andrewducker (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
andrewducker) wrote2014-02-24 01:52 pm
andrewducker) wrote2014-02-24 01:52 pm
Amazon, Video, WhatsApp, Voice - a couple of thoughts on recent tech news.
I feel really conflicted by Amazon's recent announcement that they are wrapping up LoveFilm* as part of Amazon Prime. Amazon Prime's price is going up at the same time, to£79, but when you consider that Netflix is £6/month, that's basically £7 for free shipping for the year. That's an amazing deal.
There are two problems here:
1) I already have Netflix and Prime, so either I drop Netflix or I'm paying £72/year for access to the few things that Netflix has that Lovefilm doesn't.
2) This is awful news for anyone trying to enter the market - Amazon Prime is popular with exactly the kind of people who are happy to fork over cash for streaming video. By tying the two together they're effectively leveraging a monopoly in one area into another arena. If you already have Amazon Prime then the chances of you signing up for another streaming video service is very slim unless it offers something that Amazon can't get its hands on.
The other thing that's been big news this week is the WhatsApp deal. I don't really see how they're going to make that much cash out of it, and I think that trying to will cause all of the users to run away to competitors, *as 5m of them already have. I am intrigued to see that people are still trying to make money out of messaging services. It's clearly possible to make _some_ money from messaging - ICQ** made $28MM in 2008 - but it looks like it's possible to make somewhere between 1 and 2 dollars per year per user out of IM, either through advertising or a very low charge. When Microsoft bought Skype at $13/user people thought they'd gone mad - WhatsApp (which does far less) was bought for about $42/user. How, exactly, they plan to make that out of people who have chosen to sign up for a messaging platform _because_ SMS was too expensive for them, I don't know.
I _do_ find it interesting that WhatsApp have announced plans for voice chat - with the number of cheap audio apps out there it's hard to see how phone companies are going to make much money out of phone calls at all.
What's missing here is, of course, an open standard for connecting users together. WhatsApp users can only message other WhatsApp users, Skype users can only talk to other Skype users. The internet is very-much a series of walled gardens, rather than an open space - I suspect that if email was invented now you woildn't be able to send emails to people on a different server. This saddens me, but as the vast majority of users have shown that they aren't interested in paying for services if they can get them for "free" I don't see that changing soon.
*A UK Netflix equivalent that Amazon bought in 2011.
**Now _seventeen_ years old. WTF?
There are two problems here:
1) I already have Netflix and Prime, so either I drop Netflix or I'm paying £72/year for access to the few things that Netflix has that Lovefilm doesn't.
2) This is awful news for anyone trying to enter the market - Amazon Prime is popular with exactly the kind of people who are happy to fork over cash for streaming video. By tying the two together they're effectively leveraging a monopoly in one area into another arena. If you already have Amazon Prime then the chances of you signing up for another streaming video service is very slim unless it offers something that Amazon can't get its hands on.
The other thing that's been big news this week is the WhatsApp deal. I don't really see how they're going to make that much cash out of it, and I think that trying to will cause all of the users to run away to competitors, *as 5m of them already have. I am intrigued to see that people are still trying to make money out of messaging services. It's clearly possible to make _some_ money from messaging - ICQ** made $28MM in 2008 - but it looks like it's possible to make somewhere between 1 and 2 dollars per year per user out of IM, either through advertising or a very low charge. When Microsoft bought Skype at $13/user people thought they'd gone mad - WhatsApp (which does far less) was bought for about $42/user. How, exactly, they plan to make that out of people who have chosen to sign up for a messaging platform _because_ SMS was too expensive for them, I don't know.
I _do_ find it interesting that WhatsApp have announced plans for voice chat - with the number of cheap audio apps out there it's hard to see how phone companies are going to make much money out of phone calls at all.
What's missing here is, of course, an open standard for connecting users together. WhatsApp users can only message other WhatsApp users, Skype users can only talk to other Skype users. The internet is very-much a series of walled gardens, rather than an open space - I suspect that if email was invented now you woildn't be able to send emails to people on a different server. This saddens me, but as the vast majority of users have shown that they aren't interested in paying for services if they can get them for "free" I don't see that changing soon.
*A UK Netflix equivalent that Amazon bought in 2011.
**Now _seventeen_ years old. WTF?
no subject
no subject
I've figured the only way to do it is to pass your main mobile and/or tethered sign-in(s) to everything. So if you're signed into your Android phone with your GMail account every app and website you visit already has access to your username and connected profile with no further action needed on your part. So you don't have to log into anything but your GMail account to automatically be logged into everything out there.
I'm using GMail as one example but I'm not terribly fond of Google so let's use another...Windows phones/Windows 8 on tablets/notebooks/desktops. You're signed into it all the time. That sign in is similarly passed to every app and website you visit so you're automatically logged into all of them, too...I have no idea how the iPhone works but assuming it lets you stay signed in, same thing.
All that needs to happen for this to work is three things:
1) Apple, MS and Google agree to work with each other on interoperability - in other words, from my Android I can be logged into Apple and MS properties automatically, rinse and repeat across all three brands
2) Websites work with all three brands on the interoperability issues and to help them increase processing power/server space for basically unlimited log-in potential
3) Instead of walled gardens the market sorts itself out, for once and for all..since everyone is logged into everything from every device out there at all times, consumer demand predicts app and website winners, not who uses which walled garden the most to do what
3a) OpenID or a future clone with expanded abilities probably figures into this dream of mine, somehow
An important aspect of this idea is anonymity...your Google and/or Apple and/or Windows account name and info can be separate from your actual billing details..if you want to use RealName all the way you can but if not...other options.
I think I'm fleshing this idea out here because your comment reminds me this has been on my mind lately. I wanted to comment on a website I'd never seen before on my mobile phone last week and realized I couldn't do so that easily because I'd have to create an identity for that website first. Then I thought, I already have an identity: I'm signed into my phone. Why can't I just use that identity? Why can't my phone just pass my details along? Why am I not already logged into this website that I've never seen before?
Honestly, if I could solve this problem tomorrow all by myself, I would, I'm that itchy to get it fixed.