My del.icio.us links and notes.

• Skype is kissing goodbye to P2P. Live Messenger in drag. You are assimilated. – . "We have been silently re-architecting basically the entire way Skype works." This change means Skype is moving away from its historic P2P service into a modern one ready for the mobile-based world. Skype is shifting to Microsoft's Messenger platform initially, designed with mobile considerations in mind."

These are my del.icio.us links for September 9th:

• Nele Anders: Illustration and Animation | Aquatints –
• Papercuts By Joe- Original Hand-Cut Paper Art –
• Joe Bagley papercuts –
• Contents –
• Project Noah –
• Home – Marcofolio.net –
• Nice jquery full background image slider | image slideshow –
• Huerta Tipográfica | Ejemplos de Alegreya ht –
• 17 Essential Countdown Timer Scripts You May Need One Day | Design Inspiration –
• Business Insider –

My del.icio.us links and notes.

• Multi-screen mania: how our devices work together | Importance of "mobile first" – This data shouldn't be a surprise. First rule today is think "mobile first". Few companies really have that lens on. What this little study highlights is the need for "escalation" thinking. How do conversations, work, what work is done where, what is the role of attention on tasks, how is this impacted by different environments and situations. How do programs and data respond to context etc.

I value and enjoy reading the WSJ everyday. I tweet article links too (although they are not aways shareable). WSJ is a great resource and I now have until the 11th of September to decide whether or I continue subscribing. For many years I’ve had the WSJ delivered home. I’m also an active online news user on both iPad and iPhone. Some time ago when the electronic versions went behind pay walls I also had to choose between NYTimes and the WSJ based on cost. I then ended up with my current promotional offer. Today I trust the WSJ to keep me mostly up to date. Yet there is no “news” on the WSJ that isn’t available elsewhere in a timely fashion. See Flipboard or Skygrid for example.

Yesterday I received an email from the WSJ. It made me feel abused. In a nutshell it said.

1. This notification is to inform you that your subscription will be renewed through our Automatic Renewal Program. 
2. As a reminder we will automatically renew your subscription for one year at the current rate of $8.75 per week. Your credit card will be charged $455 unless you cancel before your renewal date. Sales tax may apply in certain states.

What!!! Fact last year I paid $213.72 ($4.11 per week) for the combined print & digital service. $455 represents a steep year on year increase!

The WSJ is not alone in using promotional offers to sign up subscribers. Comcast does this and so do other Cable TV companies. Rope you in… then raise the price after six or 12 months. When accessing the WSJ online site there is no place to cancel or manage your subscription. Even renewals require you to call a rep. I called the WSJ to cancel. They immediately offered their promotional rates. For print and digital $5.99 per week for 12 months then rising to $9.65. The rep informed me I can save additional money by going digital. $4.99 per week  for 52 weeks then going to $7.95 after 12 months.  I canceled and will see what offers I get.

Conclusions:

• So the reward for being a good customer is “charge them substantially more” than a new customer. This simple rewards starting new accounts, using a different email and credit card and waiting for the right promotion. I’m sure I’ve not heard the last of my cancelation or seen their last offer.
• Hope the customer doesn’t read their email so WSJ can say… ‘we charged you inline with your contractual agreement”… when you call them to complain about the bill on your credit card. You may or may not get a discount and credit at this point. They will have your money.
• There is no real discount for the digital edition. I’m sure it costs more than $1 per week to deliver six papers to my door. Where is the savings? Digital edition readers are also more likely to participate in social media etc. Although the current closed environment doesn’t really encourage this.
• The differential in cost print vs digital should make the iPad even more attractive to both WSJ and users. I see their fee structure as continuing to to subsidize the print business rather than growing the digital business. That’s nuts!
• The digital subscription appears to have few limits on the number of devices that current access it under one account name. Registering devices will make sense in future. Is the iPhone edition worth the same as the iPad edition? More or less? Depends is the answer. My account currently runs on two iPads and I think 4 mobiles. We almost never look at the website. Should there be device limitations? What’s reasonable? One iPad subscription should be much cheaper than a multi-device subscription. The utility certainly goes down, and depending on your view it may or may not be better than a paper. There could also be one active device at a time type of support. Will we see a shit to personal rather than family or household subscriptions?
• I don’t mind paying although I lament some of the restrictions on sharing. There’s an opportunity to provide a better membership model and build more community around it.

Perhaps I’m a dinosaur I actually still read papers whether digital or print. I also suspect there’s a product for the $.20 cents per day paper or the $.10 cents a day. Unfortunately there aren’t any small independent digital papers that are around at $.10 cents per day. I might happily assemble four or five for daily reading. Business, Sports, Lifestyle, etc. I might buy the WSJ for the technology and popular sections and nothing else. I might buy the NYTimes or Guardian for “world” etc. Papers are still too scared to price their sections. The future is coming the current closed and ring fenced models are just biding time.

BTW With their current promotion I can go to the NYTimes for $3.85 per week delivered home Monday to Friday and get full access to the digital editions for all my family. Is the WSJ really worth $5.99 / $3.85 or  55% more per week? I suspect not.

Finally I must remember. I am a subscriber not a customer so they probably don’t care much about my feelings, my lifestyle, and my real relationship with the WSJ. Subscribers and subscriptions work when they are increasing. It’s a problem when your business is shrinking. One day perhaps you will think of me as a customer – the more unique the better.

My del.icio.us links and notes.

• The Platform Ecosystem Wars: Rome Is Burning | Empower Mobile Users Instead – A useful summary although this is not new news. Twitter started screwing developers a long time ago. Facebook was never really trustworthy and like Skype before favored the bigger corporates or those with more monied interests.

  Facebook and Twitter need to be in Apple's stack just so they can continue to provide a simple log-in function for other apps. Apple could provide this more broadly tomorrow with an iTunes authentication system although unlikely to happen. GameCenter already does this so the capability is ready to go.

  There's a point where things tip. The thought experiment should focus on the day and time when Apple decides that helping coordinate and empower it's users is more important than the potential for mobile advertising. The way to do this is to enable personal exchanges. An early example of what that might look like is craigslist. The users own and control the exchange and they are broadcast of and from the mobile device. Backup to iCloud is optional.

Leaving the Bluetooth session today I was talking to a couple of Airline guys. The discussion started by focusing on Bluetooth 4.0 and wondering re the comparisons with NFC. Obviously, their interest was around ticketing and we quickly added the new Passbook feature into the  conversation. So when I came to write up a few thoughts I have two main observations.

1. What’s the Future Transaction Device Set?  iPads are being deployed in many places as the replacement for the cash register. With the latest Bluetooth 4.0 as a peripheral they can act as the advertiser or broadcaster. That could make payments, loyalty cards, and other in store promotions interesting. Example notifying a rep when someone in close proximity picked up on an offer. The example in the session demo was using a simple heart monitor and there is certainly plenty of opportunity for similar health apps.  So here’s my observation and question. When the iPad becomes the register does it effectively eliminate all the complexity surrounding NFC? Why would you buy NFC terminals when a more elegant solution provides it for free and enables a broadcast functionality? Will this approach be a total lower cost deployment option? Finally, this type of deployment appears to be “outside the banks” interests in NFC and more built around loyalty and behavior options. When I add in passbook I suspect a much richer behavioral experience could be created.

2. Management doesn’t get it. Back to the airline type story. I asked them about “management” and how they see the business and how it relates to mobile. Their comment was their management doesn’t yet see mobile as that important and they would scoff at putting a ticket in Passbook etc.  This “blinders” problem should not be understated. Developers see the opportunity, and yet management continues to be blind to it. The developers seemed quite happy to continue developing, they don’t really want the hassle of promoting change with management at a strategic level. On the other hand management doesn’t have the experience or vision to understand the new behaviors or even how to direct it.  As I see it…. the way we interact with the internet of things is just starting to emerge and will accelerate rapidly over the next few years. From obscure examples to everyday occurrences like unlocking and starting our car. I’m more convinced than ever that there remains a role to energize the conversation and experimentation across the enterprise around personal devices.

Who’s the evangelist for change in your company? Where’s the conversation going?

I’m sitting down at the end of the day reflecting on what I heard or thought about today at the Apple WWDC or World Wide Developer Conference. It’s my gig for the rest of the week! Lucky me as tickets are hard to come by. After this morning’s keynote I wasn’t sure if I was going to be inspired or not. I ended up in the overflow room – not the same feeling. The last time I attended was 2009 and the swag (a zip sweatshirt vs a nice backpack then) hasn’t improved. The after lunch session “Platforms Kickoff” put the meat on the morning session. I’m a lot more excited now by both IOS 6 and the integration with the desktop. This second session also pulled new faces (for me) off the bench. It provided a great look in on Apple passion. So what are my initial impressions and where I might be looking for the rest of the week?

1. iMessage integration: It may not seem like much. However IOS6 will integrate your phone number with your apple ID. And I’m sure that will integrate even more over time with iCloud. That means your messages are synched everywhere. More importantly, You will be logging on in the future to your Mac with your Apple/iCloud ID. That’s going to bring new personalization opportunities. Perhaps not this year – rather in the future. This is the stealth Identity play under everything. We are perhaps one step closer to seeing Apple integrate the Identity space in a more effective fashion. Compared to now… where I have to log in to all these separate services… from game center, to iMessage and FaceTime, iTunes etc.

2. Windows: More a comment heard from a large co IT manager while in line and then tested on a few others. Windows 8 is trouble. Huge learning curve. Most of our employees now have Mac’s at home! Most of our stuff is still on XP etc. When the business is going mobile, and the devices defining the human and customer behaviors and actions are mobile it’s starting to make sense to make a total switch. He meant turn the business totally towards Apple. Less to learn, easier to move the employees forward. From my own perspective the very soft Apple sell today on integrating OSX and IOS was in the you figure it out. This stuff just works and who knows… whether Window’s / Android will. Choosing Apple may be the lower risk choice – particularly if you have a large group of developers already on Apple. No wonder iCloud got the push it did.

3. Social Sharing API. Yes IOS and the platform update brings Facebook integration. It’s very powerful when tied to Gamecenter. Example you can like those games in game center and send them to Facebook. That means more integration with the iTunes store too. More importantly a developer can insert the functionality with virtually a line of code. As I tweeted. This will create a real set of competitive tensions between Facebook and Twitter (And perhaps different networks in China etc.). Which network will you associate with new apps? What new services can these providers provide? How will they help me manage my App portfolios etc? What can they tell me about my friends? Why? Simply all Apple devices have just become more social. Easier to share, built into the browser etc. Apple will have the best view in on “Social”. It will also change how you log-in to most apps. Twitter and Facebook just became easier than using an email.

4. Siri: I found the Siri highlights a little disappointing. A few more smarts re sports scores. Apparently it will open any app. I’m hoping still there is a session that goes beyond the demo “Open Temple Run”. Example Open Viber Call Friend needs an extra link in the API. I want to know we can instruct apps.

5. Video Stabilization: One demo that was amazing was the video stabilization that is coming with IOS 6. That probably means with the next iPhone. The video was from a boat following a boat. Totally smooth.

6. Maps: The 3D flyover view was pretty cool. Apparently Apple has had the helicopters out. The renderings are in real time and amazing. The maps session will be one to go to. The ability to bring this type of data into an app could lead to many new possibilities from games to research. Most of us will just be happy to have Siri telling us where to go.

7. Passbook: How about the location aware movie ticket that just appears or the starbucks card that is ready to pay when you walk into Starbucks. Perhaps this will be your company swipe card next? Nicely integrated to popup on the home screen. Is this one step away from the wallet? Add some NFC functionality in and there could soon be some new ways to pay. As an aside I’m surprised that an ID photo wasn’t provided with the ticket swipes etc. Maybe that’s possible will have to find out.

There were many other announcements (privacy, languages, face recognition etc.) and I’m sure more will come back to me as the week goes on. I leave today thinking – it’s never been easier to program for IOS and never more powerful. There are new opportunities and we are still just scratching the surface. The number – 80% of IOS users on IOS5 and similarly 80% of OSX users on Lion or Snow Leopard are pretty impressive. The iCloud updates will make that even more powerful.

There’s lots of ideas here and more emerging. 2012 may well end up as looking incremental – improvement on improvement. What’s probably important to Apple and the rest of us is: This group continues to learn faster about mobile and tablets than anyone else. It’s neither a copycat platform or one simply trying to catch up. You only had to look at see the Apple Design Awards presented this afternoon to recognize the continued richness.

My apologies if I sound like the Apple Fan Boy today. I came to learn about what comes next, and what new things can be built and infer some of the behavioral implications and how and where there are opportunities to create great new apps and potentially new businesses. I still have the question; What’s your mobile strategy?” in mind, however it’s shifting more an more to a more “personal” strategy question directed at the enterprise. I still suspect that most of the developers here cannot look at or talk to their business leaders at a strategic level about this. CEO’s aren’t sending their CTO’s or Evangelical Developers here to understand enough about how to reframe their business through the lens of personal devices. Solutions like Passbook will create new businesses if the developers get on them quickly, and continue to undermine the old.

What is CPNI? Who writes the AT&T garbage AND UNDECIPHERABLE e-mails that end up TELLING me about my account and then when I read very carefully are broken when I try to do something about it? Like opt-out?

According to AT&T CPNI is important information about the privacy of my customer information. You read the info below as ask yourself.

1. Is it clear and easy to read?
2. What and why are they asking for this in plain English that my mother could understand.
3. Why did I receive it? I’m a mobile customer. What does that have to do with VoIP? Or Internet Protocol. I just make phone calls don’t I and have a data plan for the internet? To my knowledge I don’t purchase VoIP services from AT&T currently. So what is this really for?
4. Basically they want to share my data – to what end I have no idea. However, there is not suggestion of a benefit for me.
5. Where do I opt out? Oh really hidden text . By this point I figure that 90% of the people will have ignored it as too complex to understand thinking – what’s the risk.
6. Click the link. Try to opt out. It failed for me. Doesn’t recognize my account. Then says use the account at the top of the email. I don’t use that account number – guess I could log in and try and find it. AT&T makes it hard because my account works with them using my phone number! That’s what they have trained me to use.
7. So as I can’t log-in and opting out might take hours to resolve AT&T will just start using my CPNI. SUCKS.
8. What is CPNI – Well as they say it is my “Customer Proprietary Network Information”. See Wikipedia.
9. AT&T doesn’t bother to sign the e-mail. There is no person that executed this – just various numbers. No one department seems to take responsiblity. Who worries about communications? Obviously not at the top.
10. I’m the customer – it’s obvious that AT&T isn’t really on my side. It’s reinforced over and over. They are also similar to any of the other mobile operators. So it’s almost pointless to complain. However, complain we all should. It’s getting more serious by the day.

I’d have to be a lawyer and an expert to actually know what’s going on. Just be certain that notes like these are never really for your benefit. Still AT&T how many times till I can opt-out as easily as I can from any other spam email?

Note from AT&T below.

An important message about the privacy of your customer information (Customer Proprietary Network Information or CPNI)

Dear STUART HENSHALL,
Regarding Your Account: xxxxxxxxx4444
The protection of our customers’ privacy is of utmost importance to the employees and management of the AT&T family of companies (AT&T)*.  Please take a moment to read the following important message about the privacy of your customer information.

AT&T companies that provide telecommunications and interconnected Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) service (which permits VoIP customers to both send and receive calls to/from customers with traditional telephone/telecommunications service) would like to share your customer proprietary network information within the AT&T family of companies for our own marketing purposes, including using that information to offer you additional products and services.

What is CPNI? Your CPNI includes the types of telecommunications and interconnected VoIP services you currently purchase, how you use them and the related billing for those services. CPNI does not include your telephone number, your name or your address. Protecting the confidentiality of your CPNI is your right and our duty under federal law.

As an AT&T customer, you can restrict the use of your CPNI even within the AT&T family of companies. To allow AT&T to use your CPNI, no further action is required. AT&T will not use your CPNI to offer you other products and services until at least 33 days after this notice was mailed to you. AT&T and our authorized agents will not sell, trade or share your CPNI with anyone other than those who are in the AT&T family of companies or are AT&T authorized agents, unless required by law.

If at any time you would prefer that AT&T not use your CPNI to offer you additional products and services, you may:

- Click

here  

to submit your request electronically

- Call

1.800.315.8303  

 24 hours a day, 7 days a week and follow the prompts

- Call

1.800.288.2020 

 and speak to a service representative

Your decision to permit or restrict the use of CPNI will remain in effect until you decide to change it – which you can do at any time without charge. Restricting our use of your CPNI will not affect the provision of any AT&T products or services to which you currently subscribe, nor will it eliminate other types of marketing contacts.

Thank you for choosing AT&T. We appreciate your business. *The AT&T family of companies are those AT&T companies that provide communications-related products and/or services, including the AT&T local and long distance companies, AT&T Corp., AT&T Long Distance, AT&T Internet Services, AT&T Mobility, and other subsidiaries or affiliates of AT&T Inc. that provide, design, market or sell these products and/or services. Thank you,AT&T Online Serviceswww.att.com 

PS. I tried calling as well. They want the account number – not my phone number and don’t recognize that I’m calling in on my AT&T mobile phone. In other words this whole process is made extremely difficult and it was designed purposely like this by AT&T to make sure the fewest number opt-out. To add insult to injury they suggest on the phone that I can just look at my bill. Well it is an online bill and yes I do know where to find this account number – I think.

Andy Abramson pointed me to his post and another on the state of the video conferencing Industry this morning. What’s wrong with the Video Conferencing  Industry? and his post “Taking Aim and Telling the Truth”. Fact is, I all but ignore the Video Conferencing Industry now. What I don’t do is ignore video and the impact it is having on people’s lives and communications. The Video Communications Industry  was  companies like Polycom and Cisco. They are looking a little like dinosaurs now. A few years ago we were also all talking telepresence. We can still wish for teleportation! These pioneering companies ended up with incredible expensive solutions that required rooms in different locations and more. Meanwhile I just kept Skyping my friends and colleagues.  In that time it has become easier and easier to have a video call and Skype today makes a multiparty video conference pretty cheap. Video is more likely to be very distributed than 6 people in one office talking to 4 in another etc. Even the logistics of getting people there on time makes it a hassle.

Andy notes the impact of Tango and FaceTime. These are mobile solutions! If there is a power video user then I’d hold up Andy and his firm  Comunicano as a good example. He notes multiple endpoints and knows the enterprise need. Yet I’d go further. The future of Video in all forms starts with the mobile device. Like the PC and Skype proved effective video conferencing mobile will drive the next generation solutions. The cost comparison I’d use versus Scott’s ruminations would be:

Three employees enter the room. 5 colleagues are in the field. All have iPhones (true now in an increasing number of companies). Our three colleagues sit at a table. You can now go with three or one phone for them… and the TV screen in the room which has some AirPlay+ features. It’s not going to be that hard to see screensharing, a presentation, the people in the room, etc and then all the colleagues in the field. Even in the field we will see projectors on phones closing the gap. The cost of this was some AirPlay device or it came preinstalled with the screen – the employees brought their gear and always have it with them. The big telecom companies can give up on big switch gear now. It really is in the software.

That’s perhaps part of Scott’s challenge in the future. Right now VidTel has a solution that works across the cloud and enables various different video services to connect. I’m not sure how optimized or HD that makes the interconnect. I suspect better quality exists on some one to one solutions. Still a key benefit of this solutions is the ease in which other enterprises can connect their video systems with each others and remote users. It’s not really for consumers. It gives everyone a little leverage of their video assets before they perhaps disappear or are really superseded by the mobile evolution. It may also make some users more happy in their companies as they can now use the device and hardware of their choice.

The biggest problems for mobile  video are still social and a lack of bandwidth everywhere. If I’m a manager with a rep in the field and I want to see the example or help re talk them through a situation or make suggestions then video is just a natural extension. We see it in shopping, and I’ve been using it with research respondents. Video is going to save time and open up new conversations. The most important element of why the old models is dead is their static location. Mobile video may be more flawed; of a lower quality (although I’d hardly ever complain about that) that’s just part of it’s disruptive nature. The big benefit is… there is no setup cost. It potentially works at anytime and anywhere, in anyplace. iPhones and iPads make it particularly easy. I believe the majority of video conferencing minutes will soon be via mobile devices.

This type of discussion like many makes me wonder why our focus isn’t more on simplicity and simplification. As users carry more and more powerful devices in their pockets building or adding the same functionality to our environments (car, office, home) seems redundant. The office doesn’t need video conferencing. People do. The car doesn’t need a radio or music player – it does need great speakers. Does the car need a video? Perhaps not. It needs a dock for my phone and it can video everywhere I go and only save if I have an accident etc. Will that reduce my insurance cost? The revolution in video is now in mobile. From video social networks (socialcam), to recording apps and editing options. Even broadcast TV has been a mobile option for awhile.

Ask yourself. What mobile video conferencing system would you build today? And then ask, how you can make it functionally different? Video is just core basic functionality. I’d look to Camera+ for video and conferencing options perhaps. Video has a live feed component. Yet the point is… Create an API for usage like Camera+ and then video is integrated into other apps more quickly. Look at Viber or Tango. With an API on their app that functionality could be added to others. If you ever looked at Pair you will see the developers integrated FaceTime. That had zero cost to them. It’s more important how people use it and make it quickly available when required. Video today is just there. It’s not quite ubiquitous although it soon will be.