Mobile Entertainment Issue 47, January 2009

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FOR EVERYONE IN MOBILE CONTENT

www.mobile-ent.biz

MOBILE ENTERTAINMENT

CODE

WORDS

She looks happy. But what about the games developers providing the fun?

> NEWS • FEATURES • ANALYSIS • MOVES • STATS • EVENTS GUIDE • CHARTS

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ISSUE 47 January 09

Android jerks to life

News 1-6 Features

17 See you!

8 In one year, out the other

Talking to Vringo about the video ringback.

2008 was a massive year in mobile. Enjoy this review and pray the credit crunch doesn’t prevent us doing the same for 2009.

18 Communal changing

11 Arrested development?

20 Regulation issue

We speak to the gaming codeshops trying to cope with the mounting challenge posed by shrinking publishers, handset fragmentation and the App Store dilemma.

Watching the watchdogs in 2009.

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17

Zamano on how brands can benefit from mobile social networking.

23 Plotting the variables Nick Lane discusses new data pricing.

20

Reference Section 24 Appointments 27 Games spotlight 28 Shows 29 Databox 30 Product focus 32 Charts 34 Network subs 35 Features list 44 Discontent

Mobile Entertainment magazine – your direct link to the content biz No other B2B mobile content news source hits more eyeballs. Here's why: Monthly direct-to-desk print circ: 8,012 Monthly digital downloads: 2,236 Online uniques: 37,518 (Google Analytics) Email news digest subscribers: 12,129 Need to get your message across? Work with Mobile Entertainment magazine to maximise your exposure and reach all sectors of the industry, using print, online and events.

Contact Tom.Roberts@intentmedia.co.uk for more details or call +44 (0) 1992 535 647

www.mobile-ent.biz

AT a conference I moderated recently a highly tech-literate analyst predicted that the time will come when consumers change their mobile operating systems like wallpapers.

He presented a commoditised future in which users choose their phone’s appearance, applications and underlying software in-store. What a load of old nonsense. How many domestic PC users uninstall Windows to replace it with Linux?

That said, the OS space is heating up. Last month’s news that the Open Handset Alliance added 14 new recruits really upped the prospects for Google in mobile. Two new Android phones have been unveiled; there could be “Suddenly, vendors dozens in 2009. The are willing to also surrender control of news revealed how the software in willing vendors are to their devices.” surrender control of the software in their devices. Take Sony Ericsson, which now supports Symbian, Windows and OHA. 2009 will be a massive year for Google, and especially for the Android Market content store.

So far, its impact has been muted compared with the iPhone App Store, which has made available 10,000 apps in five months. Android Market managed 472 in five weeks. Clearly Apple had a much bigger run up (with iPhone out for a year before the store went live), but Google will expect serious acceleration in ‘09.

It should be confident. At present, all Android apps are free as there’s no payment system. But this will be fixed soon and should encourage ‘premium’ publishers onto the service (the revs are shared between operators and CPs too, so the networks will be keen).

New device launches and the on-going lack of a restrictive approvals system should help too.

But, against this, Google must also factor in piracy and quality issues. Android uses Java, and developers have told ME they fear the ease with which Java apps can have their protection removed. And ‘no approvals’ invites crappy products that don’t work properly. So who’s going to pick up those customer care calls?

Google? Operator? Publisher? Glad it’s not us. tim.green@intentmedia.co.uk

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NEWS

PlayPhone: Domination in 2009 Off-deck specialist promises more partners to file alongside Wal-Mart, ABC and BET US D2C specialist PlayPhone is targeting more huge consumer brands in 2009 – and is close to revealing an absolute whopper.

PlayPhone is a significant player in off-deck mobile around the world with its own sites, but has made major strides in the complementary business of powering the mobile stores of mainstream brands such as Cartoon Network, ABC and Wal-Mart. Just before Christmas, it clinched a deal with African-American entertainment specialist BET, and is already reporting 30,000 subscribers in the first month of business.

Such deals are set to proliferate this year. Ron Czerny, CEO of PlayPhone, told ME: “With the market moving off-deck there’s a real chance for brands to open up mobile as a channel of communication – and revenue – with their users.

We’re delighted with the results of the BET launch, and we have more in the pipeline. At this time we’re close to revealing possibly our biggest ever.”

In parallel, PlayPhone is exploring ways to promote its own D2C subscription services. In the UK, it just launched a partnership with Information TV to offer

We’re delighted with the results of the BET launch, and we have more in the pipeline.

Playphone CEO Ron Czerny is ready to reveal his biggest secret

mobile content from Sky Digital channel 167. The channel will comprise music video programming that combines with PlayPhone’s mobile services.

The company will study the results carefully. Czerny believes that, if positive, they could open the way for a dedicated mobile content TV channel. “We’ve seen football clubs open TV channels. Why not mobile content companies? We’re already advertising heavily on TV. It would be a logical step to start a ‘full time’ channel,” he said.

The combination of D2C activity and brand management has taken PlayPhone into 30 countries, and the firm has reported outstanding results in newer markets like Brazil, where subs are up to 200,000. Now, PlayPhone is targeting traditionally ‘difficult’ territories such as Japan. www.playphone.com

Two androids arrive on the Planet Earth

Nokia N97: One better than N96?

Now featuring a pull-out keyboard

Kogan Agora and Sciphone Dream are first of many TWO new Android devices have been unveiled – the first of dozens to hit the market in 2009.

Well, that’s the fervent hope of Google and the Open Handset Alliance as they push on with an industry drive to get the open operating system adopted by vendors. The two new devices are the Australian Kogan Agora and the Chinese Sciphone Dream G2.

However, this news was trumped a few days later when the OHA confirmed 14 new recruits to its membership, including Sony Ericsson, Vodafone, Huawei, Softbank Mobile and Toshiba. It’s expected that

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January 2009

The 14 new OHA recruits include Toshiba.

The G1 was first, but there’ll be many more Androids in 2009

this level of support will increase competition in the mobile OS space, with Nokia taking Symbian open source. It should also sharpen the competition for iPhone’s App Store. At present the Google Market is being overshadowed by the Apple offering. openhandsetalliance.com

NOKIA has unveiled a fresh twist on its rampaging Nseries smartphone range – a QWERTY keyboard.

The firm surprised visitors to Nokia World last month with the innovation. Few would have predicted that the new N97 device would hark back to the old communicator form-factor with a sliding ‘physical’

keypad. But that’s just what it does – albeit combined with a sexy touchscreen.

The N97 also features up to 48GB of storage, a five megapixel camera and an ‘always open’ window to favourite internet destinations. Nokia has high hopes: the N95 sold 15 million in 18 months. www.nokia.com

www.mobile-ent.biz

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MobiTV hits 5 million subs Election sees traffic increase too THE streaming mobile TV pioneer MobiTV added one million subs in eight months to bring its total to five million.

MobiTV streams video on mobile broadband networks and is available on more than 350 handsets across 20 networks, including AT&T, Sprint and Alltel in the US. It said the US presidential elections provided a major fillip to adoption. “We

witnessed an extraordinary increase in the number of subscribers that tuned into the presidential debates and election day news,” said Paul Scanlan, president of MobiTV. “There was a 373 per cent increase over average daily viewing on election day. Those numbers not only indicate exciting times for US politics, but also for mobile television.” www.mobitv.com

Toys 4 U Opportunities for licensing deals abound at Toy Fair 2009, which takes place at London’s ExCeL from January 28th to 31st. Toy Fair is a trade-only exhibition that promises retailers, manufacturers and press the chance to see a sneak preview of thousands of new toys and games.

Orange in motion Orange has selected Ad Infuse's adInMotion platform to serve ads across all its opcos. adInMotion offers personalisation features and embeds ads in various channels, including messaging, browsing, video, and gaming.

T-Mobile adds ads T-Mobile UK has entered the ad-funded games space, following a deal with new market entrant Digistores. The first titles offered will include Player One’s Poker Million II, with Paramount Pictures among initial advertisers.

Ads take the form of two full-screen, clickable, targeted messages before a game starts and two after it has finished.

Mobixell wants to see roll over Finds pre-roll ads ‘unsatisfactory’ MOBILE ad specialist Mobixell is working on introducing moving banners, split screen and interstitials as dynamic alternatives to pre-roll advertising in mobile video.

Mobixell is convinced adfunded video is the way ahead after it found 31 per cent of 16-24 year-olds cited price as the biggest barrier to adoption.

But it concedes that adoption cannot grow while pre-roll is king. “Pre-roll makes you wait for what you want. It’s not good enough,” said Freddy Friedman (pictured), director of marketing at Mobixell.

“Many big media companies have simply ported their web models to mobile, and that’s why there’s all this static preroll. But it’s unsatisfactory for the advertisers too because it’s not targeted or contextual.” www.mobile-ent.biz

Penguin’s new chapter Book giant Penguin Group has launched Penguin Mobile as part of a new digital publishing programme, Penguin 2.0.

The aim is to develop content to web-enabled mobile devices over the next 12 months. Its iPhone app is already available free from the iTunes app store. Random House and Ballantine have also announced fresh commitment to the iPhone and the Lexcycle Stanza ebook reader.

Single click Payforit That’s why the firm is pushing ahead with a system that gives dynamic alternatives and lets editors themselves upload in real time. It says the new formats could increase inventory by a factor of three.

Mobixell has already trialled it with Sony Pictures TV on Sprint and Verizon. www.mobixell.com

Dialogue UK has unveiled a system that delivers Payforit WAP billing in a one click option. Working across all UK operators, Dialogue believes it is a significant step forward to driving consumers to make multiple purchases.

After opting in for the Single Click service, all purchases from a specified shop will only require the single click to complete.

App, up and away 300 million App Store downloads turn the industry on its head 13 MILLION users, 10,000 apps, 300 million downloads and an almost incalculable knock-on effect.

That’s the end of year report on the iPhone as Apple marched into 2009.

Stats emerging from HQ and the blogosphere last month revealed the remarkable progress of this singular device. First up was the news that its 13 million users have downloaded 300 million apps – that’s nearly 2.1 million a day. We still don’t know how many are free, but it’s noticeable that Apple has tweaked its press ads around apps as a result.

Separate research showed the total number of products offered at 10,000, of which one in four is free

and $0.99 is the most common price point. www.apple.com

Mobile gets the thrill of the trill Entire mobile market worth $1 trillion by 2013, says Informa A SOARING global subscriber base is set to pass five billion in 2011.

Informa says the market took over 20 years to reach the three billion subscriber mark, but that the next 1.9 billion took just six. As a result, total annual revenues derived from mobile operators will grow by over a third to $1.03 trillion by 2013.

And what of the value-added services?

Well, Juniper Research is being similarly bullish, predicting that it could be worth $167 billion by 2013. It’s basing this optimistic assessment on the condition that operators can become smart

pipes that enable mobile to become a channel for ads, messaging, marketing and content sales. If so, operator-only mobile content income could reach $52 billion by 2013. www.telecoms.com

January 2009 5

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NEWS

Music goes flat for Telia All-you-can-eat is all over Nordics after another subscription launch TELIA Sonera has become the latest operator to launch a flat-rate mobile music service.

Subscribers to the Nordic telco giant will be able to download unlimited tracks from EMI, Universal, Warner and various independent labels for a fixed monthly fee. They’ll get the first three months free, after which they pay SEK 99 a month for unlimited dual downloads to mobile and PC. Telia Sweden will go live first, with Norway, Finland, Denmark, Estonia and Lithuania following shortly after. The launch covers a potential 13.3 million customers.

The move maintains the drift of mobile music towards the flat rate subscription model – from both operators and handset manufacturers.

Headline launches over the last 12 months include:

This Scandinavian female likes mobile music – possibly Abba

Danish telco giant TDC and 24-7 Entertainment launched a dual download service with the cost rolled inside the fee for broadband.

24-7 also worked with 3 Austria on a subscription offer comprising 3.3 million tracks in MP3 and WMA. France’s SFR launched

the unlimited mobile music service Pass Music Live, with a catalogue of around 500,000 tracks.

Orange France launched Musique Max, in which WMA tracks could be shared a limited number of times across multiple devices.

Vodafone rolled out its Omnifone-supported subscription service in multiple territories.

Of course, the handset vendors are, if anything, even more aggressive in this area. Sony Ericsson launched its PlayNow Plus service in September and its partner, Omnifone, is also building a dedicated device with LG. Then there’s Nokia Comes With Music, offering unlimited music for a specified time rolled in to the cost of a handset. It’s already launched in the UK, with more roll-outs to come.

Spacey is the new Redford MOBILE World Congress has made a red carpet reshuffle, with Kevin Spacey providing the Hollywood sparkle in 2009.

The actor famed for American Beauty and LA Confidential will take the place of Robert Redford in hosting the MOFILM Mobile Short Film Festival and giving the keynote speech at the mobile entertainment conference. www.mobileworldcongress.org

www.teliasonera.com

It’s patently not obvious Symbian overturned the initial rejection of a patent application, but the law on software patentability remains uncertain, says Tahir Basheer, partner at Sheridans…

IN MOBILE content R&D is key to business success. But protecting software innovation is an ambiguous area of patent law. And there are serious legal and financial consequences at stake.

The situation is made more complex by different national attitudes. In the EU, inventions can be patented if they provide a ‘new and nonobvious’ technical solution to a problem. In the US and Australia, attitudes are a little different.

The EU decides patentability on a case-bycase basis. A recent example was Symbian, which sought a patent application for an aspect of its software. The Intellectual Property Office refused it, arguing that it related to nothing more than a ‘computer programme’.

The High Court overturned this decision. Why? 6

January 2009

The Patents Act 1977 says if software falls within the definition of ‘computer programme’, it is excluded from patentability.

Symbian sought to patent software related to the mapping of ‘dynamic link libraries’ within a device. It made the device faster and/or more reliable.

The court decided Symbian’s software solved a technical problem in the computer itself that fed into connected devices, so it changed the performance of the computer for the better.

Thus, the Court of Appeal held that Symbian’s software was not solely a ‘computer programme’; it resulted in a better programme and a faster, more reliable computer.

The European Patent Convention also excludes certain items from being

The EU decides patent law on a case by case basis

granted a patent, and the court decreed Symbian’s software did not fall into any of them. It was not: a method of doing business; a mathematical method; a method for performing mental acts.

The outcome doesn’t mean there is a clear rule whether a computer programme is patentable or not. IT moves too fast. The problem has always been the question of what is ‘technical’ and what is not. The question remains. www.mobile-ent.biz

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2008 REVIEW

Pieces of 2008 The balance of power shifted a little in 2008, with Google, Apple and Nokia muscling in on the content space. It’s been an historic year. Here’s a month by month review – and a little look ahead…

JANUARY

FEBRUARY

MARCH

APRIL

Sony Ericsson added five million tracks to its PlayNow content offering... People were making muttering noises about Blyk, but the ad-funded MVNO revealed it had hit 30,000 subs. Not a great deal of reach, but it seemed happy enough... and Jump Games secured a licensing deal with Man Utd, adding weight to the idea of the 'rising East'.

A joint project was unveiled by the GSMA and UK operators to share metrics and methodologies to make mobile a viable ad channel. The consortium suggested the end result could be a 'smart pipe' worth $250bn... Zed confirmed annual revenues of over $500m... Nokia unveiled the N96, the new daddy of the Nseries range.

AT&T confirmed it would launch MediaFLO mobile TV in May, ending a long wait for the platform to get its second US operator outing after Verizon... Record label Sony BMG added its backing to Nokia's Comes With Music unlimited ‘free’ downloads concept... and the BBC launched its iPlayer catch-up TV service for iPhone.

Telcogames went into administration, much to the dismay of out-of-pocket developers. The firm blamed cashflow and an unsuccessful foray into native games... Apple revealed the iPhone generated $378m in 2007... Social network Itsmy.com celebrated its one millionth user...

Nokia launched N-Gage after many months of technical delays.

MAY

JUNE

JULY

AUGUST

Qualcomm made a move into mobile widgets at BREW 2008... Orange and Nokia signed a content deal that skirted the issue of Nokiabranded services... HTC presented its Touch Diamond handset to accelerate the hype around touchscreens... while Vodafone and Telecom Italia joined Telia Sonera in signing up to sell iPhones.

Apple launched its iPhone 3G on June 9th to predictable bedlam.

Within a month the device had sold one million units and the App Store generated 10 million downloads...

Nokia acquired Symbian for £209 million and moved to turn the OS open source to consolidate its lead over Microsoft, RIM and – more importantly – Android and iPhone.

AdMob’s absurd growth continued – it surged past 3.5bn ads served a month... Orange announced it would aggregate Facebook, MySpace and Bebo in one big social network lovein... The EC considered action against dodgy D2C content providers... Nokia’s 5800 touchscreen handset made a cameo appearance in The Dark Knight.

Research says one eighth of handsets shipped in EMEA are smartphones... do they include the 100,000 Skypephones sold by 3?.. Zeemote finally launched its Bluetooth gaming controller with Sony Ericsson in the Netherlands, and then confirmed its software would go in selected Nokia handsets too... Zed bagged a €92.5m war chest from investors.

SEPTEMBER

OCTOBER

NOVEMBER

DECEMBER

Sony Ericsson made a long-awaited move into unlimited full track music downloads, choosing Omnifone to power its PlayNow Plus service...

AT&T made Yahoo its official partner to maintain the frantic instability in the mobile search space... T-Mobile USA revealed plans for an Apple-style open app store. Everyone gasped.

A huge month for the market with the HTC’s Android G1 finally launching via T-Mobile. Great apps, ugly styling... BlackBerry and Vodafone stun everyone with the touchscreen Storm and RIM reveals plans for an app store... Nokia launched Comes With Music and previews its touchscreen 5800 XpressMusic phone.

3UK, having frightened the trade with the Skypephone in 2006, delivered the INQ1 phone with Skype, IM and Facebook rolled in... further proof of the power of social networks came when BlackBerry confirmed 400,000 downloads of its MySpace app... ominously Vivendi Games withdrew from mobile altogether.

The blogosphere squealed at the rumour that Wal-Mart might sell iPhone 4GB for $99, and at the reality that 100 million iPhone apps were sold in 45 days... MobiTV confirmed its five millionth subscriber... Nokia wowed Nokia World with new Ovi messaging and location services plus its first Nseries qwerty, the N97...

What lies ahead?

It would be great to disclose Apple’s plans for a Nano phone. But we’re journalists, not clairvoyants.

However, we did have a brainstorm – and spoke to industry insiders – to make some predictions for the market in 2009...

iPhone made headlines in 2008

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January 2009

Widgets The single most mentioned subject by our panel was mobile widgets.

Everyone’s convinced the widget will become the conduit to content in 2009. Everyone from Nokia to Qualcomm to Streamezzo wants to make this happen.

Touchscreens Hardly a revelation. Nokia’s 5800 and Google’s G1 are already out.

Expect many more.

Applications Carbon footprint calculators, currency converters, mobile lightsabers….

Consolidation As the credit crunch bites, the weak will be consumed on the cheap. Question is, how many of the aggressors will come from the Far East?

App stores Palm just jumped on the bandwagon, BlackBerry is coming, Microsoft too. The shadow of iTunes looms large.

Subscriptions Expect more of what Omnifone, Nokia and Sony Ericsson started.

Android Could be dozens of devices, and thousands of apps.

Thanks to all those friends of ME who added their opinions here. www.mobile-ent.biz

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2008 REVIEW

Who ate who in ‘08?

Purchaser . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Target SeaChange . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Mobix MobUI . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Action Engine Zed . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Mobitween Connect2Media . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . RayFusion Player X . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Gaelco Móviles Jumbuck . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Plutolife Tanla . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Openbit Comscore . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . M:Metrics LiveWire . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Groove Mobile Qualcomm . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Xiam Microsoft . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Danger Nokia . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Trolltech Glu. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Superscape WIN . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Pocket End2End . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Terraplay Handmark . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Astraware Motorola . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Soundbuzz EA . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Hands-On Mobile Korea PlayPhone . . . . . . . . . . . . Pitch Entertainment Microsoft . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . MobiComp IMI Mobile . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . DX3 Amdocs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ChangingWorlds

Nokia’s Tero Ojanperä explained how Comes With Music will work...

Farewell then…

Some went out of business, some decided content wasn’t worth the hassle. Here are a few of the companies that walked through the exit door…

Eidos Mobile Parent company had a wobble and out went mobile.

Tira Wireless Solving handset fragmentation proved insoluble for the Canadian outfit.

Action Engine It clearly didn’t ‘shatter the useability’ barrier as hoped.

www.mobile-ent.biz

Infospace The content dream died and was sold to Motricity.

Vivendi Games Mobile Vivendi merged with Activision, mobile was reviewed and ultimately closed.

Telcogames A disastrous foray into native games publishing did for the UK aggregator.

Helio The US MVNO followed Disney, Amp’d and ESPN into the history books.

Our top stories We posted over 2,400 stories to our website in 2008. It was a momentous year, with Google entering the market, Nokia launching Comes With Music service, Apple unveiling the App Store and Symbian going open source. But what was our most read story?

Yep, it was one that contained the magic words: iPhone and Porn...

Top mobile-ent.biz stories by traffic (Source: Google Analytics) 1. Private’s iPhone porn giveaway 2. 3G iPhone unlocked 3. Full length Bollywood movies hit mobile 4. Looking ahead to iPhone 3.0 5. ME top 50 (2007) revealed

January 2008 9

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GAMES DEVELOPMENT

Language difficulties Too many ports, too few publishers – the problems are mounting up for games developers. Tim Green found out how some are coping, and why others are getting out altogether…

FOUR years ago, when ME was preparing to launch, gaming was buoyant and we had a host of (UK) developers – Morpheme, Iomo, Kuju, Rockpool, Hailstorm, Affinity, Ideaworks3D, Elite and Distinctive – that we could rely on for comment and insight. Today, the first six of this group have either exited mobile or disappeared completely.

Yes, these are unforgiving times to be a Western games developer. And yet, by some reckoning, mobile gaming has never been healthier. It remains the most popular content category outside of ringtones, and has been given a fillip by the arrival of iPhone, Blackberry and other native formats. The fact that these new devices support app stores removes some of the traditional barriers to distribution (the publisher, the aggregator, the operator deck) is an extra bonus.

So what went wrong? A bunch of things. First off, existing barriers got higher: fragmentation made porting an increasingly expensive and timeconsuming distraction. Then, publishers kept buying each other or

folding to shrink the number of available distribution partners.

Finally, the D2C sector collapsed to increase the reliance on those limited operator decks.

“There just aren’t any routes to market for us any more. There are fewer publishers than ever, and they’ve all got their own developer

Mouting hurdles have squeezed out some developers. teams,” says Brian Rodway of Affinity, which is now focused on the casual console market.

The mounting hurdles may have squeezed out developers like Affinity, but created an opportunity for codeshops with a lower cost base.

And in from the East they came – from Poland and Ukraine and India.

It’s probably true to say that, numerically, the majority of mobile games development is now being carried out by codeshops like

The Native specialist Q&A: Julian Jones Biz Dev, IdeaWorks3D What’s kept IdeaWorks3D strong in such a tough maket?

We have two divisions: the games studio and the Airplay native development platform – and they form a virtuous circle that’s the backbone of what we do. Airplay protects us from the fragmentation that’s kiling other developers, and futureproofs us at the same time. It's helped us to build major releases like The Sims without major issues. The dev teams don't need to worry about device limitations, they can focus on making a great game.

But doesn't Airplay itself command a lot of resource?

We have ten people working on it.

But we’re licensing the platform now, so it's paying for itself. More and more publishers want to shift the balance away from porting.

One company we work with had 100 people in development and 400 in porting. That's ridiculous.

Why do you focus on native games formats?

It's so difficult to solve Java fragmentation because it's embedded in the handset. Native is easier. So, even though you could argue that there are new

native formats like iPhone, BlackBerry and Linux coming, it's still more manageable. The variations are in form factor, screen size and so on, not in simply making the games work.

Why build Airplay when there are porting solutions in the market?

Airplay delivers a single binary for each game whereas these other solutions work on source code.

The quality just isn't as good.

Are you optimistic about the prospects for mobile gaming?

I think we can weather the recession, because gaming is low cost entertainment. And I really see mobile as the new handheld.

The OpenGL graphics API is a level up from iPhone, and beyond even PSP.

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GAMES DEVELOPMENT

Spiel (India), Gamelion (Poland), Herosoft (Russia) and many more. The cost of labour and rent just makes it more economical for them.

Where does this leave the Western European base? Well, the fact is that the long history of games development in a country like France and the UK (home of the Amstrad and the Sinclair Spectrum) commands respect and means that, where costs can be controlled, publishers will still come knocking. This explains the success of Scotland’s Tag Games and Dynamo, the latter of which was selected to develop the long awaited mobile version of Championship Manager.

Where a developer can secure their own IP, even better. Hence the endurance of one of the world’s oldest indy studios, Elite Systems, which has built a solid mobile business on the back of classic eighties home computer IP like Paper Boy and R-Type.

Niche platforms are another area of opportunity. Developers like Germany’s Fishlabs see high-end gaming on the iPhone as chance to break out from the Java pack. At the other end of the scale, ultra-casual platforms like Flash present a similar escape route. It’s why Zed bought French Flash specialist Mobitween last year. And it’s what keeps Fluid Pixel plugging away from its UK base.

Finally, there’s the big budget high profile stuff where quality is all. Here, the big publishers keep it in-house – or they go to studios like Distinctive Developments and IdeaWorks3D. Distinctive has been developing wireless games for EA, Konami and others since 2001; its CV lists FIFA Football and Metal Gear Acid. The UK form is one of the few ‘originals’ still in the space, and has even built its own testing base.

And guess where its located? Poland.

The studio that got out Q&A: Brian Rodway, Affinity Games Brian, what went wrong?

There just aren't any routes to market for us any more. There are fewer publishers than ever, and they've all got their own developer teams. The D2C market has completely crumbled. There is a viable business in simple branded games if you've got enough of them. But the problem there is the cost base. It's impossible for Western developers to compete with firms from Eastern Europe, India and elsewhere.

What was the final straw?

We did a word search game that we developed and published ourselves, although we used a partner to get distribution in some territories. It was a good game and did well, around 100,000 downloads. So we did Word Search 2, with extra features like 'SMS to a friend'. We went to all these publishers with what we thought was a good proposition – a game with a track record and cool innovations. No one was interested.

UK studio Distinctive Developments has survived and flourished by developing premium titles such as Metal Gear Acid

Why? I think it was because there was no brand attached. There’s no space for the middle ground in mobile now. Publishers want a massive brand that will either be huge or completely flop.

What did Affinity do after mobile?

We switched to the new casual console formats like PlayStation Network and Xbox Live. All the skills we learned in mobile apply there, but we can actually make money because it's a specialist environment and we're not competing with Call Of Duty and the rest. Also, there's no fragmentation and you get to keep 60 per cent of revenue rather than 25 per cent.

The iPhone specialist Q&A: Michael Schade, Fishlabs What are the main benefits of developing for iPhone?

In terms of quality, iPhone is higher res than PSP and the rendering is similar. It’s really premium gaming and that’s reflected in the prices you can set.

But it’s also about the control the app store gives you. You get daily reports and you can change the marketing constantly.

www.mobile-ent.biz

How much does iPhone development cost?

It’s a mid-five digit figure to make an iPhone port look really good.

Mid-six figure for a genuine original title.

How do you get games listed?

You submit the game and they approve it in a few days, then you can upload it immediately. This can take months if you go the operator route. The process is great – a big thumbs up to Apple.

Is there a risk that the App Store will become unwieldy and overpopulated like an operator deck?

It’s already happening. The 99c games dominate the charts and it’s getting hard to get user ratings if you can’t get the users in the first place. I’m sure Apple is working on a new approach to premium apps. It is possible to embed links to your website and then get ad revenue, but the problem here is that the CPMs eat into your revenues. We’ve got Toy

Tanks 3D coming out in a free adfinanced version and an ad-free version at €1.59.

Do you see the App Store model being replicated by others?

I like what Nokia is doing with Ngage. It’s being selective about what goes on the portal, and it’s serious about making it work. But for anyone launching an app store with Java games, it will be tough.

It’s so easy to open up the code and take out the copy protection.

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GAMES DEVELOPMENT

The adver-gaming specialist Q&A: Juan Antonio Munoz, Unkasoft What’s the logic behind advergaming?

The aim is to move the cost of the game from the user to the supplier. There are two options.

We build a branded advergame from scratch for a client, or we take an existing game with the option of 'advergaming on the fly' in which the brand can inject ads at the point of download or during an online gaming session.

It costs anywhere between 2,000 and 40,000 euros to make an advergame.

What progress have you made so far in the sector?

We've done 65 campaigns, with clients including Sony Films,

Pepsi and Cosmo. Most have been in Latin America, Spain and France, but we're launching into the US and UK this year. We recently launched a game with Renault around its Twingo car.

We used our system to take an existing game, and change the background to Renault's specifications. Then the client created BlueTooth points and a shortcode for users to download it. In the first week it did 4,000 downloads.

Are the players themselves accepting of advergames?

Users are still wary of free games offers, so I'm not sure if you could say we're reached a critical mass yet. I’m sure that in two to three years, there'll be an explosion. We have 100 campaigns lined up for next year.

Selected games developers ELITE (UK)

IDEAWORKS3D (UK)

The UK codeshop has been around for ever, and is sustained by its ability to self-publish classic IP like Paperboy and R-Type.

The holder of ME’s Best Developer Award works solely in native gaming and works closely with Japanese publishing greats.

TAG GAMES (UK)

FLUID PIXEL (UK)

Scottish studio that is active on all formats but has really embraced iPhone, launching casual titles like Astro Ranch. Also authorised to develop for Nintendo DS and Wii.

Found a lucrative niche in developing casual games for Flash, iPhone and even iPod.

SPIEL (INDIA) Fast growing sub-continental force, with a strong parent in Pace Group. Active in every platform, well known for sports games, and India’s only certified iPhone developer.

Has worked with all the majors and is strong in driving and puzzle games. Offices in four countries now.

Q&A: Chris Head, Zed/Mobitween

GAMELION (POLAND, FINLAND, UKRAINE)

How does Flash score over Java?

It runs on only one engine, so the experience is more consistent.

The porting is more efficient too,

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The studio known for its Lego games is now diversifying into ondevice portals and branded apps.

XENDEX (AUSTRIA)

The Flash specialist

Is Flash just for casual players?

At first, yes, because casual gamers will always have certain resistance to downloading and Flash should solve this by offering browser-based play. But when Adobe ports Flash 10, as it will soon, more hardcore games could be developed.

KILOO (DENMARK)

Growing Scottish firm that’s best known for Championship Manager but also made the self-help app Mobi-Medic and acquired the cult franchise The Crystal Maze.

Founded win 2004, with 160 operator deals to date. Very active in iPhone.

Why the move into Flash?

Flash is ubiquitous on websites, and is moving fast into mobile.

Mobitween’s experience will help us deliver games that take less time to develop than other platforms – two to eight weeks in our experience.

Well-established software company now moving into multiplayer hosted gaming via Mobile Club Manager.

DYNAMO GAMES (UK)

FISHLABS (GERMANY)

because of the way the graphics are rendered on Flash. Also, Java developers are scarce, whereas Flash experts, because the web development community is so huge, are easier to find.

SANCO (UK)

Probably one of the world’s fastest growing developers, which leapt to prominence after the merger between Poland’s Gamelion and Finland’s BLStream. It now employs over 300 in these two countries and Ukraine.

PROGRESSIVE (DENMARK) Long-established Nordic studio with an esteemed track record in casual titles, thanks to Slinky, the Sheep Mania series and others.

Won huge acclaim for SolaRola in 2008, and also diversified into Nintendo DS development.

NOSTROMO (CZECH REPUBLIC) Really, a major aggregator that also develops games. Best known for its work on Mr Bean, Madagascar and other major brands.

DISTINCTIVE (UK)

MOBITWEEN (FRANCE)

One of the giants. Active since 2001 and the custodian of precious brands like FIFA. Now runs a Polish testing facility too.

This Flash specialist was snapped up by D2C pioneer Zed (no slouch in games development) last year. www.mobile-ent.biz

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One developer.

All platforms.

Your most valuable IP. Top publishers trust us to develop their next hit game for Java ME, BREW, iPhone, Android, Online, N-Gage, Nintendo DS and Xbox Live Arcade.

Mobile Games Mail: contact@progressivemedia.dk - Web: http://www.progressivemedia.dk

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VIDEO RINGTONES

Vringing the changes Video calling didn’t replace the ‘regular’ phonecall. So how can the video ringtone supplant its audio cousin? Vringo thinks it knows. Tim Green spoke to CEO John Medved... he ringtone is the foundation of the business you work in, the magazine you hold in your hands. It was the ringtone that made consumers realise their phones could do more than just communicate, and this revelation acted as a launchpad for all the advanced content products we see today.

They still sell. But most of the growth is coming from emerging markets, and it’s accepted that subscription fatigue and the ability to self-configure ringtones from MP3s is causing a long term decline in mature territories.

So what’s next? Logically, you’d think, it has to be video ringtones.

Well, it’s not that simple. People don’t make video calls. But there’s something in the basic idea, which is where Vringo comes in. It’s developed a new kind of video ringtone that combines messaging and community with entertainment…

T

The video ringback is hampered by the fact that people don’t make video calls.

How does Vringo get round this?

There’s no video call required. Videos are activated by the Vringo software that people can download for free. Then, they can sign up to particular channels, and when they get a call our servers push out a video clip to them. But there’s also a community element because they can push their own choices to friends who are also members.

Has anyone missed a call while watching a video?

It can happen at first when people are getting used to the service, but the clips are always downloaded in full, so they can be watched later.

Does Vringo work on all devices?

At first it was just on native operating systems, but Nokia and Sony Ericsson have now bought into the concept so Vringo works on nearly all of their devices. We’re working on the rest.

Why are you so sure that Vringo will catch on?

Handsets have got 5 megapixel cameras and video, and we’re all playing these simple audio tracks?

Stand next to someone whose phone is blazing with light and colour when they get a call, and watch the reaction. It’s very viral. And we find that when people sign up, they change their tones a lot.

www.mobile-ent.biz

Members can create their own content in as little as 15 seconds.

Clearly the success of the service depends on getting a critical mass of customers. In terms of numbers, how are you doing so far?

We’re into six figures, and expect to start getting to that critical mass point in 2009.

What’s the strategy for customer acquisition?

We’re making partnerships with operators and portals. The most recent ones were with Turkish carrier Avea and Bouygues Telecom, and there are a dozen more to come. We’re also on the Nokia Download and Sony Ericsson Fun and Downloads.

Last year we launched an app that let users sync Facebook pics of their friends to their address book. We used that as a promotion for the service.

How much content is currently available?

We’ve got 3,000 clips across different genres, like funky animations, music, extreme sports and so on.

The content comes from partners like Mobstar Media, Cartoon Network, Adult Swim and others. Members can also make their own user generated content in as little as 15 seconds.

Does this lead to copyright infringement?

To be honest it can lead to infringement but we take copyright very seriously, and monitor the service constantly to put a stop to it.

So what strategies do you have to monetise Vringo?

Various models. Some operators charge a subscription and we get a share. We can also offer a free basic service with the option to buy premium content. That’s something we hope to introduce in Q1.

Later on, we’ll look at adfunded services. There are lots of obvious ideas there, such as sponsorship of channels and so on. It’s unlikely to happen this year, but we’ll be looking at these options for 2010.

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SOCIAL NETWORKING

Brand new channel Mobile social networking is accelerating fast. It’s a matter of time before major brands ‘mobilise’ their devoted communities too, says Declan Pettit, UK country manager of Zamano... ne of the most commentedupon elements of the US election was the importance of social networking to the campaign process. It was especially remarkable considering that Facebook was barely months old when the 2004 election took place, and YouTube had yet to be invented.

Social networking has swept across the internet like a storm. According to comScore, 580.5 million internet users were networking socially on the web as of June 2008. In the last two years, the web giants have started to target mobile. They’ve done deals with operators to secure presence on deck (MySpace with Vodafone, Bebo with Orange) and increasingly teamed up with handset companies to pre-load a rich application on devices – witness Facebook’s muchtrumpeted deal with BlackBerry, for example. As a result, the social networks have poked and nudged their way to the top of the mobile internet. In its August ‘State of the Mobile Web’ report, browser vendor Opera confirmed that MySpace and Facebook were the most visited mobile sites (in the US) after Google.

We shouldn’t be surprised that social networks are making the switch to the small screen so successfully. Mobile is self-evidently a communications medium. It’s sociable – that’s the whole point.

Only issues such as data charges and user experience are barriers to the

O

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ongoing proliferation of sites like Facebook on mobile, and all of them are being solved.

Needless to say, the power of the social network concept has not been lost on the world’s brand marketers – especially when those brands inspire love and devotion. What better way to communicate with your consumers than to build a platform on which they can communicate with each other? Take football clubs, for example. Footy fans have been sitting

What is a social network if it’s not a kind of digital pub, but without the beer? in pubs for decades debating the greatest ever goal in their club’s history, arguing about whether the new right back is any good, discussing arrangements for the next home game. Well, what is a social network if it’s not a kind of digital pub, but without the beer?

Clubs have already launched their own TV channels and credit cards, so they’re used to extending their brands into new areas. Social networking is a no-brainer. The

Football clubs have much to gain from mobile social networking

problem, as we all know, is the sheer complexity of launching on the wireless channel. All those handsets with their different screen sizes and APIs – all those operator billing systems to plug into.

It’s why zamano has teamed up with PeekabooTV to launch SoreThumbs as a collective portal for branded entertainment channels.

The appeal for brands is the speed of set-up. A channel can be created and switched on within 24 hours to provide fans with a community through which to chat, blog and share or purchase content. This channel exists both on the wired web and the mobile internet.

Even better, brands can then monetise the channel with advertising, subscriptions or microbilling for content. Critically, it’s the brand that owns its user data, enabling it to start a dialogue with fans and track usage. Partners also benefit from the extra traffic that accrues when a user decides to explore their channel from one of the others hosted on SoreThumbs.

We have already signed a partnership with Infomedia, the mobile services specialist that runs mobile sites for Premier League football clubs such as Man Utd, Liverpool, Arsenal, Everton and Chelsea. We’re all looking forward to kick off.

www.mobile-ent.biz

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iPHONE DEVELOPMENT COMMENCING EARLY 2009 OTHER COURSES AVAILABLE:

GAME DESIGN + DEVELOPMENT 3D ANIMATION GRAPHIC DESIGN GAME AUDIO PRODUCTION WEB DESIGN + DEVELOPMENT

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REGULATION

They’re watching us…

Regulation has its heart in the right place: it wants to protect the consumer. But when there are multiple watchdogs with multiple agendas, it all gets a bit draining. Suhail Bhat, the MEF’s director of policy and initiatives, looks ahead to the many issues coming the our way in 2009… s we all know, mobile entertainment is growing fast.

It’s now worth $25 billion by some estimates. But with all that power comes responsibility. The overarching principle behind all regulation is that a consumer must be able to make an informed decision about whether or not to engage with a service. On this point, the mobile content industry and the regulators are in complete agreement. However, exactly how to achieve this goal is far more contentious, as disproportionate regulation can suffocate innovation and stunt growth.

The evolution of mobile into media has changed the regulatory landscape beyond recognition. We now have multiple regulators with remit over the same services. In the UK, for example, mobile services are regulated by PhonepayPlus, Ofcom, the Gambling Commission and more.

Needless to say, these regulations can be confusing and often seemingly contradictory.

This needs to be addressed. The partnership between regulators and the industry can be instrumental in promoting consumer trust, which is essential if the industry is to flourish.

By running a series of workshops and publishing handbooks (produced by law firm Denton Wilde Sapte), MEF hopes to educate both the industry

A

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and the regulators. Below are some of the key regulatory developments your business needs to understand:

setting out the AVMS Directive implications to help our members establish if they are affected by it.

Audiovisual Media Services Directive (AVMS) The AVMS Directive covers all audiovisual media services and there are new rules relating specifically to

Unfair Commercial Practices Directive (UCPD) The UCPD harmonises measures seeking to curb unfair commercial practices. The directive contains a blacklist of 31 practices that are always deemed unfair. For example, businesses are not allowed to run ads that contain any ‘direct exhortation to children to buy products’ or persuade their parents or other adults to buy products for them. In serious cases companies may have criminal proceedings brought against them, potentially leading to unlimited fines and up to two years’ imprisonment of company officers. There is currently a lack of information on how it will be applied across the European Union.

Again, the Mobile Entertainment Forum has published a practical handbook on the UCPD.

Consumer trust is essential if the mobile content industry is to flourish. the provision of mobile TV, associated advertising, sponsorship and product placements. Compliance lies with the company that has ‘editorial responsibility’. However, in practice there may be difficulty determining who this is. What’s more, not all audiovisual services will be covered by the directive – there are six requirements that a service must meet before it applies. The MEF has published a practical handbook

PhonepayPlus (PpP) PpP recently made a number of proposals to regulate the mobile content industry. It recommended that, after a certain date, all service providers who provide content via a subscription or joining fee would need to get a prior permission licence from PpP. The licence will contain

specific conditions. At the time of publishing this article, PpP had not formally set out how it would proceed. However, we believe this measure will introduce a significant regulatory burden on the service provider with very few long-term benefits for the market.

Other regulatory developments which may impact the industry over the coming year include the Ecommerce Directive, the Payments Directive and proposals for the Telecoms Reform Package.

For more information on these regulatory issues as they develop, you can visit http://www.m-e-f.org or http://m-e-f.blogspot.com.

www.mobile-ent.biz

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RESEARCH

One price

fits all?

ver since the very start of the mobile media age, observers have quoted data tariffs as perhaps the single biggest hurdle to progress. Happily, this particular barrier is crumbling fast. Last month, Virgin Mobile UK introduced a 30p per day rate to attract more prepaid users to the mobile internet, undercutting 3 UK’s daily fee of 50p.

It’s good. But is it enough? The limitations of the apporach have led many to push for variable daily rates.

Off-peak pricing could make data even cheaper to buy. Low charges at weekends, for example, could encourage users to search for restaurants and movies on the move.

It sounds appealing. But variable data pricing risks re-introducing the complexity recently removed by the advent of flat-rate plans and bundled data/SMS/voice tariffs. To introduce a time-based price point would, in effect, mark a return to those dark data days of yester-year when people had to be vigilent about when and where they browsed at all times.

E

Operators reason that they remain focused on driving consumers onto flat-rate data plans. Therefore they are unlikely to even consider a variable data pricing model in the near to medium-term. But not everyone wants flat-rate. So what about those consumers that want some other solution? It is conceivable

Variable daily data tariffs might be one way to encourage more consumers on to the mobile internet. Or would they just add to the confusion? Nick Lane, of Direct2 Mobile, shares his thoughts…

All this assumes that there is some pent-up demand among consumers for variable data pricing. Consumers have accepted a flat-rate package from their fixed-line broadband provider and get the cheapest price by shopping around from the most competitive provider. Why should mobile be any different?

Consumers understand the concept of saving money and that is one variable that isn’t for changing. that operators will adopt a two-phase data pricing strategy. Firstly, looking to snare those data-hungry users willing to pay the flat-rate fee, and then following this up – it’s been suggested from 2010 onwards, with the introduction of capped off-peak tariffs to hook the less frequent consumers of data.

Why does Blyk target 16-24 year olds? It’s because they are cash-poor and time-rich. If you apply Blyk’s mantra, then today’s cash-poor, timerich are tomorrow’s time-poor, cashrich – and they’re being primed by the brands from an early age.

On this basis, the

existing mobile data pricing methodology is not necessarily right for the youthful demographic – a demographic that will potentially be tomorrow’s heavy user of mobile data. So why not introduce cut-price mobile data, targeting different demographic groups to encourage consumption? Surely that’s not too confusing.

Perhaps the mobile industry risks belittling the mobile consumer? After all, these same consumers have been able to grasp the concept of peak and off-peak rates on the train, for example. And to throw in additional complexity, travel companies also had the audacity to offer discounted rates for the young and old. Consumers understand the concept of saving money and that is one variable that isn’t for changing. Is it time to reevaluate the mobile data pricing structure to encourage mass adoption? I think it might be.

ME Research: Now open for business ARE you looking for targeted research into a specific area of mobile? Got a business plan to prepare? Maybe a speech? These are the kinds of projects that ME Research can help with. Mobile Entertainment has teamed up with Direct2Mobile to deliver targeted intelligence into the content space. Projects are carried out by Nick Lane and his

www.mobile-ent.biz

team. Interested? Send a mail to: meresearch@intentmedia.co.uk

January 2009 23

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RECRUITMENT

Sponsored by

GetJar makes its Mork Glu Mobile exec unsticks himself and moves to application specialist...

The JON VLASSOPULOS bandwagon rolls on. The Brit who went to run Endemol’s US Digital operation has joined mobile content firm Moderati as its new CEO. What a coup for the Vlassopulos clan. His brother Alex does mobile stuff for Sony BMG. AdMob has had a bit of a re-shuffle.

RUSSELL BUCKLEY has been promoted to VP of global alliances and will now roam the world being evangelical about off-deck mobile advertising – and representing the MMA as global chairman. He leaves a vacancy at European MD, which will be filled by THOMAS SCHULZ. Previously Schulz was with Yahoo!

Search Marketing.

Player X has made two additions to its exec team. CEDRIC MAISONNIER is the new European

sales director, while DAVE UNSTEAD has been promoted to UK & Ireland sales director.

deep experience in the operator sector, having spent time at Telekom Austria and Hutchison 3G.

MARCO ARGENTI has jumped from the Italian community and D2C firm Dada to join Nokia as VP of Media. Sounds like a big gig for the MEF board member.

Mobile Interactive Group (MIG) keeps on growing. It’s just added ANDREW JACKSON as head of client services. He will oversee the formation of a new business unit in MIG to provide value added services to all sectors.

io global has unveiled PHIL EAMES as its new CEO. He joins from Morse plc, but has also worked at Fujitsu, Nokia and Ericsson.

BT-backed io provides digital services platforms and is closely associated with music and video.

ANDREAS BISCHOF has joined the games developer Xendex as chief financial officer. The Austrian has

PATRICK MORK has left Glu to join Lithuanian app store GetJar. The Eastern European company has grown fast since launch in 2004. It describes itself as a mixture of content store and wikipedia – offering free apps that visitors can test and ‘improve’.

Kiwi mobile marketing firm The Hyperfactory has hired ANGELA STEELE as SVP and global strategist. She worked at Publicis Group for eight years prior to joining. envIO networks has appointed MANISH JHA as president and CEO. He replaces the company’s co-founder PRAKASH IYER, who’s moved over to CTO.

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www.mobile-ent.biz

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RECRUITMENT

IMR’s personal personnel touch UK recruitment specialist may be UK-based, but its reach now extends from the US to Russia

IMR is an international executive search company that can claim to be a genuine specialist in mobile content, digital media and marketing. It seeks out opportunities that can offer the optimum in career progression and finds executives that can successfully embrace these challenges.

IMR’s founders have over 20 years of collective international experience in the specialist search industry. The organisation uniquely addresses the markets in which it operates. IMR works with leading companies at every stage in the value chain and its in-depth knowledge enables the firm to identify key staff.

However, as its clients have gone global, so has IMR Executive’s reach. It currently offers positions in countries ranging from the US to Russia, ensuring a truly international selection. Placements are primarily in business leadership positions across clients' strategic management boards, including all senior level sales and marketing roles as well as leading technology positions.

Recruitment is, of course, a people business. However, elements of of the process have now moved online, and IMR can claim to be at the forefront of this internet activity. In June it launched a new website to introduce a fresh virtual environment, which is easy to use for both clients and candidates. The site has improved job functionalities so that all www.mobile-ent.biz

opportunities can be found quickly and effectively. Plus, there are added extras available for IMR website subscribers, such as SMS, e-mail and phone alerts, RSS feeds, resources, downloads, event news and specialist advice.

In 2008, record growth in sales and the introduction of new digital music services caused a surge of interest in new ways to monetise online and mobile music distribution. With this in mind, IMR Executive has put together a specialist department dedicated to sourcing talent for the digital music industry, headed by senior consultant Louisa Killeen.

Choosing a preferred recruitment partner is best done when it is an informed process. To this end IMR Executive is making a trial offer: for the first assignment that it takes on with a new client, it will offer to work on a trial basis and at an introductory fixed rate.

IMR Executive offers a reliable and trustworthy service and will listen closely to specifications before introducing a broad shortlist of candidates. Its knowledge of the industry helps to provide someone that will add great value to any company, anywhere. www.imrexecutive.com

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SOURCE Stuck for a stat or just looking to expand your mind? Find everything you need right here...

N

umbers. We love them. You love them. And they’re all here in Mobile Entertainment magazine’s reference section. It’s a one-stop shop for all the contentbased numerological and statological information you can possibly imagine.

Our run-down of key operator subscriber numbers is here again. As usual, our Games Spotlight pages focus on the hot new titles coming out soon. We also have a round-up of all the latest industry research, a comprehensive show and conference guide, and a run down of best seller charts from across the mobile content market.

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January 2009

There’s also the Product Focus, which picks out a selection of the content, hardware and services either just launched or coming to market.

What’s more, every month Mobile Entertainment magazine publishes the Mobile Marketplace, an invaluable directory of key product and service providers in the space. Put simply, there’s something here to satisfy every number cruncher and any Powerpoint presentation.

If you have any queries about the data, or would like to submit information for any of the pages in this section, just send an email to: tim.green@intentmedia.co.uk.

INDEX GAMES SPOTLIGHT

P27

Hot new titles coming out soon

EVENTS

P28

Conferences, exhibitions, seminars and networking

DATABOX

P29

We love stats, you love stats

PRODUCT FOCUS

P30

Best of this month’s content, hardware and services

CHARTS

P32

All the movers and shakers

NETWORK SUBS

P34

Key numbers from key operators

FEATURES LIST

P35

What’s coming up in ME...

MARKETPLACE

P37

Mobile content product and service providers

www.mobile-ent.biz

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SOURCE: GAMES SPOTLIGHT

Fluid Pixel goes KamiCrazy for the App Store UK developer follows the success of Mix n’ Match with its second iPhone release Middlesbrough-based Fluid Pixel Studio, has been operating in the games segment for nearly two years now and in that time it has developed a number of titles for the mobile phone, PC and Sony PSP platforms.

At the end of November the company introduced itself to the App Store with the release of Mix n’ Match, a free cartoon-style character creator. Following the success of this first release, Fluid Pixel unveiled KamiCrazy, a platform-based puzzle game. The title follows a group of ‘KamiCrazy’ soldiers that crash land in the jungle and must

TITLE: KamiCrazy GENRE: Platform RELEASED: Out Now PUBLISHER: Fluid Pixel PLATFORM: iPhone/iPod Touch navigate their way through treacherous terrain and dangerous natives to regroup with their comrades. The player must then flick, push, nudge and swing them to safety using the touch screen, across 40 levels with two distinct themes.

KamiCrazy was built on Fluid Pixel’s own in-house developed game engine, which it says allowed for a speedy development cycle. The company intends to use this platform to create future releases and to convert existing content for use on touchscreen handsets. www.fpstudios.com

Prepare for a very Distinctive zoo Indie studio expands original IP with upcoming iPhone offering Distinctive Developments is one of the few independent studios to survive and thrive in mobile games. The Sheffield-based outfit is one of Europe’s largest, with offices in Sheffield, San Diego, and Gliwice in Poland.

It’s become a trusted partner for major publishers, creating FIFA Football for EA Mobile and working with Glu, Konami and Namco among others. More recently it won Best Mobile Game at the 2008 What Mobile Awards for its mobile conversion of Metal Gear Acid.

The studio has seen success with its own IP such as 3D Pool, which was launched on Facebook and is in its latest incarnation as 3D Pool: Urban Hustle on various mobile devices.

For the upcoming release, Distinctive is once more developing its own IP in the form www.mobile-ent.biz

TITLE: Flip Zoo GENRE: Arcade Puzzle RELEASED: Q2 2009 PUBLISHER: TBC PLATFORM: J2ME, iPhone, Android of Zoo Flip. The aim of this casual puzzle game is to guide a variety of runaway creatures, each with their own specific abilities, through ten levels with five themes to the safety of the exits. A comedic element will be conveyed through the animals’ dialogue and “the amusing, if not gruesome, ways that various creatures meet their deaths.” The game will utilise an intuitive one-button control.

Distinctive is currently looking for a publisher to take this game to the mobile market. www.distdevs.co.uk

January 2009 27

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SOURCE: EVENTS

FORTHCOMING HIGHLIGHTS January 7th-10th CES

January 21st-22nd Mobile Games Forum

January 26th-29th NATPE

January 29th GfK International Telecom Conference

2009 CALENDAR January January 7th-10th Digital Hollywood at CES Las Vegas, USA www.digitalhollywood.com January 8th-11th CES Las Vegas, USA www.cesweb.org

event in 2008. We’ll be back there in 2009 as an official media partner.

February 17th-19th FICCI Frames Mumbai, India www.ficci-frames.com March

Kick off 2009 with a show that covers every kind of gadget and dongle you can think of.

March 23rd GDC 2009 San Francisco, USA www.gdconf.com

January 13th Commercial Opportunities in Mobile Entertainment London, UK www.efactor.com

The biggest developer event in the world returns for yet another stab at bringing together the game development community.

January 21st-22nd Mobile Games Forum London, UK www.osneymedia.co.uk

March 24th NXT STAGE Online & Mobile Entertainment Conference Los Angeles, USA www.nxtstage.net

The original mobile games conference in its sixth year.

January 26th-29th NATPE Las Vegas, USA www.natpe.org/conference

March 24th Game Connection America 2009 San Francisco, USA www.game-connection.com

Game Connection returns again to provide game developers and service providers the chance to exhibit their wares March 30th-April 3rd MipTV ft. Milia Cannes, France www.miptv.com The global content market for creating, co-producing, buying, selling, financing and distributing entertainment across all platforms.

April April 1st-3rd CTIA Wireless 2009 Las Vegas, USA www.ctiawireless.com Mobile Entertainment magazine will once again be a media partner for the foremost trade event in North America.

April 22nd-24th Wireless Telecommunications Symposium Prague, Czech Republic www.csupomona.edu/wtsi

The GSMA Mobile World Congress (Feb 16th-19th 2008) has a designated conference stream and exhibition for Mobile Media and Entertainment. It will allow you to meet with leading executives and experience the technologies that will drive mobile media and entertainment into the next decade.

June June 2nd-4th E3 2009 Los Angeles, USA www.e3expo.com

January 29th GfK International Telecom Conference London, UK www.gfk.com/telecom-conference

The place to be for game publishers, developers and distributors.

The 4th GfK International Telecom Conference will take place at The British Library.

June 2nd-4th Licensing International 2009 Las Vegas, USA www.licensingexpo.com

February February 10th-12th Casual Connect (Hamburg) Hamburg, Germany hamburg.casualconnect.org

More than 525 exhibitors with 6,000 brands and properties all in just three days.

February 16th-19th Mobile World Congress Barcelona, Spain www.mobileworldcongress.com

June 2nd-5th Java One 2009 San Diego, USA java.sun.com/javaone

More than 55,000 attended the GSM Association’s showpiece

28

January 2009

June 3rd-5th Brew 2009 San Diego, USA brew.qualcomm.com Qualcomm’s annual developer and partner conference.

June 23rd-24th Mobile Entertainment Markets London, UK www.m-e-f.org MeM is the Mobile Entertainment Forum’s official annual event, produced in partnership with Informa.

October

CTIA Wireless 2009 – The big US event brings key audiences such as enterprise users, solution providers, content owners and mobile distribution channels together to form strategic partnerships, service industry needs and create new innovations in wireless data. Takes place in Las Vegas, April 1st-3rd.

Sun Microsystems’ annual Java developer conference.

October 6th-9th CTIA Wireless IT & Entertainment San Diego, USA www.wirelessit.com

www.mobile-ent.biz

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SOURCE: DATABOX

databox A selection of stats from across the mobile industry...

Loud text alert Worldwide SMS revenues will remain the king of data revs and almost double in value in the next five years. Portio Research says traffic volumes and revenues will confound predictions to grow from $130 billion in 2008 to $224 billion by 2013 – that's 60 per cent of non-voice service revenues.

Portio also predicts mobile e-mail users worldwide will quadruple from approximately 250 million in 2008 to over a billion users by the end of 2013.

10,000 iPhone apps

Mobile turns the music up Mobile music revenues will rise from €1.6bn in 2007 to €3.2bn by 2012, says Screen Digest.

Although mastertones and ringback tones will account for more than half of this sum, full-track and video service revenues will increase to 46 per cent in 2012, from 29 per cent at 2007 year end. At €219m, the Western European and North American full-track and video mobile music market is a fraction of online music's current value of €1,309m. Screen Digest believes the introduction of subscription models such as Vodafone's MusicStation in the UK will help the market and predicts subscription service revenues will be worth €928m in 2012.

BBC no. One Gulf stream The Beeb is pipping Google to top spot in the mobile browsing stakes. Nielsen says BBC News is the most popular destination for mobile web users in the UK, with 1.7m average unique visitors per month in 3Q08. Behind it were Google, BBC Weather, Facebook and Windows Live. Nielsen says the number of UK residents using the mobile web is now at 7.3m. The number of people using the mobile web in the UK increased by 25 per cent in Q3.

The fast-growing Middle East region is approaching 200m mobile subs. A new report from Arab Advisors Group reveals 194.5 million connections in 19 countries at the end of June 2008. It noted that Saudi Arabia's Aljawal and Egypt's MobiNil sustained their top rankings, with 17.8 million and 16.3 million subs respectively.

Apple watchers have put a figure on the amazing success of the Apple App Store. Two services that track the portal – AppShopper and 148Apps – say 10,000 apps have been uploaded, and that the store is dominated by games. The majority of services are free, with $0.99 the most common price point on paid-for apps. Elsewhere, Apple itself revealed that Blimp Pilot's Koi Pond was the top paid for app in 2008, with Vivendi's Crash Bandicoot and Sega's Super Monkey Ball second and third, respectively. The top featured free download was the iPint drinking productivity tool.

HSPA spanks WiMAX HSPA will have more than a billion subs by 2013, while WiMAX will have just 103 million. Informa describes the rampant mobile broadband market as a 'tale of two markets'. While WiMAX has gained momentum in the last year, with launches

by Sprint Nextel and various device vendors, HSDPA is the clear winner with backing from the likes of Vodafone and China Mobile.

Our $167bn biz The global mobile content market will be worth $167bn by 2013, according to Juniper. It says this massive total will be shared among players such as operators, content providers and third parties, such as content aggregators and billing companies. Juniper believes that if operators become smart pipes that ‘share value creation’ they can increase their mobile content income from $23bn in 2008 to $52bn by 2013.

www.mobile-ent.biz www.mobile-ent.biz

January 2009 29

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SOURCE: PRODUCT FOCUS

NEW STUFF A selection of new content, hardware and services...

Materna: MACS

IN A NUTSHELL: A management system for the delivery of content to any device, and now offering a widget module.

Available: Out Now These days it’s not just mobile operators offering their customers multimedia content or messaging services, they also face competition from hardware manufacturers, ISPs, fixed-line networks and D2C portals among others.

Materna has responded to this challenge by developing its fullservice solution, entitled MACS – Multimedia Application and Content Server – as a platform that provides the link between operator, service provider and suppliers of content through any network and to any sort of device. MACS provides a selection of innovative applications and modules for entertainment, social networking, mobile marketing and advertising, as well as an e-commerce shop

system for digital content. It even works with physical content areas such as ticketing.

In line with the surge of interest in mobile widgets, Materna has embraced the concept, and now makes it easy to integrate selected content from an existing shop portfolio into a widget with little development. As a result, the customer reach of an online shop can be increased substantially.

Corporate widgets can also be integrated into partner sites. This enables end users to find and buy music content, concert tickets or merchandise directly from the website visited, while proactively looking for information on the Internet about their favourite artists, for example.

Logic3 i-Station25 Available: Out Now IN A NUTSHELL: A portable speaker system for watching video and listening to music on the iPhone.

30

January 2009

The emergence of the mobile phone as a music playing device has prompted the growth of complementary accessories – and made some phone stores look more like audio centres.

Logic3 is one of those moving into the space. It has a long history in the peripherals market. Over the years it has acquired an in-depth experience in the design, development, manufacture and supply of portable audio accessories.

The company uses its sales execs as ‘listening partners,’ which allows it to study market demand and changing consumption patterns. Logic3 says this method

has kept it ahead of the market with innovative product development.

One of its latest products is the iStation25, a speaker dock for the iPhone and iPod, allowing the user to play music or videos stored on their device. This portable system carries four 40mm speakers, and incorporates circuitry to reduce TDMA noise distortion. The iStation25 can be powered by four AA batteries.

It can be connected to a TV via its video-out port and the iPod or iPhone can be adjusted to sit in either portrait or landscape mode.

The speakers can then be operated by remote control. The i-Station25 carries an RRP of £69.

www.mobile-ent.biz

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SOURCE: PRODUCT FOCUS

Girls Gone Wild Available: Out Now In September last year, Australian content provider Zeal Entertainment acquired the worldwide mobile content distribution rights for the Girls Gone Wild franchise, both on and off-deck outside the US. It is now looking to develop the brand in other key markets such as Europe, Asia and South America.

The Girls Gone Wild brand, which is owned by Mantra Films, is already well-estabished in other chanels. Its focus is ‘capturing adventurous young women against settings such as Mardi Gras, Spring Break and tropical islands.’

Part of Zeal’s development of the brand outside the US has been the re-design of its WAP site, which relaunches this month. The new site features a library of adult content comprising over 5,000 video clips

now available for download, together with games and wallpapers, while an automated update system ensures that the content keeps rolling.

A new feature permitting the creation and uploading of user generated content will be integrated into the system shortly.

Users can access content through a variety of payment models including subscription, pay-per-view or a combination of the two. Levels of explicitness vary depending on the region, ensuring legal compliance for the user.

IN A NUTSHELL: A popular adult web brand removes its bikini and launches itself into mobile.

SMARTPHONE ENTERTAINMENT CHARTS from Bplay.com Thru Dec. 7, 2008 TOP 20 GAMES

TOP 20 THEMES Title

Category

Publisher

Hands-On

1

Fireplace

Next Gen

Magmic

Magmic

2

iBerry 2.0 Today Plus

Next Gen

Magmic

Strategy/Board

Hands-On

3

iBerry 2.0

Icon

Magmic

Crash Bandicoot Nitro Kart

Action/Arcade

Vivendi

4

FlowBerry

Next Gen

Magmic

5

Chuzzle™

Puzzle

PopCap

5

iBerry Neo Today Plus

Next Gen

Magmic

6

Sudoku

Puzzle

Magmic

6

Tinker Bell

Disney

Disney

7

Mahjong Solitaire

Puzzle

Magmic

7

Saltwater

Next Gen

Magmic

8

Frogger

Action/Arcade

Konami

8

iBerry Eco Today Plus

Next Gen

Magmic

9

Solitaire Legends

Cards/Casino

Magmic

9

iBerry 2.0 Zen

Zen

Magmic

10

Bookworm

Puzzle

PopCap

10

iBerry 2.0 Today

Today

Magmic

11

Golden Tee® Golf Mobile Edge

Sports

InFusio

11

Tranquil Garden

Next Gen

Magmic

12

Spider Solitaire

Cards/Casino

Magmic

12

Amaranth Zen

Zen

Magmic

13

Cake Mania 2

Action/Arcade

Vivendi

13

iBerry Eco Zen

Zen

Magmic

14

Leisure Suit Larry: Love for Sail

Strategy/Board

Vivendi

14

Explorer

Next Gen

Magmic

15

Nintaii

Puzzle

Mobigloo

15

Crossbar

Next Gen

Magmic

16

Spades

Cards/Casino

Magmic

16

Tickled Pink Zen

Zen

Magmic

17

Ka-Glom

Puzzle

Magmic

17

Seasonal

Icon

Magmic

18

Brain Up

Puzzle

Magmic

18

Reflex Color Zen

Zen

Magmic

19

Medieval Kings Chess II

Strategy/Board

Magmic

19

Pooh and Tigger

Disney

Disney

20

Phase 10

Cards/Casino

Magmic

20

Dallas Cowboys

NFL

NFL

Title

Category

1

Guitar Hero 3 Mobile

Action/Arcade

2

Texas Hold'em King 3

Cards/Casino

3

Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare

4

www.mobile-ent.biz

Publisher

January 2009 31

32 ME47_final:charts

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SOURCE: CHARTS

charts Check here every month for the best selling games, ringtones and mobile apps from across the market...

Tagging

Ringtones

Artists & handsets

Ringtones.com top Euro music tones, Dec

Artist

Flycell US Top Ringtone Artists, Nov

Hot ‘N’ Cold

Katy Perry

Artist (Ranked by downloads)

Model

Vendor

2

Live Your Life

TI ft Rihanna

1

Lil Waye

1

M1000

Kyocera

3

Infinity 2008

Guru Josh Project

2

Akon

2

Shine

LG

4

Sex On Fire

Kings Of Leon

3

Rihanna

3

SGH-A737/A736

Samsung

5

Right Now

Akon

4

Jay-Z & TI

4

W580i

Sony Ericsson

6

Human

Killers

5

Ludacris

5

Centro

Palm

7

So What?

Pink

6

50 Cent

6

RAZR V3xx

Motorola

8

Hero

X Factor

7

Ne-Yo

7

RAZR V3r

Motorola

9

Let Your Love Flow

Bellamy Brothers

8

Kevin Rudolf & Lil Wayne

8

Super Slice

UTSTARCOM

10

Womanizer

Britney Spears

9

Kanye West

9

MARBL K127/K123

Kyocera

10

Taylor Swift

10

SGH-I617

Samsung

Source: Mobilestreams 1

Family Guy

2

Who The Hell’s Ringing? Peter Kay

3

Your Phone Is Ringing

Terry Tibbs

4

What’s Occurring?

Gavin & Stacey

5

Message From Dark Side Yoda

Damn You Vile...

6

Chamone Mother...

Bo Selecta

7

Full-Length Spider Pig

The Simpsons

8

This Is 007 Alert

James Bond

9

Let The Game Begin

Saw

10

Good Afternoon Madam

Phonejacker

Music

Source: Mobilestreams

Zed top truetones, 15 Nov - 15th Dec Artist

1

Goodbye Mr. A

The Hoosiers

2

Insane In The Brain

Cypress Hill

3 4

All I Want For Christmas Mariah Carey Brainstorm

USA realtone soundalikes, Dec

South Africa realtone soundalikes, Dec

Ringtones Song

Source: Flycell

Source: Flycell

Ringtones.com top Euro voicetones, Dec

Arctic Monkeys

5

Circle of Life

6

Girlfriend Alert

Elton John n/a

7

Kiss SMS Alert

n/a

8

Asshole Alert

n/a

9

Axel F

OST

10

High Five

Borat

Source: Zed Zed games, 15 Nov - 15th Dec Game

Publisher

1

Formula Racing 3D

Zed

2

Brain Coach

Zed

3

Alexa Episode 2

Zed

4

Bubble Boom Challenge

Zed

5

Street Basketball

Zed

6

NBA Blocks

Zed

7

Block Runner

Zed

Shazam Tagging Dec 1 B ‘N’ Nite Kid Kudi 2 Infinity 2008 Guru Josh Project 3 Right Now Akon 4 Libe Your Life Rihanna 5 Run Leona Lewis 6 Hot ‘N’ Cold Katy Perry 7 Use Somebody Kings Of Leon 8 Human The Killers 9 Let Your Love Flow The Bellamy Brothers 10 I’m Yours Jason Mraz Source: Shazam

1

If I Were A Boy

Beyonce

1

Circus

Britney Spears

2

Crush

David Archuleta

2

If I Were A Boy

Beyonce

3

Can You Hear Me

Enrique Iglesias

3

Live Your Life

TI ft Rihanna

4

I Hate This Part

Pussycat Dolls

4

Single Ladies

Beyonce

5

Green Light

John Legend

5

Just Dance

Lady Gaga

6

Disturbia

Rihanna

6

Whatever You Like

TI

7

Womanizer

Britney Spears

7

Love Story

Taylor Swift

8

The Man Who...

The Script

8

Let It Rock

Kevin Rudolf

9

Beggin

Madcon

9

Paper Planes

MIA

10

Single Ladies

Beyonce

10

Womanizer

Britney Spears

Source: Melodi Media

Source: Melodi Media

Video & wallpaper Fonestarz top videos, Dec

Fonestarz top wallpapers, Dec

1

Wii Fit Girlfriend

1

2

Laughing Baby

2

Googly-eyed Pets – Chimp

3

Sexy Cam

3

Flirty Fireworks – I Love You

4

Glamour Girl Greetings

4

Animated Liverpool Crest – Anfield

5

Kiss Me Kwik

5

Together Forever

6

Girls Aloud ‘The Promise’

6

When Animals Attack – Leopard Leap

7

Guru Josh Project ‘Infinity 2008’

7

Smiley Sayings – Hug For You

Lyndsey Looking Good

8

3D Man Utd Logo

Violet Butterfly

8

Bowling Challenge

Zed

8

9

Jungle Balls

Zed

9

Ice Cream Girls

9

Holly Willoughby

10

Life Is A Fiesta

Zed

10

Violent Veg – Banana v Blender

10

Love Themes – Butterflies

Source: FoneStarz

Source: FoneStarz

Source: Zed

32

Flycell US Top Download Handsets, Nov

Song 1

January 2009

www.mobile-ent.biz

US Charts January:Layout 1

12/12/08

10:04

Page 1

U.S. CHARTS Tones

Games

Wallpapers

Titles

Artist

Titles

Category

Can't Believe It

T-Pain Ft. Lil Wayne

1

Quantum of Solace

Bond

Bleeding Love

Leona Lewis

2

We Takin Over

Pink Frosty

No Air duet with Chris Brown

Jordin Sparks Ft. Chris Brown

3

Bloo Screen

Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends

Love In This Club

Usher Ft. Young Jeezy

4

Clemson paw

Clemson

Wish You Were Here

Pink Floyd

5

One Shall Stand

Transformers

Hot N Cold

Katy Perry

6

Shut Up and Kiss Me

Pink Frosty

Suffocate

J. Holiday

7

Glittering Cross silver

Christian

Beautiful

Snoop Dogg Featuring Pharrell

8

Warning Idiots Everywhere

Fun

Spider Pig

The Simpsons

9

Celtic Knot Silver

Fight Songs

10

Kiss Kiss

Chris Brown Ft. T-Pain

10

I Love Obama

Barack Obama

Titles

Publisher

1

3D Pool

I-play

1

2

Jewel Quest速 II

I-play

2

3

5 Card Draw Poker

Glu

3

4

True Crime

Hands On

4

5

3D Pool Urban Hustle

I-play

5

6

Fast & Furious: Fugitive

I-play

6

7

Wheel of Fortune Deluxe

Sony Pictures

7

8

Blitz: The League

Hudson Entertainment

8

9

Flavor of Love

IGfun

9

10

Jewel Quest(r) Solitaire

I-play

11

Destiny's Child Groove

Square Enix

11

Always Be My Baby

Mariah Carey

11

Buttercup

The Powerpuff Girls

12

Gem Drop

Real Networks

12

And I

Ciara

12

Retro Skulls

Pink Frosty

13

Collapse! Chaos

Real Networks

13

Another Way To Die

Jack White & Alicia Keys

13

Adios and Ciao Ciao

Tokidoki

14

Donovan McNabb Street Action

Skyzone Mobile

14

Single Ladies

Beyonce

14

Hot mama

Fun

15

The Price Is Right

Mobliss

15

Talkin Out Da Side Of Ya Neck

Dem Franchize Boyz

15

Up In Smoke

Pink Frosty

16

Bounce Out

Real Networks

16

I Got A Thang For You

Trina Ft. Keyshia Cole

16

Michigan State Helmet Logo Michigan State

17

2008 Weakest Link

I-play

17

Ms. New Booty

Bubba Sparxxx Ft. Ying Yang Twins

17

Burberrys

Cool Designs

18

Text Twist Turbo

Real Networks

18

Waking the neighbors

Step Brothers

18

Terror Chicken Head

Robot Chicken

19

South Park 10: The Game

Real Networks

19

So What

P!nk

19

Cherry Hearts

Fun

I-play

20

Sexy Can I

Ray-J ft. Yung Berg

20 Haters Make Us Famous Pink Frosty

20 Slingo Quest

The PlayPhone featured content listing is created and compiled utilizing download data results from strong sellers, fast movers and top-rated mobile content available across PlayPhone Web and WAP mobile destinations. (c) PlayPhone, Inc. All Rights Reserved. All other phone images, trademarks, logos and copyrights are property of their respective owners.

34 ME47_fINAL:networks

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SOURCE: OPERATORS

NETWORK SUBS Key operator subscriber numbers from around the world Country

Operator

Subscribers

Country

Western Europe UK

Spain

France

Israel Netherlands

Ireland

Sweden

Norway

Germany

Denmark

Belguim

Poland

34

T-Mobile (PTC)

12,800,000 5,267,000

16,800,000

TMN

6,004,000

3

4,445,000

Optimus

2,280,000

Virgin

4,115,100

Orange

13,900,000

O2

18,878,000

Switzerland

Orange

1,510,000

Orange

15,642,000

Eastern Europe

BT-Mobile

360,000

Czech Republic

T-Mobile

5,300,000

O2

5,186,000

18,510,000

T-Mobile

23,008,000

Vodafone

2,751,000

Megafon

36,970,000

15,700,000

Mobile TeleSystems

77,970,000

23,056,000

VimplelCom

41,800,000

Kyivstar GSM

23,711,000

Ukrainian Mobile (MTS)

19,811,000

3

1,500,000

Optus

7,100,000

Telstra

2,400,000

Vodafone

3,573,000

China Mobile

332,000,000

Orange

11,091,000

Vodafone

16,210,000

Orange Vodafone 3

8,184,000

Wind

15,600,000

TIM

35,000,000

Asia Pacific

Orange

24,315,000

Australia

SFR

18,800,000 9,256,000

Bouygues

Greece

Subscribers

Vodafone

Vodafone

Movistar

Italy

Portugal

Operator

Russia

Ukraine

Vodafone

5,438,000

Cosmote

6,280,000

Wind (Previously-Qtelecom)

4,500,000

China Unicom

162,491,000

Orange

10,354,000

Tibet Telecom

957,000

Movistar

22,800,000

3

2,515,000

Cellcom Israel

3,073,000

Pelephone

2,400,000

China

Hong Kong India

Smart tone

1,108,000

Bharti Airtel

64,268,049

Vodafone

4,360,000

BSNL

40,790,000

T-Mobile

4,889,000

Idea Cellular

24,002,000

KPN

8,800,000

Tata Indicom

24,330,000

Vodafone

2,247,000

Japan

NTT DoCoMo

53,400,000

O2

1,688,000

Philippines

Globe Telecom

22,700,000

3 (includes UK)

4,445,000

Meteor

962,000

3 (includes Denmark) Telenor Tele 2

3,118,000

Djuice (Pannon) Telenor

Smart

30,000,000

AIS

21,089,000

945,000

Dtac

12,000,000

2,856,000

True Move

11,200,000

Singtel

2,570,000

3,401,000

StarHub

1,750,000

2,856,000

MobileOne

1,554,000

Celcom

6,404,000

Thailand

Singapore

Malaysia

Netcom

1,577,000

Tele2

441,000

Digi

6,409,000

Vodafone

35,295,000

Maxis

8,500,000

T-Mobile

38,400,000

North America

O2

13,576,000

Canada

Bell

6,260,000

E-Plus

13,600,000

Rogers

6,200,000

Debitel

13,200,000

Telus

5,656,000

Victorvox (Drillisch)

2,236,000

Sprint

51,900,000

3 (includes Sweden)

945,000

T- Mobile USA

31,500,000

TDC

3,000,000

Verizon Wireless

67,178,000

Sonofon

1,680,000

Alltel

13,170,134

Mobistar (Orange)

3,590,000

US Cellular

6,200,000

BASE

2,600,000

AT&T

72,900,000

Belgacom Mobile

4,620,000

Vodafone

2,642,000

Orange

13,900,000

January 2009

USA

Source: Mediacells was established in 2004 to assist clients in making more money out of mobile. The company provides accurate and actionable intelligence to the mobile, media, retail, research and information sectors. www.mediacells.com

www.mobile-ent.biz

35 ME47_final:28 ME34

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FEATURES

Feature

The definitive guide to ME’s main editorial preoccupations in 2009. Should keep us busy...

Planner2009 FEBRUARY2009

MAY2009

AUGUST2009

NOVEMBER2009

Mobile World Congress special issue ME is an official media partner, so we’ll take thousands of copies to Barcelona.

Pure-play mobile communities The start-ups outmaneouvreing MySpace et al Tickers and idle screen The new info and ad channel intriguing big brands all over the world The coming of mobile Flash Browser based, fragmentation solving… but is it widespread enough?

Video ringbacks Piracy proof, rich and sexy – but only if users embrace video calling

BREW and Java focus A focus to co-incide with the Brew2009 and JavaOne shows Original made-for-mobile video production Who’s putting money and craft into original content for the smallest screen?

Mobile traffic analytics services Mobile is uniquely personal. But if you can’t mine the data, so what?

India market focus Recruitment special Massively multi-player gaming

Age certification systems Embedded mobile content ads Mobile comics and animation

Editorial deadline: July 13th Advertising deadline: July 15th

Editorial deadline: Oct 12th Advertising deadline: Oct 14th

SEPTEMBER2009

DECEMBER2009

ME Awards preview Mobile internet site building Enhanced messaging

Top 50 content execs Pureplay mobile search City guides, travel aids…

Editorial deadline: August 10th Advertising deadline: August 12th

Editorial deadline: Nov 9th Advertising deadline: Nov 11th

Editorial deadline: April 13th Advertising deadline: April 15th

JUNE2009

Location-based search The great monetisation hope in an era of mobile GPS Barcodes and QR Coming of age now that technical issues are being solved Brazil market focus Putting the B into BRIC, and growing to a samba beat

MEM show preview The MEF’s big showcase returns to London Porting, testing & certification Handset fragmentation endures.

We examine the testers and the porting specialists Memory card content The role of the SD card in driving content sales One year of the Apple App store Examining the impact of the iPhone retail centre after 12 months

Editorial deadline: Feb 9th Advertising deadline: Feb 10th

Editorial deadline: May 11th Advertising deadline: May 13th

MARCH2009

APRIL2009 CTIA special issue We’ll be in Las Vegas as an official event partner. So will our mags DVB-H mobile TV progress The hype’s gone quiet. What about the signals?

Off-portal adult video focus Tracking the drift away from nervous operators Music ID services The spontaneous key to driving mobile full track sales?

Editorial deadline: March 9th Advertising deadline: March 9th

www.mobile-ent.biz www.mobile-ent.biz

OCTOBER2009

CTIA special issue US market focus Top 30 US content execs Google Android – one year on

Editorial deadline: Sep 14th Advertising deadline: Sep 16th

For more information about advertising opportunities around these features, please call Tom Roberts on +44 (0) 1992 535647 or email tom.roberts@intentmedia.co.uk For all editorial queries call Tim Green on +44 (0) 1992 535 646 or email tim.green@intentmedia.co.uk

JULY2009 Eastern Europe market focus ME’s Iron Curtain raiser Off-portal mobile advertising Is it easy? Is it profitable? Is there enough inventory? We investigate the possibilities Casual mobile games focus The driving force of the console market goes mobile Mobile web site transcoding We examine the controversial route taken by some operators Editorial deadline: June 15th Advertising deadline: June 17

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Robert Dotson, President and Chief Executive Officer, T-Mobile USA

9 #;.1>@ ;@?;: 85B1 - ;.581 521 What does “mobile life” mean to you?

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-3; 2>51:0? -:0 2-95851? ->1 A:85718E @; 85B1 5: @41 ?-91 @;C: %45? ?1<->-@5;: 4-? />1-@10 - />-B5:3 2;> -88 ;2 A? @; .1 9;>1 /;::1/@10 C5@4 @4;?1 C4; 9-@@1> 011<8E %41 ?<1/@-/A8-> 5::;B-@5;:? ;2 >1/1:@ E1->? 5: @41 9;.581 C;>80 4-? 9-01 ?4->5:3 8521 ? 1B1:@? 9;>1 <1>?;:-8 >5/4 -:0 599105-@1 %4-@ 9-71? -88 ;2 ;A> 85B1? 9;>1 >1C->05:3 What is your primary business goal for 2009?

%; /;:@5:A1 ;A> =A1?@ @; .1/;91 91>5/- ? 81-05:3 ?1>B5/1 /;9<-:E .E 19.>-/5:3 @41 :1D@ C-B1 ;2 5::;B-@5;: 5: 0-@- ?1>B5/1? %4-@ >1=A5>1? A? @; ;<1: A< ;A> .A?5:1?? 9;018 @; .>1-7@4>;A34 @45:75:3 -:0 :1C >18-@5;:?45<? (1 ->1 8;;75:3 @; 19.>-/1 @41 9-35/ @4-@ /-: /;91 2>;9 4534 @1/4 ?@->@ A<? ;> @41 /;88131 0>;< ;A@ @5:71>5:3 5: 45? 3->-31 88 ->1 C18/;91 How does attending CTIA WIRELESS 2009 help you meet that goal?

&:/;B1>5:3 5::;B-@5;: ;2@1: .135:? C5@4 2>11 C41185:3 05-8;3A1 -:0 - 41-8@4E -:0 -/@5B1 1D/4-:31 ;2 501-? %41 % ( # $$ ?4;C 5? @41 3-@41>5:3 <8-/1 @4-@ .>5:3? @;31@41> @41 >534@ <1;<81 C5@4 2>1?4 501-? -:0 /-<-.585@51? @; <;C1> @41 5::;B-@5;: 1:35:1? ;2 @;9;>>;C

Mobile Life!

Lif

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†

March 31, 2009 April 1-3, 2009

h Partner Seminars

† Exhibit Floor, Keynotes, Sessions & Partner Conferences

Las Vegas Convention Center www.ctiashow.com

Las Vegas, NV, USA

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MOBILE MARKETPLACE

MOBILE

PUBLISHING PLATFORM

MARKETPLACE

MARKETPLACE INDEX 26 CONTENT............................................+49 9547 870 120 www.26content.com ABSOLUTE QUALITY ...............................+44 141 220 5600 www.absolutequality.com BANGO...................................................+44 08700 340 365 www.bango.com BRIGHTSHARE...........................................+972 4 955 4020 www.brightshare.com DIALOGUE COMMUNICATIONS ..............08700 790 300 www.dialogue.net DYNAMO...............................................+44 (0)1382 348635 www.dynamogames.com ELITE ........................................................+44 01543 268826 www.elite-systems.co.uk FLUID PIXEL STUDIOS ...........................+44 01642 384336 www.fpstudios.com FROGGIE ...................................................+34 954 98 08 48 www.fpstudios.com GAMELION ................................................+48 606 101 500 www.game-lion.com GENIE .........................................................+44 844 415 5531 www.broadbandgenie.co.uk/mobile INLOGIC...................................................+421 904 628 889 www.inlogic.eu

GAMES DISTRIBUTOR

NETBISCUITS GMBH .............................+49 631 303 1400 www.netbiscuits.com PARTNERTRANS..................................+49 (0)2104 172660 info@partnertrans.com SPIEL STUDIOS .......................................info@spiel-s.com www.spielstudios.com SPLASH .......................................................+1 310 8212 666 www.splashnews.com THUMBSTAR ..............................................+44 151 231 4832 www.thumbstargames.com UNIVERSALLY SPEAKING....................+44 (0)1480 210621 www.usspeaking.com WAPPLE..................................................+44 (0)1527 558247 www.wapple.net XIAM ............................................................+353 1 483 2000 www.xiam.com

The Mobile Marketplace offers a complete marketing package of print, online and editorial visibility, allowing companies to maintain contact with readers each month without the cost of full display advertising.

The Mobile Marketplace and its associated online version has also been designed to offer readers a directory of all products and services in the content industry. A presence in this section ensures that your company's details are easily found, keeping you one step ahead of your competitors.

Want unrivalled SALES, MARKETING and PR for your titles?

Then join the only distributor that gives you all three to maximise your revenue!

Contact: www.thumbstargames.com info@thumbstargames.com

Our distribution network covers operators and portals throughout Europe, the Americas and Asia. Thumbstar Games prides itself on excellent relationships with developers and business partners.

Thumbstar Games is a leading global distributor of mobile content.

Our primary focus is games, but we also have an extensive range of wallpapers, screensavers, applications and videos.

The standard package includes: 1/4 page advert in each issue Regular editorial coverage in the dedicated column Company details listed in the online directory with web link and marketplace index

To get your company featured here contact tom.roberts@intentmedia.co.uk t: +44 (0) 1992 535647 www.mobile-ent.biz

Š 2008 Thumbstar Games Limited. All Rights Reserved. Thumbstar, Thumbstar Games and the Thumbstar Games logo are trademarks of Thumbstar Games Limited. All other copyrights, trademarks and trade names are the property of their respective owners.

January 2009 37

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MOBILE MARKETPLACE SALES AND MARKETING

MOBILE BROADBAND

GAMES DEVELOPER

MOBILE ANALYTICS

BAFTA award winners DYNAMO GAMES are celebrating their FIFTH BIRTHDAY in style with their latest games excelling in the market: CRYSTAL MAZE: Retro Classic - Best selling mobile game in June, Mobile Game FAQ's - 82% - Gold Award CHAMPIONSHIP MANAGER MOBILE SERIES: Winner of a prestigous BAFTA award. Five versions and counting. 98% - MobileGameFAQ's, 9/10 PocketGamer Gold Award If you are looking for high-quality mobile game development by an experienced player, look no further: G J2ME development G BREW G iPhone Development - Approved Developer G Handheld Console development for DS and PSP Check out our new company website:

www.dynamogames.com and get in touch.

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MOBILE MARKETPLACE PUBLISHER

COMPANY SPOTLIGHT

FROGGIE

GAME DEVELOPMENT STUDIO

www.mobile-ent.biz

Established in 2001, Froggie is one of the pioneering companies of the Spanish mobile entertainment and mobile marketing industries. With offices in Seville, Madrid, Buenos Aires, Copenhagen, Seattle and Newfoundland, it now has a truly global base, and aims to bring its services to a variety of non-English speaking markets.

Froggie can claim a number of firsts in the Spanish value added mobile services space. It was, for example, the first company to launch mobile gambling, video chat and video calling, mobile communities and unique content concepts such as virtual pets.

The firm also specialises in mobile marketing and WAP billing, creating interactive campaigns that can generate direct purchases from customers. It does this by arranging a consultancy period with the client to outline its needs and then comes back with a range of suggested solutions.

To enable the company to offer a range of complementary services, it works alongside two other partners, each with its own area of specialisation. So while Froggie handles mobile marketing, its sister company Publicidad Interactiva negotiates and runs

mobile ad campaigns in over 14 countries across the world, while Creafi Communications handles traditional internet-based activity with an online ad network that creates 16 billion banner impressions per month.

Froggie now works with over 300 clients all over the world, the majority of which are Spanish companies including grupoGodo, which is Catalonia’s premier media holding company and one of the most important media groups in Spain.

It also handles the European adult and gambling content provider Bagdad, and Spanish editorial provider CMY. Froggie director Tom Horsey is particularly proud of the fact that, since the company’s inception, the vast majority of Froggie’s clients have continued to work with it long after the initial solution has been provided.

Froggie is likely to be an important port of call for any company that wishes to advertise in the Spanish mobile marketplace and any reader that would like to meet the team in person can find them at stall CY11 in the Spanish pavilion at Mobile World Conference.

January 2009 39

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MOBILE MARKETPLACE VIDEO/PICTURE AGGREGATION

SOFTWARE DEVELOPER

Splash News TV - the Paparazziâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s own TV Channel. Unique ready-for- mobile Snack TV shows from the streets of Hollywood voiced in any language.

Our short form clips are already streamed over a million times daily. Available for easy download or push. Raw video, images and text feeds also available.

We have a global network team of over 1000 photographers shooting pictures of A-List stars Whatever your mobile needs entertainment Programming, wallpaper, text alerts and mobile video - the largest paparazzi archive with more than 20,000 videos, over 2 million images and a comprehensive daily text feed is at your disposal.

To discuss licensing our content or partnering with us on portals contact us:

YOUR AD HERE Lorem Ipsum is simply dummy text of the printing and typesetting industry. Lorem Ipsum has been the industry's standard dummy text ever since the 1500s, when an unknown printer took a of

Phone: Jessica Townsend on +448709342666 Email: jtownsend@splashnews.com or mobile@splashnews.com Blog: www.splashnewsonline.com Web: www.splashnews.com Video: www.splash-video.com

LOCALISATION

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MOBILE MARKETING AND ADVERTISING

www.mobile-ent.biz

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MOBILE MARKETPLACE CREATIVE STUDIO

COMPANY SPOTLIGHT

ADULT CONTENT

SPLASH NEWS The wave of celebrity news and photos that started when the digital era began in the 1990s has now reached tsunami proportions.

This has not just given the public more opportunities to consume the stuff, but also the chance to create and monetise their own celeb material.

Hence, all those images of Lindsay Lohan in the supermarket.

Mobile phones – specifically cameraphones – have been the driver of this phenomenon. And companies like Splash News have emerged to sit between those who create the content and those who wish to serve public hunger for celeb news, videos and pictures.

This US-based independent entertainment news and picture agency has become a leader in the space, thanks largely to skills honed in the ultra-competitive UK newspaper market by its founding team of British expats. The company essentially aggregates and syndicates pics on behalf of over 1,000 photographers, ranging from professionals to amateurs and bloggers. It now serves 55 countries worldwide with millions of images and clips. www.mobile-ent.biz

Inevitably, the company has diversified from the mainstream world of old media into mobile, offering wallpaper, text alerts, video and more to the world’s consumerfacing mobile channels. It currently has a catalogue in excess of two million images and 20,000 clips, and uses face-recognition software to check published snaps against archived images.

Splash recently launched Splash News TV, its own in-house production unit providing fast paced entertainment news programmes totalling nine minutes of footage, five days a week. Splash News also produces a three-minute round-up of the day’s and week’s best celebrity news.

Each show is available for easy download from the website in all major broadcast formats. As well as providing the shows in several languages, Splash also offers a ‘no voiceover’ option complete with a downloadable script, allowing customers to record their own voiceover. Splash News TV claims its brand of dynamic celebrity news content has now become a fixture in the many countries in which it is currently broadcast.

January 2009 41

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MOBILE MARKETPLACE TESTING AND LOCALISTION

SOFTWARE DEVELOPER

LOCALISATION

DEVELOPER

Specialist Games Services Localisation • Global network of games specialised linguists • Translators to cover all genres of games • All languages covered • In game, scripts, paper parts and marketing translations

Quality Assurance • All platforms (Sony, Microsoft, Nintendo, PC and Mobile) • Localisation QA • Compliance checks for TRC, TCR and LOT approval • Functionality QA

Audio • Voice overs across all languages • Full casting service • Pre and post production including lip synching • Highly experienced voice directors and engineers

Universally Speaking Priory Chambers, Priory Lane, St Neots, Cambs, PE19 2BH, UK Tel: +44 (0)1480 210621 info@usspeaking.com www.usspeaking.com

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MOBILE MARKETPLACE MOBILE GAMING PARTNERSHIPS

COMPANY SPOTLIGHT

BRIGHTSHARE

INTERACTIVE MOBILE SOLUTIONS

Need a mobile site?

Dialogue’s Mobile Site Builder offers you the full end-to-end solution to publish your mobile site - all you need is the content.

Mobile site builder allows you to: • • • • • • •

Brightshare, a subsidiary of the Jackpot Factory Group, was created to ensure that the digital gambling group’s partners could maximise the amount of commissions they generate. The Jackpot Factory Group therefore boasts five downloadable casinos in Flash formats based on the Microgaming platform, and two mobile casinos developed by Spin3.

Brightshare aims to improve its partners effectiveness by supplying detailed reports of player activity with full banner and link activation stats. The general reports are designed to enable partners to view their player profiles and preferences and plan their promotional activity accordingly.

They also enable affiliates to monitor each player’s progress and thereby improve the effectiveness of their collective promotional and campaign activity with Brightshare.

Two years ago, Brightshare released Wild Jack Mobile Casino as a consumer-facing brand. It’s now one of the leading brands in mobile gaming. Now, it’s building on this success to introduce new services like All Slots Mobile Casino and others.

With handsets like the Apple iPhone and Blackberry Storm bringing a real fixed internet experience to mobile devices, Brightshare decided to take the

flagship online brand of the Jackpot Factory, the All Slots Mobile Casino, and package it into an application for the iPhone and iPod Touch.

The All Slots Mobile Casino instant-access games require no downloads or software installations and should further develop the Jackpot Factory brand name as a leading Web and WAP-based casino service.

The web-to-mobile adaptation is being executed by Spin3, a mobile specialist that’s won awards from the GSM Association, the MEF and ME itself.

Partnering with BrightShare provides access to quality mobile casino gaming, services and revenue. The firm continually invests in the client relationship, and is willing to create customised programmes, tailor-made to suit client specifications.

Promote & expose your business Sell content through a trusted payment service Run viral marketing campaigns Include marketing subscriptions Drive traffic to sites with text-to-browse campaigns Generate Revenue Monitor user behaviour

Visit: www.dialogue.net/mobilesitebuilder.pdf Email: info@dialogue.net Tel: 08700 790 300

www.mobile-ent.biz

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DISCONTENT We take content extremely seriously in Mobile Entertainment. But not here...

(Dis)content f you’re reading this, you work in the mobile content biz. And if you work in the content biz you need to come to a Meet-Up networking event.

Meet-Up brings together hundreds of industry professionals from across the value chain: your colleagues, partners and customers. The events are a chance to cement business relationships and start new ones. And drink beer.

Meanwhile, Meet-Up sponsors derive tremendous value for a

I

44

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modest outlay. This is an effective tool for promoting your company, product or service.

Benefits include: Extensive promotion before and after event in the magazine Multiple email alerts to our 12,000-strong list Full on-going coverage on the ME website Branding at the event But don’t just take our word for it. Here’s what James Kaye, ex-director of marketing at Hands-On Mobile, said about

his special Guitar Hero Meet Up: “It was a fantastic success in every respect. The value of the coverage we received from Mobile Entertainment was superb and the editorial team could not have been more supportive. The event itself was fantastically well attended due to all the prepromotion. I think sponsoring the Meet-Up should be a fixture in any marketing plan.”

If you would like to know more about sponsorship, email: tim.green@intentmedia.co.uk

www.mobile-ent.biz

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Send your pictures and gossip to tim.green@intentmedia.co.uk

favourites Paul Cotter, CTO, ChangingWorlds

Which phone do you currently own?

Sony Ericsson P1i.

What’s the best phone you’ve ever had?

The Sony CMD-Z5, I had it for five years.

Way ahead of its time, with an unbeatable user interface.

What phone would you like next?

A P1i with the original Jog-dial from the Z5.

It's the little wheel at the side that lets you do almost anything without pressing a single button.

All is revealed, saved and then Bluetoothed Another nail has been banged into the coffin of privacy by mobile. According to the Campaign to Prevent Teen Pregnancy, 22-per cent of teen girls have taken nude or semi-nude photos of themselves and sent them to someone. Guess what? 40 per cent of young men have seen them. Well, duh. The ME boys can only hark back to teen years looking at ads for bras and wish they were 20 years younger.

Current ringtone?

I have different ringtones for different people and groups. The main one is called 10 Days.

Favourite mobile internet sites?

I get news from rte.ie and bbc.co.uk, and weather reports including maps from met.ie.

Anything you’d gladly pay for on a mobile that you can’t currently get?

A personalised mobile personal assistant.

My phone already knows my schedule, interests, friends and contacts, and where I am. Apply some intelligence and we have a very useful assistant to help my day run smoothly.

Quick one off the wrist

CTIA’s City Slicker

Among the new device prototypes going through the patent process is, we hear, the GettaGrip Musclephone. Like a cross between a W902 and a stress ball, it features handgrips that exercise the wrist muscles in a far more socially acceptable manner than masturbating. Even better, the squeezing will recharge the GettaGrip battery.

Again, something that wanking just can’t do.

We’re delighted that Billy Crystal has been booked to host the Wireless Gala at CTIA, even though we won’t be at the $250 event unless someone invites us. Crystal is the best Oscar host ever and is guaranteed to deliver an amazing evening. Safe to assume he won’t be using the line first heard in his underrated movie Mr Saturday Night: “I know you're out there, I can hear you reloading.”

what was that about?

Visual Radio Sometimes, in history, there are ideas that sound great for about five minutes. Before this magical juncture, they are technologically impossible.

After, they just look a bit silly.

Nokia’s Visual Radio is a grade-A example. It was unveiled in 2004, promising

www.mobile-ent.biz

to bring artist info, graphics and even ringtone offerings to users based on the songs they heard on participating radio stations. Great eh? But only if you had a weird looking Nokia 7700, as nothing else would support it. The Visual Radio web site now re-directs you to Nokia’s music site,

where you can find out all about FM radio, internet radio and podcasting…

Which content biz do you most admire?

The BBC. It has a huge amount of content that is accessible no matter what device you use.

Worst idea you've seen in mobile?

Those phones where the keys go around the screen in a circle. Are they still around?

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Send your pictures and gossip to tim.green@intentmedia.co.uk

DISCONTENT

A Magnum for the MIG team What’s this from the boys at MIG? Is it some kind of tribute to Greg Ballard?

No, it turns out the team volunteered to grow moustaches to raise money for a prostate cancer charity. Obviously the women couldn’t be bothered. Typical.

No more vroom, thank you

Over the air and on trial

A fright at the Oprah

The sportscar maker Porsche has launched its second stab at the handset market with the P9522, developed in partnership with the premium phone brand of, er, Sagem. The device is very sleek and sexy, as you’d expect. But car collaborations weren’t always so tasteful. Who remembers the LG M4300?

This clamshell was shaped like a Ferrari and made an engine noise when it was flipped open. What was a pleasing novelty the first time became tiresome the second and annoying the third. The fifth engine roar made you want to kill somebody.

Well done Musically for its excellent ‘Mobile Music In The Dock’ event last month. In a mock courtroom trial, Ralph Simon defended mobile, while Jeremy Silver of Sibelius prosecuted. There was a fine moment when Deloitte’s Paul Lee admitted mobile music is ’probably medieval’ in evolutionary terms. “The Dark Ages, then?” replied Silver, like Ironside himself.

ME caught up with Robert Tercek shortly after he got his job as president of digital media for the Oprah Winfrey Network.

Now, Robert is a self-assured dude, with vast knowledge of his subject. But he admitted to being terrified when he was finally alone with the penetrating stare of the Winf. Still got the job, though. Go on, get us an interview with your boss, Rob!

MOBILE ENTERTAINMENT

Executive Editor: Tim Green Tim.Green@intentmedia.co.uk Online Editor: Stuart O’Brien Stuart.Obrien@intentmedia.co.uk Managing Editor: Lisa Foster Lisa.Foster@intentmedia.co.uk Staff writer: Matt Grainger Matt.Grainger@intentmedia.co.uk

O’Brien

Green

Advertising Sales Executive: Tom Roberts Tom.Roberts@intentmedia.co.uk

CONTACTS

Design: Rebecca Almond Rebecca.Almond@intentmedia.co.uk

EDITORIAL: +44 (0)1992 535646 ADVERTISING: +44 (0)1992 535647 FAX: +44 (0)1992 535648

Production Manager: Abigail Fanger Abigail.Fanger@intentmedia.co.uk

Mobile Entertainment is published 12 times a year

by Intent Media ~ Saxon House, 6A St. Andrew Street, Hertford, Herts SG14 1JA, England

Publisher/Managing Director: Stuart Dinsey Stuart.Dinsey@intentmedia.co.uk

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Subscriptions Manager: Hannah Short Hannah.Short@intentmedia.co.uk

SUBSCRIPTIONS UK: £50 Europe: £75 Rest of World: £90 If you or one of your colleagues would like to request a subscription to Mobile Entertainment, please email mob.subscriptions@ccms.com or call 01580 883848 Please note that this is a controlled circulation title and subscription criteria will be strictly adhered to.

Intent Media is a member of the Periodical Publishers Association.

Total average monthly net circulation per issue for January 1st 2007 to December 31st 2007 was 8,012. © Intent Media 2007. No part of this publication may be reproduced in any form or by any means without prior permission of the copyright owners. Printed by Pensord Press, NP12 2YA

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