I was amazed with the iphone User Interface, Microsoft latest product Surface has blown me away!!!

IKEA here we come……..

Interesting article in The Australian today about Beeb (BBC’s online venture) going social with a plan to establish social communities around their popular TV shows like 5th Gear.

No timeframe set…..that’s the catch.

Great interview and demo of the upcoming Apple iPhone at the recent CES event. For someone that’s been in the mobile space, it is certainly an impressive devices. You can really see Apple usability and simplicity features come thru…..

It is so human likable…..I close to being converted to the Apple revolution!

Another interest point made in another post from a senior Apple exec in doing the deal with Cingular was that there is no way they are going to open up the platform for anyone else developing on it…interesting approach to business but for a business that is obsessed with design and function like Apple…well what can i say.

Great blog piece on how over time, user generated content and social network driven sites will  eventully become part of the norm leaving Google as Mt Everest!

http://www.longtail.com/the_long_tail/2006/12/visualizing_the.html

As a visual person, I found this representation a very interesting perspective on the Long Tail……

With greater uptake and usage of broadband services, users are demanding richer web experiences. On this note, one of the (if not the) most broadband enabled country’s South Korea has demonstrated the value of these communications enablers with the success of cyworld (Korea’s version of MySpace and the most successful per capita in terms of usage and revenue generation). Last year, they generated more than 20% of South Korea’s online musc sales via their online communities!!

What’s different about is there business model and rich user experience. They have long recognised the value of rich user experiences online and have taken this one step further with the announcement of a relationship with Double Fusion . This agreement will allw cyworld to immerse digital assets in the cyworld spaces with branded sponsorship opportunities. Check out this press release for more info on this exciting announcement.

What a great moment in the mobile world!

Some of you maybe aware of the fact that I have being running a mobile solutions company (Smooth Mobility) for close to 1 year now with continuous changes to the business model and initiatives due to many reasons. One of the major issues has been the “gravity” and perception the mobile carriers have with the general consumer and business markets when it comes to the range of products and services available.

For a long time, I’ve been talking about the fact that carriers have unfortunately being using the marketing “muscle” to actually not doing anything real proactively to drive higher data volumne growth across their networks. The “poster child” in the business mobile market has been Blackberry yet this is only the tip of the iceberg with respect to data usage and user value.

An announcement this week by three (3) in the UK with its X-Series bundle and pricing has created the chnage needed to drive user adoption and value for mobile data services in my view. Check out the press release 3’s X-Series and also 3’s great promotional site for the X-Series bundle.

I really believe this will take off based on human usage and behaviouron traditional mobile voice and simple data services. Those capped plans have really given users a sense of “sleep at night” factor comfort and I see this doing the same thing.

Let’s see what other carriers do next.

Many of you who know me have a passion for good design (have a real passion for industrial design and architecture) and came across this site about a design competition sponsored by Microsoft to find the next great device design. 

It seems like a great success as an event and I really enjoyed the video clip depicting, in Microsoft view, the world of tomorrow!

http://www.startsomethingpc.com – select the flash cube and go to see video link. 

Imagine a world with no devices and Microsoft Windows all around us – in the air!!

Wow.

Attending another great Fourth Estate Domain Networking Night with guest speaker Jack Matthews (Fairfax Digital CEO).  What came out of this great session tonight for me was Jack’s recurring focus on the Fairfax brand(s) value proposition vs web site “eyeball”/visitor targets.   I seem to agree with him with respect to brand experiences online (seeing I’m quite passionate about this) and it should be every media company’s imperative to build and drive long term brand value vs. short term revenue gains.

In simple terms – who know where MySpace will be in 5 years time?  We are already seeing MySpace unique visitors (UV) per month reduced in recent times.  Is this a sign?

Great points Jack!  Interested to see what the new “watch this space” announcements will be in the next few weeks!

My believe is this…..the guys selling the shovels at the moment (Google, Yahoo, etc.) with respect to online search marketing are making a killing selling this notion of click thru advertising.

The interactive space both locally and globally seems to be mesmerised with the high growth rates of online advertising currently.  In my view, it’s flawed!

What do I mean?

Well, so much money is being spent by corporates, big brands, etc on online marketing hoping it is going to generate all these new revenues online for them.  Reality is that without a focus on the complete user experience then a lot of this money can be kissed goodbye!  e.g I’ve had the privilege of discussing new and exciting online strategies, initiatives and specific opportunities with many of the large corporate brands lately and let me tell you, the consistent story of high abandonment rates post click thru is interesting. 

 What does this all mean?

In my view, organisations need to start to look at the revitilisation of their complete web experiences online (with a clear focus on moving beyond “i have a web address come and visit me!” to providing online environments for their customers to actively converse online.  Furthermore, their customers’ outcomes need to be put at the top of the priority list of “to dos” here vs. a products/services approach to web site design and development. 

This approach should drive online marketing (based on user usage and behaviours) not keywords!

An industry colleague of mine (Norbert @ Microsoft Australia) mentioned to me recently about an amazing rich photo management tool that Microsoft was going to launch.  Well it finally arrived and wow it’s amazing……

It’s called Microsoft Photosynth – check it out at http://labs.live.com/photosynth

Great rich experience and can see great new opportunities for the novice and professional photography market!