Saturday, April 02, 2005
Reading Your Cell Phone
Japan is way ahead of us when it comes to Reading Books On Cell Phones : "Your eyes probably hurt just thinking about it: Tens of thousands of Japanese cell-phone owners are poring over full-length novels on their tiny screens. ... Several mobile Web sites offer hundreds of novels - classics, best sellers and some works written especially for the medium. ... In the latest versions, cell-phone novels are downloaded in short installments and run on handsets as Java-based applications. You're free to browse as though you're in a bookstore, whether you're at home, in your office or on a commuter train. A whole library can be tucked away in your cell phone - a gadget you carry around anyway. "
One of the most fascinating aspect of this trend is the emergence of new highly interactive models for creating and marketing book products. Consider the case of Yoshi who began by posting novel installments on his cell-phone site, asking for voluntary payment. His stories captured a young audience and resulted in a movie, a TV show and a comic book.
As reported, he : " sees his readers as "a community," reads the dozens of e-mail messages teenage fans send him daily and uses their material for story ideas.
He also knows immediately when readers are getting bored and changes the plot when access tallies start dipping for his stories.
"It's like playing live music at a club," he said. "You know right away if the audience isn't responding, and you can change what you're doing right then and there." "
That's a markedly different approach to developing, marketing and distributing 'creative content' than the current US focus on major media-content companies trying to protect their existing business models from technology. I wonder if it will catch on here?
Random House has made a licensing deal with VOCAL to provide cell-phone access for some of their products, such as foriegn language study programs. Perhaps some big players are positioning themselves to take advantage of the coming deployment of very high bandwidth cellular phone services. These 4th generation services will accelerate the use of cell phones for relaying data and photos and downloading music and video. The e-reading application may be small in comparison but still be popular and profitable as a relatively low cost add-on feature.
I think that two developments are key to the growth of e-reading - one is multi-media convergence on low cost platforms such as cellular handsets, PDAs, iPods, and PSPs; the other is availability of copyrighted material for digital distribution. Hopefully, Random House's interest may signal that the content owners are looking for new creative ways to market their goods.
One of the most fascinating aspect of this trend is the emergence of new highly interactive models for creating and marketing book products. Consider the case of Yoshi who began by posting novel installments on his cell-phone site, asking for voluntary payment. His stories captured a young audience and resulted in a movie, a TV show and a comic book.
As reported, he : " sees his readers as "a community," reads the dozens of e-mail messages teenage fans send him daily and uses their material for story ideas.
He also knows immediately when readers are getting bored and changes the plot when access tallies start dipping for his stories.
"It's like playing live music at a club," he said. "You know right away if the audience isn't responding, and you can change what you're doing right then and there." "
That's a markedly different approach to developing, marketing and distributing 'creative content' than the current US focus on major media-content companies trying to protect their existing business models from technology. I wonder if it will catch on here?
Random House has made a licensing deal with VOCAL to provide cell-phone access for some of their products, such as foriegn language study programs. Perhaps some big players are positioning themselves to take advantage of the coming deployment of very high bandwidth cellular phone services. These 4th generation services will accelerate the use of cell phones for relaying data and photos and downloading music and video. The e-reading application may be small in comparison but still be popular and profitable as a relatively low cost add-on feature.
I think that two developments are key to the growth of e-reading - one is multi-media convergence on low cost platforms such as cellular handsets, PDAs, iPods, and PSPs; the other is availability of copyrighted material for digital distribution. Hopefully, Random House's interest may signal that the content owners are looking for new creative ways to market their goods.
