related project hosting services.
Doctrine 2 - Not The Same Old Php OrmView more presentations from Jonathan Wage.(Slide 14 is an instant favorite)
I want a $drug->new()
Of course, even if you focus on Doctrine you find references to alternative ORM options such as Propel. This is because an ORM can often be found intermingled in wider discussion of PHP MVC frameworks.
For example, Propel is often mentioned in relation to Symfony and CodeIgniter or as another alternative to using Doctrine with other PHP MVC frameworks. In addition, the Propel blog is a good resource for extracting the value when using Propel or any ORM in general.
Again, there is more than just one ORM option in the PHP community. You may have even ended up writing your own at one point or found your MVC framework came with a library that supplied ORM functionality.
When selecting an ORM, what are your considerations? What did you expect to gain from the ORM? Have you had success or strugles with use of an ORM in your projects?
Let us know in the comments below!
DiscussApple Relaxes Restrictions on Mobile App Development
Today, Apple announced it is relaxing the previous restrictions on the use of third-party development tools for the creation of mobile applications on iOS, the operating system that powers the iPhone, the iPad and the iPod Touch. Specifically, sections 3.3.1, 3.3.2 and 3.3.9 of the iOS Developer Program have been modified with new language that rolls back some of the changes that were enacted earlier this year.
The first two sections included restrictions on the use of development tools that allowed developers to code in languages familiar to them, like Adobe Flash, then port those applications to the iOS platform. Section 3.3.9 also placed restrictions on the use of third-party software within an app whose purpose was to collect and analyze app usage data.
According to the Apple press release, these decisions were made because the company "listened to our developers" and has "taken much of their feedback to heart."
Most of the complaints at the time of the initial changes revolved around Apple's decision to ban the use of Adobe's "Packager for iPhone," a tool which allowed Flash developers to leverage their existing skills in order to produce iPhone applications. The announcement led to escalated tensions between the two companies, and shortly thereafter Apple exec CEO Steve Jobs posted a lengthy piece on Apple.com which explained all the reasons why his company did not want Flash technology on any of its mobile devices, whether as a plugin or as an app-creation tool.
However, today's news doesn't just affect Adobe Flash developers, although they were the most vocal about the prior ban - it could also permit the use of other mobile development technologies including Sun's Java or Microsoft's Silverlight/Mono, notes Apple-watching blog, AppleInsider.
They also point out that the decision, in part, may not be simply because Apple "listened to feedback" but because of recent U.S. Federal Trade Commission (FTC) investigations which had the regulatory body looking into the complaint regarding the Flash ban, among other things.
Meanwhile, as the language in the Apple Developer continued to change on an ongoing basis, developers interested in building mobile applications for iOS had to remain constantly vigilant that they were not using any technology that could later come under fire from Apple.
When Apple then updated the section banning the use of some third-party analytics services, the move was called out as permitting an unfair competitive advantage for Apple's own iAds advertising platform and analytics service over competitors' services, like Flurry, Distimo and most notably, Google's AdMob, all of which were popular among mobile app developers for monitoring usage numbers and other details about how consumers were interacting with the mobile apps.
Apple says it will also publish its App Store Review Guidelines online in an effort to be more transparent with the community. This decision is likely due to the constant media attention given to each and every mobile application that Apple bars from entry into its App Store, removes from the store, or leaves in limbo, awaiting approval for months on end.
The full text of the Apple Press Release is below:
The App Store? has revolutionized the way mobile applications are developed and distributed. With over 250,000 apps and 6.5 billion downloads, the App Store has become the world's largest mobile application platform and App Store developers have earned over one billion dollars from the sales of their apps.
We are continually trying to make the App Store even better. We have listened to our developers and taken much of their feedback to heart. Based on their input, today we are making some important changes to our iOS Developer Program license in sections 3.3.1, 3.3.2 and 3.3.9 to relax some restrictions we put in place earlier this year.
In particular, we are relaxing all restrictions on the development tools used to create iOS apps, as long as the resulting apps do not download any code. This should give developers the flexibility they want, while preserving the security we need.
In addition, for the first time we are publishing the App Store Review Guidelines to help developers understand how we review submitted apps. We hope it will make us more transparent and help our developers create even more successful apps for the App Store.
The App Store is perhaps the most important milestone in the history of mobile software. Working together with our developers, we will continue to surprise and delight our users with innovative mobile apps.
DiscussApple Relaxes Development Demands as Android Grows
Apple today has relaxed development requirements for iOS devices, allowing programmers to use non-Apple tools to create mobile applications. This easing still prohibits iOS applications from downloading any additional code, but should open the doors for iOS apps to be built from non-Apple frameworks and cross-platform tools. In a statement this morning, Apple had this to say:
We are continually trying to make the App Store even better. We have listened to our developers and taken much of their feedback to heart. Based on their input, today we are making some important changes to our iOS Developer Program license in sections 3.3.1, 3.3.2 and 3.3.9 to relax some restrictions we put in place earlier this year.
In particular, we are relaxing all restrictions on the development tools used to create iOS apps, as long as the resulting apps do not download any code. This should give developers the flexibility they want, while preserving the security we need.
In addition, for the first time we are publishing the App Store Review Guidelines to help developers understand how we review submitted apps. We hope it will make us more transparent and help our developers create even more successful apps for the App Store.
It’s worth noting that the now-relaxed restrictions were originally put into place to block apps not built on Objective-C, C, C++ or Javascript: Think Adobe Flash and Microsoft Silverlight, to name a few. Apple’s statement and change in development terms doesn’t necessarily mean that Flash apps, for example, are now acceptable, but the doors have been opened, if only a crack. We’ll be following up with some additional thoughts from both a developer and end-user perspective on what this means, so stay tuned.
It’s clear that Apple has also heard developer criticisms of its App Store review process, which has been a black box up to this point. Developers have submitted software and sometimes waited for months to gain approval, or rejection without detailed reasons, for that matter. I’ve criticized Google’s Android Market in the past, but perhaps Apple is concerned that rising Android device sales are starting to attract the attention of developers. Regardless of the reasons for more transparency in the App Store process, developers and iOS device owners alike will be happy with this news.
Related research from GigaOM Pro (sub req’d):
The App Developer’s Guide to Choosing a Mobile Platform
Flirtomatic Reaches 3m Users, Out Flirts Match And eHarmony In U.S. Mobile
Meet The G2, A Zippy Phone For T-Mo’s Fast Network
T-Mobile today officially unveiled the G2 handset, the first smartphone able to fully take advantage of the carrier’s mobile broadband network capable of speeds of up to 21 Mbps. The G2 will ship with the latest version of Android , aka: Froyo, in the near future and T-Mobile will begin taking pre-orders later this month. Along with a 3.7-inch multitouch display, the G2 uses a unique sliding hinge for access to a full QWERTY keypad. The device will support Adobe Flash Player, high-definition video recording and Google Voice Actions.
On paper, the new G2 is definitely an evolution from the very first Google Android phone, the G1, which T-Mobile debuted in 2008. At that time, when all of its major competitors already offered fast 3G networks, T-Mobile entered the mobile broadband race with its own 3G implementation. It’s fitting then, that the G2 has a radio capable of using T-Mobile’s HSPA+ network, which I’ve found to be faster even than Sprint’s 4G WiMAX offering.
Since the G2 is competing against high-end handsets with so-called 4G network support such as the HTC EVO 4G and Samsung Epic 4G, it needs some horsepower under the hood. And some may be put off by the 800 MHz CPU that will power this smartphone, but I believe it’s too early to make a judgement call on that. The G2 uses a Qualcomm MSM7230 chip, which is slightly different from the current crop of 1 GHz Snapdragon chips that are used today. This chip was announced after the original Snapdragons and was shown off in February at the Mobile World Congress. Here’s a glimpse of the MSM 7230 powering four simultaneous videos and 3-D gaming at 30 frames per second on reference hardware as an example of the chip’s capabilities.
Aside from the potential of the CPU, there’s little question that the G2 is a contender in the current crop of smartphones. Real-world mobile speeds around 10 Mbps combined with the features of Google’s newest Android version should be a potent combination. In just two years, Android has helped transform T-Mobile from a mobile broadband also-ran to a carrier that’s taking the lead for fast mobile web connectivity. And the G2 is an example of more powerful handsets with access to faster networks that are sure to come.
Related content from GigaOM Pro (sub req’d):4G: State of the Union
Apple Opens App Store To “Other” Development Platforms, Publishes Review Guidelines
The black box that is the Apple review process is creaking open. In a very brief release, Apple has essentially relaxed the requirement that developers use Apple’s own development tools “as long as the resulting apps do not download any code.” They’ve also published some review guidelines, allowing programmers to understand just what will go on behind the curtains in Cupertino.
What does this mean? Well, in the updated SDK license, circa April of this year, a number of paragraphs essentially banned outside development tools including systems that ported Flash, Silverlight, Java, and other platforms to the iPhone. Now, presumably, any app that runs on the iPhone, regardless of source, will be considered. The language is so mushy that it’s still unclear what this actually means.
Amazon Kindle Comes To Best Buy Stores This Fall
Crossing the wires now—the Amazon Kindle will be available in Best Buy stores sometime this autumn. This probably makes sense for a few reasons.
Smartphone Security Startup Lookout Crosses Two Million Users
Lookout, a company that offers security data backup services for smartphones, is growing rapidly. Less than two months after the startup surpassed one million users, the company has crossed the 2 million registered users mark. It took just over six months to reach 1 million users.
Lookout, which recently raised $11 million from Accel, Khosla and others, says the growth in smartphone adoption, mobile app downloads and increased consumer awareness of mobile security threats have made consumers aware of the security threats on mobile phones.
While smartphone use is growing rapidly, there are security risks associated with the increased data and application usage on these devices. Similar to a PC, users need to protect their phones from malware, viruses, data loss and more. Lookout’s web-based, cloud-connected application indentifies and block threats on a consumer’s phone. Users simply download the software to a device, and it will act as a virus protector much like security software downloaded to a computer.
Lookout also recently launched the App Genome Project which identifies applications that carry the same characteristics of established dangerous applications, quickly isolate them, and protect users. To date, Lookout has analyzed over 300,000 apps.
In less than one year in business, the company has also found lost or stolen phones for users more than 700,000 times, with a phone found every 15 seconds over the past two months. And Lookout has backed-up over 130 million photos and backed-up over 625 million contacts.
Lookout is of course riding on the growth in smartphone adoption, and the increased use of apps on these phones. For now Lookout, which is on more than 400 mobile networks in 170 countries, is only available for BlackBerry, Android and Windows Mobile devices. Lookout has over 80% of its users on Android and BlackBerry with the remaining users on Windows Mobile. And 70% of users are in the US.
CrunchBase InformationLookoutInformation provided by CrunchBaseAmazon Payments Now Allows Users To Checkout Directly On Merchant Websites
Today, Amazon Payments, the company’s PayPal competitor, has made its payments feature on third-party sites much more streamlined. Checkout by Amazon, which allows anyone with an Amazon.com account to make purchases on a third-party merchant’s site using their Amazon.com account credentials, don’t have to leave the site to access their payment information and address book when completing a purchase.
Previously, consumers had to leave a merchant’s site after clicking the checkout button, and were redirected to Amazon if using Amazon Checkout. Now, consumers can access their Amazon address book and stored payment methods directly on a merchant’s site.
The new version of Checkout By Amazon is already being used by Geeks.com and clothing site WetSeal. Amazon says that this small feature will be able to make the checkout process easier for its “tens of millions of Amazon.com account holders.”
There’s no doubt that not having to leave a merchant’s site could help with the conversion process at checkout. Of course, Checkout By Amazon is not nearly has popular as PayPal, which seems to be growing by leaps and bounds, and is adding one million new accounts per month.
CrunchBase InformationAmazonInformation provided by CrunchBaseAndroid Is As Open As The Clenched Fist I’d Like To Punch The Carriers With
This past weekend, I wrote a post wondering if Android was surging in the U.S. market because Apple was letting it? The main thought was that by remaining exclusively tied to AT&T, Apple was driving some users to choose Android, which is available on all the U.S. carriers. In the post, I posed a question: if it’s not the iPhone/AT&T deal, why do you choose Android? Nearly 1,000 people responded, and a large percentage focused on the same idea: the idea of “openness.”
You’ll forgive me, but I have to say it: what a load of crap.
In theory, I’m right there with you. The thought of a truly open mobile operating system is very appealing. The problem is that in practice, that’s just simply not the reality of the situation. Maybe if Google had their way, the system would be truly open. But they don’t. Sadly, they have to deal with a very big roadblock: the carriers.
The result of this unfortunate situation is that the so-called open system is quickly revealing itself to be anything but. Further, we’re starting to see that in some cases the carriers may actually be able to exploit this “openness” to create a closed system that may leave you crying for Apple’s closed system — at least their’s looks good and behaves as expected.
Case in point: the last couple of Android phones I’ve gotten as demo units from Google: the EVO 4G and the Droid 2, have been loaded up with crapware installed by the carriers (Sprint and Verizon, respectively). Apple would never let this fly on the iPhone, but the openness of Android means Google has basically no say in the matter. Consumers will get the crapware and they’ll like it. Not only that, plenty of this junk can’t even be uninstalled. How’s that for “open”?
And this is just the tip of the iceberg.
Earlier this year, Verizon rolled out its own V Cast app store on some BlackBerry devices. This occurred despite that fact that BlackBerry devices have their own app store (App World). From what we’re hearing, Verizon is also planning to launch this store on their Android phones as well in the future. Obviously, this store would be pre-installed, and it would likely be more prominently displayed than Android’s own Market for apps.
Does V Cast have some good content? Probably. But most of it is undoubtedly crap that Verizon is trying to sell you for a high fee. But who cares whether it’s great or it’s crap — isn’t the point of “open” supposed to be that the consumer can choose what they want on their own devices? Instead, open is proving to mean that the carriers can choose what they want to do with Android.
It’s too bad, but there is now a very real risk that the carriers are going to exploit the open system Google set up in order to create a new version of the bullshit proprietary ecosystems that they had before the iPhone came along and turned the market on its side.
And it’s not just Verizon, it’s all the carriers. One of the great features of Android is that you can install apps without going through an app store, right? Well, not if you have an a Motorola Backflip or a HTC Aria running on AT&T — they’ve locked this feature down. How? Thanks to the open Android OS.
Oh, and how about tethering? It’s one of the truly great features of Android 2.2, right? Well, not if you have a carrier that doesn’t want to support it. Google has to defer to them to enable their own native OS feature. It’s such an awesome feature — in the hands of Google. Once the carriers get their hands on it — not so much.
Speaking of Android 2.2, you know it’s out there right? You’ll be forgiven if you don’t because a whopping 4.5 percent of you Android users are currently running it, according to Google’s dashboard. And again, that’s not Google’s fault, that’s all the carriers. Incredibly, over 35 percent of you still aren’t even running any version of Android 2.x. It’s pathetic.
Apple gets crap for not supporting phones that are three years old with OS updates — the open Android system can’t even upgrade phones that are only a few months old in some cases — again, all thanks to the carriers.
The excuses for why this is run rampant. They need to tweak their custom skins, they need to test the new software, etc. It’s all a bunch of garbage. This is an open platform and yet you’re more restricted than on Apple’s supposedly closed one.
What happens when Verizon won’t update your phone to the latest greatest Android software — not because they can’t, but because they want you to upgrade to a new piece of hardware and sign the new two-year agreement that comes along with it? The game remains the same.
My point is not to bash Google — what they’ve created is an excellent mobile operating system. My point is that the same “openness” that Android users are touting as a key selling point of the OS could very well end up being its weak point. If you don’t think Verizon, AT&T, T-Mobile, and Sprint are going to try to commandeer the OS in an attempt to return to their glory days where we were all slaves to their towers, you’re being naive.
“Open” is great until you have to define it or defend it. I’m not sure Google can continue to do either in this situation.
And before all of you pros storm the comments with how great it is to root your Android phones, consider the average consumers here. They are the ones being screwed by this exploitation of “open.” Anyone with the desire to do so can fairly easily hack an iPhone too. Open is not a reason to choose Android + carrier vs. iPhone + AT&T.
[photo: AP]
Human Translation Startup myGengo Raises Seed Round From International Investors
The market for web-based translations is estimated to be worth around $3 billion currently, and big markets tend to attract investors. One of the newer companies in that area, Tokyo-based myGengo (which we previously profiled as “Mechanical Turk for translation”), just raised a $750,000 seed round from some high-profile backers.
What’s interesting is that the round was extremely international, as its total of twelve participants cover eight nationalities and currently reside in eleven different countries. Investors include Dave McClure (who made a personal investment earlier this year and now added myGengo to his 500 Startups fund), last.fm co-founder Felix Miller, Delicious founder Joshua Schachter, Brian Nelson (CEO at Japan-based affiliate marketing firm ValueCommerce), Pageflakes co-founder Christoph Janz, Benjamin Joffe (CEO at China-based tech consultancy Plus Eight Star), and a number of Japanese angels.
myGengo offers crowdsourced translations in nine different languages. The main bullet points are that all translations (from short sentences to long texts) are handled by certified human translators, entirely over the web and up to 70% cheaper when compared to professional translators. In April, myGengo rolled out an API that allows developers to plug on-demand human translation directly into websites, apps, widgets, social networks, and other products.
The company is on a roll, saying that since April, the volume of words translated per month grew five-fold – just like monthly revenue did. myGengo now intends to use the fresh money to expand its multi-lingual site tool “String”, create API plugins for a number of popular frameworks, and build its US enterprise sales operation.
CrunchBase InformationmyGengoInformation provided by CrunchBaseFirst Android TV Launches Weeks Before Google TV Arrives
Earlier this week we looked at the upcoming launch of Google TV. It's slated for this fall (U.S.) and will be integrated into a new line of Sony Internet TVs. Meanwhile a Swedish company has just launched its own Internet TV, built on top of Google's open source Android Operating System.
The company is called People of Lava and its new line of Internet TVs is called Scandinavia (in the same way that Sony has a line of TVs called 'Bravia'). With the tagline "Window to the World," the Scandanavia comes in 3 sizes: 42", 47" and 55". The new product was unveiled this week at the IFA consumer electronics trade show in Berlin.
Firstly, to clarify that Google TV is a software product built on Android. It will be integrated into televisions (like the Sony Internet TV) and set-top boxes. It appears that People of Lava plans to integrate Google TV into its TVs too, but for now it has gotten a jump on Sony by building its own Android-based Internet TV software.
The People of Lava TV will come pre-loaded with applications, including YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, Google Maps, email client and a web browser. The browser is custom built, based on Webkit (the foundation of many modern web browsers, including Safari and Chrome). The company says that it will launch a "People of Lava App Store," but no time frame has been given. Also included in the TV package is a wireless keyboard with a pointer/mouse.
Right now the TVs are only available to purchase in Sweden.
How Will it Compare to Sony Internet TV?It will be interesting to see how this fares against the Sony line when that's released in the fall, as Sony has the benefit of having the official Google TV software integrated from the get-go. Sony is also of course a well established TV manufacturing brand, whereas People of Lava is relatively unknown.
People of Lava is clearly trying to get a jump on Google's anointed partner Sony and establish a name for itself in Internet TVs. However it's likely to be short-lived glory, as Sony's offering will surely be more advanced due to the inclusion of Google TV. So the question will become: how fast can People of Lava iterate to compete?
DiscussEden Ventures Joins The Super Angels Gang, Five Investments Down
Another Instant Music Video
Ok, so not only is Google Instant rejiggering how we think about search, but it is also a clever way to create instant music videos. We saw this with the official Google Instant version of Bob Dylan’s “Subterranean Homesick Blues” (where the lyrics on the flash cards get typed into Google and create a stream of related results).
But now the same thing has been done with the “Instant Elements” song in the video above. The lyrics to Tom Lehrer’s song, “The Elements,” are typed into Google Instant, and it creates a visual accompaniment to the song, showing search results and images for each element like magnesium, silicon, and gadolinium. I think we have a meme here. You can do this for any song, and now people will.
The video was created by ad agency Whirled, the same one behind the famous Pulp Fiction Google Wave video.
For Advertisers, Location-Based Services "Blew Up Overnight"
Advertisers have long talked about the mystical possibilities of using real-time location data to target customers. The technology existed; most cell phones have a GPS receiver in case of emergency. But real-time location data was off-limits to advertisers until Web-centric phones introduced people to the concept of sharing their location in exchange for utility. Soon, along came apps like Foursquare and Gowalla, which essentially trick users into sharing their real-time location with advertisers. Suddenly, location-aware marketing is red hot.
"It's huge and it's increasing," said Michael Becker, a director at the Mobile Marketing Association. "Location is going to play an increasingly critical role in enabling successful consumer engagement through and with the mobile phone."
For advertisers, the growth of real-time location data felt like an explosion that "blew up overnight," Becker said.
Big name advertisers seem to be throwing money at location-based services. Brightkite is reportedly charging between $10,000 and $20,000 for local promotions. Foursquare seems to be announcing a new A-list corporate partner every week, including Starbucks and MTV. And Shopkick, the treasure hunt of consumption, launched with Best Buy, Macy's and American Eagle among its sponsors - which had to install special audio transmitters in all their participating stores just so the app will know when a user walks in.
Advertisers are excited because location-aware ads really work, Becker said, citing a study that showed nearly 50% of users who are shown a location-aware ad on a mobile device will "take some action," beating out text messaging (37%) and Web display ads (28%).
But isn't that because location-savvy ads are fairly novel? Advertisers were also excited about display ads in the early days of the Web, when users were so unaccustomed to browsing that they clicked on anything that caught their attention. Doesn't it seem like the higher engagement reported for location-aware ads could be because a user is not used to seeing her city or neighborhood mentioned in an ad on her phone?
Newness may be inflating the numbers a bit, Becker acknowledged, but advertisers will just create more engaging and sophisticated ads as time goes on. But location is just one of many important factors in mobile marketing. Advertisers also consider a consumer's age, type of phone, even time of day.
"Location is not necessarily the goal of the interaction. Rather, location is a piece of information that provides context to the user experience and can create a more relevant and engaging interaction with the consumer," Becker said.
Advertisers in the U.S. will spend $1.8 billion on location-aware marketing in 2015, according to a recent report by market research firm ABI Research. (By comparison, advertisers in the U.S. spent $10 billion on search advertsing in 2008.)
Not every advertiser will care about location, said Neil Strother, a director at ABI Research who put together the report. For restaurants and bars, real-time location is crucial. But for NBC or Coke, not so much.
And there are lots of companies hesitant to join in the location game, Strother said. That's because of inexperience and fears about threatening consumers' comfort level. "The next few years will be very important for companies to get it right and not abuse the location information they're getting," he said.
DiscussMasterCard Releases Person-To-Person Payment App MoneySend for BlackBerry
You can't pay with your phone at the register yet, but you can use it to pay the babysitter. MoneySend, an application from MasterCard for sending and requesting money in informal person-to-person transactions, is now out in the BlackBerry App World.
MasterCard's app lags significantly behind PayPal's mobile payment app, available for Android, iPhone and BlackBerry, except perhaps that MasterCard has more cache and credibility with older generations. But MoneySend's shortcomings aside, MasterCard is clearly excited about mobile-enhanced shopping.
MoneySend for BlackBerry is the latest in a slew of MasterCard-branded apps including Marketplace Overwhelming Offers, which pushes users steep daily discounts, Easy Savings Program, which locates nearby discounts from participating merchants, Priceless Picks, an app to encourage shoppers to geotag and share deals, and ATM Hunter.
MoneySend lets users send, request, receive and manage money from the app. Hook the app up to your bank or credit union and link it to your debit card or MasterCard credit card to send money. You can also create a prepaid account through Bancorp Bank, an FDIC-insured online bank. Then manage your transactions, which are subject to some fees, from within the app. No financial data is stored on the device, according to MasterCard.
With MoneySend, both parties have to have the MoneySend app in order to complete a transaction. You can also send money to the mobile phone number of a non-user, who will then get an invite to join MoneySend and pick up the payment. That means until now, a sender would have to be sure the recipient was using an iPhone.
There was speculation that MasterCard's mobile payments could compete with PayPal's when the MoneySend iPhone app launched three months ago. That doesn't seem to have happened. MoneySend has three out of five stars in the App Store, compared to four out of five for PayPal. Simply put, PayPal's mobile app is more navigable and less restrictive. Also: PayPal's userbase is larger, you can connect its app to non-MasterCard credit cards and you can first bump to transfer money. But maybe opening MoneySend up to BlackBerry's well-heeled users will encourage adoption.
DiscussWhen Does A Company Deserve A Fresh Ethical Start?
Zynga has been taking it on the chin from the SF Weekly the last few weeks. First there was a four part series about some stickers that Zynga’s ad agency put on the streets of San Francisco – lame but not exactly Third Reicht territory. But the last two days the newspaper has focused on Zynga’s penchant for stealing game ideas from other companies. FarmVille, FishVille, PetVille, Café World, and Mafia Wars were all copies of other company’s games. That warranted a cover story.
The SFWeekly even gave this copying thing a name – Farmvillians. Which is kinda catchy, although it’s no Scamville if you ask me. Scamville was major league evil. Copying business ideas is just being part of Silicon Valley.
All this got me thinking about the quote “Behind every great fortune there is a crime” and the tendency of some people to go legit just as soon as they’ve won the game. Then they hope that they can wipe the slate clean and be accepted in the better parts of society.
I’m not talking about some real world gangster who moves into a more legitimate role as real estate tycoon and starts giving money to charity. I’m talking about the startups all around us. They all have stories. Some are worse than others, and Zynga has a particularly troubled past. Facebook may have done a better job of avoiding direct video documentation of some of its more interesting ethical moments, but they aren’t squeaky clean, either. Microsoft was famously evil for the first 25 years or so it was around. It’s just too easy to do the wrong thing in business, there are very rarely any consequences.
Should we just let the past go and wipe the slate clean once a company decides it makes more sense to be clean than dirty?
Here’s what I think. If they’ve sincerely changed, give ‘em another chance. It’s worked for the Catholics all these years, and I think it works well in our world, too. Plus, the stuff the Catholic Church has forgiven itself for is way more impressive than, say, putting stickers on a sidewalk or ripping off a few tens of thousands of clueless Farmville players.
That’s the rub though. Whether or not they really are sincere about not being evil any more. I’ve got no answer for that one.
Hey iPhone, Meet a Tiny Chip With Superpowers.
I can distinctly remember the day when Intel Corp. launched the Pentium processor. It was the day the desktop computing changed for me and for a lot of others. It was also the day when Intel started to put a gap between itself and all its wannabe processor rivals. I bring up that day because I feel that we are about to see a similar shift in the world of mobile, thanks to ARM Holdings, a company that develops and licenses chip technologies to others like Texas Instruments, Samsung and Qualcomm.
ARM, today is introducing a new chip architecture called the Cortex-A15 MPCore. This architecture will form the underpinning of the newest (and perhaps the beefiest) members of the Cortex family of mobile chips that power our iPhones, Samsung Galaxys and the iPads. Thanks to this new architecture, companies such as TI and Samsung will make chips that will come in dual and quad core configurations and will run at clock speeds of up to 2.5 GHz. Don’t be surprised that by 2012 our tablets and smart phones on average be about five times as powerful, with no detrimental impact on power consumption.
And while Apple is nowhere to be found in official ARM’s literature, it goes without saying that many of its products are going to get a major boost because of the new generation of Cortex-A15 architecture-based chips. Why – because Apple is a major license of ARM’s technology.
The Power Principle
So why is this new new chip architecture important? The answer is pretty simple. As we have often explained in the past, the computing is going through a transition akin to the shift from fixed line phones to telephones. Computing is becoming portable and pocketable. It is omnipresent and at our finger tips. It is making us rethink all current notions about the Internet. Mobile connectivity is also bringing the power of the cloud to our palms.
Soon we are going to have even faster networks at our disposal, thanks to the rise of next generation wireless broadband technologies such as Long-Term Evolution or LTE. These faster networks will bring data to our devices at much higher speeds, which mean we will need faster chips to process that information. Just as the growth of faster broadband sparked the sales of ever-more-powerful Pentium chips, a similar trend is going to take hold in the wireless world.
This new world needs a new kind of architecture – one that marries power with very little power consumption so as to give long battery life to our portable devices. “Even with a lot of bandwidth, we are still going to need processing power in the devices,” explained ARM’s director of marketing, Nandan Nayampally. Think of this chip as a heavyweight boxer with the stamina of a long distance runner.
Augmented Reality Gets a Boost
Playing games in 3-D, running work and home environments on the same machine, conducting videoconferences along with dozens of other activities are going to be a breeze for devices powered by this new chip technology. But that is not all since it will be able to equally at home inside a new generation of web servers and personal home devices that need beefy yet power efficient processors. The low power requirement eliminates the need for fans and makes these device cool and quiet. Running on these new chips are a slew of operating systems including the fast-growing Android, Ubuntu Linux and Symbian.
One of the mobile technologies that would likely to get a big boost from this new chip –- augmented reality. Sure you have heard of companies like Layar, but the fact is that AR is going to remain a curiosity unless the chips can take all the visual and other information and turn it into something magic instantly. We are not there yet, but a chip built on the Cortex-A15 architecture can help.
Intel’s Problem
The new ARM architecture is likely to cause further heartache for Intel which has been trying to position itself in the mobile world through various efforts including its low-power Atom processors, and more recently via a $1.4 billion acquisition of Infineon’s wireless chip business. The company has made some strides with its new mobile oriented chips, but the folks at ARM aren’t really sweating it for now.
Nayampally pointed out that slightly older Cortex-A8 chips are enough to take on net books and the newer Cortex-A9 chips are leaving Intel in the dust. Intel, he said is trying to focus on lowering power consumption, a problem ARM has licked. For now, he said the Cambridge, UK-based company is pretty comfortable with its Cortex roadmap. And why not –- more than 20 billion ARM-based processors have found way into our lives. And the company is only just getting started.
Related content from GigaOM Pro (sub req’d):
As Devices Converge, Chip Vendors Girding for a Fight
For Phones, the Future Is Multiple Cores
How Will Google Instant Affect Your Company's SEO?
When Google announced this morning that it would be delivering search results to users in real time as they type a query, it rightfully generated quite a bit of chatter and intrigue in the tech world and beyond.
The changes are certain to fundamentally change the way people interact with the world's biggest search engine. But what is less clear is how this game-changing update will affect search engine optimization and search traffic referrals to Websites.
The Impact on Search Speed, Refining Searches and the "Long Tail" of SearchGoogle Instant does two things: it returns results more quickly and it predicts search queries as the user types.
While it's too early to predict the implications of this with any certainty, a few speculations come to mind. For one, searching on Google is going to become a much speedier process for the end user, who may now be less likely than ever to click through to the second page of results. Searchers will also be able to more quickly refine their search terms on the fly, which could either prove to be good or bad for site owners.
"It seems to me that the top three rankings will get even more value," says Ian Lurie, President of Portent Interactive and blogger at Conversation Marketing. "Also, long-tail search is going to be more important, since folks can just keep typing until they see what they want."
On the other hand, John Ellis at Search Engine Land wondered earlier if Google Instant would "kill the long tail" of paid search advertising by making it less worthwhile to bid on more specific, long tail keywords.
How the User Experience Will ChangeAccording to Avichal Garg, former Product Manager of Search Quality at Google, the impact of Google Instant on SEO and search performance will come as a result of changes in the user experience, not the ranking algorithm, per se.
He cites query construction patterns, click patterns, page scanning behavior and the ease of making search query refinements (re-searching) as examples of user behaviors that are likely to be different from here on out.
"It will have a tremendous impact," says Garg. "User behavior will change. And good SEO is all about understanding end user behavior."
Will It Impact Traffic to My Site?For insight into whether the volume of search traffic to one's site will change, look no further than the Google's own Webmaster Central Blog, which advises site owners that they "may notice some changes in your search queries data due to the launch of Google Instant." The post goes on to explain that the number of impressions for many search queries is likely to increase. In other words, the number of times a given site is displayed in results (whether they're clicked or not) is bound to go up, since users no longer need even finish typing a search query before the results show up.
Google's Matt Cutts Chimes InPerhaps the most insightful commentary on Google Instant's potential impact on SEO came in a blog post from Goolger Matt Cutts a few hours after the company's announcement:
"The search results will remain the same for a query, but it's possible that people will learn to search differently over time. For example, I was recently researching a congressperson. With Google Instant, it was more visible to me that this congressperson had proposed an energy plan, so I refined my search to learn more, and quickly found myself reading a post on the congressperson's blog that had been on page 2 of the search results."Are you concerned about how Google Instant might impact your site's visibility on Google? What do you think about the new feature in general? Leave your thoughts in the comments.
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