Early 2008. We sat down with a visionary and a pragmatic. Among many other things we talked about content distribution models and making money in today's market by leveraging existing user behaviour.
The true discovery engine for mobile content continues to be the desktop PC, TV, print, billboards... Mobile 2.0 will only come to life when it is able to sustain its own discovery processes. In other words, change will come about when users start using the mobile as a discovery medium more than a connection medium. [Imagine nomads in a landscape filled with possibilities]. In the meantime companies like Cellfish will continue to prosper. They understand and maximise current user behaviour and market structure. It still is about sms, ringtones (blingtones), casual games and simple WAP pages.
It still is a world where distribution is king because mobile content producers are inherently lazy and operators too monopolistic. Soon things will change [they already are] but it may take a while to get critical mass and in that while the pragmatic will prosper and the visionary circle desperation.