After nearly a year as Radium's EP of Integrated Media, I am just in the early stages of planning a new venture. I do believe that there is an enormous amount of opportunity right now. In the coming weeks I will begin to express some of that vision here. The main consideration now is that everything is data.
Remember when 2012 was used in sci-fi books as a futuristic date that was so far in the future it was almost impossible to imagine?
Here is an interesting article by way of Silicon Alley Insider written by Michael Learmonth.
It give some coverage of Jack Myers' networking breakfast: "Economics of the New Television Marketplace
Myers makes a prediction that within four years 40% of all video consumption would occur outside of the television set. That's according to a poll of nearly 300 media execs by Myers and video tracking firm Teletrax.
This isn't as bold a statement as it may seem on the surface. Consider that people spend more than 40% for their day at work. Consider also that nearly 8 minutes of every half hour of network television is advertising. If there is anything interesting here it is that consumptive behavior and content delivery systems are evolving to replace much of the time in front of the TV. Download times are nearly a thing of the past quality of the viewing experience has become embedded in Moore's law.
Where and when things are going to get interesting is when IPTV and other set-top / console devices evolve to make searching, watching and storing online video content as seemless as channel surfing.
Integrating the data of "video / content" with the other intelligent systems we use throughout of lives and lifestyles is what is evolving.
Here is a great article on GigaOM about a near to launch ad supported casual game site - NeoEdge. The article is announcing the fact that Nolan Bushnell, the father of video games, has become the newly appointed Chairman of The Board. I highly recommend reading the entire piece.
The Following paragraph really hit home for me.
“The casual game space is wonderful but has had bad economics,” Bushnell said.
As both a supporter and watcher of the casual games market, he’s noticed the disjunct between the audience for games and the platforms on which they ran. “When you looked at the console game market, the domestic market got stuck at about 15 million,” he noted. Meanwhile the audience of players in the casual market, primarily defined as simple web-based games, totals some 80 million in the U.S., comprising 34 percent of all American Internet users, according to Parks Research.
Roughly 98 percent of those casual gamers, however, don’t pay to play, Terry noted. “We’re not saying the purchase of games goes away,” he said, but at least an ad network will make that audience monetizable.
The last gem of wisdom from Nolan is “When you change the economics and allow easy publishing, you unlock the floodgate to creativity….You have the chance of unintended consequences on the positive side.”
If you believe anyone's own press anymore... "Playyoo will launch an exciting new community based on mobile games. You will be able to make your own games, challenge friends and strangers, and download free games to your mobile phone with minimum hassle."
Just curious how playing with strangers scores on the casual gamers' fun card..
I am keeping an open eye on the mobile game space. I think that there are some very interesting opportunities on the horizon and that there will be some content shifting along the way. It is absolutely clear that mobile computing and casual behaviors have a big future. I am interested in seeing how branded content makes its way into the pipe.
