Web 2.0 in Australia: The birth of Silicon Harbour?

By

A few initial reflections on the Web 2.0 in Australia event held yesterday… Overall it was a great success, with 100 over invited guests filling the KPMG conference facility, and all requests for invitations having been turned away over the last couple of weeks since we reached capacity. Everything ran smoothly on the day, and some great insights emerged.

For many attendees the highlight was the showcase of five leading Australian Web 2.0 companies (full details here), which amply demonstrated the calibre of local companies and talent, as well as BEA’s demonstration of their new enterprise 2.0 suite. This is just the tip of the iceberg of the Top 60 Web 2.0 applications in Australia we’ve identified (I will be posting shortly about some of the applications I missed in my first go at the list).

We jammed a stack of rich content into the event’s 2½ hours, and while the primary theme of attendee feedback was that they wanted a longer event, I think we did justice to the topic, with some great panel discussions in addition to the showcases. Video coverage of the event done by our event partners Viocorp and One Minute World will be released shortly and will be posted on this blog and elsewhere. In the meantime, a few quick thoughts on what was covered:

Read more →

Web 2.0 in Australia drinks: 6 June Sydney

By

The Web 2.0 in Australia event is way overbooked. We’ve been turning away all requests for invitations for some time, including from senior executives from organizations such as Commonwealth Bank, Telstra, and the Federal Department of Finance, and from a whole host of very cool entrepreneurs who we would have just loved to have along. However our event space is limited to a 100-odd, so unfortunately it’s not possible this time.

We will, however, produce a stack of excellent video content from the event for free access, including the key presentations and panels, produced by the kind folks over at Metrix Digital, and one-minute interviews with most of the speakers and showcase presenters by One Minute World, a very interesting company focusing on one-minute video content for streaming and mobile devices. I’ll let you know on this blog as soon as the Web 2.0 video content is up.

In addition, the fantastic response to the event means that we will definitely be running some open events later this year. Probably a Web 2.0 showcase, an Enterprise 2.0 workshop, and perhaps a bigger event on where the web is going. I will ask here later what people are most interested in.

Anyway… because we’ve had to turn away so many people for the main event, and also to take advantage of Richard MacManus being in the country, we’ll have a Web 2.0 drinks on the evening of 6 June. Anyone’s welcome to turn up – there’ll be a cash bar.

Where: Casa Asturiana, 77 Liverpool Street, Sydney

When: 6 June, from 8pm

Who: Anyone interested in Web 2.0, especially those making it happen.

Pass on word if you want. Hope to see you there!

The latest on Web 2.0 in Australia: Showcasing the best

By

[POST-EVENT:] Also see post-event comments and release of Web 2.0 Framework.

The Web 2.0 in Australia event on 6 June is turning out pretty much exactly as designed. It will be a compact, senior executive, invitation-only event covering topics including frameworks for thinking about Web 2.0, why progress has been slow in Australia, current leading examples of Web 2.0 in Australia, and implications and opportunities for corporates, start-ups and marketing.

Sponsors and partners include BEA Systems, KPMG, Australian Venture Capital Assocation, Australian Information Industry Association, Department of State and Regional Development, Australian Interactive Media Industry Assocation, Smart Internet Technology CRC, and Innovation Bay. The latest information on the event is here.

Web2cover.jpg

The final speaker line-up is absolutely fantastic, including:

* Richard MacManus, Editor, Read/ Write Web

* Allan Aaron, General Partner, Technology Venture Partners

* David Backley, Chief Technology Officer, Westpac

* Brad Howarth, Journalist and Director, LaGrange Communications

* Randal Leeb-du Toit, CEO, Yoick

* Adrian McDermott, Vice President of Engineering, BEA Systems

* Chris Smith, General Manager, Sensis Interactive

I’ll also present our Web 2.0 framework (which will be released next week) and chair the event. Richard and Adrian are flying in from New Zealand and Silicon Valley respectively. Richard’s been keen to get over to Australia to get a better feel for the local Web 2.0 community. The event is partly intended to help Richard – and of course others! – to do this. We have a fantastic audience of some of the most senior executives from the corporate and technology sector in Australia coming along on the day.

The main reason for this post is to announce the companies we’re showcasing as “five leading examples of Web 2.0 in Australia” at the event. These have been selected purely on merit. We did a good scour of what’s out there in this space to make the selection. The results of our research, giving a quick rundown on the top 50 or so Web 2.0 companies in Australia, will be released in the next few days, appearing first on Richard’s Read/Write Web, which is one of the top few technology blogs in the world. I’ll post it on this blog shortly afterwards.

In the meantime, the leading five companies that are being showcased at the event are (in alphabetical order):

Read more →

Geocloning and the globalization of media

By

The other day I was having a conversation with a senior executive of Reed Elsevier about the future of media, and in discussing their inititiatives he used the word “geocloning”. I immediately took up on this neat and intriguing neologism, which obviously means taking a business and duplicating it in its entirety in another country. I later Googled the term, and found that geocloning seems at this stage to be a word used exclusively by Reed Elsevier, however it uses it freely in its investor communication.

The word interests me because it immediately evokes many of the issues in the globalization of media. One of the key themes of the Future of Media Summit 2007 (as last year) is Global Strategies for Media:

New distribution channels allow content creators anywhere to access global markets. A useful way to identify some of the variables across media markets is to compare key features of the US and Australian media markets, including industry structure, ownership concentration, scale, demographic, and technology platforms. This helps to identify appropriate global strategies for media industry participants.

The core issue is that while the Internet allows global distribution for digital content, localization is often required. At the highest level, language and format may need to be changed. Entertainment in some cases benefits from localization, such as country versions of Big Brother or American Idol, or Russian imitations of American soap operas or Latin American telenovelas. Global syndicated news is often localized with currency translations and addition of local relevance or commentary. Local niche media is a growing space, however it requires a judicious mix of local and broader customized content.

Read more →

Reflections on EconSM conference

By

A few quick reflections on the EconSM conference before hopping on a plane… The event title, the Economics of Social Media, was certainly what attracted me, making this the first conference I’ve attended as a delegate rather than a speaker for probably five years. Just about the most pressing single issue for the media industry as a whole is what the business models will be for the emerging space of social media, neatly encapsulated in the event theme. In addition, Rafat Ali’s PaidContent has clearly established itself as one of the most authoritative publishing sources on the space.

It was great to find several hundred people in the one room where you could assume a high degree of understanding and knowledge on social media. There is something indefinable yet recognizable about a social media geek (or suit). The cast of attendees, let alone speakers, was very impressive, representing most of the really serious players in social media, including the large mainstream media organizations.

Read more →

EconSM: Social media meets news

By

This was a great topic and a very interesting discussion, though it didn’t break new territory. One of the key themes was the perennial of what will be the business models for “serious” journalism. While the panellists all referred in some form to the “clinical depression” that the newspaper industry is finding itself in, there was also much optimism on the opportunity of creating and distributing quality content at low cost. The panel was heavily weighted to establishment players, giving the discussion the tone of incumbents. What was touched on but not really covered was the business models supporting the nexus of mainstream and social media. There are a wealth of new models for monetizing participation that go beyond plying people with ads, though not a word on these. Moderating user generated content was another key issue, with legal issues, taste, and keeping value for audiences. However the mechanics and costs of moderation were not covered. As with the last panel, we got some solid discussion, but few answers. Selected comments from the panellists:

“The zeitgeist in the newsroom is awful. We need to stop bellyaching and do something about it.”

“Journalists got snotty about bloggers. They deserved the slaps they got. We think there’s a place for traditional journalism to go against social-generated media. They’re complementary. The feedback mechanism of the blogosphere is pretty good for filtering user-generated news. As long as it’s transparent and relevant, it’s good to have it out there.”

“Newspapers have to stop rolling over and playing dead.”

“I was speaking to the 12-year old who runs Google News; he was saying that people don’t care where people news come from. I think people care where news comes from. It’s not just established brands; there are some great new brands, like PaidContent.”

“People still want a high quality product. Younger people still read the New York Times, just from the website rather than the paper.”

“The cost of putting up our site is so low, but we’re still high quality. It should be very easy to cover that in sales.”

“Google News is a parasite on the system, but it’s a useful parasite. Sam Zell is completely wrong.”

“We feel that free is better. We want to be part of the conversation. I wouldn’t dream of not being free.” (Referring to the WSJ’s new venture D: All Things Digital.)

Kara Swisher, Wall Street Journal

Read more →

Economics of Social Media – the role of Hollywood

By

I’m at the Economics of Social Media conference in LA. It’s now the third session, Social Media meets Hollwood. I’ll try to review some of the earlier discussions later.

The session was primarily about how mainstream media is complemented by social media, by building conversations about broadcast programs and among their viewers, and also how they are now creating social networks in their own right. On the former issue, it seems like a real no-brainer to facilitate conversations about programs, to build relationships and access. It is very interesting that networks are now presenting themselves as experts in building social networks, and making that a core part of their offer to advertisers. If they (or probably just a few of the existing mainstream broadcasters) can indeed leverage their existing relationships and expertise into this new space (as brought out in George Kliavkoff’s comments), this will provide a solid safety net and platform moving forward.

Here are some snapshost of issues raised by the panellists (not 100% verbatim).

“Anything that can do to raise rating, we’ll do. The more that people do online to be engaged, the more time they’ll spend watching the show. There were concerns that the online activities would cannibalize, but the opposite has been true. It’s helped ratings.”

“We’ve found that charting conversations about programs before they start accurately predicts their success.”

“If we have a sponsor who wanted to access a particular market, and there isn’t an existing social network, we’ll build the social network which will be underwritten by the marketer.” (There will be an announcement shortly on this)

George Kliavkoff, Chief Digital Officer, NBC Universal

“As discussion starts on our site, it radiates out to other parts of the web. It’s very powerful.”

“There are lots of launching pads for everyone.”

Alan Citron, General Manager, TMZ.com

Read more →

40 biggest players of Australia’s digital age

By

B&T has just launched Digital Media magazine, “Australia’s journal of the new media revolution”, with the cover story on their inaugural issue: “40 Biggest Players of Australia’s Digital Age”. I am named as one of the 40 biggest players in digital media in Australia, saying about why I matter (no this is not from my PR release :-)):

biggest40.jpg

“Ross Dawson is one of the truly big thinkers of the Australian digital media industry. He has been described as a guru of the online media and Web 2.0 movement, which embodies everything from online social networks such as MySpace through the user-generated content revolution epitomised by YouTube. As a strategic consultant with the Future Exploration Network, Dawson is a regular on the speaker circuit across Australia, the US and the UK, and has authored two books and more than 50 articles for a wide range of journals. He was also the creator of the Future of Media Report 2006, which has been downloaded 35,000 times.”

I’m probably an odd one out here, with most of the others on the list the more obvious CEOs of digital media companies such as News, Fairfax, Yahoo!7, and Sensis, and leaders of major advertising and online marketing companies. I’m certainly happy to be recognized for the work I’m doing here, particularly since I don’t work only in the digital space, and I focus much of my attention and energy in the US and elsewhere. However my intention is to live up to the billing, and do a lot more this year and beyond to help shift how business in Australia thinks about and taps into our marvellous digital world.

Insights from network analysis of the Australian media industry landscape

By

Network analysis provides powerful insights into how social groups, organizations, industries, and economies are structure. More pointedly, it also can help identify the leverage points that will enhance strategic positioning and improve outcomes. Over the last few years of my work in the network space, I have focused primarily on social networks and organizational network analysis, however I have also spent time on applying network analysis to industries, and in particular strategic positioning within industry landscapes.

I first came across Laurie Lock Lee in the mid 1990s when he was working at BHP, and one of the first people worldwide to apply social network analysis to enhancing organizational performance. We’ve shared much thinking over the years, and on occasion worked together. Laurie has fairly recently left his role at CSC, and set up a consultancy, Optimice, together with some talented colleagues. Check out the interesting resources on Optimice’s web. Last year Laurie did the fascinating media industry network analysis that we included in our Future of Media Report 2006. Laurie has followed up on that work by writing a great paper, New Ways to Explore Australian Media Ownership Opportunities and Threats. In it Laurie explores how network analysis can be applied to understanding the media ownership landscape in Australia.

Laurie uses the data on media ownership maintained by the Australian Communications and Media Authority, and without any special industry knowledge, begins to pull out some very interesting insights. The first chart below shows the network of media ownership, from which it is clear that there are two quite distinct networks. The central tightly-connected cluster is comprised of a few television stations, related radio stations, and a diverse array of owners. Outside this central group there are a string of highly centralized clusters, such as the Macquarie group on the top left, that are connected by one or two common properties or owners. Two owners – Southern Cross Broadcasting and Tri-com Radio’s stake in Consolidating Broadcasting (WA) are responsible for linking the upper and lower parts of the industry network.

austmediaownership.jpg

Australian TV and Radio Media Ownership Networks

Source: Laurie Lock Lee, Optimice

Read more →

Dreaming of new business models for content – may the best one win!

By

Last night I had a fascinating dream. In some off-street parlour people were being offered a fantastic immersive experience. They could step into a world that would be tailored to them in every way, catering to their interests and tastes, creating what for them would be the most entertaining experience imaginable. And it was entirely free! However the producers inserted advertisements into the experience, which you could choose to skip for a payment. What actually happened was that people were so entranced by the experience that they continually skipped the ads, distraught by the idea of being taken away from their entertainment. As such you regularly had people racking up bills of over a million dollars. I, as many others, was sure I had the fortitude and self-discipline to be able to handle the ads and time away from my entertainment, so I could experience this wonderful entertainment for free. Yet I was aware many who thought they could do it ended up paying fortunes to skip the ads. I entered the immersive experience, and found that I could direct my character how I wanted, interacting in an amazing world. I recall thinking that the personalization of the entertainment left something to be desired, and that it needed more development, but it was certainly a fabulous experience. By the time the ads arrived the dream had taken another turn into the fantastic, so I wasn’t able to test my resolve.

When I woke I thought immediately of the extraordinary book Infinite Jest by David Foster Wallace. In the book, a film titled Infinite Jest is so entrancing that anyone who sees it watches it in continual loop until they die in ecstasy. Some saw off their fingers in order to see it again. It is difficult for content creators today to make content as compelling as Infinite Jest. But perhaps they should be aspiring to do so.

Read more →