Thanks to some computer problems, I missed this last week, but it’s a great story on the impact of mobile music in the mature market of Japan. PostPlay reports on a J@pan Inc newsletter piece with details of how mobile music sales there — mainly ringtones — are more than making up for declining royalty fees from CD sales.

The post also reflects on a new survey of mobile music users. 42% said they get their music by ripping CDs to their PC, then transferring them to a memory card; 29% said they get music on their handset exclusively from KDDI’s Chaku-Uta Full download service. Of the people that transfer music from their PCs, nearly half say they’re spending less on buying CDs, but more on renting them — PostPlay correctly wonders if the increase in rentals (from which record labels earn royalties) offsets the decrease in sales. The bottom line: digital and mobile media are changing the face of the music business, particularly consumer buying habits. Companies that not only adapt to this, but embrace it, will be the ones that thrive.

US carrier Verizon Wireless and radio and concert behemoth Clear Channel say they’ll team up to offer concert footage on Verizon’s EV-DO “V CAST” service. What they’re calling the Encore Channel will show broadcasts from concerts (presumably at CC-owned venues) a couple days after the event for a week at a time. The press release linked above has a schedule through the end of the summer, and it’s pretty stacked. The PR isn’t totally clear, but it reads as if it will be video content. Also, access to the channel will be included in users’ monthly V CAST access fee.

This is an interesting proposition, and supports the idea that with its gigantic holdings in radio and concerts, Clear Channel could emerge as a significant player in mobile music. While the young space needs somebody to champion early efforts, the impact CC has had on radio and the greater American music landscape hasn’t been too positive, so hopefully the same won’t happen here.

Melodeo, one of the leading companies in the emerging mobile music download space, said today it’s inked a deal with EMI to make 200,000 of the label’s songs available to its mobile download customers.

Melodeo’s catalog now features over 500,000 songs with the EMI tracks in addition to those from Warner Music as well as a host of independent labels.

BlogCritics is a great blogging resource for bloggers and blog readers. It aims to showcase the best blog writing on the web, giving bloggers a wider audience and giving readers a one-stop resource to discover new writers. It focuses on music, books, film, TV, video, politics and technology - or life the universe and everything, really.

I’d say they get about 100 posts a day submitted.

I send in the odd thing to them, especially if I think the point I’m trying to make deserves a wider audience.

So I’m really thrilled to have my Death Knell of Privacy post selected as the Editor’s Pick of the Week.

I’d just like to thank……

I was chatting to a 13 year old daughter of one of my friends over the weekend. She goes to a boarding school not far from here, complete with Harry Potter style dormitories.

When they go off to bed, they have to place their mobile phones in a big, locked strong box to stop them smsing/phoning/playing games and every other thing you can use a mobile for these days. And they collect them in the morning.

The interesting thing is that it’s not an excuse to say that you haven’t got a mobile - it’s just not credible.

It’s also strange that the teachers don’t seem to have thought about all the second phones the girls keep, just for this purpose. It’s last year’s model that gets locked up overnight, leaving them free to use the new one all night if they wish.

So first we had the shag phone. Now we have another example of why someone might want two phones - the Hostage Phone.

I wonder if there are any more examples of two phone ownership…

I’m never sure how much personal stuff to include here - some of you say you like it, but I think it can get terribly self-indulgent. So if you’re not interested in that kind of stuff, skip this, without further ado.

As you may know, I moved to Munich, Germany about a year ago for family reasons. My wife is Bavarian (being Bavarian is more relevant than being German, actually) and we wanted our kids to grow up speaking the language and feeling at home here.

From a family point of view, it’s great. We live just south of Munich in a town that’s so desirable that it’s probably the most expensive in Germany. It’s by a huge lake (55 km around) that’s spectacular and great for swimming in Summer. We’re near the Alps for hiking and skiing. And Munich has bags of culture, if that’s your thing too.

From a professional point of view, it’s been little short of taking a sabbatical. It’s not practical to live in Germany and freelance/consult in England. And I don’t have much of a network here - most of my work has come from referrals, historically.

So if you know anyone who needs someone with expertise in mobile/mobile marketing/location based services, get them to give me a shout if it can be done with me living here - though I would be happy to travel, if necessary.

On a more positive note, tomorrow sees the opening of the new football stadium here, The Alliance Arena (pictured), shared between Bayern Munich and their less famous cousins, 1860. The stadium changes colour depending on who’s playing that day - red for Bayern, blue for 1860.

The opening ceremony will be concluded with a match between Bayern Munich and the German national side. And I’ve been invited by a pal of mine - my network might be small, but it’s pretty good quality
Well enough about me. I’ve been doing some research into YOU. Does this describe you? I think you’ll find it does…

People close to you have been taking advantage of you. Your basic honesty has been getting in your way. Many opportunities that you have had offered to you in the past have had to be surrendered because you refuse to take advantage of others. You like to read books and articles to improve your mind.

In fact, if you’re not already in some sort of personal service business, you should be. You have an infinite capacity for understanding people’s problems and you can sympathize with them. But you are firm when confronted with obstinacy or outright stupidity. Law enforcement would be another field you understand. Your sense of justice is quite strong.

Hmm… does this ring any bells for you?

It’s based on the fascinating art of Cold Reading, a technique behind much magic and con tricks like horoscopes and spiritual medium (media?).

I thought you might find it interesting.

Have a great week!

Russell

An interesting spin off of Sunday’s EU Referendum in France was that supporters of the “YES” vote were urged to campaign by Bluejacking (if you’re thinking “huh?” read this):

“If you have a Bluetooth-enabled mobile, you can ‘bluejack’ militantly until Sunday. Rename your mobile ‘vote yes’ and when you’re on public transport or in a public place, set your phone to seek out other Bluetooth-enabled devices.”

Obviously, it wasn’t a staggeringly successful concept as the “NO” vote prevailed. But who knows if humiliation, rather than a narrow defeat, would have resulted without the Bluejack element?

Actually, this is a pretty desperate campaigning tactic. Bluejacking is fun, but it’s hardly a worthy or valid marketing technique. It’s about on a par with marching up to someone, slapping them in the face with a kipper and declaring “vote for me”.

That’s not to say that mobile marketing can’t be made to work, by any means. It’s just that, like corporate blogs, you need to understand what you’re doing before jumping in - and that normally requires someone with proven expertise to help you do it.

Story source: The Guardian.

Overture, the paid-search network, has announced several deals to take it into the hot space of mobile search. More deals and partnerships are expected soon.

Well, actually the announcement they’ve made is more an announcement that they’re going to make an announcement. They have signed up to provide paid-search for Yahoo’s WAP portal (well, since Yahoo! own Overture, it would have been a bigger story if they’d gone with someone else) and the off-portal search from a mobile operator (to be announced). This is in addition to a deal already signed with Orange.

More deals and partnerships are expected soon.

Mobile search is an interesting area, for two reasons.

Firstly, 30% of searches are currently to look for mobile content (ringtones etc). Since about 2/3 of mobile content is currently sold via operator portals, this is a clear and present danger for operator revenues. In other words, while they may make money from the advertisers paying for their ads to be presented to users, many of these ads will be for competitors of the operators.

Since the cost of the ad itself is clearly going to be much less than the profit on the sale of the content (it has to be, otherwise there’s no business model), this has the clear potential to cannibalise operator content revenues.

Having said that, operators have little choice but to get involved. If they don’t offer search, someone else will. Though the prospect of an operator paying to advertise on its own search portal is an interesting one. The danger is that if the operator does pay to get high results every time, other advertisers are very likely to boycott the service.

Hmmmm.

The other fascinating element of this emerging market is that no one is talking about local mobile search. While this isn’t the only market for mobile search, by any means, it will be an important one.

My opinion is that search on mobiles will polarise into two distinct and sizable markets - maybe even dominated by different types of companies.

The first area is Location-Independent Search (LIS), which is very similar to the type of search you do on your desk top. After all, if you’re looking for ringtones to download to your phone, the location of the retailer is of little importance. Distance is dead and all that.

But if you want the name of a shop or restaurant, as an example, location is probably a very important factor indeed. Thus, you’ll want to undertake a LDS (Location Dependent Search). The default location will be where you’re standing right now, but you’ll be able to over-ride this by inputting another location, if you wish.

So the LIS sector could well end up being dominated by Overture or a company like that - I can’t see Google standing by and letting them win though. And the LDS sector should be the heartland for Yellow Pages or other locally organised directory service.

It’s going to be a fascinating space to watch it emerge.

Story via NMA.

As part of my occasional foray into the archive, I thought you might enjoy this from May last year:

Thereís a very amusing booklet from the 1940ís at Contact Sheet. Itís full of startlingly obvious advice about how to use the Telephone. Stuff like ìBe sure of your numberî and if you choose to ignore this little gem ìApologize for
wrong numbers”.

But then I thought. Actually, wouldnít it be great if todayís technologists:

1. Understood that their users donít have the same grasp of their technology that they do.

2. Explained how to use their technology clearly, simply and in congruence with contemporary society.

Whatís especially ignored is some kind of etiquette in using this new stuff ñ like Making Friends on the Telephone. Nowhere is this more apparent than Instant Messaging, but it applies to SMS, email, chat and pretty much everything else.

Taking IM as an example, this is leading to huge problems with kids. Since most communication is non-verbal and since the keyboard removes inhibitions, many a child has got themselves into hot water with their peers over an IM conversation. Giving away too much too soon is a common mistake, to be regretted at leisure. As is passing on dodgy gossip or a quickly regretted bitchy remark.

And, like the Telephone guide, thereís no older generation to explain the rules ñ they donít know, as they have no experience. So a world (and IM is a world) where kids make the rules is going to be a pretty brutal one.

Remember Lord of the Flies?

Consulting firm, The Management Network Group has released a study about what youth and young adults want on their mobile phones.

While the emphasis of the report is to spin the results positively, if you look at it with a “half empty” focus, it’s a little worrying, in some respects.

For instance, 34% were interested in mobile music downloads, which I think is pretty amazingly low. And only 21% were interested in video clips and 3D gaming respectively.

However, this endorses last week’s MOBILE LIFE 1 survey, which found that none of these features made it into the Top 10 features wishlist.

The other key finding is that 20% of respondents would be interested in getting ad-supported content, like video clips, on their mobiles. This also seems low, given the popularity (still) of other ad-supported content models, like radio and TV - and indeed, online, generally.

This kind of research can be notoriously misleading admittedly. But it’s still rather puzzling and if it is right, it’s certainly bad news for all those companies rushing into mobile TV and video right now.

Story via MocoNews. Image from The Age.