Locomatrix in London Lite

Locomatrix in London Lite
Originally uploaded by twhume

Locomatrix and Future Platforms are doing a fine job defining mobile virtual gaming with a location element to it too.

Well done!

Alfie’s Blog » Blog Archive » Twitters model is partially broken: Europe the first casualty

Technorati Tags: sms,twitter,network operator,mobile,social networking

Alfie Dennen (of Moblog fame) has done a write up on Twitter's recent decision to stop the free SMS element of its service. I've seen quite a bit written about it and most of it lacks any understanding of how SMS or the operators work but this post makes some sense of it so worth a look.

For the record, I would pay to receive my (selected) DMs (that's direct messages to the twitter uninitiated) via SMS as well as email. I don't get a huge amount each week, but enough to warrant me buying some kind of bundle.

And for those on the facebook group on this topic who think that the pay to receive SMS on twitter is tantamount to paying to receive junk text messages then they clearly don't understand how the privacy and DM settings work - it doesn't *all* happen on SMS you know. Most of the interaction is web-based - be that mobile or full-fat internet.

Alfie’s Blog » Blog Archive » Twitters model is partially broken: Europe the first casualty

Google Ads: Emphatic 'No' on Homepage, but Mobile Will Be Big | Epicenter from Wired.com

Well at least that's what Google's Eric Schmidt says:

Now mobile, that's different. That niche has such potential, Schmidt believes, that it will eclipse the tethered business it already does by way of home and office computers.

"Over time we will make more money from mobile advertising," Schmidt said. "Not now, but over time."

Google Ads: Emphatic 'No' on Homepage, but Mobile Will Be Big | Epicenter from Wired.com

Ever wanted to know the gender and age breakdown of social networks?

Then Rapleaf has answered your prayers. They've just released the full dataset of the 49.3 million people included in the Study of Social Network Users vs Age. It covers the main online social networks including Bebo, Facebook, Myspace, Hi5, LinkedIn, Flickr and more.

Overall, it appears that women are significantly more active on social networks than men as they're more interested in nurturing relationships (confirmed by higher membership on sites like MySpace, Bebo and Facebook. Men on the other hand are more interested in transacting and therefore have a higher representation on LinkedIn (I wonder if that also exposes the gender gap in the workplace at executive level?)

Rapleaf tell us: "women spend more time on social networks building and
nurturing relationships, whereas men are less likely to spend as much time
nurturing relationships as they are 'transacting'."

The missing link in this study is of course the mobile element. None of the mobile social networks are included such as Mxit, Trutap or Peperonity. We also know that online social networks such as Facebook going mobile drives mobile data usage. My question is does that mean *women* will be driving the mobile data revolution (as they seem to be driving the online social networking revolution)? And if so, how are we tailoring mobile data services and the marketing thereof to women. In the UK at least, network operator advertising feels either masculine or gender neutral. It certainly doesn't feel very feminine to me (and I'm not talking about the expectation of seeing pink and pastel colours).

And if my hunch *is* right, then shouldn't we be designing this stuff with women in mind first if we really want to drive mobile data services forward? And if so shouldn't women have more of a voice in making decisions about their digital lives - be they on the mobile internet or the fixed line internet?

[gets off soapbox!]

Museums are embracing mobile technology

Mike Short tipped me off to an interesting event coming up in September showcasing how museums like London's Tate Gallery are using mobile technology to enhance the visitor experience. (It's a one-day event "From Audiotours to the iphone" on 5th September and costs £150.)

And it got me thinking as to what museums are doing in the field of mobile marketing, advertising and media. And it seems they're up to quite a bit. And I imagine some of these things will be explored further at The Tate's forthcoming Symposium.

Across the pond, Cellit ran 'The Digital Post Office of Love', a Valentine's Day promotion, for the Chicago Museum of Contemporary Art as part of its ongoing SMS marketing effort. This featured a large, interactive display where visitors could use their mobile phones to instantly post messages via sms to woo other visitors, all in the spirit of Valentine's Day.

Dan Sutch from Nesta's Futurelab has some ideas as to what mobile learning and mobile experiences could be like, particularly from a youth marketing and youth engagement perspective. The slides are interesting and should be food for thought.

Boston Museum of Fine Arts launched a mobile initiative, MFA Mobile. Through MFA Mobile, users are able to personalize a mobile device with works of art from the Museum’s extensive collection of art, ranging from a Claude Monet water lily or Edward Hopper lighthouse to an Egyptian sculpture or African mask.

However, I'm slightly more cynical about this as they were charging $1.99 for an individual image or $4.99 a month for a subscription. I suspect that you could actually take a picture with your cameraphone of *most* of the exhibits which would negate the need for the download. And not only that, if you go to the website, it's easy enough to save the images for free.

I think if I were running this service, I would look to make a donation optional but easy to do to help generate revenues. And perhaps provide the subscription package as an added value bonus to some other fundraising scheme. Maybe Boston museum-goers are happy to pay these prices?

I've been a fan of TXTual Healing for some time and they help create public performances with text messages, some of which are at museums and art galleries. Check out their blog for details of past events.

And if that's not enough, then a rifle through Textually's blog using the tag museum will come up trumps with some interesting examples of what's happening with mobiles and museums, including a lot of art exhibits.

ilovemobileweb awards should be renamed

the 'I love mobile web awards but only if you're *not* a woman and only if your site is on a dotmobi URL'.

Informa Telecoms has organised the Mobile Web Europe conference and in its usual inimitable style has failed to recognise the other half of the sky (to quote John and Yoko). It's a 3-day conference covering all aspects of mobile web (and apparently the *only* mobile web event you'll ever need), sponsored by dotMobi and at the time of writing have only THREE women speaking during the whole event so that works out at one woman per day. That really is unacceptable in this day and age. There are plenty women out there worthy of participating at this conference. Informa really must try harder to find them and engage them. I'm not expecting half the panellists or speakers to be women, but I would expect more than a token one a day. Of course the male speakers are interesting and relevant, but to only have one woman per day is ridiculous.

And then there's the ilovemobileweb awards sponsored by dotmobi. In fact, dotmobi is sponsoring the whole thing. There are no female judges listed. (Haven't Informa and dotmobi seen this list of the Top 50 Women in Mobile Content from Mobile Entertainment Magazine? And that's just for starters).

Then this is compounded by only allowing entries if your site is a dotmobi site. So this rules out everything else that is mobile web. It doesn't seem right to me. The mobile web *isn't* all about dotmobi. And no matter how much money you throw at a conference or awards ceremony, being exclusive in an inclusive, connected world is just barmy. A different thing if it was billed as 'the dotMobi awards for dotMobi customers'.

dotMobi or Informa - care to comment?