Apple Tablet, or iSlate, or Google Whatever

What's in a domain name ? When a company takes an URL it's not necessarily to use it*. It can be a defensive move, for instance to limit noise around one of its brands.

Tracking domain names for major corporations is now part of day to day routine when you are into business intelligence, that's the reason why companies who want to remain discreet use a proxy. Arnold Kim just reignited rumors about an Apple Tablet to be launched early next year ("Apple Purchased iSlate.com in 2007. Apple's New Tablet Called iSlate?" - MacRumors.com 20091224), but iSlate happens to be the name of an Apple Store app...

... which doesn't change anything : the best way to protect a brand is to use it, and iSlate would make a nice brand to rival the "tablet" label (I can't see Apple marketing a "tablet device" any more than I can see it mention "PC" for its own devices).

Anyway Apple needs to propose a solution for scribblers, sketchers, and their readers. Google has yet to join the netbook party, but I can't see Google NOT working on some android thing or another in that field, and not just to fill the fabled 20 percent time.

ebooks, tablets, and related mobile devices are nothing new but they are bound to have a better decade than the one which is about to end.

mot-bile 2009

* I recently got rid of the bulk I owned after my registrar tripled the annual fees, and some have been snatched right away but that's OK.

UPDATE 20100118

Apple is expected to announce the entertainment gizmo (ebook, movies, music...) in an event on January 27th.

AOL, Time, Warner

AOL keeps shopping at Google to prepare its spin off from Time Warner : Shashi Seth will be Senior VP of Global Advertising Products, serving under President Jeff Levick (formerly Google) and AOL CEO Tim Armstrong (formerly Google). AOL itself shall relocate its headquarters in Mountain View, CA (always Google).

Still mother company Time Warner is expected to get rid of its other "half" : a Capital Group director gave more than a few hints about a Time Inc. spin off, leaving basically Warner on its own.

OK. Warner Brothers (Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment, Inc. - wbie.com ) still have many gems, HBO, CNN, Warner Brothers Games or the newly formed DC Entertainment Inc., a superhero vehicle to counter the Disney-Marvel League. Furthermore, getting rid of paper along with the industry's massive (but everyday more cashless) flow now could land them on a green paper mattress of around half a dozen billion bucks or more (why not from Google, now that lifeless LIFE Magazine archives are on Google Books ?).

TIME may be struggling, the brand remains... timeless. And the Warner group would be brandless : its umbrella has already been torn away in 2004, when Warner Music Group left. That day, Edgar Bronfman, Jr. made a comeback Steve Case will never try - too much involved in mortarizing his native Hawai'i thanks to his clickally owned billions, and in his Case Foundation (basically, a foundation fundraising enabler - fooled me once...).

All major media / entertainment groups need to refocus, but this major is not really keeping a... major. I mean they more into distribution than media, more into production than creation, more into rights and franchises management than brand management. Harry Potter is a beautiful franchise and the final (double) movie will probably break all records but it's not as if they owned it. And Harry will neither resuscitate Warner, nor resuscitate, period.

Don't worry. Warner will stay afloat for awhile*. But I hope they have other ambitions than exposing "Adult Swim" to entertain us.


* particularly if they keep discarding BUs... need a broom with a (Mountain) view ?

SK Telecom's Semestrus Horribilis

The light at the end of the tunnel ?

Starting August 8, Hanarotelecom will offer quad play bundles featuring synergies with its new owner SK Telecom (probably under the SK Broadband brand). Telemarketing operations, suspended following a scandal over personal information leaks, are to resume August 11.

When SKT integrated it last February 22, Hanarotelecom claimed a 24.6% market share for broadband internet subscriptions (3.6M, 1M of which FTTH : 100Mbps optical LAN network coverning over 12M households), and 8.9% for fixed telephony (2M lines).

SKT paid a dear price for this, not to mention a few obligation imposed by the regulator (to open their mobile internet gates beyond Nate, to share access to their 800MHz frequencies, to invest massively in suburban networks...), and legal consequences of the personal information scandal. SKT considers suing former shareholders Newbridge and AIG for not mentioning this practice :
Hanarotelecom has been massively losing customers (even on the booming IPTV market : Hana TV has lost 50,000 customers over H1 2008 while KT's Mega TV gained 220,000 and myLGtv 70,000), thousands are filing for a class action suit, and even more through direct channels.

After a first half of 2008 which saw local rivals KTF and LG Telecom revive, US rival Virgin absorb Helio, and such brands as TU media and T struggle, SK Telecom has an opportunity to redeem itself, provided it delivers the goods and wages the convergence wars as a respectful leader.

A disruptive move would be to boost VoIP on a market that lags behind many others, to the risk of endangering voice revenues even in the mobile business. It's time to leverage on SKT's already multiplatform services and to restore some of the brand's fun factor.