Volker on Mobile - Latest Comments

Re: Capturing Users / StartUp Next Sofia [Slides]

mpux — Tue, 03 Dec 2013 07:51:38 -0000

:) Hope to see you soon. Mike

Re: Capturing Users / StartUp Next Sofia [Slides]

Volker Hirsch — Mon, 02 Dec 2013 11:21:39 -0000

Yes, that's my point indeed! :)

Re: Capturing Users / StartUp Next Sofia [Slides]

mpux — Mon, 02 Dec 2013 10:54:10 -0000

Yes, in-built retention features as part of the product DNA! Although sadly this is not a very widely distributed knowledge among product owners, which I guess is your point :)

Re: Capturing Users / StartUp Next Sofia [Slides]

Volker Hirsch — Mon, 02 Dec 2013 08:51:27 -0000

Thanks! And, yes, McClure is of course well-known. What I tried to do is to get people to design their product/service/app in a way that they pull retention in by way of design rather than sales/marketing/pre-/after-sales. The AARRR metrics refer to similar things but McClure could have made the importance of "engagement by design" a little clearer: without that, the job gets so much harder. In essence, I think we are all saying the same thing though, I suppose. :)

Re: Capturing Users / StartUp Next Sofia [Slides]

mpux — Mon, 02 Dec 2013 08:15:28 -0000

Very interesting.... especially the ref to Yakai Chou/ gamification. Assume you're also familiar with Dave McClure's AARRR Pirate metrics then?

Re: Next-Gen Mobile Computing

Volker Hirsch — Thu, 26 Sep 2013 07:55:17 -0000

Hello, old friend! :)

re iBeam: yes, you are right of course, good old BLE. However, note how Apple manages to re-position it not by highlighting tech stuff but by offering use cases. This is where they excel (and have always excelled): they were rarely first with anything but they were often first with packaging things in a way AND communicate the resulting benefits to consumers well.

My hunch this is (and I think I mentioned this in the post) that this is the reason for choosing BLE over NFC: from a user perspective, the slightly larger distance you can bridge matters. Security concerns etc *might* be the reason why they have not (yet?) introduced payment functions together with it but that doesn't matter as long as they can deploy a solution that makes sense to a normal user. And as to handshakes in public places: as long as it is paired the user perception will likely be OK. I am not enough of an expert on the technical side of this so will happily listen to anyone who knows better but from a UX point of view, this certainly has the chops to win.

As to cost/unit: If you can defend the price points (and margins) Apple has by putting something into the device that is, say, $1 more expensive, I would assume that you still have a more than sound business case (as far as I know Apple's margins are by orders of magnitude higher than this). At the same time, you preserve the superior UX (and this is something that is crucial to Apple's positioning).

Re biometrics: I do not think they look at the fingerprint reader to authorise train fares (yet). As I mentioned in another comment, I haven't played around with it yet but it is said to be quite quick, so perhaps soon. Alas, when you look at it from an ecosystem perspective: how quickly can you roll these things out (see this article: http://news.techworld.com/m... The amount of stakeholders is insane. Again, this has nothing to do with the technology but with the experience of a user: too many stakeholders, too complex an ecosystem (or at least the bits that are exposed to the user), bad UX, no uptake.

I am not saying all this is ideal or this is how it should be but my hunch is that this is why they took that route.

And, yes, I wish for some drinks at a friendly neighbourhood pool bar soon, too! :)

Re: Next-Gen Mobile Computing

Ken Gai — Wed, 25 Sep 2013 20:17:40 -0000

Heya Volker... Great to see you posting out here in the wild again!

Curious about a few points.. wrt iBeam.. kinda 'fun' to see the re-brand of decade old Bluetooth function hailed as Apple game-changer.. fine as far as that goes, however; as I recall there was (is) plenty of teeth gnashing about the security of NFC for payment transactions.. a bit strange to me this somehow poses an alternative? My guess would be it's more affordable cost per unit for the license and install.. so there's that for the bean counters. Also thinking there will be some 'privacy' issues related to that always-on handshake in public spaces.

As for the biometrics (another decade old approach, looking at Fujitsu here), imagine that's where they decided to spend, as opposed to above, the extra $5 each. I'm not clear the time to authenticate, but a pretty good bet that might slow down paid access thru gates for the train though. Maybe they'll add NFC to the iWatch instead (heh) as that would be 'almost' up to current speed as we've seen with now 2nd-gen. unit already deployed by Sony.. 8-)

At any rate.. looking forward to catch-up w/you again my friend.. it's been too many years since serendipity at Wet Republic!

Re: Next-Gen Mobile Computing

Volker Hirsch — Wed, 25 Sep 2013 16:16:17 -0000

Thanks, Jon, I just learned something! I had never thought it would be 5-7% of people! I haven't used the new phone yet myself, so can't say but - conceptually - the combination of the all the features I mentioned in the post open remarkable pathways, I think. I do not think that a single one of them in itself is the bees knees - it is their combination (or rather the opportunities the combinations open).

Having said that, I fully agree with you that this is only a beginning, both in terms of identification/security as well as in the overall scheme of things. It is why I titled the post "next-gen mobile computing" rather than "I, too, like the new iPhone", you see... ;-)

Re: Next-Gen Mobile Computing

Jon Jordan — Wed, 25 Sep 2013 15:33:14 -0000

Key issue with fingerprints is 5-7 percent of the world's population don't have them, esp. manual workers - they wear off. That's a big percentage, and as anyone who has used fingerprint detection on a laptop knows, even for people with fingerprints, it doesn't work around 10 percent of the time, so you switch it off.

Iris scanning would be much better from a biometrics point of view, but no one is going to enable that from a usability point of view.

Much more interesting would be a mixture of standard password and infrastructure-wide security such as IP address and in-device app usage.

Re: Oh America, where art thou?

DJP — Wed, 12 Jun 2013 07:10:21 -0000

Very, very well said my learned friend. It is getting ridiculous "stateside" that is for sure. I wonder if the total aggregate of their "sniffing" has been archived in a huge NSA operated cloud?

Re: Oh America, where art thou?

John Lewis — Wed, 12 Jun 2013 03:48:20 -0000

It is all in the name of the "war on terrorism". The terrorists are now winning.

Re: Oh America, where art thou?

JL — Wed, 12 Jun 2013 03:08:50 -0000

Good old fashioned bit of freedom of speech there. Applauded! :)

Re: Oh America, where art thou?

Volker Hirsch — Tue, 11 Jun 2013 21:33:17 -0000

A bit creepy (and/or expected): most hits on this are from "bots" of Facebook or Google...

Re: London’s Tech City or the Art of Navel Gazing (?!)

Volker Hirsch — Tue, 21 May 2013 18:14:34 -0000

No harm meant, Russell. I appreciate you're just getting started and you would probably be the last person I'd accuse of navel-gazing!

I will be in touch as soon as there are funding needs!

Thanks for taking the time to share your thoughts! And please let me know if you want me to show you around the NW a little. :)

Re: London’s Tech City or the Art of Navel Gazing (?!)

Russell Buckley — Tue, 21 May 2013 16:49:48 -0000

Hi Volker

Yes, very conscious that my remit is the whole of the UK. And the clue is in my department's title - UKTI. As I'm just getting my feet under my virtual desk, I have worked out that the UK part stands for United Kingdom, even if I'm a little hazy on the TI part.

Would love to hear about great tech companies I can help get funding - anywhere in the UK. With the proviso that in order to attract funding from abroad they'll need some traction and already have some local funding in place. And be world-class, of course.

So, North West, show us what you've got.

Russell

Re: giffgaff: Doing Good! More to Do?

Mayfair Mobile — Tue, 21 May 2013 09:30:08 -0000

I am a GiffGaffer... and apart from a few minor hair pulling sessions (including one ACTUAL support call - from Northern Ireland no less), I don't mind them at all...

Re: London’s Tech City or the Art of Navel Gazing (?!)

Erik Pavelka — Tue, 21 May 2013 01:24:46 -0000

Wish our office wasn't in tech city and nearer to you! Will remind my friends at the UK consulate here in SF that I'm seeing tomorrow about you and your town.

Hope all is well my friend.

Re: Angry Birds Or Wings of Distribution

Volker Hirsch — Sun, 17 Mar 2013 15:19:24 -0000

That's a whole new post, I suppose: the ability to publish third-party titles (Amazing Alex was one of those, too, if we're being honest). And I was quite critical of that one: http://vhirsch.com/blog/201...

Re: Angry Birds Or Wings of Distribution

Jon Jordan — Sun, 17 Mar 2013 10:15:36 -0000

Shame that Rovio has fouled its nest with The Croods then...

Re: Amazing Alex? Really amazing?

Guest — Mon, 20 Aug 2012 13:20:00 -0000

Good post Volker. I think it's hard to really keep hitting the grand slam. While setting the bar high to be synonymous with Disney is generally a good thing, sometimes, like a private firm going public too early, it becomes a distracting force. What used to be a "fun" creative thing, becomes a business thing, driven my metrics (downloads, shares, media snippets) and that my friend is a very very hard thing to work with.

I've seen far too many smaller entities become engrossed in the magic of success that they don't ever recover.

Imagine the pressure faced by Christopher Nolan to make each successive Dark Knight film. The first one was easy. It was a reboot. The second one was stress-fully harder because it was a reboot of an extremely famous villain. Famous like Donald Duck. The third -- magically difficult with a new villain (to older generations). Did he succeed? Yes, I think so. Each film connects to the other in one long story.

In game development...it's a hit and miss. Sometimes, the very ingredient to the success are repeatable and in some cases, not repeatable. I like the Rovio guys too and the Mighty Eagle is a good guy. Has heart.

But with so much "app noise", trying to maintain the same level of intensity is just impossible.

Alexander Bosika
MobileMonday Toronto, Co-Founder
http://www.alexanderbosika.com
http://www.mobilemondaytoro...

Re: Game Horizon 2012 / Slides

Guest — Fri, 29 Jun 2012 12:15:46 -0000

Volker, great presentation! Big support from Toronto and the MobileMondayToronto.com team. Looking forward to the the slick new stuff and I'll be upgrading my device to BB10. :-)

Re: Network + Context + Trust = Woah!

Jyri Engeström — Mon, 23 Apr 2012 18:55:39 -0000

A great story -- and a wonderful example of the power of communities built on trusted relationships around a shared social object. Congrats to your son for landing what sounds like an exciting internship!

Re: Mobile Games Publishing in 2011

Volker Hirsch — Thu, 29 Dec 2011 14:37:01 -0000

Hey. Have a look which attributes you need and feel free to get in touch (use the contact form if you want to do it in private). Happy to help! :)

Re: Mobile Games Publishing in 2011

AR Gun Fight — Tue, 20 Dec 2011 03:10:16 -0000

Can anyone propose a publisher to first online multiplayer for android?

https://market.android.com/... - link to market

Re: Carnival of the Mobilists # 249

Nokia C Series — Sun, 04 Dec 2011 03:30:49 -0000

great post, nice information regarding to mobile