Mobile Social Media Services

T-109.4300 Network Services Business Models

Olli Mäkinen

Researcher, M.Sc. (Tech)

Topics

• Social media services• STOF outline for mobile social media services• Service domain• Technology domain• Organization domain• Financial domain• Existing cases• Future development and expectations

Social media services

• Based on interaction between users (vs. traditional user and service provider interaction)

• Often include user created content• Feature contact/friend lists• Users can usually form groups based on e.g. similar

interests• Examples include Facebook, MySpace and Flickr

STOF outline

Service• Communication within a social

network• Always with the user

Technology• Platforms• Mobile specific features

Organization• Phone manufacturers• Network operators• 3rd parties

Finance• Revenue models• Restrictions for traditional models

Mobile social media services

Service

• Mobile social media services extends the concept of desktop WWW social media services to a mobile phone

• The primary added value to the user is being able to be in contact with a social network at all times

• Being in contact can take different forms– Media upload– Text messaging– Voice and video calls– Status updates– Locating friends– Sharing items, for instance coupons or tips

Service

• In the mobile context, some of the typical social media services’ features exist already– Calling– Sending text messages or images– Phonebook represents the list of contacts

• Convergence between the traditional telecom services and social media services can be seen

• The phone’s address book can be the starting point for all mobile communications

Service

Service

Technology

• Mobile social media services all require an Internet connection, so unlimited data subscriptions are practically required

• The whole mobile software development industry is unfortunately very fragmented

• Distribution and simplicity of the applications is a key issue for gaining a large user base

Technology: Platforms

0.0 %

10.0 %

20.0 %

30.0 %

40.0 %

50.0 %

60.0 %

3Q07 1Q08 3Q08 1Q09 3Q09

Nokia

Research In Motion (Blackberry)Apple

HTC

Others

Source: Gartner

Technology: Platforms

• Platform market share varies regionally– Symbian is used in Europe– iPhone and Blackberry popular in North America– Windows Mobile in Asia– Android becoming more common globally

• Platforms are not compatible with each other• Java 2 ME is supported by many manufacturers, but

implementations vary

Technology: Platforms

• Mobile WWW browsers are widely used but features are restricted

• Widgets run JavaScript+HTML outside a browser environment and can in the future have access to mobile specific features too, such as positioning and phonebook

• Some browsers allow positioning on normal web pages as well (iPhone OS 3, Nokia N900, Android, BlackBerry)

• HTML5 is expected to bridge the gap between mobile WWW and desktop WWW by bringing semantic elements to HTML, i.e., dividing content presentation– Additionally has local storage capability

Technology: Mobile specific features

• Always-on connectivity everywhere the user goes• High speeds enable media transfer and VoIP• Positioning

– GPS being included in more and more phone models– Indoor positioning technologies still vague and non-standard– WLAN AP and CellID positioning common as well

• Media capture– Photos and videos– Compared to a standard camera, can be sent on spot

Organization

• The key players in mobile social networking are the end user, mobile service provider and the network operator in between

• The mobile service provider can provide a social network or can connect to 3rd party social networks

• Device manufacturers can also integrate the service to their devices, becoming a part of the value network

• Advertisers optionally provide revenue to the service

Organization

End user

Network operator

AdvertiserSocial

network provider

Device manufacturer

Mobile service provider

Finance

• The revenue models for mobile social media services are very limited as of yet

• Most services do not have a direct revenue model• Some of these companies seem to be waiting for a

bigger company to buy them out• The rest are usually device manufacturers or other big

companies with existing revenue from a main business• Possible usable models could be revenue sharing with

telecom operators and device manufacturers

Existing mobile services

Source: Mäkinen and Luukkainen 2009

Desktop WWW to mobile

Aggregated desktop WWW to mobile

Straight to mobile Aggregated straight to mobile

Facebook Mobile

• An interface to one of the largest desktop WWW social networking services

• Limited in functionality, although Apple and Android specific clients exist

• No mobile specific featuresSource: Self taken

Yahoo OneConnect

• Yahoo’s aggregation service which was not launched in the end, but a good example still

• Connects with many other services and integrates them into one

• No mobile specific features Source: Yahoo

ShoZu

• Was launched as a photo sharing tool

• Now includes social networking aspects

• Acts as an user interface to many other services

• Services are separated, though, and not very intuitive

• Includes GPS geotagging Source: Self taken

Ovi Contacts

• Nokia’s S60 application, integrating network contacts within the phonebook

• Presence and positioning features

• Limitations in the networks users can connect to Source: Nokia

Maemo address book

• Nokia’s Maemo 5 platform features an advanced contact book out-of-the-box with integrated IM and VoIP functionality

• Presence data is also sent and received for contacts Source: Self taken

Future development and expectations

• Aalto University’s and HIIT’s OtaSizzle is a research platform for mobile social networking services

• The phonebook will be an important starting point for many different services

• In the future, social networking can be seen as a substitute for standard mobile communication services such as voice calls and text messages

• The operators’ role might be changing

Thank you for attending!

• The Easter holiday starts next week, so no lecture for 1.4.

• Any questions?