Media /// Forward

The scenario under which the cable and telcos are the only survivors of the digital media wars who maintain their current profitability has been called “The Dumb Pipe Paradox.” In fact, there’s nothing paradoxical about it. Media shareholders seem to have a deep psychological need to believe that they will be rewarded for backing the right creative visionaries rather than dumb pipes. But about the only sure thing in the creativity business is that the visionaries are smart enough to keep as much of the value of what they create for themselves as the market will bear, leaving little for the shareholders. The retail end of the media business where the dumb pipe sits has always been the most resilient in the face of changes in technology and consumer demand. In between the content creation and the local distribution remain the aggregators who must continue to up their game if they are to stay ahead of the digital onslaught.

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Preface to the new paperback edition of The Curse of the Mogul, by Columbia Business School Professors Jonathan Knee and Bruce Greenwald. 

Not So Cursed? (Book Excerpt)

I conducted a [very unscientific] experiment yesterday. I had a day full of meetings all over the city, so I decided to conduct a #checkinginmarathon on Foursquare yesterday …

For the #checkinginmarathon, I checked in and tweeted everything I did all day. I added and subtracted points (no rational scale here) for how much utility (or hassle) I got out of the check-in experience. My overall utility score was 6 points, with an average of 0.375 points per check-in for my 16 check-ins …

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A valuable and interesting look at a day in the life of an NYC Foursquare user.

Also, I feel like a celebrity and am proud of the numerous n00b references.

looking up: #Checking In Marathon

Developers only want to do product, not coding. Business people only want to do business, not sales. There is only coding and sales.

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Jon Steinberg, President, Buzzfeed, on a panel at Columbia Business School with Roger Ehrenberg of IA Ventures, about VC investing and startups

We have great alums.

Our philosophy is simple—when Apple brings a new subscriber to the app, Apple earns a 30 percent share; when the publisher brings an existing or new subscriber to the app, the publisher keeps 100 percent and Apple earns nothing,” said Steve Jobs, Apple’s CEO. “All we require is that, if a publisher is making a subscription offer outside of the app, the same (or better) offer be made inside the app, so that customers can easily subscribe with one-click right in the app. We believe that this innovative subscription service will provide publishers with a brand new opportunity to expand digital access to their content onto the iPad, iPod touch and iPhone, delighting both new and existing subscribers.

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As long as consumers continue to snap up iPhones and iPads Jobs will keep pushing all his complementors. The other platforms just don’t have the same magnitude, so he has the edge. 

The question is, at what point to do all the complementors decide Apple’s platform just isn’t worth it at any market share?

We’ll probably see some big developers/content producers working more closely with Google on Android and perhaps with Windows Mobile too. Together they have to do something to mitigate the switching cost of moving users over. Right now that cost is pretty high, not least of all because of Apple’s App advantage.

One way to do it would be to allow users who have already purchased an app with Apple to download the same app on another platform for free, or use the rest of their subscription on another platform.

Steve Jobs Responds To All The Cry-Baby Publishers About Apple’s Subscription Payments

Going to be a fun year.

(via evangotlib)

The battle of devices has now become a war of ecosystems, where ecosystems include not only the hardware and software of the device, but developers, applications, ecommerce, advertising, search, social applications, location-based services, unified communications and many other things. Our competitors aren’t taking our market share with devices; they are taking our market share with an entire ecosystem. This means we’re going to have to decide how we either build, catalyse or join an ecosystem.

— Nokia CEO Stephen Elop rallies troops in brutally honest ‘burning platform’ memo? (update: it’s real!) — Engadget

Every atom in your body came from a star that exploded. And, the atoms in your left hand probably came from a different star than your right hand. It really is the most poetic thing I know about physics: You are all stardust. You couldn’t be here if stars hadn’t exploded, because the elements – the carbon, nitrogen, oxygen, iron, all the things that matter for evolution and for life – weren’t created at the beginning of time. They were created in the nuclear furnaces of stars, and the only way for them to get into your body is if those stars were kind enough to explode.

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If there’s one thing that I find truly mind-boggling it’s astrophysics. Especially the basic quandary that, if the universe is constantly expanding, what is it expanding into?

As it turns out that gets discussed a fair amount, including recently at io9.

So here’s a new mind-boggler: 

But what happened at the very beginning to create space out of literally nothing? Physics doesn’t have an answer for that yet, I’m afraid, and we’ll presumably have to wait (at least) until a theory of quantum gravity comes along before we have one.

Lawrence M. Krauss (via topherchris)

(via evangotlib)

(1) Crimes shall never be presented in such a way as to create sympathy for the criminal, to promote distrust of the forces of law and justice, or to inspire others with a desire to imitate criminals.
(6) In every instance good shall triumph over evil and the criminal punished for his misdeeds.

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Code of the Comics Magazine Association of America, October 26, 1954.

The comic book industry was required to create this Code in response to hearings conducted by the Senate Subcommittee on Juvenile Delinquency.

It’s a pretty fascinating story. I’ve often wondered why more movies don’t end with the bad guy winning — perhaps this is part of the reason, or a reflection of the community norms that discourage that sort of ending. (This movie is a notable exception.)

“Good Shall Triumph over Evil”: The Comic Book Code of 1954