Ok, I certainly consider myself converted on most points.
Also, please don't misunderstand - I am not a WAP advocate or an iMode
detractor, I just realized that it may have sounded like that in my
original post. I just think that both the success of iMode and the current
issues with WAP have nothing to do with the technology or necessarily the
content creation process (although today, for this market, it is a no
brainer who has the most compelling content). Also, I really think it
won't matter in 6 months when NTT uses WAP and WAP includes cHTML, but this
is just conjecture based on the fact that NTT wants to be a global player.
My only real disagreement with Ren is that I still don't agree that iMode
is an open standard or that WAP is closed. It seems to me that DoCoMo
simply uses its HUGE leverage to force some tags to be supported and others
not to be (the Microsoft solution to open standards). Also, we still don't
know what java classes they will support, etc. WAP's languages use http
and a subset of xml and are completely open in the sense that the standard
is published and is free to use. What makes that less of a standard or
less open? W3C is just a standards organization as well, no? If the
argument is that network operators need a WAP gateway product to run WAP,
well no one else can operate an iMode gateway other than NTT - at least you
can buy a WAP solution. Also consider that JPhone could not use cHTML just
a similar system - actually I probably shouldn't say this I don't really
know the history of why Jphone used MML and who provides their gateways,
etc..
Comparing iMode to WAP is a bit like comparing AOL to HTTP. iMode is not a
technology, it is a service. I certainly agree with almost all of your
points about WAP operators not getting it, I just don't think it's the
technology which stops them (i.e. WAP has SSL, a scripting language,
support for animation, color (although I don't think this is part of the
spec?)). I think it's plain old stupidity, and maybe a different market
preventing WAP operators from success. If I were a WAP operator I would
make everything as easy to use as possible (one button access?), provide a
subscription based service, micropayments schemes for 3rd parties, etc.
I would never just be a gateway. The great "marketing" decision of NTT is
that they did not think like typical network operators, i.e.: provide the
wires (so to speak) and they will come. They provided a service. This is
a great, great lesson for network providers everywhere (especially since
the network will become a commodity and not a source of revenue growth in
the future).
Overall, I guess we are in violent agreement, so to speak. Maybe for
different reasons, but there you go.
jason
keitai-l-bounce@appelsiini.net
08/15/2000 06:49 PM ZE9
Please respond to keitai-l@appelsiini.net
To: keitai-l@appelsiini.net
cc:
Subject: (keitai-l) Re: New member/i-mode stumbles?
jason.c.freedman@ac.com wrote:
> The first question you have to ask yourself is how successful would iMode
> be anywhere else? Sure there are 10million users registered here. Most
of
> those users use exactly 2 things: email and games (oh, and Hello Kitty
> screensavers..). Would it be sucessful in the EC or US anyway (in other
> words, how many Eurpoeans are excited about wap screensavers and typing
> email on a cell phone?).
Email is just messaging, like SMS. Currently there are 2 BILLION SMS
messages
sent every day globally.
The US and Europe are THE largest markets for electronic games. There is no
doubt in my mind that wireless gaming would be huge if available as it is
in
Japan.
Users in Europe who do have access to things like customizeable ring-tones
(Finland) have proven that teenagers are teenagers whereever they are; they
are
willing to customize and pay for it.
Therefore my answer to your questions are:
>how many Eurpoeans are excited about wap screensavers and typing
>email on a cell phone?
All those who use SMS now, all those who customize ring tones now, everyone
in
Europe between the ages of 13-22, everyone who wants to use SMS but wants
more
characters, the ability to send ANYWHERE (via SMTP), everyone who had/has a
gameboy or other portable electronic game device...
>
> OK, let's say you get past that. iMode is successful in the same way
> Amazon is - lots of traffic. Then you need to ask yourself what stops
WAP
> from having the same success?
Poor business models:
No contents, no simple payment scheme, no ease-of-use.
I honestly don't know why WAP operators haven't figured it out yet. Case in
point: banking. DoCoMo has gone out of it's way to get EVERY bank on
i-mode,
from the biggies like Citibank to the tiny, local agrarian cooperatives to
the
post office savings system.
In Europe, how many operators have more than 5 banks available on their
gateway?
You MIGHT buy a WAP phone b/c you happen to bank at NatWest, which happens
to
be on the gateway of the carrier you use. But it's unlikely you'd switch
operators just to bank online or switch banks to NatWest just to bank
online.
However in Japan just about anyone can get an i-mode phone and be pretty
sure
that they can use it to bank online wirelessly.
>
> Is it the language? True cHTML is easier than WML - just as HTML is
easier
> than XML (cHTML is a subset of HTML, WML is a part of XML) - but you
still
> have to create special content for the phone and can not just use your
HTML
> web pages (or it will look like crap). And really, how tough is any
markup
> language?
Agreed, cHTML vs WML is not too relevant.
But the underlying issue is key: there are 700 official and thousands of
unofficial sites because DoCoMo asked potential contents providers what
they
needed to deploy lots of wireless contents. They responded by saying they
wanted to reuse their existing html and web infra, and thus DoCoMo went
with
cHTML and therefore there are LOTS of contents on i-mode.
>
> How about contents? Well, I have both an iMode and a EZWeb Phone (WAP).
> Today, there are 10 Million iMode users and about 4 million EZWeb
> (interestingly, this is a similar ratio to the overal number of phones
from
> each company). Now with iMode I have a tremendous number of local sites,
> banks, etc. and I think that is exactly what is needed here in Japan. If
my
> Japanese were better, I would probably have no need for any other
solution.
> Having said that, my EZ Web phone has access to sites all over the world.
Yes, but exactly how much does that get you?
There are STILL more quality sites on i-mode than on all of WAP globally.
There are hundreds of banks, news sites, game/entertainment, search
engines....
>
> One could argue that the Japanese market doesn't care as much about the
> external world and/or English content (this may well be true, I don't
know)
> but I think this model is not as logical in places like Europe or the US.
> Personally, I use my EZWeb phone to look at US newspapers to check on my
> home sports teams, Look up book reviews at Amazon, get my email from
> Hotmail, and sync my address book and calendar with my Pilot through
Yahoo.
> I can not do that on iMode and will never be able to until NTT convinces
> the rest of the world to go to that standard.
You are not the target of DoCoMo's i-mode service.
English-speakers in Japan are a miniscule part of the market, and there is
no
reason why DoCoMo should bother to serve you English contents.
That does not mean, however, that i-mode is Japanese-only.
Obviously a smart operator in Europe would provide lots of contents AND in
many
languages.
This is not a fault of i-mode, it's simply b/c DoCoMo has 60 million
customers,
and they are all Japanese speakers with little demand for foreign language
contents.
>
> Now, the argument does make sense to me that NTT can just dictate what
> technologies are appropriate whereas like any good committee WAP needs
> years to decide what type of paper to write the minutes on. Therefore,
> Java phones can be thought out, developed, and rolled out on DoCoMo while
> the rest of the WAP Forum is still deciding on Java vs other
technologies.
> Having said that, would any other solution work in the fragmented markets
> of the rest of the world?
You've got it backwards. The WAP Forum is attempting to dictate technology
standards -- and from the reaction, they are failing, because they did not
include contents providers and they totally ignored existing technologies
and
protocols.
However, handset makers (major players in the WAP Forum) totally failed to
enfore adherence to WAP standards, and thus the incompatibilities between
gateways, handsets, WML/HDML, dev kits, etc...
DoCoMo hasn't dictated anything; they asked what contents providers wanted
to
use, they adopted existing, established technologies, and they enforced
adherence to those standards. EVERY i-mode phone adheres to the basic
i-mode
technical standards and protocols the same. Sure some phones support tables
(out of spec) and some don't, but no significant number of sites attempts
to
take advantage of these inconsistencies b/c it limits total audience reach
to
those handsets only.
A better argument is to think of it this way:
J-Phone is #2 in Japan. They could have gone WML or cHTML or anything else.
They chose MML, which btw is 99% compatible with i-mode contents.
If I were a European operator who didn't own and dominate the market (like
DoCoMo), I'd go with open standards more likely to be adopted by everyone
else.
Through basic game theory, all operators would conclude that it makes sense
to
support open, etablished standards like HTML, HTTP, Java, etc.
However "open" the WAP Forum claims to be, WAP is based on patented
technologies, many of which totally rewrite perfectly good existant
technologies, AND the WAP Forum is by and large dominated by
tech/operators.
What the WAP Forum needs is more content providers dictating user needs,
which
should drive technology, which should be enforced by ALL handset makers,
gateways, etc. evenly.
>
> Cost is also certainly an issue. One of my friends from the EU told me
> that just from trying her WAP service for a month, she spent the
equivelent
> of 400$ usd and felt she barely used the service. Certainly an argument
> for a packet-based network!
Agreed. But WAP in Japan also shows it's possible to provide compelling
contents such that some market segment is willing to pay the relatively
high
cost of circuit-switched access. The lesson (again) is: content rules.
>
> Phone turnover is another. I have been told that here in Japan the
average
> phone turnover is once every 4-5 months. This allows you to get the
latest
> technology into the market right away. In Europe almost no WAP phones
even
> exist. Of those that do, most have gone to early adopters, not teenagers
> checking their email or getting movie tickets. In the US there are
usually
> large penalties for turning over your phone after less than one year. On
> my ATT phone, I believe it was a 300$ fee for dropping the service after
> less than 1 year and if I needed to replace my phone I didn't get a
> discount on a new one.
Whose fault is the turnover penalty? Whose fault is the lack of handset
supply?
NTT DoCoMo made sure that ALL major handset makers provide i-mode handsets,
and
the costs are not considerably more expensive than other handsets.
Smart operators eat the cost of the handset (rapidly approaching commidity
status), giving it away to the customer, in order to deliver services that
users will pay for.
>
> Maybe I'm missing the point entirely. I just think that way too much is
> made of the technology and current level of contents. I think that if
> iMode started on WAP (yes I know that it wasn't released yet), then it
> would have been just as popular and have the same, if not more content.
The business model would have been the same:
lots of contents, easy to use, easy to pay for.
Interestingly, DoCoMo did NOT choose WAP back when they started i-mode
specifically b/c the technology was not ready to support those three basic
tenents; it would have been too much of a burden on contents providers to
provide WML contents, existing handsets weren't easy enough to use...
I agree that technology is less important than most make it out to be, but
you
cannot deny the fact that for most contents providers, it was simply easier
to
provide cHTML contents than WML contents for several reasons:
*WML behaves too differently across different handsets/gateways/services
*HTML->cHTML was easier than HTML->WML (without automatic translation
tools)
*lack of contents provider participation in WAP Forum meant they had less
motivation/buy-in to go to WML contents
However, now that there are more tools available, I don't think making WML
is
debilitatingly more difficult than cHTML. But then the issue is: can the
WAP
network deliver? Is it easier to make money offering a service (can you
easily
charge and collect $3 a month)? Can enough users get access to your
service?
r e n
--
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morgan stanley dean witter japan
e-business technologies | engineering and strategy
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Received on Wed Aug 16 10:22:42 2000