Good article on minonline highlighting the challenge for eReaders of creating a need for a new device. It asks “how many people really want to add an eReader alongside a mobile and a laptop when they leave their home?” Not for the first time, my riposte could be attacked as too old-school. But I would ask – what proportion of the population actually leave their house with a laptop in their satchel or briefcase? Yes, probably a fair % of the sort of people who the author of this article hangs around with. But if I counted the people I see on the train and on the streets each day, I’d say it’s closer to 5%. Just as importantly, I haven’t seen this % climb significantly over the last couple of years – nor do I see any driver of growth over the next few years. Compare that to pretty much 100% who already carry a mobile phone, and a rapidly increasing % whose mobile is a smartphone. On the other hand, 75% of people I see are carrying some form of paper – either a newspaper, magazine, book, or notepad. So my reasoning is that the next-generation of eReaders (ie wireless, touch-screen, colour, document-sized, light-weight, web-enabled, and cheaper) – particularly when they are fully featured eWriters too (see my earlier blog post) – will definitely earn their place in Joe Public’s bag; lighter and more versatile than hauling around a stash of “ink on dead trees”. Meanwhile, the laptop can battle it out with the desktop as the main computing device for home use, offering the added benefit of portability… Anybody care to challenge this perhaps unfashionable assertion?
Monthly Archive for August, 2009
Today’s announcement that News Corp will start to charge for full online access to all its titles is being generally derided. Taken as a standalone move, I agree that it won’t work. I don’t see more than a trickle of subscription revenue no matter how hard they promote. And I doubt it will even be enough to compensate for lost web-advertising. So he is consciously taking a decision that will (peripherally) hurt his bottom line. However, Murdoch isn’t stupid. His thinking is strategic and is about changing customer attitudes. I don’ t believe he’s thinking about the web here – frankly, I think he has probably written off the web as a profitable channel for serving News Corp content. And if he hasn’t, then I am guilty of over-rating his intelligence, as this is truly a lost cause. Murdoch’s move is about preparing the ground to hit the reset button in time for the eReader revolution. In other words, to use the opportunity presented by a new platform in order to get people to pay for news content again. Which means pulling back free content in order to re-educate people about its value. I’ve written elsewhere why I think this is sensible to some degree for almost all publishers. However, I also think that News Corp’s stable of general news titles is least well-positioned to take advantage. So overall – it’s strategic and sensible, but it’s a defensive move and a gambit. I have no doubt that Murdoch can do no more than slow down the decline of News Corp. Its glory days belong entirely to the past.