Digital Lifescapes

The traditional advertising industry is not the place to be right now -- unless you have a very high tolerance for stress. eMarketer reports that the decline in overall ad spending is not only continuing, it is getting steeper on a month-to-month basis. As an example, ZenithOptimedia revised their ad spending forecasts downward. After forecasting a 6.9 percent decline in advertising spending worldwide in April, they're now estimating a drop of 8.5 percent. Zenith analysts predict a recovery to begin in 2010, but not in North America. Q1 spending was lower than expected and Q2 outlays continued to slide. Zenith says total worldwide spending for 2009 will be $456.5 billion, down from nearly $500 billion last year. Few markets are growing, such as China and India. Zenith predicts ad spending in China will increase by 5.4 percent in 2009, exceeding the UK to become the world's fourth-largest ad market. The Internet is the only medium that will enjoy spending growth this year -- ris...

A recent Ipsos market study demonstrates that ad-supported models could provide an important new channel for many U.S. consumer music file sharers. The models are already helping to reduce file sharing, and have the potential to become part of a long-term trend. Moreover, this proactive approach would surely be more advantageous to music record labels that have previously used litigation as their primary reactive method -- in an attempt to dissuade consumer file sharing. A majority of downloaders and streamers currently operating outside of the fee-based market may simply be unwilling to pay for music. However, given the choice, many fee-adverse consumers may prefer to avoid MP3 file sharing as well. These consumers value music, but in the absence of an ad-supported offering, the desire not to pay is greater than the desire not to file share with friends and family members. The annual Digital Music Discovery and Purchase Process study -- part of TEMPO, an Ipsos bi-annual study of digit...

New video content hosting technology -- known as Content Delivery Networks (CDNs) and Next generation Data Centers -- will dramatically change the business model and the user experience for video delivery services, according to the latest market study by In-Stat. CDN provisioned Video-on-Demand (VoD) will allow content owners more control over their creations and provide viewers with more choices in programming and delivery methods. "As Content Providers build or out-source their own data centers, they will be in charge of every aspect of their content," says Gerry Kaufhold, In-Stat analyst. "We will see flexible, complex, and creative ways to derive every last penny out of every piece of content." In-Stat's market study found the following: - Over the next five years, the worldwide value of Content Delivery Network services will nearly double, to more than $2 billion. - The Information Technology (IT) industry is aggressively driving forward with cost-cut...

Results from IDC's ongoing survey reveal that 59.1 percent of Singapore CIOs are increasing their investments in new business applications based on Web 2.0 technologies (Portals, Mashups). An amazing 59.1 percent are also actively revamping social media networking and collaboration services for employees in 2009. "We are at an interesting juncture", says Dr. Patrick Chan, Chief Technology Advisor for IDC's Asia-Pacific Emerging Technology Council. "As a result of the financial downturn, corporations are under mounting pressure to invest only in IT technology that can help their businesses save costs and grow at the same time." As a result, CIOs today have very challenging roles to play. They need to balance savings against IT investments in order to achieve optimal growth for their organizations. To date, 71 Singapore CIOs have responded to the survey which is ongoing. The current market study findings include: - In 2009, 62.1 percent of the Singapore CIOs s...

Recommendations by friends and opinions posted by consumers online are the most trusted forms of purchase influence globally, according to the latest Nielsen market study. The Nielsen survey, the largest of its kind, shows that nine in every ten Internet consumers worldwide (90 percent) trust recommendations from people they know, while seven in every ten (70 percent) trust total stranger opinions posted online. However, in this new age of consumer influence, advertisers may be encouraged by the fact that brand websites -- the most trusted form of advertising -- are trusted by as many people (70 percent) as consumer opinions posted online. "The explosion in consumer-generated media (CGM) over the last couple of years means consumer's reliance on word-of-mouth in the decision-making process, either from people they know or online consumers they don't, has increased significantly," says Jonathan Carson, at Nielsen. The Trust in Advertising element of the survey was firs...

Wireless home network connections are fine for many routine Internet access applications. However, when people need to stream high-definition video to other devices within the home -- such as an HDTV set -- wired network connections tend to provide better performance. Coax and phoneline networking is becoming increasingly important among home network connectivity alternatives, particularly for service provider provisioned networks. Cumulative households with an in-home provider network utilizing coax or phoneline technology will more than double from 2008 to 2010, according to the latest market study by In-Stat. "Consumers want web video on their TV and also increasingly want whole-home DVR capability" says Joyce Putscher, In-Stat analyst. Networking over coax makes particularly good sense in North America where 90 percent of homes have pre-existing coax wiring. In-Stat's market study found the following: - In 2010, average PC home network throughput will exceed 150 Mbps ...

Current business information has always been important to executives. In the past, they read newspapers and trade magazines for information on trends and developments. Not any more. Times have changed, and so has the source of buying-cycle influence. According to the "Rise of the Digital C-Suite" study from Forbes Insights and Google, the Internet has become the most valuable information resource -- by far -- for U.S. executives. Online ranked ahead of at-home and at-work contacts, personal networks, trade publications and outside consultants as an information resource. Newspapers and magazines trailed way behind. When it comes to locating business information online, search engines were rated higher than other digital tools, such as blogs, social networking sites and subscription search services. Although, ironically, the search results may lead executives to influential blog content that's typically ranked highly by Google and other search engines. The most important ty...

Market penetration of broadband access services continues globally, with total subscribers on track to reach 500+ million next year, according to a market study by Futuresource Consulting. "More than 60 percent of all fixed broadband households on the planet are connecting using xDSL, where digital data transmission takes place over a local telephone network, while cable accounts for a little over 20 percent," says Patrik Pfandler, Senior Market Analyst, Futuresource Consulting. Although markets in many developed countries are becoming saturated, alternative hot spots are starting to emerge -- Africa and the Middle East will experience spikes this year that equate to 33 percent growth. Longer term, India is the country to watch. With one of the lowest household penetration rates for fixed broadband -- at just over 2 percent, or five million subscribers -- they're projected to grow five-fold by 2013, to almost 25 million access lines. Asia-Pacific is still the global leade...

The iPhone, from Apple, increased the market awareness of value-added service (VAS) mobile applications. These applications and associated "app stores" are becoming the next mobile sector market development opportunity. However, most new mobile applications require smartphone capabilities, limiting their potential market. Moreover, a new architecture that applies a cloud-based model could drastically change the way mobile applications are developed, acquired, and consumed. According to the market study from ABI Research, mobile cloud-based services will be disruptive and could eclipse the current mobile application model by 2014, delivering revenue of nearly $20 billion annually. "Mobile application developers today face the challenge of multiple mobile operating systems," says ABI senior analyst Mark Beccue. "Either they must write for just one OS, or create many versions of the same application." More sophisticated apps require significant processing pow...

The latest global market study by Multimedia Research Group (MRG) demonstrates how hybrid IPTV set-top boxes (STBs) are helping IPTV Operators accelerate early service deployment or extend the reach of their existing video IP Networks. By merging existing digital video broadcast programming with IPTV services, Operators are finding they can significantly slash CapEx and lead-time costs from typical IPTV deployment costs. In 2008, there were already 14.4 million installed hybrid STB units worldwide, with estimated growth to 22.3 million in 2012. The MRG report explores how hybrid IPTV set-top boxes can receive broadcast digital channels from Satellite, Terrestrial or Cable—plus from a managed IPTV (on-demand) service. By using existing broadcast sources in addition to on-demand IPTV service, IPTV Operators can significantly reduce the content acquisition and early network infrastructure requirements. "Use of hybrids can solve some serious problems presented by technical restriction...

Copy protection, watermarks, digital fingerprinting, and conditional access are all Digital Rights Management (DRM) technologies used with the intent to enforce copyright protection of video content. However, the problem is, typically they don't. Apparently, efforts to stop the reported 12 billion peer-to-peer (P2P) downloads occurring annually in the U.S. have come up short, according to the latest market study by In-Stat. In-Stat believes content owners and service providers need to shift from content protection to a two-pronged content monetization strategy consisting of digital rights information management and offering a better user experience than consumer P2P services. "What is needed is a new approach to monetizing digital content including moving a relatively small group of consumer households that do the bulk of P2P downloading (power users), to legal services," says Keith Nissen, In-Stat analyst. The question is whether the big media companies in the video indu...

The consumer demand for smartphones is growing rapidly and will push annual sales worldwide from 131 million units in 2008 to over 300 million by 2013, according to the latest market study by Parks Associates. The assessment finds people are attracted to these converged devices because they combine applications into a mobile platform, which can then be expanded incrementally -- with new and unique add-ons and applications. "Consumers have a personal connection to their mobile phones," said Harry Wang , Director, Health and Mobile Product Research, Parks Associates. Applications like T-Mobile's Sherpa will learn from its user's preferences in order to make personalized, location-based recommendations on restaurants and shops. The latest iPhone release is also making a strong case for mobile video. Smartphone users worldwide will top 1.1 billion in 2013, creating a lucrative market for mobile service providers and mobile phone application developers. "The success o...

According to the latest survey from Reardon Smith Whittaker (RSW), the economy has had a negative effect on the business of 87 percent of U.S. advertising and PR agencies -- and 91 percent of their clients. Could this actually be a good thing for Digital Marketing professionals? In the first half of 2009, 55 percent of clients had spending decreases of 6 percent or more. In addition, 35 percent expect to see marketing spending fall by 6 percent or more in the second half of the year. Fifty percent of agency clients spent more on e-mail marketing than the previous year. Almost one-third of clients increased their commitment to search engine optimization (SEO), while 56 percent and 28 percent did the same for social media and online display, respectively. "If you don't have a good grasp of new media, you had better get on it," recommended RSW analysts in their report of the apparent survey results. Creative talent and business savvy is in demand, regardless of the current e...

Latin American mobile operators are promoting new data services in order to offset falling voice revenues and satisfy the growing demand for value-added products. That helped make 2008 the year of 3G in Latin America, where virtually every Latin American mobile operator launched 3G services. There were more than 6.8 million active WCDMA connections across Latin America at end March 2009, up 50 percent in just one quarter. Possibly the most striking growth of all has been in Brazil, where there were 3.8 million WCDMA subscriptions at end-March 2009, up from 2.2 million three months earlier. "We can expect that number to continue to accelerate, because America Movil has made it clear that its investment priority in the region for 2009 concerns its 3G network," said Eva Benguigui, Senior Research Analyst at Informa. Informa expects investments in 3G networks will accelerate across Latin America. For instance, there will be more than 15 million WCDMA subscriptions in Latin Americ...

According to Point Topic's latest market assessment, by the end of Q1 2009 there were 429.2 million broadband subscribers worldwide. This represented a 4.02 percent increase on Q4 2008 when the total was 412.6 million. The largest number of net additions was in Q1 2007 when 19.6 million new subscribers signed up for broadband services. Despite the recent dips in Q2 2008 and Q4 2008, the lowest number of net additions in the period shown was in Q2 2006 at 14.5 million. This was almost 14 percent less than the net additions acquired in Q1 2009 which totaled 16.6 million. Over the 12 months to end Q1 2009, 63.5 million new broadband subscribers were added worldwide, representing 14.8 percent of total subscribers by end-Q1 2009. Global broadband population penetration was 7.4 percent by the end of Q1 2009, up 17.4 percent on the same time a year ago from 6.3 percent and up 4.2 percent on the previous quarter from 7.1 percent. Global household penetration was 27.3 percent, up 17.7 perce...

The market for digital photo frames has gone mainstream, particularly since prices dropped to affordable levels in the first half of 2009, according to the latest market study by In-Stat. However, most units shipped still lack advanced features such as wireless connectivity to the Internet. Nevertheless, Wi-Fi enabled photo frames are a key growth driver as they will grow at twice the rate of overall digital photo frames in 2010. "Prices for connected frames will continue to decline, and as manufacturers educate consumers about these devices -- the mass market will become more comfortable using the Internet services connected frames support," says Stephanie Ethier, In-Stat analyst. Applications such as sharing and downloading pictures over the Internet, as well as streaming Internet radio and video from online sites like YouTube, are also expected to be primary drivers. In-Stat's market study found the following: - Worldwide unit shipments of all digital photo frames a...