Metaverse Ethics (To Be Or Not To Meta-Be)

Last Monday, Korea's Ministry of Science and ICT updated the 'Expanded Virtual World Ethics Principles' it released last Summer. Now 3 core values and 8 principles are listed under a more buzzword-friendly title 'Metaverse Ethical Principles'.

As far as core values go, 'safe experience' and 'sustainable prosperity' were much more predictable than a 'sincere identity' you usually don't associate with virtual, avatar-filled meta-worlds. But remember that this is Korea, a netizen nation were you're never totally anonymous, and where most of your online experiences require a digital ID or a digital signature (often through public-private partnerships involving such platforms as Kakao or Naver) that keeps getting smarter and smarter, and wrapping around you with tighter and tighter technologies (biometrics and blockchain on the government's menu).

Likewise, if 7 of the 8 principles follow a classic playbook...

- 4 usual suspects: 'respect for privacy', 'protection of personal data', 'autonomy' (as in lack of coercion), 'reciprocity' / mutual respect

- 3 feel-good mantras: 'fairness' / equal access, 'inclusiveness', 'responsibility for the future' / sustainability

... one oddball looks disconnected from the metaverse's inherent... disconnection: 'authenticity' means that your virtual self should behave like your actual self, since the former will impact the latter.

Forget about role playing: that's you up there. The real you, even with those fangs and wings, this embarrassing cosplay, or this spectacular virtual gender correction. After all, this is Korea, where you can't escape plastic surgery, and where you can change your name on a whim. 

The metaverse is not an out of body experience: the economics of attention go 3D, and it's not only your clicks of browsing patterns that will be captured, but also the very way you move and breathe. The more you submerge yourself into it, the better you'll be decyphered, the faster your intentions and your decisions will be detected and shaped for you. 

The guidelines for users are one thing, and service providers have their own duties in that list, but it's mostly about not overdoing it, a very vague self moderation. And of course nothing about interoperability or portability, each one can lay its traps without many consequences. 

In short, the government tells users 'be responsible', but falls short of telling service providers a decent 'don't be evil'.

This is 2022, and the 2020 metaverse bubble has already kind of deflated, a bit like in the crypto / blockchain world, where the collapse of Do Kwon's Terraform predated that of FTX. Yet both remain strategic axes of competitiveness for Korea, so this wasn't the moment to clip the wings of players who were actually involved in these guidelines.

Ready, Player Won...

mot-bile 2022

(video: Naver Z / Zepeto Studio's world building teaser)

Meta-Fiction or Meta-Stasi?

You all remember that scary picture of Mark Zuckerberg walking in a room full of unsuspecting Oculus slaves, five years ago.

Yes, yes, there's also that eerie mugshot we used two years later in our fictional "Interview with the data vampire".

 

When Zuck presented the new brand covering all the group's activities, it really felt like everybody was invited to submerge themselves again into a rosy virtual future, and forget all about an inconvenient present: the Facebook Papers and whistleblower Frances Haugen's confirmations that the platform contributes to human trafficking, Trump's insurrection, antivaxxer movements etc*...

 

'Meta' is so Facebook. That's not Google's Alphabet, the alpha and the omega, controlling the keys and tools at the source of sharing knowledge. It's all about encompassing everything, absorbing as much as possible under a gigantic, pervasive umbrella. The ultimate, self-contemplative tech blob. An infinite loop no one can escape. 

If 'Meta' opens all possibilities, the MVRS ticker 'reduces' it to the 'metaverse' flavor of the month. See? We've got the label, we made that paradigm shift, Facebook joined the dotcom club of the twenties!

The self-proclaimed 'Social technology company' will not de-merge its activities but regroup all 'Family Apps'  (Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp, Messenger...) on one side and 'Reality Labs' (Oculus AR, Spark AR, Novi ewallet, Portal and Co.) on the other. As if to signify that somehow, these household names are not about reality, maybe closer to fiction. The toolbox and the black box.

Facebook could be such a wonderful platform if it were run properly and responsibly. Business as usual is not an option now, and certainly not when on metaverse steroids. The name change almost makes things worse, and people are expecting more than Andrew Bosworth (a.k.a. Boz the robot) and Nick Clegg (a.k.a. Scatterlings of Meta) claiming that Meta is 'building the metaverse responsibly'. Unless Facebook truly changes, it's bound to land somewhere between meta-fiction and meta-stasi.

mot-bile 2021

* let's put in the 'etc' that ad for 'Mein Kampf' Facebook proposed me the other day as a reward for browsing Republican contents (not the best incentive for reaching across the aisle).

DMU (a.k.a. The Shadow) v. Super-GAFA

March 11, 2020 - The UK Government takes a first measure to curb the progression of a devastating global, viral phenomenon across the nation by announcing a new Digital Markets Taskforce (and that coronavirus thing, which claimed its first British life the previous week? well... let's just wait and see, keep partying, and zoom towards herd immunity).

April 7, 2021 - The Digital Markets Unit is officially launched within the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA). Announced last November, the DMU is pitched as a tough superhero powerful enough to tame such supervillains as Google, Facebook, or Amazon, the 'SMS' level baddies (that's Strategic Market Status).

For the moment our superhero regulator is a 'shadow' without a proper license, and without any legal weapons, that will only become operational next year. Because we're talking about a launch "in 'shadow' non statutory form ahead of legislation granting its full powers. (...) The government will consult on the design of the new pro-competition regime this year and legislate to put the DMU on a statutory footing as soon as Parliamentary time allows."

Which leaves lobbyists plenty of time to show their muscle - picture Clark David Kent Cameron entering a BT phone booth to change into Supermean (BTW the Ofcom will be a key partner for The Shadow).

We've already seen plenty of action earlier - remember Facebook's memorable move, and Australia lawmakers pledging to defend the orphan and widow news companies? Frankly, I can't wait for the Netflix version of the novels published by the Taskforce ahead of Christmas: GAFA's answers to their Call For Information. My favorite remains Amazon's - the way they dismiss the need to even define their kind, the way they use the words 'care' and 'harm' when one of the key regulatory fights will be over the expected 'Duty of Care' for harmful contents... they've got great screenwriters for this Digital Markets Universe!

'A tough new regulator' - at least according to the Government's press release (20210407)

mot-bile 2021

Interview with the data vampire

mot-bile: 'Thank you, Mark Zuckerberg, for accepting this exclusive fake interview at our Agence Fausse Presse'

Mark Zuckerberg: 'Actually, I thought that was yet another subpoena, but now that I'm here, I might as well answer'.

mb: 'Well so far, you didn't provide many answers to European or American judges and committees. Apologies, yes, solutions, not really. Seriously, after all the scandals and bad press surrounding you and Facebook, do you still believe you can become President some day?'

MZ: 'Facebook helped a very despicable man get the job once, why not twice? I'm only 34, and by Clinton standards, probably 'likable enough'. Plus, if I'm using Definers Public Affairs to get at George Soros' throat, I don't need Cambridge Analytica to get into your head. By the way, you're a very troubled person.'

mb: 'Takes one to know one, thank you. You're not as publicly weird as say Elon Musk, but there's at least some cold aspergersian nerdness in you. And obviously, you don't seem to mind playing, like Bill Gates in the 80s, the role of the supreme techno-villain with pervasive reach.'

MZ: 'I learned everything from him, including the pseudo philanthropic narrative involving our best halves. While the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation helps Monsanto infiltrate Africa, our Chan Zuckerberg Initiative basically serves as a vehicle to remote control Facebook, and the human population that comes with it, while Sheryl Sandberg takes most bullets.'

mb: 'So you control Facebook, even when you say it's impossible to control it.'

MZ: 'We're working on it, and A.I. helps a lot. All humans have to do is to give up all control, so that we can ultimately get the most holistic systems to monitor them.'

mb: 'The thing is you're also giving up all moral standards. I mean, how far lower can it go now, after your latest underage bride auction?'

MZ: 'Never underestimate human lowness. You don't want to know what happens every day on Facebook.'

mb: 'But you do. And even when you don't, you monetize it. I wonder which ads ran for the bidders during that sick auction.'

MZ: 'There are bad guys out there, but we're not totally evil. If China blocks us, that's because we herald Western freedom.'

mb: 'If China blocks you, that's because they envy your alienating system, and want to develop their own blend of behavioral control.'

MZ: 'China's Social Credit system will never be as popular as Facebook. They can become even more pervasive and amoral than us if they want, it's fundamentally bad for business to let your users know how much it costs them actually.'


mot-bile 2018

Click and mortar v. Click and mortar

Where you live, where you work, and where things happen are not necessarily the same places. Yet, even as technology abolishes distances, major trends tend to emerge from creative ecosystems that are not too stretched.

The model becomes more challenging where real estate and technology bubbles coexist. Will San Francisco ever recover its soul? How long will Berlin or Montreal remain affordable? Artists can hop from Brooklyn to Queens or New Jersey, but can they still feel the vibes when they return to Manhattan?

All majors are building artificial ecosystems around new headquarters, following more or less open patterns (See "Google's Gtown wins over ZeeTown and the Large Apple Collider" after "Zee Talk of Zee Town").

Somehow, these utopian projects celebrate urban failures, a mutual transplant rejection.

If startup ecosystems often play crucial roles in urban regeneration, it's more complex for big players to play god beyond a simple hotspot, such as a Google Campus for instance.

Xavier Niel's Station F is truly monumental, but neither open, nor really connected to its direct neighborhood - how many smaller fishes will fray near this titanic aquarium? how far can it stretch and transform eastern Paris?

Talking about massive concrete platforms... I'm also curious to see how my beloved Seun Sangga will evolve. The city of Seoul wants to turn this whale of a building into a startup hub, leveraging its unique DNA. But can you force it down its throat? Can the fragile ecosystem survive storytelling, even well intended?

One thing seems clear: if good and sound urbanism can foster and nurture innovation, you shouldn't overplan, and you should make space not just for the insiders and outsiders, but also for the fifty shades inbetween.

mot-bile 2017

Now MAP me: Facebook testing OpenCellular

A promising start-up is "Introducing OpenCellular: An open source wireless access platform", "an open source and cost-effective, software-defined wireless access platform aimed to improve connectivity in remote areas of the world", "supporting everything from 2G to LTE".

This Mobile Access Platform prolongs the equally open Telecom Infra Project, and sports the same green-white-blue colors.

Green white blue? Is this humanitarian NGO from Sierra Leone?

Well that's tree hugger green, open source white, and Facebook blue. Spot the oddball. 

Facebook, the control freak of your personal data, wants to be a driving force in next gen wireless through the whole value chain, and Zuck doesn't want to miss a beat (see "Networks: the TIP of Facebook's iceberg"). If Facebook failed at the handset level, they want to be in the loop for future standards.

So their PR provided another picture, less appealing to the great( outdoor)er audience, but more relevant for the core target of developers, who must hop in, chime in, and make this platform the winning proposition for MNOs across the world...

... particularly the ones in developping nations with booming consumer bases and huge coverage issues.

mot-bile 2016

Networks: the TIP of Facebook's iceberg

Earlier this year, Facebook gave us a TIP (Telecom Infra Project*) about what could come next for them at the infrastructure level. Most members of the project, starting with Intel, Nokia, SK Telecom, Deutsche Telekom, are also on board of Facebook's much wider Open Compute Project, which also claims top coopetitor Google.

Naturally, Menlo Park wants a front seat for next gen network premieres - typically, early bird SKT is expected to be the first on 5G. But recent announcements*** at the F8 days confirm that the company intends to reach deeper into the value chain to secure and strenghten its leadership, particularly where innovation in network performance can prevent bottlenecks in these pervasive big data / heavy content times.

Terragraph (WiGig WiFi on 60 GHz) proposes ultra efficient W-LAN coverage for dense urban areas. You only need a station every 200 to 250 m. Of course it doesn't provide seamless handover, but a 200 m radius allows you more mobility than your typical hotspot.

Project ARIES (Antenna Radio Integration for Efficiency in Spectrum - MIMO) is more into W-WAN for rural areas. It combines 96 antennas to manage 24 simultaneous data streams, and aims at over 100 bps / Hz compared to 71 in early trials.

Here too, for a fraction of the price of a standard infra...
 
Could Facebook become a non-2-to-5G MNO, or a player in the game of standards? Not so fast. But an even more competitive value aggregator, certainly.

mot-bile 2016

* telecominfraproject.com
** opencompute.org 
*** "Introducing Facebook's new terrestrial connectivity systems — Terragraph and Project ARIES" (Facebook 20160414) 

Google's Gtown wins over ZeeTown and the Large Apple Collider

As soon as Facebook revealed the plans of Zuckerbergville ("Zee Talk of Zee Town"), Google presented its future headquarters on its official blog*.

Big G will still reside in Mountain View, but in North Bayshore District. And double its capacity to 20,000 employees.

Waterway? Check. Highway? Check. But the rendering is much sexier and futuristic, and there's a nice video to support it (YouTube of course):

With its organic touch and absence of cars, Gtown looks more like a city of the future than Zeetown, probably because Google is much more into hardware innovation than Facebook. Furthermore, the architect is not a 85 year old legend (Zuck's Gehry) but two fun looking younger guns: Bjarke Ingels (Bjarke Ingels Group) and Thomas Heatherwick (Heatherwick Studio). Where Z looked for a brand, G went for sense and the essence. 

Granted, I'm unfairly comparing headquarters with employee quarters, and the constraints are not the same. But these projects speak volumes about differences in approaches and projected images.

Nothing as scary as the dystopian panopticon / large apple colliderish Apple Campus 2 announced two years ago. Now that's One Infinite Loop if I ever saw one:

Consistent with a hardware manufacturer used to proprietary systems...

mot-bile 2015

* see "Rethinking office space"

Zee Talk of Zee Town

Welcome to Zuckerbergville, 200-acre of sentient brick-and-mortar right across the Menlo Park headquarters, a paradise where Facebook will be able to monitor every move of 10,000 employees: who's buying what where? who's sleeping with whom when? just like your good old Facebook, but In Real Life.

Looking for the Hatespeech Arena? Start from Hacker Way, follow Push Marketing Avenue, and at the Cookie Roundabout, take a right turn. Never leave the NSA lanes, and try to avoid the Snowden Cul-de-Sac.

Frank Gehry has been invited to run his software and to propose a curvier cityscape than this dull 2012 project:

The 2012, Pre-Gehry Zuckerbergville

Gehry's fee must be comfortable, but only a tiny drop in Zuckerberg's multibillion dollar Zanadu. The land itself didn't cost too much: $400M for the last 55-acres, that's only $1,800 per sqm. You're on the waterfront, but also on a highway. And your HQ are on the other side of the Bayfront Expressway. Maybe they'll dig a tunnel for the commuters, and soundwalls to make sure employees get some sleep. Some Privacy? Don't even think about it. Your contract stipulates that you let your Samsung Smart TV on night and day*.

Ironically, the main street in the area is called Constitution Drive. Maybe Zuckerberg, who likes to build "the Hacker Way"**, has also his own special definition of the word 'Constitution'. I wonder if We the People of Zee-Town will enjoy Net Neutrality. And if visitors will need to sign special terms of service when they enter the Zee-Zone.


mot-bile 2015

* the EPIC (Electronic Privacy Information Center) just filed a complaint with the FTC (Federal Trade Commission) over privacy concerns regarding private conversations.
** "As part of building a strong company, we work hard at making Facebook the best place for great people to have a big impact on the world and learn from other great people. We have cultivated a unique culture and management approach that we call the Hacker Way. The word “hacker” has an unfairly negative connotation from being portrayed in the media as people who break into computers. In reality, hacking just means building something quickly or testing the boundaries of what can be done. Like most things, it can be used for good or bad, but the vast majority of hackers I’ve met tend to be idealistic people who want to have a positive impact on the world. The Hacker Way is an approach to building that involves continuous improvement and iteration. Hackers believe that something can always be better, and that nothing is ever complete. They just have to go fix it — often in the face of people who say it’s impossible or are content with the status quo."

Google From 'Forge Me' To 'Forget Me', Facebook From Emoticons To Emotics

Facebook doesn't stop at asking you in which mood you feel, it wants to decide how you should feel (see "Facebook reveals news feed experiment to control emotions" - The Guardian - 20140630). You don't chose your emoticon, the platform embeds one into your own mind. "Emotics" as the ultimate marketing/propaganda tool: I want you to feel thirsty before this ad for Coke, I want you to feel insecure before we beef up our intrusive security systems, I want you to feel sympathy or aversion for this industrial or religious lobby before lawmakers convene, I want you to feel good/bad about this candidate before the elections...

Guess what, Facebook remains a media with a clear editorial line: to make money, we'll do whatever it takes, and with such an amoral leader as Mark Zuckerberg, you'll never know how far (low) we can go. For example to open up new markets like, say, China.

Europe has already forced Google to propose a "Forget Me" function for those who want to opt out of the standard "Forge Me" treatment. So the ideal of that other pervasive, blue, big brother may not be totally dead yet.

mot-bile 2014

Facebook has a blind date with Oculus VR

Facebook added Oculus VR to its portfolio.

The star product is the Oculus Rift headset..

... compared to which Google Glass looks much less autistic...

... but then we're not talking about the same kind of eyewear, human "inter-face", or applications - with Google Glass 1.0 at least. 

Besides, Oculus also proposes a Development Kit that captures motion IRL:

Apprehending environments and interactions is key in internet everywhere / internet everywear / internet of things times. Regardless of which devices will prevail when 5G is ready, you want to be at the key entry points, have your say at key standardization levels. 

Virtual Reality already enjoys moneymaking applications (e.g. games), and the ecosystem is much more advanced than say holograms, to name another 5Gology darling.

And the nerd factor is sooo Zuckerberg.

mot-bile 2014

With WhatsApp, what Facebook gets is what you pay

With 450 M active users of one of the most pivotal services - messaging, WhatsApp is already an interesting catch for Facebook. But the best thing about WhatsApp subscribers is that in order to keep the service after the first year, they must pay a fee. Only 99 cents a year for now, but on a messaging platform, you can plug in an infinity of free or paid apps.

How many of these 450 M active users are actually paid subs? Probably much less than the half, since the bulk of the growth has been made over the past 12 months (e.g. 350 M active users back in October 2013). The key question is how many will want to pay knowing that Facebook will be tempted to peek into their messages and somehow monetize stuff. Beyond advertising, off limits according to Facebook; WhatsApp already pledges to bar ads, and Facebook needs new kinds of revenue streams, preferably CtoC or BtoC for a change. I bet that WhatsApp user fora are going to scrutinize any changes in the fine print of privacy and terms...

Business models are one thing, brands and platforms another: they too open up new horizons for Menlo Park at a time when churn rates get worrying.

Today, Google rules with the two most powerful search engines, its main service and YouTube... but both are free. Facebook already raised many eyebrows when it launched its vanity URL service precisely because terms and conditions opened the door to future fees, and a non-free Facebook could be the final straw for many users on the verge of deleting their accounts. Keeping WhatsApp as it is sounds a wiser bet to collect recurrent fees from hundreds of millions of endusers, but wisdom doesn't seem to exist in Zuckerberg's dictionary.

Anyway, the winner is WhatsApp founder Jan Koum: waiting one year before giving in to Facebook's siren calls proved very profitable for him.

mot-bile 2014

Windows Mobile Go Home

The mercato is over, and while Vodafone-Verizon clinched a long expected Tottenham-Real Madrid-Garreth-Bale kind of deal, Nokia and Microsoft ended their 1990s rivalry at Intertoto Cup levels.

EUR 3.79 bn for the business units, and EUR 1.65 bn for the patents: that's all Nokia mobiles and their 32,000 employees are worth today. To add insult to injury, the buyer is generous. Microsoft would have dreamed to do just that a decade ago but today, the move sounds like a bitter defeat for two former foes years of decline had already brought close to each other (to the point Nokia's CEO - an aptly named Mr Elop - came from Redmond).

Blackberry should follow soon, but even that won't save Windows Mobile OS. Microsoft will have to leave its incredible shrinking comfort zone, slash royalties, or why not go Home, like Facebook did (a much cheaper mode of diffusion for blue screens).

Of course, the move doesn't disrupt in any way the ecosystem. It only puts more pressure on Steve Ballmer's successor. Google can rest for a little while: these days, neither Apple nor Microsoft seem to have a clue, and software-wise, Samsung remains a gnome. So no major challenges in the short term except themselves, regulators, or a new alternative popping up out of the blue (China could do that, but trust would be an issue).


mot-bile 2013

Facebook Home, a Mobile - Virtual OS Operator?

Mark Zuckerberg, who's doing a pretty good job at following Bill Gates' footsteps, reinvented the blue screen with Facebook Home.

The meta-app (embedded in HTC First for proof of concept) basically puts your Android experience in the background - nevermind the mobile network operator, that fabled 2G hero. And Google already faced a win-back surge from manufacturers, Samsung leading the way with a suite of me-too apps on time for Galaxy S3*...

Even if only 5% of hardcore mobile Facebook users switch to this "Virtual OS Operator" Facebook Home, that's going to have a significant effect, including for key partners. For instance, Bing's performances will significantly improve in all fields: search engine, mapping, translation, value aggregation... remember how Google Maps caught up with Daum Map and Naver Map within months in Korea?

Feeling blue? Seeing red? No green robot around?

But of course, too much Facebook kills Facebook, and all attempts to control the user interface and customer experience have failed so far when the brand is too overwhelming (and Google was pretty good at hiding its brand on Android).

If hardware and OS become commodities, personal environments remain personal... or at least the main ruler remains smart enough to let endusers believe they do remain personal.

mot-bile 2013

* see "Anovations for Applelatres: Apple has lost its compass"

joyn or die? forget about KakaoTalk and Anipang?

Remember last year, when KakaoTalk celebrated its 10 millionth user (see "Kakao Talk of the day")?

Well, 1000 days after launch, the Korean player claims 70 M users in 13 languages, with daily averages of 27 M users, 43 mn per user, and 4.2 billion messages. Even if Skype remains far ahead with its 280 M users (and the support of Microsoft* - whatever that's worth nowadays), Kakao Inc. has already become a global phenomenon  - maybe level 5 on Gangnam Style scale - , and remains as ambitious as ever.

The way Anipang on KakaoTalk turned into an instant hit in the competitive game apps arena** probably scared the heck out of pure players (messaging services, VoIP...), not to mention much bigger netcos, starting at home with Daum and Naver, two giants on the Korean market who've - so far - failed to reach international recognition. Note that Kakao Inc. founder KIM Beom-soo is not an outsider: he created Hangame Communications, Inc., and headed NHN after the merger with Naver.

Even top players are paying attention. Sundaytoyz (Anipang's developer) is not Rovio, and Kakao is not Facebook, but I bet many people in Menlo Park start wondering what kind of value the Kakao platform will aggregate after games. And if Big G can leverage its superiority in searches to boost Google Voice (and counter Apple's Siri), the brand itself is not exactly a success.

Of course, the most nervous of all coopetitors are the MNOs, who see their customers use KakaoTalk for their calls and messages, and their own networks, even LTE-enabled, glogged with that booming data traffic. No wonder all 3 Korean cellcos decided to implement joyn, the GSMA's "Rich Communication Services" platform.

To start with, the "joyn" logo is the perfect anti-KakaoTalk: a double black on yellow speech bubble to counter a single yellow on black speech bubble. And RCS brings what operators who cooperate do best: interoperability. As the GSMA puts it in its sales pitch, the solution "delivers an experience beyond voice and SMS by providing them with instant messaging or chat, live video and file sharing across any device, on any network, with all the enabled contacts in their address book".

That's what cellcos will sell to their endusers - something young, sexy, colorful:

But first, the GSMA must convince its own customers, the MNOs, to implement the solution. Everybody must be on board for the promise to be delivered.

So further down the same page, the sales pitch sounds much more defensive and frigthening:

"Don't lose out to OTT  – stay competitive and innovate with APIs

Your consumers are hungry for access to the entertainment and interaction offered by RCS-based apps. Agile and innovative, Over The Top (OTT) providers are exploiting the massive penetration of Smartphones by developing appealing rich communication apps available at little or no cost to the consumer.

Research conducted by one operator discovered a direct link between the penetration rate of cross-platform messaging services and the reduction of outgoing SMS traffic. Without RCS, the decline of voice messaging is likely to be next, as consumers increasingly engage with alternative IP based voice solutions.

Once consumers start using an OTT app service, that offering becomes, for them, the lead brand for communications services. Operators remain more competitive by responding more rapidly to consumers’ expectations and behaviour, and by using RCS to enhance the value of their network and bring richer calls to their consumers."

And those most dramatic final words: "Act now before it’s too late - Implement RCS today!"

Stop pulling your hair out, try this air lotion and stop the airtime loss. We don't guarantee return of love.

And be quick: the end is nigh.


mot-bile 2012

* see "Skype keeps moving, Google googling"
** over 20 M downloads, only on Android (iOS to follow soon)

Klout, I pronounce you Gilty

Buzztime for Gilt and Klout?

That's 3 hype words in one 5 word sentence, so let me rephrase it: online fashion retailer Gilt proposes discounts depending on the Klout score of its members.

Klout calculates individual influence scores (from 0 to 100) by aggregating behavioral data from various social networking services (Twitter, Facebook, Google+, LinkedIn...), and other partners. The concept rewards people who boast about how they fare on Klout, and actually monetizes social networking behaviors by offering 'perks' to the guys who behave well with selected partners.


That's were Gilt jumps in. For this member-only service based on flash sales, buzz plays a key role. Their glossy website looks quite different from the more sober Klout.com, but basically that's the same ego flattering concept: you're smarter than the rest of the crowd, you belong to a special breed of shoppers/influencers. A partnership with Klout makes sense to recruit new members as well as to ensure high turnouts for each sale...

Not to mention, of course, a more lucrative IPO.

mot-bile 2012

* see "Gilt Groupe, Inc. and Klout Partner to Offer First-of-its-Kind Reward to Users"

Facebook's Initial Privacy Offering

Dear Friends and Neighbors,

My Wall and Wall Street are about to become an item: we're all going public, and you'll have to issue a profit warning each time I unlike you nth kitten picture.

Yet Facebook Initial Public Offering remains a non-event: Facebook has been milking our relationship from the beginning, and even with his 11M+ friends, Mark Zuckerberg has never been much of a philanthropist. The question was "when", and the answer is "now".

Now the other question remains: until when?

It doesn't have to come from the next big thing (a 4D, 5G meshroom cloud? the SOPAtriot Act?): remaining at the top happens to be difficult, even for a free, pervasive platform. And even a 800 pound gorilla can get off your back (I recently mentioned the potential Tripodization of Facebook: "Cloud Portability"). Furthermore, money won't do you much good without a vision. Look at Rupert Murdoch, who after losing over half a billion bucks on MySpace, delivers his pearls of conservative wisdom* for free over Twitter. And speaking of doing good: Google started being evil after its IPO...

... Come to think of it: Zuck started as a bad guy.

mot-bile 2012

*if such a thing exists.

Cloud Portability

You is everywhere. Ubiquitous, yet with different levels of thickness depending on platforms and contexts. A change of temperature, and parts of your cloud precipitate into big drops for everyone to look and feel.

You is the marrow of the backbone. The bread earner for a Google or a Facebook, maybe a former unwilling employee of a Yahoo! or a MySpace.

You is stuck in a net, hooked, dependent. You has the mother of all monkeys on you's back. You can't kick the habit. You can't see a future without the virtual past you amassed over the years.

You probably doesn't remember Tripod, the killer app of yore. Picture this: a customized homepage, featuring whatever you fancy about you...

You, online.

Tripod joined Lycos (yeah, go-get-it Lycos, a star of the silent internet times - limited colors, dial-up, only background track the faxlike connection), and followed its master to Germany (Bertelsmann), Spain (Telefonica), and Korea (Daum). Now both brands belong to Ybrant Digital (India). Tripod fetches domain names for the digital marketing group. Unlike most internet ventures, Tripod took some time to deserve its brand: is still walking around, but with a cane. At least, they're making a few bucks with the brand. Yahoo! totally euthanized Geocities.

I'm not digressing. Lycos was the first netco to make a decent living. And the most disruptive moment I remember about Tripod is when they announced the portability of homepages. Competition remained one click away, but you could switch with all your belongings.

Social network portability is much more complex. Friendships and synapses reach beyond simple pages or links. But we'll have to get there some day.

And who knows, 20 years from now, some South Sudanese venture shall sell capacity under the brand Facebook.

mot-bile 2012

Amazon, Facebook Smartphones? Who cares for Nokia Siemens Networks?

The coming holiday season is strategic for tablet market shares, and that's one of the main reasons why Apple blocked the Samsung Galaxy Tabs in key countries. Cupertino lawyers didn't even try to stop Amazon's Kindle Fire in spite of its vague iPhone 1G design: this low cost gizmo is not a direct competitor, it contributes to democratize the tablet format, and by contrast enhances the coolness of iPad in places where Galaxy's not available.

If the commoditization of tablets will take more time than it did for smartphones, it won't take ages either. Apple obviously intends to milk the cow as long as it can, and to make sure it doesn't miss the next wave. Meanwhile, Samsung doesn't seem to make the most of its leadership in bigger screens because what Smart TV needs is a leader in value aggregation. Unless your TV remains a dumb screen and your smartbox grows wings.

Smartphones will keep getting smarter, but frankly I don't care if Facebook, Amazon, and the countless players rumored to work on them launch one or not.

I care for the 17,000 people kindly fired by Nokia Siemens Networks by the end of next year, a measure shamelessly presented as a "new strategy" ("Nokia Siemens Networks puts mobile broadband and services at the heart of its strategy; initiates restructuring to maintain long-term competitiveness and improve profitability").

Fair enough, networks have never been sexy in this sector. Except maybe when there were more base stations than mobile subscribers, and when handsets were bigger than Macintoshes. But NSN can sound as attractive as SNS, and if it really wants to put "services at the heart of its strategy", all it has to do is to rephrase its press release.

I'd suggest: "Introducing "Newstrategization", our latest killer app".

mot-bile 2011

Samsung SH100 : from your camera to your social network

A Wifi camera, a keyboard enabled touch screen, a remote viewfinder Android app and voila, your picture straight to YouTube or to your Facebook page.

You can bet the said app will itself be connected to the existing Samsung Mobile Print app, which allows me to print wirelessly from my Samsung Galaxy phone or my Samsung Sens laptop to my Samsung Printer.

Sooner or later, my Samsung Fridge shall join the party to spit shopping lists out, but I don't have the Wifi model yet.

Next thing you know, SGR-1, Samsung's killer-robot that has been patrolling the DMZ since last year, will update his status on his twitter account ("shot a crane today - getting rusty I guess").

mot-bile 2011

PS: and as far as Samsung's army of 400 lawyers is concerned, they just sent one message to Apple : bring it on (see "Samsung Electronics cleared of infringement of Japanese patents" after "Apple heart(break)s Samsung")