Future of Media Drinks in Sydney tomorrow – all welcome!

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After the Future of Media Summit in Sydney tomorrow speakers and participants will be gathering at the Firehouse in North Sydney from 5:30pm for drinks and general post-event conviviality. We’ve simply named it as a spot for all to gather to grab a drink, so anyone is welcome to turn up, irrespective of whether they’ve attended the Summit or not.

Venue details and directions are here.

I will be in Silicon Valley for the US side of the event and long since in bed after a long day, so will miss out on all the fun, but the Future of Media Summit Sydney Chair, Jenny Williams of Ideagarden, and Jessica Hough and Julian Hill from Future Exploration Network will be there to welcome you and say hi. Pass on word to whoever you wish. Have a great time if you make it along! I’ll hear all about it afterwards…

Launch of Future of Media: Strategy Tools framework

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The third key framework from Future of Media Report 2008 (after Future of the Media Lifecycle and 7 Driving Forces Shaping Media) is the Future of Media: Strategy Tools framework.

This lays out three of the most valuable tools for building strategy in the media and adjacent industries. The high-level overviews are intended to provide some useful introductions to relevant strategy tools for those engaged in the front-line of creating and implementing strategies in an extraordinarily dynamic environment.

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Flow Economy Framework

The central framework used here is the Flow Economy framework that I first described in Chapter 7 of Living Networks (free download of chapter 7 here).

The chart gives an overview of the process of using the Flow Economy framework for media strategy, illustrated by brief examples of the strategies adopted by Apple, BSkyB, and NTT DoCoMo.

Scenario Planning for Media

A high-level example of the scenario planning process is described as applied to media, together with a scenario framework that is particularly relevant in the current environment.

Game Theory: Strategies for Openness

Traditional approaches to strategy are having to change as the industry landscape moves at a rapid pace to openness. One of the most powerful tools available to address these issues is game theory.

Future of Media Summit blog: Mark Pesce on iPhone phails, Tom Abate on future of journalism, insights from other speakers and participants…

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Every event we do, we run a blog for all speakers and participants. Since Future of Media Summit 2007 we’ve maintained the Future of Media blog on an ongoing basis, including my blogging activity on the future of media.

As we approach the Future of Media Summit 2008, the Future of Media Summit blog is taking off as a forum for fantastic contributions and ideas on the future of media. Summit speakers and participants are now posting, and we can expect some fantastic conversations on the event blog up to, during, and after the Summit next week.

Some recent highlighted posts with brief excerpts:

Mark Pesce on iPhail: A fantastic, detailed post on what is wrong with Australia’s iPhone plans.

Never in my five years in Australia have I seen such a complete failure in marketing. Three Australian telcos – Optus, Telstra and Vodafone – have the device. All of them have completely failed to recognize the pent-up demand for the device, and the way it will change network usage. This was revealed – beyond all doubts – in the way they released their pricing plans, and the specifics of those plans.

…

We could name our MVNO the Future AUstralian Carrier, or FAUC.

Don’t like your plan from Telstra, or Vodafone, or Optus? Well, get FAUC.

Yes, we’d still have to deal with Apple, we’d still have to promise them 10% of the operating revenues from iPhone, if we wanted to retail it on FAUC, but we could at least be completely transparent about our costs. Customers (that is, us) would understand where every dollar spent on FAUC went. That, in itself, would likely engender tremendous loyalty from the base of users – which would bring more users in, a slow tidal wave, as people abandoned the big-name carriers for a crazy mob of Australians who decided to do it themselves.

So… who’s in?

Mark Pesce (again) on Another Planet, Utterly Unlike Our Own.

This is the risk Disney takes when it uses old-fashioned business models in a thoroughly modern world. They may squeak by this time, and perhaps the next, but one day – and for the rest of time – that tactic will fail them. They’ll lose their market window, because they misunderstood the audience.

Tom Abate on Take me to your leader. Reflections from a life in journalism on where it’s going.

Read more →

Launch of the Future of Media Report 2008! We predict the media industry will be worth US$5.7 trillion in 2024

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Our Future of Media Report 2008 is now launched! (See also our extremely popular Future of Media Report 2007 and Future of Media Report 2006).

This will be given to attendees at the Future of Media Summit 2008 next week in beautiful glossy print format to take home. If for some reason you are NOT attending the Summit, you’ll have to settle for a digital version with small print-outs of the spreads (unless you happen to have a large-format printer handy…) :-)

This year we’ve taken a slightly different approach, moving away from providing statistics, and focusing on developing three frameworks to help people think about the future of media and engage in constructive conversations at the Summit. We’ve always found we get a fantastic response to our frameworks, so we focused on this as a way to create value with the report.

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Future of Media Report 2008 (pdf 1MB)

A quick overview of the report contents:

WELCOME

An introduction to the report. The full text is at the bottom of this post.

MEDIA: A GROWTH MARKET

Contains our prediction that the global media and entertainment market will grow from US$1.7 trillion this year to US$5.7 trillion in 2024 (in 2008 dollars) – released in this report – as well as information on current growth trends in advertising.

Read more →

New Framework: Seven Driving Forces Shaping Media

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[UPDATE:] The complete Future of Media Report 2008 is now available.

We are releasing our new framework: Seven Driving Forces Shaping Media.

This is the second framework we are releasing in the lead-up to the Future of Media Summit 2008, which will be held next week simultaneously in Silicon Valley and Sydney. This and other content will be used to provide a starting point for discussion and conversation.

The first was the Future of the Media Lifecycle, which has already attracted substantial links and commentary. In the next days another framework on strategic tools will be released, as well as the complete Future of Media Report 2008, including all three frameworks and additional content.

Seven Driving Forces Shaping Media (pdf 700KB):

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Even more new speakers: Belinda Rowe – Zenith Optimedia, Stephen Hollings – News Limited, Bruce Meagher – SBS, Jane Schulze – The Australian, Willie Pang – Yahoo!, Jim Waltz – Traffic Marketplace, Brian Lott, Burson-Marsteller etc…

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Adding to my last post on the fabulous list of new confirmed speakers at Future of Media Summit 2008 …

See the full line-up of media leaders speaking at the event.

Others recently confirmed for the event include:

Belinda Rowe, CEO Australia of Zenith Optimedia, one of the top few media buying groups globally, with very detailed insights into media industry structure.

Stephen Hollings, CEO, News Digital Careers, who has probably the broadest understanding of the classifieds market in Australia.

Jane Schulze, Media Editor, The Australian. The Media & Marketing section of The Australian is the most widely read media publication in the country.

Bruce Meagher, Director Strategy at SBS, Australia’s multicultural public broadcaster, which has adopted a variety of new initiatives.

Willie Pang, Head of Yahoo! Search Marketing, previously worked on Yahoo!’s Panama project and has very international perspectives.

Jim Waltz, President, Traffic Marketplace, one of the leading advertising networks.

Brian Lott, SAP Global Client Leader, Burson-Marsteller, one of the leading PR firms globally.

Check out our Future of the Media Lifecycle framework, just released. More research and analysis posted here soon.

Hope to see you at the Summit!

New confirmed speakers: Phil Bronstein – Hearst, Mark Antonitis – KRON-TV, Robert Scoble – Fast Company TV, Tom Abate – MiniMediaGuy, Angelos Frangopoulos – SkyNews, Chris Tolles – Topix, Chris Warren – MEAA, Mark Goldman – Current TV… (mo

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Trying very hard to keep up on this blog with developments on Future of the Media Summit, which is falling into place as an amazing event.

Check out the Future of Media Summit 2008 website for full details on the latest speakers – it’s been described to me as a “stellar line-up” and that’s about right…

Just a couple of words in a few of the latest confirmed speakers:

Phil Bronstein, long-term editor of the San Francisco Chronicle and all-round media star, now editor-at-large at Hearst.

Mark Antonitis, President and GM of KRON-TV, which is one of the most interesting metropolitan TV stations in the US, with some very interesting practices.

Robert Scoble, MD Fast Company TV, formerly the lead blogger at Microsoft and at the very heart of the social media revolution.

Tom Abate, MiniMediaGuy, a blogger, journalist, and explorer of the future of journalism

Angelos Frangopoulos, CEO, Australian News Channel, which operates Sky News and also distributes content over multiple online and mobile platforms.

Chris Tolles, CEO, Topix, a Valley veteran running a leading US and international hyperlocal news site.

Chris Warren, General Secretary, Media Entertainment & Arts Alliance (Australia’s journalism and content union), who is deeply engaged in the transformation of journalism.

Mark Goldman, COO, Current TV, which is still one of the most exciting and interesting media business models since it was founded by Al Gore and Joel Hyatt in 2005.

More fantastic new confirmed speakers in my next post – see the full list of speakers.

We tested the high-definition video link between Sydney and Silicon Valley today, courtesy of our event Strategic Partner Tandberg. Looks fantastic. As last year, people will be commenting that they can’t distinguish between the local and cross-Pacific panellists.

Also be sure to see our Future of the Media Lifecycle framework, just released specifically for the Summit. More frameworks and other content out over the next few days.

It will be a great event – hope to see you there!

Launch of the Future of Media Lifecycle framework

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[UPDATE:] The complete Future of Media Report 2008 is now available.

Another Future of Media Summit, another framework! We are today proudly launching the Future of the Media Lifecycle framework. This is the central framework of our Future of Media Report 2008. (See also the Future of Media Strategic Framework from 2006 and Key Elements of Media Business Models from 2007).

Over the next few days two additional frameworks as well as the full Future of Media Report 2008 will be released – check back soon!

Media Lifecycle FrameworkMedia_Lifecyle_Framework.pdf

While I’d like to think that the Future of Media Lifecycle framework is self-evident, it probably helps to explain it a bit :-), so here goes:

Read more →

Newspapers promote QR codes, linking print and outdoor media to online, and building tighter social-mainstream media symbiosis

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QR code for this blog

The Sydney Morning Herald has recently had big features in its Saturday edition on QR codes, the 2-dimensional bar codes that act as visual URLs for mobile phones, taking them automatically to the linked online content. QR codes are massive in Japan, appearing in magazines, billboards, business cards, shop windows, T-shirts, and more, by dint of NTT DoCoMo’s promotion of the codes. One Japanese magazine consists entirely of free things you can download with QR codes. Now Australia’s Telstra is trying to do the same thing in Australia, shipping all of its NextG phones with the necessary software, and making it freely available to anyone else.

It is very interesting to see a newspaper so actively promote a mobile technology. The Sydney Morning Herald is introduced daily QR codes on page 2 from this Monday, providing a link to the five most popular stories in the paper and other content. This means that you can engage with the media cycle even while reading a print newspaper. I wrote over two years ago about how each story on the online version of the Washington Post was showing links to blog posts about that article. Now this kind of immediate reflection of social media views is available in the print world.

So far in the US there have just been tests of QR codes in San Francisco, providing links to Citysearch reviews of local restaurants and merchants.

While there are a number of competing standards for codes that will link mobiles to online content, QR codes are substantially in the lead, and look set to become an international standard. There is a good chance these could become commonplace globally within the next 1-2 years. What is most interesting is the innovative ways they are used, particularly within mainstream media (which can include television).

The symbiosis of media: Journalists find stories on Twitter

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This is cool. Renai LeMay, a tech journalist for the Australian Financial Review (just now returning to CNET Australia as News Editor) attended our Top 100 Australian Web 2.0 Applications event the other week. While he was there, he sent a message on Twitter asking if any companies had a good story to tell. Richard Slatter of Plugger, one of the companies showcased at the event, twittered Renai back. Renai found it a worthy story, and it appeared in the Australian Financial Review, the major business daily in the country, this morning as Plug in to keep tabs on directors’ board links. (See Renai’s telling of the story on his blog.)

This harks back to what I was talking about a couple of years ago on the ‘symbiosis of traditional and social media’, as illustrated in the Future of Media Strategic Framework we released then (as below). While many have compared social media to parasites on mainstream media by feeding on it, increasingly mainstream media finds its sources and stories in social media. Things happen and are seen in social media before they are discovered and disseminated more broadly in traditional media. Each has their role, and they feed off each other in a highly complementary symbiosis.

This will be a theme on the future of journalism panel at the Future of Media Summit 2008.

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