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The fact that the mobile operators "only certain source of money" today is ringtones, background graphics, SMS and other brain dead products is not my problem. It is their problem, and they have earned that problem all too well. Now, reality is catching up and I have been all over this issue with them the last couple of years. Finally, they can't hide. Run, perhaps, but not hide.
The ringtones-product is an excellent starting point for the discussion that is at the absolute core of the mobile Internet debate:
who should be able to offer services, how to offer them and how to get paid?
I firmly believe that Internet is what will drive the wireless connectivity forward, in all aspects. With very, very few exceptions can I accept that a mobile operator shuts out the entire or parts of the Internet from their networks.
Anyone that has a service/product (ringtones, for example) to offer on the Internet should be able to sell it to mobile device users; over the Internet. Support for open content standards in mobile devices, be that Internet standards or multimedia standards, are absolutetly criticial to implement what everyone is talking about and desperately wanting: wireless access to the Internet.
So, I want a free market for ringtones on the Internet. Not a monopoly, owned by the company through which network I happen to connect to the Internet. Would you want your ISP to dictate what sound files to download to your PC?
How to get paid? In this debate it seems as if many believe that it is only the mobile operator that send invoices to their customers regurarly.
Content providers seem to line up at the mobile operator gates to share THEIR revenue with the operator. Strange.
I would like to shock them all now: many other companies send invoices to the content providers potential customers, too: banks, gas companies, power companies, insurance companies etc etc. If an invoicing system is a determining factor, then the mobile operator is not likely to be your best partner. And you know what? An invoicing system on the Internet with customers of your own is an option, too!
From micropayments on the Internet, the VISA/Mastercard partnership for Internet payments, to simple Handango-like sites. There are simply SO many options out there.
I get the feeling that many "content providers" worry more about HOW to get paid, than WHAT they actually have to sell. Market rule: if you have a product to sell that the market wants, then the basic condition for the transaction to occur has been fulfilled. In fact, this is why I believe many mobile operators and their likes are worried today; they don't have a product that the market really wants.
This ends up being a long reply... but one more thing:
addressing copyright issues by trying to avoid the Internet is not going to work in the long run. Napster to Kazaa to Morpheus to ??? will eventually reach mobile devices too. The music industry, and all other content industries, need to start asking themselves: how can we get paid through digital (Internet) means?
Conclusion:
the software in the Smartphone 2002 is one, extremely important innovation in the mobile device market, because it finally opens up the Internet to mobile phone users. Now, the mobile operators have to quickly start thinking about their VALUE ADD, not how to lock in their customers.
I want to freely choose the provider of my ringtones on the Internet or even produce my own. I will never pay a dime on a mobile operator's invoice for braid dead products like that. Soon, no one else will either.
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