Possibly the most famous quotation from the Net Neutrality debate thus far is from US Senator Ted Stevens (R-Alaska):

‘(The internet) … it’s a series of tubes.”

You sort of know what he means and that the correct colloquial term for an internet connection is ‘pipe’ but the point he was trying to make actually was quite important.  The internet has choke points that  occur the closer you get to the user.   Senator Stevens believes that consumer level ISPs should be able to charge content providers such as Yahoo!, Google et al. whatever they want notionally dependent on the priority that the traffic would take over the network.   So, streaming video would be most expensive, buffered download video next, Voice over IP (VoIP), then coming in last compressed images and text (HTML).

On one level this might sound perfectly reasonable - after all, if YouTube’s content places more of a load on local internet connections than the New York Times, why shouldn’t the former pay more?  There are two main reasons this is an absolutely horrendous idea:

1. The consumer will end up paying more.  Inevitably if content providers are charged on a heterogenous basis for network access then your ISP will replicate the billing structure to you.  Providers of pseudo-monopoly infrastructure, such as the phone or cable company adore complexity in billing.  Look at your home phone or cellphone bill and the range of plans and billing structures for what is a utility service. Feel like you are getting screwed?  That’s because you are and the incumbent phone companies and cable firms will look to do the same for internet access.

2. The local infrastucture duopoly of the phone and cable companies are content providers themselves.  We are already hearing about the possibility of metered billing for internet access  apparently to protect everyone from certain heavy-downloaders ‘abusing’ the flat price structure.   As the English say - bollocks to that.  The phone companies are installing fiber infrastructure and offering video service and the cable firms are upgrading their networks to offer better and more video services.  The last thing they want are pesky video download services like Apple TV or Amazon Unbox to run on their networks without being able to charge a premium and price them out of the market.

So unless you think you should pay more for your internet access and only buy video services from one of two companies, then watch out for the political candidates in the election speaking about this.   Yahoo! has some coverage here .

To follow - more on this topic and the impact on digital marketing.

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There are some distinct advantages to being British and doing work in the US but there’s also a few disadvantages. Today I am reminded of one in particular: modesty. It’s a blessing and a curse all by itself and very often I’m prompted to be less shy about boasting our company’s achievements.

Last Exit was borne out of a company called Deepend. Started by three Royal college mavericks, one of them the inimitable Gary Lockton, the company was twice named world’s #1 creative interactive agency. We were a design powerhouse and also a technology pioneer, notching up firsts in Flash development, iTV (interactive television), mobile, integrated campaigns and online video. When I started Last Exit with Andy Beach, online video was a speciality of ours and as one of Apple’s technology partners we produced boutique encoding services and development services for interactive QuickTime. Interactive video, we were sure, would be big and bigger, would be distribution and sharing of video. To that end, we developed the first interactive QuickTime powered by a full content management system. Long time friend to Last Exit, Eyeball NYC was our first commercial success as we produced a video library for their archive - all in QuickTime. The amazing thing was that you could senf the QT skin to someone via email, it would launch and draw the content over the net from our servers. It was a bloody masterpiece and was such a success that we went on to develop several iterations, finally going for an HTML interface and branding it “WaterCooler”. Ken McGorry wrote an article about it back in early 2003 (click here to see the article) and we won several contracts including one with Voltage Video - a traditional tape house/archive - for whom we customized the entire system and built out transcoding infrastructure at their New York city HQ. This enabled their clients to securely long on, and manage all their video based assets and even distribute in any media via Voltages distribution channels. But technology was merely transportation for the creative campaigns we were developing and other fantastic tools started to emerge that we began to use also.

We now utilize a range of solutions as best fit our clients and have built a very successful creative agency. I do want to pin a big fat medal on our collective chests though as (very) early mover in the world of online video. We now continue to exploit all the best aspects of video online and it is now part of almost every campaign we’re involved with. Good job we have the nous to to deploy it properly, effectively and relevantly.

Some examples:

My TiVO Gets Me

Canon

Control Freak

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According to eMarketer, North America is likely to surpass Asia Pacific in mobile gaming revenues due, largely, to the iPhone and the Apps store launch: “Screen Digest said the iPhone would drive mobile gaming revenues to more than $1.5 billion in North America in 2012, up from $930.5 million this year.” Worth a quick peek at this excellent posting I referred to in an earlier blog, that discusses the iPhone’s breakthrough from a developer’s point of view.

This again reinforces the notion that people are:

1. Hungry for content and entertainment on the move (eben if that means sitting on their couch)
2. Eager to maximize the investment they made in their spanking new iPhones
3. Happy to hand over ca$h for content if they’re given a safe, reliable, enjoyable and easy to use method (iTunes in this case).

Right, I’m off to dream up ideas for iPhone games that will make us $Millions.

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OK, my downer on Apple of recent might be a little uncalled for but even as a (very minor) shareholder I’m a little turned off at the moment.  Problems with the the latest operating systems for both desktop computers and servers, applications not being up to par, point releases coming in late and missing features and now the whole furor over the iPhone - sigh, bring me a cup of tea and a biscuit please - have made me feel a little lackadaisical towards the brand.

I do still love my iPone 1 and the latest software release has added utility and entertainment with the apps store but I’m not rushing out to get the new one.  So, I’m going on a little Apple/iPhone holiday.  As we’ve opened a new office over in London and because I’m from there I’m finding more and more excuses to jet across the Atlantic, so I’ve decided to get myself a second phone that I can plug a pay as you go sim card into and I’ve selected the well rates Nokia N-95.  Stacked with applications, 3.5G, GPS with Garmin Navigation and a whopping 5MegaPixel camera.  Most appropriate for a traveling man I reckon

If you think I’ve made a grave mistake, let me know and why.  I’ve really only skimmed over the reviews and I guess I’ll find out soon enough: the phone lands tomorrow!!

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Funny how even though I spent hours and hours and bundles of cash setting up an awesome home entertainment system, that the television remains predominantly my wife’s domain. It’s OK, because mostly I think TV is filled with crap. We enjoy movies together and show photos and home video (thanks to AppleTV), so I get my slice. So last night I took advantage of having the apartment to myself (oh and my dogs) to turn the volume up, crank up the sub-woofer and watch the animated Batman - Gotham Knight. Navigating the AppleTV interface is, as you would expect, perfectly intuitive and quite enjoyable, and when I landed on said movie, I thought that maybe I’d want to own it. However, my options were restricted to: Rent, Rent HD and buy, but with the buy option you only get the standard definition version.

DAMN!!! Content providers are still, unbelievably fighting digital distribution and hiding behind ignorance and paranoia. Their fear being that if they allowed you to buy the HD version, that you would automatically go rip it, burn it, duplicate it and sell it buy the thousands down on New York,s Canal Street , thus financially crippling the studios, networks and anyone else who’s cowering in the ignorance corner.

The fact remains and always will that piracy will always be here but will always be restricted to those making a (small) business out of it or/and are bothered to go through the countless steps to do so. Personally, I have the ability, technology and infrastructure to rip/download movies strip out the DRM and share with my friends and family. But I don’t because I can’t be bothered. I have endless better things to do with my time and sooner charge my time out to clients, who need me, for multiples over the value of a $15 movie.

As we all know, Apple boldly made this step with iTunes much to the derision of the entertainment community who mostly believed it wouldn’t work and that everyone would continue to download music via peer-peer networks. Wrong. Give people the right way to do things in an easy to use manner representing an enjoyable and utilitarian experience and they will (well over a billion songs sold on iTunes so far). Yes, the big record companies are still crying in their milk but their just too big and too old to change quickly. So is it just me, or is it crazy that the studios and networks are still fighting it?

Back to last night and my personal experience: I rented the HD movie for $4.99. I wouldn’t buy the SD version for $10, not with my awesome home entertainment system, no sir!! But, I would have gladly given them $15 of my hard earned moolah for a copy of the HD version, which would have sat very happily on my AppleTV, without ever being ripped, burned and shared with anyone else.

The next in my line of fire is the Telcos - an industry which has basically devolved into a monopoly once again - and the slow development of wireless technology in infrastructure and handsets compared with the rest of the world. Again, we see Apple rock the boat . Regardless of the shambles demonstrated at time of launch for the new 3G iPhone and regardless of what you or I think of the device. The most important aspect has been the incredible approach to digital distribution, here in terms of the developers kit and the application store. Super Monkey Ball has already made approximately $5million for Sega! Bloody incredible. I read a fantastic blog posting regarding mobile app development this morning. Worth a read and further evidence that traditional distribution channels are altering - significantly.

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Am I just a grumpy, cynical old fart or am I right in judging the hordes of people who have camped out overnight and are right now standing in lines all across America (and the world in fact) to be among the first to get their hands on the new 3G iPhone, as complete and utter losers? Apologies for the rather long sentence there.

I always ponder the motivation people have for getting something or getting in somewhere, especially when walking around New York city and seeing the lines of party goers desperately trying to get into the new new place.

Hey, don’t get me wrong, I’m a huge Apple fan and have successfully transitioned our two offices to Mac environment (the only PCs here are used for testing), but I really believe that nothing is worth begging for; not a cramped position in a night club and definitely not a phone. The hysteria is astonishing and ever more evidence that people are not far removed from their closest mammalian relative, the sheep.

So everyone get back out there and do something a little more positive with your time and pop into the Apple store later on, or tomorrow when there will be no line. 24 more hours without GPS and 3G is not going to kill you - I promise.

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