How Businesses and Technologies Survive Death Sentence

Have a look at these screenshots -

These pictures show the raging debates in recent times about whether or not these businesses will survive in coming years. However, like many more similar things which were sentenced to death by experts, these businesses are not dead yet.

Transformation, not death.
This sounds philosophical. But it is perfectly applicable to all these things. Newspaper is not dead yet but the newspaper as we knew it is certainly dying. Same can be said to be true for many other things.

So, when some expert says that a particular concept or business will be dead, what it really means is that the reality is changing for that particular format. So the idea can still live on in a transformed avatar.

The masthead of NYTimes.com shows a successful transformation. 

Focus on technology at NYTimes.com

Circa an acclaimed news app which calls itself a news organization

Nexus 6 represents a trend where we will see a fusion of not only the capabilities but also of the physical form of smartphones and tablets (and laptops?)

Google's new Inbox application treats emails as messages and your inbox as a hub of your activities.

Amazing Idea from Korea! A Must see... [Video]

These stores are operated by Homeplus a Korean retailer. According to Wikipedia, Home plus is jointly owned by Samsung and Tesco (a British company) with 113 branches throughout South Korea.

Will these be successful in India?

A top comment on the Youtube page of the video may indicate what may happen in India - 

Idea: instead of wasting time scanning the products, visit the online shop of a supermarket website while you're on the train. It's better than a whole crowd standing in front of those walls, punching??? with their elbows just to take pics...

N96 About to Start Distribution in India…

A few days ago, I registered on Nokia India site for prior booking of N96 – the hyped i-Phone killer in a country like India. Today, I received a call from Nokia dealer in city informing to book N96 by paying Rs. 4000. He said that N96 will be delivered to me within 8-10 days. With the handset, there is a free 2GB card (why it will be needed when N96 will have 16GB of internal flash memory?) plus an assured gift from Nokia. On asking about price, he said that it will be in Rs. 37000 – Rs. 40000 range.

This price range will be considerably higher in Indian market, also considering facts that N96 won’t have touch screen or a QWERTY keyboard…But anyway, N96 has enough as its tagline says - “How Much Power Can You Handle?’

Greased Lightbox

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Adsense for Conversation? (Update..)

Nice idea...




Now Read and Write Web has an exclusive sneak peak into Google Dreamads!!! You guessed it right...it is contextual advertising for your dreams!!!

Human-Computer Interaction to Get Revolutionised

Here are links to 3 BBC articles which talk about the new & revolutionary ways of human-machines interaction -

Has touch technology come of age?
Technology is going touchy-feely as products appear which threaten to replace the humble mouse with finger-touch computing...

Brain control headset for gamers
Gamers will soon be able to interact with the virtual world using their thoughts and emotions alone.
A neuro-headset which interprets the interaction of neurons in the brain will go on sale later this year...

Beyond the keyboard and mouse
Earlier this week the front page of the Austin Chronicle featured a picture of the band the Guitar Zeros - a group of musicians who perform using hacked versions of the Guitar Hero video game controller.
It's an extreme example of how popular the game and it's guitar style interface have become.

"It's pretty amazing we took something that was real and made it fake and they took something fake and made it real" said Kai Huang, CEO of RedOctane who created the game.

But while games like Guitar Hero and the Nintendo Wii are exploring new kinds of kinetic interface, in our work lives most of us are stuck with the Qwerty keyboard and the computer mouse: inventions that date back 134 years and 24 years respectively.

Photo originally published on Daily Galaxy.

Apple's Art of Innovation

Economist has a cover story on 'Apple & Art of Innovation'. In this brilliant feature Economist has enumerated the rules behind this art of innovation. The article says - 

"...But mostly Apple's zest comes from its reputation for inventiveness. In polls of the world's most innovative firms it consistently ranks first. From its first computer in 1977 to the mouse-driven Macintosh in 1984, the iPod music-player in 2001 and now the iPhone, which goes on sale in America this month, Apple has prospered by keeping just ahead of the times."

How it was possible for Apple do that consistantly? Here are the rules according to Economist -

1. Network Innovation - the innovation can come from within and without the company. A company must be open to receive new ideas
   
2. User is at the centre, not demands of technology. This also leads to simplicity of the products
   
3. Thinking ahead of times i.e. rather than bowing to today's market demands, innovate for tomorrow
4. Fail wisely - learn from your mistakes. That;s what Apple did in case of Lisa

One point, which I feel is the most important and is not covered here is 'Neglect competitors'. If Apple competed with numerous mp3 player manufacturers, iPod would not have born and neither iPhone. Your concentration on competitors limits your achievement prospects by limiting your originality. Thus you can make a Prada, but not iPhone. An innovative company must compete with itself and time and not with other market-players.

Intelligently Artificial - Shape of the Future

Sometimes you come across something intellectually refreshing and fulfilling. Palo Alto based Singularity Institute of Artificial Intelligence [SIAI] which is at the forefront of expanding our limits of ignorance about Intelligence has started its own blog. Look what SIAI has to say about its mission - "In the coming decades, humanity will likely create a powerful AI. SIAI exists to confront this urgent challenge, both the opportunity and the risk. SIAI is fostering research, education, and outreach to increase the likelihood that the vast promise of AI is realized for the benefit of everyone." Read this post on SIAI blog named '5-min Singularity Intro' -

Sometime in the next few decades, we’ll start developing technologies that improve on human intelligence. We’ll hack the brain, or interface the brain to computers, or finally crack the problem of Artificial Intelligence. Now, this is not just a pleasant futuristic speculation like soldiers with super-strong bionic arms. Humanity did not rise to prominence on Earth by lifting heavier weights than other species.

Intelligence is the source of technology. If we can use technology to improve intelligence, that closes the loop and potentially creates a positive feedback cycle. Let’s say we invent brain-computer interfaces that substantially improve human intelligence. What might these augmented humans do with their improved intelligence? Well, among other things, they’ll probably design the next generation of brain-computer interfaces. And then, being even smarter, the next generation can do an even better job of designing the third generation. This hypothetical positive feedback cycle was pointed out in the 1960s by I. J. Good, a famous statistician, who called it the “intelligence explosion”. The purest case of an intelligence explosion would be an Artificial Intelligence rewriting its own source code.
The key idea is that if you can improve intelligence even a little, the process accelerates. It’s a tipping point. Like trying to balance a pen on one end - as soon as it tilts even a little, it quickly falls the rest of the way.

The potential impact on our world is enormous. Intelligence is the source of all our technology from agriculture to nuclear weapons. All of that was produced as a side effect of the last great jump in intelligence, the one that took place tens of thousands of years ago with the rise of humanity.

By the way, I also love the term Singularity. Singularities are of various types. I think SIAI takes it as a Technological Singularity, which denotes a point of 'next leap' of a scientific civilization.

Technology Wins With Marketing - Seth Godin

Here is great talk by talk master Seth Godin at Google, where he tells why Marketing is important. Also a great viewing for those who want to know what is a really great presentation?

Microsoft Marrying Yahoo?

Google has taken two entities head on. On one hand Google challenged Yahoo; firstly on Search front and then on a lot of other fronts. On the other front, there is Microsoft who is threatened by Google's web based office applications. Among these three, only Google seems to be completely belonging in the Web 2.0 eco-system, while Yahoo is the runner-up(mainly due to Flickr) and Microsoft seems to be totally out of sync in the new regime of user-control, mash-ups, communities etc. Further, the lucrative market of mobile search is also a field where Microsoft and Yahoo would have to toil a lot to take on Google.

However, this particular news of tomorrow is only a rumour today. Most of the newspapers have put a question mark in the end of the news. WallStreet Journal has put up a news as

'Microsoft, Yahoo Discussed Deal'

"Microsoft and Yahoo discussed a possible merger or other matchup that would pair their respective strengths, say people familiar with the situation. The merger discussions are no longer active, these people say, but that doesn't preclude the two companies from some other form of cooperation."

Here is a video commentary of one of WSJ analysts on WSJ Online. Watch it here

How Second Life Is a Disruptive Idea?

What can be a truly disruptive idea? What can be said to take the business one step ahead of the competition? What can be the answers of these questions when they are asked in connection with media business? These are the questions which I ask myself again and again.

I think that in media the business ideas which succeed beyond expectations are those which truly exploit the potential of that particular medium. For example, what is the strength of Internet? Is it the fact that there are lesser or no size limits when compared with print medium, where you have to stuff all the news you have into 16 to 20 pages (in India)? Is it the fact that you can stream videos? According to me, until now Internet had 2 strengths – One, the hyperlinks [which make the Internet infinite, by always giving you some entry points and some exit points]. The other strength which Internet has is its ability of offering interactivity, or a window to react and be creative, for the users. For example, I can easily connect with a friend over content on a website using the same medium. Single medium is used as a content offering tool and at the same time also a tool to interact and communicate, unlike in any other medium except perhaps a mobile.

This takes us to a relationship between type of business idea and the characteristics of the medium. The relationship is –

[Extent of disruption caused by an idea] α [Extent of use of unique strengths of the medium for maximum benefit]

This point gets validated by the disruptive ideas on Internet in recent times. Google [connects you to resources on Web], Wikipedia, Youtube and Flickr [all 3 - window to create something], MySpace [connect with each others] and Amazon / eBay [imitate real life on Internet using interactivity and communication ability].

What will be the biggest disruption on Internet from its inception? I am sure it is going to be Second Life [as an idea. Current Second Life is not at all sophisticated in technology. Perhaps it will be Google’s similar offering that will change the game altogether]. If you look at Second Life, you will find that it has everything that I listed above – communication tool, transaction tool, creativity tool and a lot more than that like it is a real-time MMORPG which will keep you engaged, provide you an earning and also entertain you.

Keep your fingers crossed, because the Virtual World is going to change not only Internet – that will be a minute part. It is going to stir the Human Society to its roots by challenging the existing logic, notions, transactions, inter-relationships and Interactions in ordinary human life in most confounding way.

3G Enters India...Almost.

Today, there is a full page ad of Nokia N95 in Times Of India. The features list of N95 is just impressive. It has a dual slide design, 5 MP camera, Wi-Fi abilities, internet browser with Mini Map for better internet experience, integration with Flickr, the LifeBlog application, GPS...and so on. Cool! That is a range of features I will die for! See all the features here and a deatiled review here. So, futuristic handsets are here, penetration of mobile-phones is rising at a scorching pace and operators are also prepared to play the 3G game. What about the spectrum?

Other news in the same newspaper, that has caught my attention is about Indian governement's decision (or is it just a proposal?) about inviting global bids for spectrum auction. The Indian Airforce is expected to vacate 42.5 Mhz of spectrum by July, this year. The bids will be invited after this. The significance of global bidding is that it will give some big global players, an opportunity to catch the telecom-boom bus, which they have lost or left earlier. For consumers, this will mean that they will have a richer 3G experience and the tariffs will be lowered considerably. And for government, this will mean big bucks. The news says -

"The most significant aspect of Wednesday's announcement read along with the modified 74% FDI guidelines in telecom announced by the government just last week, is a clear invitation for global telcos to put their money where their mouth is. Analysts suggest that this is perhaps the last opportunity for those who have not been a part of the Indian telecom juggernaut to now jump in."

Read the news here.

Best Cell Phones

Virginia Tech Timelapse on Wikipedia

It was great watching this video about how wikipedia changes during a world acknowledged event. I originally viewed it on Wired.com. Now it seems that even NY Times has made a great homepage feature on Wikipedia's woking in the wake of V Tech shooting. A must read feature on NYT and also a must watch video...

iPhone - the Features That Will Matter

1. Touchscreen - From video, it looks great, but we will have to wait to see how Apple has tackled issue of scratch resistance, unintended touches etc.
2. Internet surfing experience - This will be where iPhone's success will matter in long term, especially in the non-US markets like Europe and Far East, where use of cell phone for net-surfing is rising with leaps and bounds.

Sify CTO Talks About Wi-Max

In a podcast interview, Indian ISP major, Sify's Chief Technology Officer Bhaskar Sayyaparaju talks to Kiruba Shankar of Kiruba.com about Wi-Max technology and the promises the technology holds for future.

This is a really good podcast. Listen to it here.

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Unfortunately, I could not embedd the podcast video here...Hmmm. I will try and see if I can.

Off to Norway!

I am on my way to Norway to participate in the 'Digital Winners Summit', which focuses on the Strategic lessons to be Learnt from Mobile, TV & Internet.

Wikipedia Founder Jimmy Wales Speaks

Kiruba Shankar recently talked with Wikipedia's Jimmy Wales on the sidelines of WikiCamp in Chennai. Here is the podcast from podtech.net
[podtech content=http://media1.podtech.net/media/2007/02/PID_010374/Podtech_kiruba_jimmywales.mp3&postURL=http://www.podtech.net/indiatech/technology/1340/jimmy-wales-at-wikicamp-chennai&totalTime=1327000&breadcrumb=3F34K2L1]

The Mobile Internet's Future Is East

It has been now a well-accepted fact that mobile handsets, the ubiquitous cellphones, will be the future of all media. Integrating these devices, having a 3G / 4G technology, with day-to-day lives of people, through the high capacity, high speed wireless networks will be the key to unhindered flow of information. In this regard, South Korea and Japan are rolling out high-speed wireless networks that provide Internet access for an array of gadgets. Businessweek Online has published a story about surge of Far East ahead of western countries in the arena of wireless mobile communications. read more

What is 3G technology?

Boom!

Yes. Laptops do explode. Save your laps from laptops.