 No
MMS for Christmas
by Michael Hulme
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Michael
Hulme is the Chairman of Teleconomy Group Plc.
He has written and lectured extensively on issues
relating to consumer behaviours and corporate
communication, and has had a successful commercial
career in senior management and as an entrepreneur.
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MMS (Multimedia Messaging Service)
will be a huge success! Or it will be if the need
for quick profits is controlled, and sufficient thought
is given to product establishment and evolution. And
if we do get this right, we may well open the door
to many of the more glamorous services that are still
a ‘dream’ away.
Based on Teleconomy’s longitudinal studies
of emergent mobile device-centred behaviours, combined
with our examination of more broad-based issues of
technology adoption and evolution, a clear insight
is possible into the conditions for MMS adoption and
its future evolution.
The youth market has been essential in the success
of text messages because the ability to share experiences
with fixed-cost SMS is particularly significant to
the youth market. MMS has the same innate qualities
for success because, as part of a ‘power package’
of voice and data information, it has the capacity
to effectively translate in image, text and speech
format a physical location or experience
So what does the experience of SMS tell us about
MMS?
1. Rapid successful adoption will centre upon access:
physical, financial and social. Physical access is
obviously a priority. There needs to be a critical
mass of devices capable of talking to one another,
within and beyond individual networks: currently phones
cannot send picture messages to other networks and
this functionality is not expected until well into
2003.
Financially the enabled mobile device needs to be
affordable. The high prices of MMS-enabled phones
are well out of the reach of the youth market that
will drive growth. Furthermore, just as importantly,
connection packages need to combine simplicity with,
at least initially, a high degree of affordability
for the sort of quick basic services that most fit
into ‘early adopter’ behaviours, encouraging
messages to be sent spontaneously. The adoption of
MMS is almost certain to centre round packages of
spontaneous, rapid communication - what we have called
‘power packages’ – that can combine
voice and data in simple pricing formats that enhance
device usage at minimum cost.
Social access requires physical and financial requirements
to be met, and from this point it becomes increasingly
important that the new service becomes part of social
lifestyle. Achieving lifestyle status drives the pace
of initial adoption and encourages new or novel behaviours
or usage. It is only at this stage of novelty (or
sustaining cool) usage that increasingly significant
profit opportunities will develop.
2. Secondly, initial adoption will almost certainly
be as an extended form of communication. It will become
an issue of co-presence: the ability to share experiences
that is particularly significant to the youth market.
So, for example, it allows a teenager in a club to
maintain his or her social network in a similar manner
to SMS, but with richer opportunities to share, virtualise
and translate the physical and experiential presence
of being in that club to their friends. The adoption
of MMS is almost certainly to centre round packages
of spontaneous, rapid communication - what we have
called ‘power packages’ – that can
combine voice and data in new pricing formats.
3. Thirdly, its evolution curve will almost certainly,
by using frozen frame pictures, act as the ‘gateway’
for moving image/video and the further development
of ‘power packets’.
Ultimately successful adoption is about there being
a reason for use. The service must either substitute
or enhance an existing format or experience. Successful
adoption will ultimately depend on the imagination
of the network providers to create the optimum access
conditions. If they succeed they may find they have
unlocked the evolutionary door to many future generations
of mobile services.
This article was taken from a longer thought piece
by Michael Hulme Forthcoming Success- MMS,
‘Power Packets’ and Evolution.
Click here to read
the full article.
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