The next level

SAN FRANCISCO-Two things are certain in the wireless industry: Everyone in the ecosystem wants to take content consumption to the next level, but no one can agree on the best way to get there.
So at last week’s CTIA I.T. & Entertainment show with split personalities-entertainment and enterprise-we heard a lot of oxymorons.
At the Marketing the Mobile Channel event, panelists made the case for why the cellphone is a great way to connect advertisers with consumers. One point: 80% of cellphone users don’t turn off their phones when they’re sleeping, noted David Evans of Market Platform Dynamics. (He didn’t advise that you call cellphone users in the middle of the night with your ad pitch.)
Evans contends that industry needs a catalyst to drive the marriage of marketing and mobile. But even as people are sure this union will take place, no one knows if consumers even want advertising on their handsets.
Further, no one is willing to give up a piece of the revenue share so the space can flourish, Evans said. “100% of nothing is not a great business model,” he noted. Andy Nulman, president of Airborne Entertainment, told me the same thing in a separate conversation. It’s like how they do math in the movie “The Producers,” he explained. “Everyone wants 50%.”
More problems to fix before consumers really embrace mobile content: the carriers’ need for control; too many different technologies on too many handsets; too much clutter; not enough compelling apps; etc., etc.
Still, the mobile content channel-whether entertainment, access to laptop applications or as a marketing method-is going to take off in spite of itself.
The market potential is simply too big to ignore; the players are too savvy to let the opportunity go away; and frankly, younger users will expect their devices to be capable of performing incredible feats.
The details are frustrating, yes, but last week’s show was an opportunity to start sorting them out.