Fantastic international comparative data on media, social media, and mobile

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For those who love rich data on the world of media and telecoms, the release of a report by UK telecommunications regulator Ofcom is always a cause for celebration.

Last year I covered some of Ofcom’s report on key trends on communication and media usage. Here I will excerpt a few of the highlights from today’s Ofcom International Communications Market Report 2011, which focuses on country comparative data. There is an absolute wealth of information in the report. The data below is a small selection that I found particularly noteworthy, with some brief comments.


Global telecoms sector revenue has flattened considerably, with just 2.2% growth last year, brought down by performance in major markets. Interestingly television revenue continues to increase at a healthy pace beyond GDP growth.
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Why luxury defines our society and what to expect in 2012

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There are many themes and ideas threaded through our rich and complex times, so when I choose concepts to represent the heart of the year ahead, there is a lot to sort through and select. There were many dozens of ideas competing for the 12 themes I chose to represent what awaits us in 2012 (see slides below).

One of the most important themes of today that made the cut is ‘The New Luxury’ (Theme 8). I thought it would be worth expanding a little on what I wrote in the 2012 Themes on why this is important and what is unfolding in this space, following up on my post earlier this year on How is the culture of luxury changing?

2012: 12 Themes – What to expect in the year ahead

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Sunrise: What to expect in 2012: transformation, social media divide, crowd work

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This morning I appeared on the Australian national breakfast TV program Sunrise in their ‘Ask an Expert’ segment, talking about the year ahead. Here is the 4 minute clip.

In the brief segment I draw on a number of the 12 Themes for 2012 I recently released. The key topics we discussed were:
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Will your privacy completely vanish? It depends how we use facial recognition

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We recently launched our 12 Themes for 2012, shown below, in which the third of the 12 themes is ‘Privacy vanishes’.

2012: 12 Themes

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One of the drivers of privacy vanishing is the rise of facial recognition. As the 2012 themes document notes, while Facebook has prominently launched its facial recognition technology, Apple and Google have facial recognition capabilities that they have not yet launched. The landscape is now changing.
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Launching my new book today! Getting Results From Crowds

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Today we are launching my new book Getting Results From Crowds: The definitive guide to using crowdsourcing to grow your business!

This has been, in all, many years in the planning and making, and I’m extremely happy with how it has come out. It is definitely my most useful book, and while it’s hard to compare it with my other books as it has a distinct purpose and design, it is in some ways my best work.

I’ve believed in, followed, and worked with crowds for over a decade. My 2002 book Living Networks had many examples of what we currently call crowdsourcing, including being the first of many business books to describe the Goldcorp challenge, and mentions of Elance, InnoCentive, and Procter & Gamble’s Connect & Develop program, before any were well-known.

Today much of my work is around the future of work and future of organizations. The most powerful single force shaping work and organizations is the rise of distributed work, often drawing on crowds. I have used crowdsourcing platforms extensively for the last decade, and studied and learned how to get the best results from these. Our group business model is centered on the effective use of crowds.

The Getting Results From Crowds book website has a whole stack of resources, including:
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Tech-savvy children are driving the future of education

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Last week I participated in and spoke at an Education Roundtable organized by Telstra, which brought together a small group of very senior executives in all layers of education in Australia. In the same way that I have been drawn into discussions on the future of government over the last 18 months, I am finding myself increasingly frequently asked to engage with decision-makers on the future of education.

There is much I want to share from my presentation and the fantastic discussion at the Roundtable, but for now I’d just like to point to the excellent Telstra White Paper launched at the event, titled Personalised Learning. The White Paper itself is the outcome of an Education Roundtable held a year earlier, and interviews with a variety of Australian senior educators and government officials.

The White Paper’s Executive Summary makes five points, in summary:
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12 Themes for 2012: what we can expect in the year ahead

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Towards the end of each year I share some thoughts on what awaits in the year ahead.

It is actually a lot easier to look years into the future than just a single year, as while we can readily discern broad trends, the major events in a year are usually unforeseeable, though they may express the longer-term directions. However as the pace of change accelerates, it is becoming a little easier to see the themes, if not the specifics, of the year ahead. My Map of the Decade shows the 14 ExaTrends that are shaping this 10-year period. Today I launch my 12 Themes for 2012, in conjunction with Future Exploration Network.

2012: 12 Themes

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Below is the text for the 12 themes, though they are better viewed in the slides above, as the images used are an intrinsic part of the themes. Alternatively download the pdf of 12 Themes for 2012 (10.6MB)
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The future of retail: the rise of omnichannel marketing and sales

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This year I have been drawn significantly into the retail industry, being the lead technology advisor for a major study on the long-term future of shopping centers, and giving keynotes at a number of public and in-house retail industry events on topics including the future of retail shopping districts and social media in retail. We are now considering creating a detailed report on strategies for the future of retail next year.

The current edition of Harvard Business Review includes an excellent article titled The Future of Shopping, which echoes many of the themes we are seeing. Its frame of ‘omnichannel retail’ is a useful one.

As it evolves, digital retailing is quickly morphing into something so different that it requires a new name: omnichannel retailing. The name reflects the fact that retailers will be able to interact with customers through countless channels—websites, physical stores, kiosks, direct mail and catalogs, call centers, social media, mobile devices, gaming consoles, televisions, networked appliances, home services, and more. Unless conventional merchants adopt an entirely new perspective—one that allows them to integrate disparate channels into a single seamless omnichannel experience—they are likely to be swept away.

Most retailers think of themselves as primarily physical or online, with just a few thinking far beyond that to creating a fully integrated approach to the customer experience. ‘Clicks and bricks’ is a highly dated view in a world where there is continual channel proliferation.
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Our shrinking degrees of separation: heading down from 6 to 3

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In Chapter 1 of my 2002 book Living Networks I wrote:

When did you last say or hear someone say “what a small world”? People have an unquenchable fascination with how richly we are connected, never ceasing to be amazed by the seeming coincidences of how one friend knows another through a completely different route. Yes, it is a small world, and growing smaller all the time. The well-known phrase “six degrees of separation” suggests that we are connected to every person on the planet by no more than six steps.

After explaining the concept, its origin, and how ‘small world theory’ is helping us to understand the nature of social networks, I continued:

From six degrees, we are moving closer to four degrees of separation from anyone on in the world, with the possible exception of a few isolated tribespeople. We live embedded in an intensely connected world.

That prediction is being borne out today. A paper just submitted to arXiv titled Four Degrees of Separation, says that a study of the entire network of 721 million Facebook users with 69 billion relationship links shows an average distance of 4.74 degrees of separation.

Source: Four Degrees of Separation. Note: it = Italy; se = Sweden; itse = combination of Italy and Sweden; us = USA; fb = all Facebook.
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The liberation of music for consumers and musicians

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At the Canon CIO event I spoke at last week, jazz trumpeter extraordinaire James Morrison and his band played music through the event.

James also gave a brief presentation on the event’s theme of the future. He said that not so long ago music was not chosen by consumers, but pushed on us by record companies, who selected artists and controlled radio airplay. Only those musicians who fitted established criteria of attractiveness, age, music style, and so on had any chance of being heard.

Fortunately things have changed. He gave the example of Andy McKee, who is not highly attractive, can’t sing, and is a solo guitar player. McKee and many, many other musicians, have reached out to listeners directly. His YouTube videos have been seen by tens of millions of people. His revenue now includes performing, a record deal, ads on the YouTube videos, and keen demand for the guitar tablature for his songs. Just a decade ago he probably never would have had an audience beyond the local cafe.


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