BrandBrains

A roundup of Kindle news, for those of you keeping track.

Guy Kawasaki: Amazon Announced Kindle

“Summary: If you want something that requires very little attention that will deliver your favorite newspapers, magazine, and blogs, you should definitely check out Kindle. Having reference books and documents handy is also quite valuable. Reading electronic versions of novels is cream. If nothing else, you have to admire Amazon for trying things that are as interesting as Kindle, S3, and Mechanical Turk.”

Gizmodo: Video: How to use Amazon Kindle

Gizmodo: Amazon Kindle Hands-On and Questions Answered (with Gallery)

“What’s in the library, aka Kindle Book Store? There are already plenty of books, 90,000 in all, including 101 of the current NYT bestsellers. Don’t believe us? See for yourself at the Amazon Kindle Store.”

Wired: Amazon Kindle vs. Sony Reader

BoingBoing Gadgets: 15 Things I Just Learned About the Amazon Kindle

Apple Insider: Amazon’s New Kindle dubbed the ‘iPod of reading’

Daring Fireball: Dum

“So the Kindle proposition is this: You pay for downloadable books that can’t be printed, can’t be shared, and can’t be displayed on any device other than Amazon’s own $400 reader — and whether they’re readable at all in the future is solely at Amazon’s discretion. That’s no way to build a library.”

Scoble: Amazon Reader Hate

“For $400 this device is pretty damn remarkable. It can be read out in bright sunlight (my $3,000 Mac can’t do that). Its battery lasts dozens of hours. It’s a joy to use for the stated purpose: reading.”

BusinessWeek: Can Amazon Kindle Digital Book Fever?

Russell Shaw: IMHO: Amazon Kindle drum roll another example of digerati clustercluck

“You know the real word I wanted to type but my Mom raised a gentleman.”

Wall Street Journal: IPod of E-Book Readers? Amazon Taps Apple Strategy

Peter Glaskowsky: Amazon’s Kindle: first impressions

BlogCritics: Bringing Books into Generation G(adget): the Amazon Kindle

“But it appears that the best thing about the Kindle is the delivery system. No computers, no wires, no sync-ing. Just press button, browse the Amazon.com store, push another button and voila. Instant book-gratification. Best sellers are $9.99, and a quick browse this morning found that most books (that would likely by now be in paperback) go for around $5-6.00. No shipping fee and instant delivery. No charge to wirelessly connect to the store either.”

Silicon Alley Insider: What the Kindle Isn’t

UPDATED:

David Pogue of the New York Times and Wilson Rothman of Gizmodo give their reviews.

Technorati Tags: Amazon, Amazon.com, Kindle, Amazon Kindle, ebooks, gadgets, hardware, books

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Since getting my first iPod, I’ve paid little attention to the quality of my earbuds. Until recently, I primarily listened to my iPod in my car, so I focused more on car stereo integration.

For the instances when I did use my earbuds (running, mountain biking, dog walking, plane trips, etc.) I used the stock Apple earbuds until I was given a pair of Griffin EarThumps, whose in-ear design was much better than the stock earbuds.

These days, I commute by train into NYC so I use my earbuds every day. Recently, the connector on my EarThumps died and figured it was time to invest in some better earbuds. As I begun to research a new pair, I noticed price variations from $5 to $500.

First of all, $500 is more than my freakin’ iPod cost. Given that I’m not what one would call an audiophile, there’s no way I could justify that kind of expense. (Especially to my wife. But that’s another story… )

So I began to wonder, what is “Good Enough” and how much will “Good Enough” cost me?

To be honest, I didn’t take any for a test drive. (I don’t know about you, but sticking a pair of demo earbuds into my ears that may have been used by 500 other people is not exactly on the top of my list of things to do.) That said, I did do quite a bit of online research.

Ultimately, I decided on a pair of Shure SE110 Sound Isolation Headphones. At $99, I found that I could justify the expense as they double nicely as a pair of reference headphones while recording or editing my podcast.

Compared to my previous pair of earbuds, the overall quality is unbelievable. The sound is clear and balanced, and while they could use a little more bass response, the deficit is minor.

By far, the sound isolation is the most impressive feature. I wore them so that I could listen to a podcast while mowing the lawn yesterday - and I could barely hear the lawnmower! The podcast was a recorded presentation delivered by Tim Bray from eTech and I could hear every word clearly. I was really surprised.

I can’t help but wonder: Would I notice the difference between the SE110’s at $99 and the SE530′S at $499?

Somehow I doubt it, but I’m sure there are a million people out there who will tell me I’m wrong.

Technorati Tags: iPod, Earbuds, Shure, Shure SE110, Shure SE530, Headphones, Apple, Music, Podcasts

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Ethan Kaplan’s talk at Gnomedex (Saturday, July 1st @ 11:30a) will be about buying digital audio and video:

I’ve been thinking about what I want to talk about at Gnomedex later this week, and I keep coming around to a blog post I made about the intrinsic monetary value of digital content, and how it is ascribed.

The $39 Dollar Song and 6 Cent Ringtone didn’t really light up the charts on the TechMeme saturated blogosphere, but it is a valid discussion to have, especially when the business of content is exploding as it is (to use Jeff Jarvis’ parlance).

Given who I work for and my experience, I know a little something about that. I’ll be happy to contribute to that discussion and hope to be able to add some value.

[via Chris Pirillo]

Technorati Tags: Ethan Kaplan, Online Video, Video, RIAA, Jeff Jarvis, Ringtones, Digitial Music, Audio Subscriptions, DRM, Chris Pirillo, Premium Content, Digital Rights Management, Gnomedex, iPod, iTMS, Lockergnome, Presentation, Audible, AudibleWordcast, Audio, Conferences, Events

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I’m riding the train back from Boston to New Jersey and thinking about the discussion on podcasting metrics at the Podcast Academy.

Lately, the discussion has turned toward what we know about the podcasting audience from surveys and other research. That’s great - it helps us know the “who”. But no one is addressing the methodologies for measuring “how many”. I find that no one wants to engage in this very difficult discussion.

Perhaps these panel discussions aren’t the right venue for this topic? If they aren’t, then what is? When and where will we have it? This is where the real work will be done.

Technorati Tags: advertising, audiblewordcast, events, marketing, media, podcastacademy, podcasting

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Next Steps:

1. Encourage development of a large-scale traffic goal (meet traffic to NYTimes.com by 06/07)
2. Encourage strong station support for consolidate metrics, and the development of r”report cards: that would give stations concise, usable summaries of their performance and progress.
3. Encourage contact with major metrics services, especially Nielsen//NetRatings, to include more online traffic from the public broadcasting site under a composite listing.
4. Encourage careful consideration of the emerging platforms to be presented and leading to a set of constructive steps to develop strategies based on those platforms.
5. If appropriate, encourage participants to explore the issues raised in the “MLB” approach to determine if there is sufficient interest to warrant full-scale planning.
6. Channel conference discussion and recommendations into the NPR New Realities project and similar activity with PBS/PTV

Initiatives from the group:

• Constraints of time, resources; need central repository (podcasts, etc.)
• Entity for coordinating & aggregating efforts (e.g. MLB). Who will that be?
• Shared scripting platform for code folks
• Aggregate RSS data to display network & station initiatives
• ‘publicservicemedia.org’ idea
• Centralized way to use outlet opportunities (video & audio assets); how can we do this better collectively?
• Tim Olson: how about a system that offers a central repository for content, then transcode content to distribute to appropriate outlet
• Focus on content, not distribution platforms
• What’s the next step for podcasting? Subscription?

Why do we need to compete with NYTimes.com? Is it ego, fundraising, or other?

What’s the brand or identity going to be for public media? Maybe see something like the BBC in the U.S.

We need numbers to raise money, and everybody wants money.

IMA Objective #2: Consolidate Metrics & Reporting

Can open doors for underwriters, foundations; demonstrate power of whole system

IMA Objective #3: Contact with metrics services, composite listings

ComScore & Nielsen//Netratings are objective third party panel-based methodologies. The value back to the system is that they can report a system-wide number.

Need equivalent of radio AudiGraphics reports covering web usage trends, data that can lead to actionable results.

Radio analogy: in early 80’s, public radio questioned whether they should even count listeners for fear of being too commercial.

IMA Objective #4: Encourage careful consideration of the emerging platforms

Do we go individually? Do we go collectively?

“When the barriers to entry into our market are very low, we should be impatient with process.”

Platforms: on-demand is happening; mobile casting is coming; wimax will change everything.

We don’t have a place for all of us to share information about these new platforms. IMA should provide a “space” for this information. (IMA has it, but it’s quiet.)

Sharing of knowledge will allow us to succeed.

When you get practical services right, usage of those services explode.

Keep rolling out new features; be fluid; dynamic.

“The division of free and paid services is the hardest part to get right. It’s just starting to make sense - more art than science. You have to experiment. If we had a tax basis like the BBC, we could make it all free - but we don’t. We have to figure out how to create revenue to support programming. The revenue sharing component is the real change of culture in this environment. Automated revenue sharing is the future, but complicated. Just getting recurring billing to work was a challenge. It’s going to take an awful lot of diplomatic work. Securing a new revenue base for the system is an important mission.”

What’s the bright line between serving large markets vs. smaller markets?

Technorati Tags: audiblewordcast, media, podcasting

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(My last meeting ran late and I missed the first speaker. I’m bummed… -j.)

Barry Parr, JupiterResearch

Portals, cable TV sites rival traditional national news media. Mostly young people. (duh)

Locally, traditional media are still dominant

Most publishers have no alternative to ads

• Subs work for WSJ, Variety, Playboy
• Ecommerce may work for specialist pubs
• Even requiring registration is a problem
• Subscriber-only access may an alternative for some magazines…but there are a host of free competitors

Advertising alone is probably not enough

• You need huge traffic volume
• Building traffic is a challenge - requires more than on-air promotion
• You don’t own (most of) the content
• Sales culture - where are the ads?
• Public broadcasting is poorly positioned for pay-for-performance advertising

A membership model is an alternative to ads

• Your members love you
• Your nonmember audience loves you
• Low penetration of membership among actual broadcast audience
• Most site visitors are potential members
• Limit services to members only…
• …and ask for the order

Rafat Ali, paidContent.org

• Stay away from advertising, stick with sponsorship and membership
• Startup content companies will arise and compete with radio. For example, who’s the biggest cult of personality in radio/podcasting today? Ricky Gervais, and he came through a meeting that didn’t exist a year ago and now he’s being distributed through Audible.com.
• Shouldn’t public radio stations embrace consumer-generated media and aggregating it? Community will be the driver in helping to monetize.
• Rise of the quasi-commercial companies, which let consumers do what they want with their content. (e.g. YouTube.com)

Technorati Tags: media, paidcontent, podcasting, robgreenlee

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I’ll admit it. I was a Crackberry addict. I had an original RIM Blackberry 850 - the pager sized model that easily clipped to your hip for easy access and you can bet that I took advantage of its handiness.

The 850 operated on the aging Motient DataTAC network and the coverage was soon surpassed by the cellular data networks. It also cost me $50/month. The cost, coupled with the spotty network coverage and short battery life of the device gave me the incentive to drop the service and look elsewhere for my Crackberry fix.

In the summer of 2004, AT&T Wireless (now Cingular) launched the Ogo. A Sidekick-sized device that has three simple functions: email, IM and SMS messaging. Designed for the IM Generation, the pricing, size and feature set was targeted squarely at younger customers.

The unit cost was $99 and the service pricing started at $17.99/month with no committment. I thought, “Why not?” and picked one up.

It’s not the smallest or most elegant or even the most well conceived device, but it performs as advertised. Email is delivered every few minutes and I have access to the AOL, MSN and Yahoo IM networks. (I only have a need for AIM, though.)

Lately, in the interest of simplicity, I’ve thought that I should move up to something that integrates phone, IM and email so I checked out some of the new offerings from Cingular. Now that AT&T and Cingular have merged, the network coverage rivals that of Verizon, so I thought I would give them a shot.

Understandably, integrated devices cost more. After all, there was a lot invested in design, engineering and production, so you pay extra for the convenience of integration.

However, Cingular dings you twice for this convenience. In addition to the higher cost of the integrated device, the data service for these devices is $49 instead of the $17.99 that they charge for Ogo data service.

Why?

I’m a marketer, so you don’t have to explain product positioning to me. But it’s the SAME SERVICE that I currently pay $17.99/month for.

And the interesting thing is that I’m not even looking at a “professional” Treo 650 - I’m investigating the LG F9100, a consumer grade device that just happens to integrate the three services.

The devices sit side-by-side with the Ogo in Cingular retail stores - how do they justify the price differential to consumers?

Right now, I have Verizon Wireless for my phone service and AT&T/Cingular for my data service. This would have given Cingular the opportunity to have not just my data service, but also the voice service for both my wife and me. (We have a family share plan, which just makes sense…)

Now? The jury is out.

I can always get a Treo 600 running on the Verizon Wireles Network and add data service to it for the same $49/month and know that I’ll have the absolute best coverage of any wireless network in the NY Metro Area. Sure, it has it’s trade-offs. (Device size, for one thing) but if the cost is the same, why switch providers?

To be honest, it’s not so much the cost as it is my incredulousness.

This is something the phone companies still, to this very day, don’t “get”. When a customer feels as though they’ve been taken advantage of, they’re a customer under duress. As soon as something better comes along, they’re gone. There will be no loyalty.

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Unless you’ve been living under a rock, you know how auction-based media works. Just in case you have been living there, let’s recap, shall we?

In search marketing, Overture is a pure auction-based advertising medium, while Google uses a combination of bidding-plus-relevancy to deliver your message. Both companies charge based on the click. So, the more you’re willing to spend to reach someone looking for a specifc search term, the better the placement of your ad.

Well, there’s a new network in town. (Literally. Right here in NYC.)

Right Media is a sophisticated advertising network founded and run by a group of former DoubleClickers. Their proprietary software automatically optimizes your campaign based not only on the audience you’re trying to reach and the performance of your campaign, but also on the maximum you’re willing to pay to reach that audience.

Each time an ad call is made to their ad server, the system reviews the bids that each advertiser has pledged for that particular audience, then serves the appropriate ad. (Note: this is not keyword based.)

Any marketer who needs to back into a specific CPA will immediately understand the benefits here. For a better understanding of their methodology, take a look at this network comparison chart, then check out the rest of their web site.

I’m running a test campaign with them for a client and I expect the results to be in line with the target CPA. While I can’t disclose actual numbers or other details, I’ll share my overall perceptions.

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I’m in the market for a new cell phone. Not for any particular reason, except that I’m bored with the current style and feature set of my current workhorse - a Motorola V60C running on the Verizon Wireless network. It’s a great phone with exceptional battery life, but it has only a small monochrome screen and its ability to be customized is ZERO. (I like to tweak my gadgets…)

So, I’ve started looking around at phones, networks and their customers and I’m beginning to find two different kinds of people - those who prefer flash and those who prefer substance. Or, more aptly put, people who are willing to forgo pure substance for a little flash, fun and possibly lower pricing.

Let me explain, without getting into a painfully detailed analysis of the wireless industry.

Given that the choice of handsets and choice of carrier are inextricably linked, I think that these are the four basic properties that are a part of the evaluation process:

(Infographics are not my specialty, as you can see…)

Price refers not only to the cost of monthly service, but to the handsets and accessories.

Feature Set: I define a Feature as functionality that can be delivered either by the handset or the network (or both). Features that fall into this category include: ringtone variety; ability to add ringtones; bluetooth; phonebook; color screen; SMS, etc.

Network Coverage refers to the minimum requisite coverage area for each customer and the ability (or lack thereof) to make calls.

Compatibility/Accessories/Extensibility refers to the ability to pair your phone with accessories such as handsfree kits; chargers; computer-to-phone connectivity, cases, etc.

While I would fall squarely in the center of the above diagram, (I want it ALL, damnit!) let’s look at what I call the “flash/substance continuum.”

This is a pretty simple axiom: if you REALLY need to trust the use of your mobile phone, you need coverage (substance). Everything else is just “nice to have.”

If your phone is not mission critical or you’re on a tight budget, you can look passed price and coverage and go for the features (flash).

Wireless providers reflect this basic approach in their pricing plans and their advertising.

Verizon: best network coverage, highest prices, relatively boring phones.

Verizon is all about substance. The company has, by far, the best coverage of any national network provider. They’ve been rated highest in customer satisfaction by Consumer Reports, as well as a number of other publications and independent research. They represent the completeness of their network coverage in their advertising.

However, in their price promotions they don’t really feature their PLAN pricing - they feature the phone pricing. Verizon consistently has the most expensive pricing plans of any wireless company, because they can. You join Verizon for the coverage, not the cool phones - and you pay a premium for it.

Why aren’t the phones as feature-rich as their competition? Again, because people who currently use Verizon, use them for their network coverage.

Verizon now has one - count it - ONE phone that supports Bluetooth (the Motorola V710). It’s pretty damn expensive AND it’s been crippled so as to not offer complete Bluetooth features. (A lawsuit is pending…)

On the other end of the flash/substance continuum is T-Mobile.

T-Mobile: probably the weakest network coverage of all providers, feature-rich phones, lots of included minutes.

The strategy here is obvious: carrier coverage is spotty, so how do you attract people to your network? Cool phones with great features and lots of included minutes at ultra-competitive prices. Lock customers into contracts to protect against rampant churn.

I know more people who are enraged by the fact that they have these cool, feature-rich phones with hours of included minutes, but many times can’t make calls - and can’t switch providers due to a service contract. I hear the same from Sprint customers.

Based on my personal experience and anecdotes from friends and colleagues, the flash/substance continuum might look like this:

(I’m sure I’m going to be flamed by lots of people who just love T-Mobile/Sprint/Nextel, etc. Yes, you exist, but I haven’t met you, yet…)

You could also add phones to this contiuum. For instance, take my current V60C. It delivers nearly 4 hours of talk time and 10 days of standby time (in ideal conditions, of course). Get yourself a phone with a color screen, a faster processor, screen savers, polyphonic ringtones, etc. and you’re lucky if you can get 2.5 hours of talk time and a few days of standby.

Plus, the V60 is from Motorola, so it scores high in the realm of accessories and connectivity, adding to it’s “substance”. I have a portable speakerphone system, USB data cable for syncing with Apple’s Addressbook, charging and even for use as a CDMA modem.

Hey Verizon: how about a little flash for your customers? We’re all drooling over the RAZR V3, but right now it’s only available for GSM networks…

Cheap Thrills

Thanks to eBay, it looks like I may have scratched my itch for a new cell phone. I picked up a used (pre-owned?) Motorola T730c with a color screen, polyphonic ringtone support, 1XRTT data capability, full email client and changeable faceplates. (These would definitely be conversation starters at client meetings…)

The standard battery life isn’t great, but there are a number of aftermarket high-capacity batteries that should perform as well (if not better) than the OEM battery in my V60C.

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