When’s the Apple iGame Coming?

By Mark Evans in Apple/iPod 4 Comments

Leopard capped off an incredible year for Apple but 2008 looks like it could be as exciting.

Perhaps the biggest question – at least in many quarters – is when Apple is going to charge into the lucrative video game business. What? Yes, Apple is getting into video game; it’s just a matter of time.

Apple’s strategy goes back to 2005 when it filed a patent application for the iPod that covered a wide variety of applications, including data, text, music, video and computer games. (For an in-depth look at Apple’s patent activity and what it means, check out Core77). For conspiracy theorists or people who believe where there’s smoke, there’s fire, the patent is really Apple’s strategic roadmap.

The rumblings about video games is now being heard within the analyst community, which has started to look at Apple’s prospects for next year.

In a research note earlier this week, UBS Securities’ Ben Reitzes said his financial model for 2008 does not include “potential new products” such as “ultra-portable devices, a pay-per-view service, gaming opportunities and new phone models. We look forward to new products at Macworld in January.” If analysts are starting to talk about “gaming opportunities”, something’s up.

The video-game market appears to be a no-brainer for Apple. It’s enormous – expected to hit $46-billion worldwide by 2010, according to PWC; the demographic that plays video games is similar to iPod users; and the emergence of high-speed wireless networks should make it easier for consumers to download games so they can play on the go.

While Apple has yet to release a game-focused iPod (although the Touch looks like it could be pretty game-friendly), there is a market emerging. Electronic Arts, for example, has added iPod versions of “Sudoku,” “Tetris,” “Sims Bowling” and “Sims Pool” to library. And you expect the number of video games to flourish once Apple releases its software development kit for the iPhone in a few months.

Update: GigaOm and Venture Beat take a look at the $2.25-billion casual gaming market

It’s Bubble Time, Baby!

By Mark Evans in Web 2.0 7 Comments

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Yup, it’s now official; we’re in the midst of another dot-com bubble. It was something I was desperately trying to avoid suggesting given the last one was so painful to watch but it’s now probably upon us.

The final straw? On the heels of the Facebook-Microsoft deal last week, Read/WriteWeb has a post in which PlentyofFish’s Markus Frind suggests his AdSense-drive dating site could be worth $1-billion. Maybe it is worth that much money but when one of the leading tech blogs goes along with the claim with hardly any push back, then something is not quite right.

The $1-billion premise hinges on Frind’s contention that POF makes $10,000 a day from AdSense, and will generate about $10-million in revenue this year. Combine that with POF getting 1.2 billion pageviews a month, 500,000 unique log-ins a day and significantly better click-through rates than Facebook – and lets encourages Frind to start talking about an ultra-high valuation.

For its part Read/WriteWeb does little to question Frind’s contention, which may be accurate but we have no way of knowing given it’s a privately-owned company. All Read/WriteWeb does is lamely conclude that:

“Markus didn’t put a figure on what PlentyOfFish is probably worth, it’s clear he is thinking in Billions and not Millions. It’s very hard to quantify this, but at the very least POF would be worth in the 9 figures due to its annual revenues of $10M. Not bad for a one-man company (plus a new Customer Service Rep!).”

I don’t mean to take a shot at Read/WriteWeb, which consistently writes thorough posts, but this is the kind of of breathless writing that was alive and well during the dot-com boom. (Note: I wrote more than my fair share of these kind of stories during the last boom)

Just to dig a little deeper into POF, I did some quick research. Here’s a Compete.com chart, which suggests POF gets about 1.8 million unique visitors a month.

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Quantcast suggests POF gets about 1.4 million unique visitors in the U.S. while Alexa estimates 43% of POF’s traffic comes from the U.S., 27% from Canada and 15% from the U.K. – so if you’re being generous POF probably gets about three million unique visitors a month in total.

For all anyone knows, POF may be a two-person cash-making machine that is worth a whack o’ dough, particularly in this frothy environment. The problem is that until Frind opens the company’s books, no one will really knows what’s what.

The other more troubling issue is Facebook’s $15-billion valuation has completely warped the economic landscape. Facebook has now become the benchmark by everyone else is valuing themselves: if Facebook has this much traffic and this much growth, then we must be worth [insert rich valuation here] because we have this much traffic and growth. This is just dot-com deja vu all over again.

So, welcome to the official start of Bubble 2.0. Let’s hope it’s not as painful and dramatic as the last one!

Update: A terrific read on whether there’s a bubble happening is the New York Magazine‘s John Heilmen’s story. His take is we are in a bubble but it’s okay given some terrific companies will emerge from it – just like companies such as eBay, Yahoo and Amazon came out of Bubble 1.0. Meanwhile, Steve Rubel has a nice rant on how he’s tired of the hype, the deals and the parties. He want to go back to 2004 when the online landscape was a lot more calm.

The Slow Demise of (Traditional) TV

By Mark Evans in Media 3 Comments

A couple of interesting reads this morning:

1. TechCrunch touting the launch of Hulu. an online joint venture between NBC and News Corp. to distribute television shows, movies and short clips.
2. A story in the Globe & Mail looking at how interaction is apparently the way to encourage people to keep watching television.

Either way, traditional TV is either changing or dying depending on how you want to look at it. The rapid emergence of online video and the growing ubiquity of broadband – both wireline and wireless – means video has become a personal, any time, anywhere experience. This contrasts with television, which is still predominantly appointment-based – be on the couch at this specific time on this day – despite the growing popularity of PVRs and devices such as the Slingbox.

The gap between watch-as-you-go/watch-when-you-like and traditional TV will only widen as services such as Joost and Hulu become easily to use and offer more compelling and engaging content. Meanwhile, television will continue to suffer because it’s still a one-way experience even though the industry has been talking about it becoming interactive for years. For example, do you remember all the excitement about t-commerce (a.k.a. television commerce where you could see an actor wear a great sweater, and then you could buy it)?

The demise of traditional television is fascinating because it’s coming at a time when people are spending more money than ever to purchase new LCD and plasma televisions. When you’ve got a 50″ high-definition television in your living room, what you’ve really got is a better way to watch movies and sports as opposed to something you need to watch Desperate Housewives or Survivor.

Traditional television is dinosaur, and will continue to be so until the Internet is seamlessly integrated into the hardware using software/technology that is user-friendly and consumers are willing to pay to use. So forget about all the talk about interactivity, it’s just window dressing for suppliers trying to convince people they need bells and whistles to enhance their TV experience.

Links:

- Mathew Ingram isn’t convinced Hulu is going to resonate with consumers given it’s a lot like TV.

- NewTeeVee’s initial take is mixed. Thumbs down because it’s only offering advertising-suported streams; thumbs up for having a solid library of old and new content.

- Inside Silicon Valley on how Hulu is “screwed”.

Thinking About WordPress Themes

By Mark Evans in Blogs 2 Comments

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You may be able tell that I’ve been experimenting with a number of WordPress themes since moving my blog to a new host, A Small Orange, a couple of weeks ago. It’s been fascinating to see how many themes are available – many of them for free – and the wide variety of resources such as WordPress’ Theme Viewer you can use to find one.

So far, I’m sticking with Brian Gardner‘s Blue Zinfandel because it has many elements that I like: a clean look and feel; three columns with sidebars on the right and left; it’s widget and plug-in ready; and has just a healthy dash of blue to go with the dominant white colour. If I could figure out how to get rid of “Test” and replace it with something like “About” in the header, that would be a good start. :)

While I’ll continue to explore other themes just to see if another one really catches my eye, I think the next step is customizing Blue Zinfandel. I’d like, for example, to have re-do the header with something more personalized. The sidebars needs a lot of TLC. I’d like, for example, to include a “mini-blog” widget (Rob Hyndman‘s Scribbles features is particularly nice.)

If anyone has suggestions about good themes or resources to tweak themes, I’d be most grateful.

Update: WordPress will be launching a Theme Marketplace, which will be a place where developers can distribute and sell high-quality theme.

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The Wrap of the Week (Leopard, Craigslist, Microsoft, Facebook)

By Mark Evans in Main Page 2 Comments

A new feature – drum-roll, please! – looking at things that caught my eye this week.

1. Do you have your copy of Leopard yet? Is it wonderful? Lots of people are impressed, including Walter Mossberg, David Pogue and Engadget.

2. I sort of understand Craigslist’s strange approach to business – make money but not too much because how much do you really need. That said, do you think Craigslist should spend some time and money to improve the look and feel to make it more user-friendly? Right now, it’s utilitarian but some colour, a bigger search box and larger text would really help. That said, Craiglist is an amazing tool. At PlanetEye, we’re looking to find local travel experts in cities around the world, and after trying a number of other methods (blogs, word-of-mouth), Craigslist has come to our rescue.

3. Research in Motion made a big splash earlier this week talking about how a new software platform will give people access to Facebook. But for all the talk about the Blackberry having an application eco-system, does anyone use the Blackberry for anything other than e-mail and the phone? And while RIM is at it, how about developing a real Web browser and MP3 player.

4. Bell Canada has apparently delayed the launch of its IP-TV service, which is powered by Microsoft. You have to remember Bell announced its IP-TV plans in 2004 so it could go head-to-head with cablecos such as Rogers and Cogeco at a time when consumer bundles are all the rage. Bell’s not saying anything but you have to wonder if it even makes sense for Bell to push ahead IP-TV given it could be difficult to get a return on investment any time soon. As well, Bell is looking to slash costs now that it’s gone through a leveraged buy-out so perhaps IP-TV is a project that may be turfed.

5. Microsoft Good, Google Evil: It wasn’t that long ago that Microsoft was the evil empire that dominated the computer market with two must-use products, Windows and Office. These days, Google seems to have assumed this mantle given that it controls the search market, and wants to push aggressively into wireless, social networking, advertising, etc. So, it was fascinating to see some people look at Microsoft’s $240-investment in Facebook as a positive thing for the high-tech market because it kept Google from getting its hands on the Web’s hottest property. Now Microsoft it seen as good, and Google as being evil.

6. Speaking of Facebook and Microsoft, how can you give a business a valuation of 100 times sales? I’d love to see a spreadsheet that demonstrates how this Google-like valuation was determined.

Apples’ (and Microsoft’s) Big Day

By Mark Evans in Apple/iPod, Microsoft 1 Comment

It’s been a long time for the MacNation since the last major OS X release – 30 months – but today is finally the day for Leopard to be set free. In less the 12 hours, the ca-ching of cash registers around the world will be heard as people plop down $129 for the “biggest update in Mac history”. There will be tons of media coverage and bloggers will be gleefully pounding out posts with reckless abandon.

Stepping back, it is interesting see how the computer industry works when it comes to the release of new operating systems – and the marketing frenzy that is unleashed on consumers who feel compelled to upgrade or, if needed, purchase a new computer so they use the new OS. I remember when Microsoft released Windows 95 (using the Rolling Stones “Start Me Up” as the official theme song). It was a huge marketing campaign with hundreds of millions of dollars spend by Microsoft. Same thing for XP and Vista, although I don’t remember quite the same excitement around Windows ME.

As a relatively new Apple user, I wasn’t really as cognizant of the marketing bonanza surrounding about Tiger or Panther, although I’m sure they it was a big deal for Mac users. But with Mac being used by more people and Apple now the belle of the ball, it’s easy to see why Leopard is such a big deal. (Note: For a different look at why people are so excited about Leopard, check out Four Reasons Why).

Why is it that new operating systems are marketed so aggressively? The most answer is they generate an awful lot of revenue and, in many cases, people have little choice other than to upgrade or go out and buy a new computer with, in theory, more useful bells and whistles. Sure, many consumers are holding off – like XP users are trying to do these days – but eventually you have to step up to the new OS, which reminds of that old Fram oil filter commercial with the tag line “You can pay me now or you can pay me later”.

It is ironic that on Apple’s Big Day, Microsoft has just reported extremely strong third-quarter results, driven by healthy sales of the much-maligned Vista, as well as Halo 3, Office 2007, Windows Server and SQL Server. Mary Jo Foley writes that Microsoft has now sold more than 88 million copies of Vista – many of them premium editions (aka the expensive versions).

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