Unpaid fines see PPP put the squeeze on outpayments – could this be the end of PRS as we know it?

News that PPP fines are going unpaid as companies – particularly fixed line service providers – plead insolvency may seem a bit of jolly wheeze: after all, its not that unlikely that some of these people are, as PPP attests, setting up shell companies, running a scam, then dodging the fine by ‘going out of business’. It’s the oldest trick in the book.

The problem is that PPP is now telling network opeators to withhold outpayments on anyone that looks slightly like they are in financial trouble in a bid to out manoeuvre the hucksters. The result: the already hard hit PRS market is suffering even more than usual with this extra squeeze.

When asked about the move and whether it was perhaps heavy handed, PPP reiterated its statement on the process thus: “In its recent Scope Review, Ofcom has recommended a registration process that is intended to improve due diligence processes, and the development of a new edition of PhonepayPlus’ Code of Practice should lead to additional protection. Until these arrangements are in place, PhonepayPlus intends to use existing powers to target certain types of organisation that have a profile of susceptibility to non-payment, by using directions to withhold revenue in Standard Procedure cases which meet the criteria set out here. Networks will be familiar with these procedures, which are currently already in use for Emergency Procedure cases”.

The move is one more step towards forcing service providers to start to adopt web based service provision and could, in my view at least, mark the death knell for the old way of doing PRS with telephones and operators and the like.

The move towards alternative billing solutions, better broadband and the acceptance of using the web to make calls, do messaging and so on are all making the idea of looking at new ways of delivering premium content and services ever more attractive. Moves like this by PPP to put the squeeze on even further will only hasten the end of trad PRS – and indeed hasten the end of what PPP seeks to regulate.

All this – and more – will be debated in depth at Telemedia 360 in Liverpool on 21 October. Watch this space in the next five working days for details of how to register for this key UK industry event.

Social networking is no longer a teen-scene... thank the gods

Research published last week by Ofcom reveals that about 19 million people in the UK – which amounts to half of all internet users – visit Facebook, spending an average of six hours a month on the website. This is an increase from four hours in May 2008. The report also found that the proportion of 25 to 34-year-olds who said they had a social networking website grew by six percentage points in a year to 46 per cent, while the figure also rose among 35 to 54-year-olds to 35 per cent.

Ofcom also found that the younger demographic, the teens were seemingly abandoning Facebook, MySpace and Twitter, deeming the sites uncool because their parents used them. This news was greeted with the usual near hysteria in the media, who decided that kids not using Facebook, mobile social networking and everything else ‘mainstream’ was a bad thing and the golden age of social network was dead.

Surely it isn’t? I may be wrong, but if I was running a business I would want to attract me to use it as I have money. The teenagers who hang around where I live don’t, so why target them? The same applies to smartphones. While it may now be the height of uncool to have an iPhone and use apps for it (as pointed out, somewhat laboriously by the never-off-my-tv Charlie Brooker), the demographic it targets is the golden slice of society: tech savvy, monied, showy-offy and game to try anything – and game to try and find new things before their mates do, so you don’t even have to spend on marketing to them.

This same idea should apply to social networking. Everyone is still trying to find the business model for Twitter (relax, there isn’t one), when all they have to do is look at the like of Flirtomatic, which has cleverly and lucratively worked out how to make social networking pay: and it isn’t for kids.

Same with adult. Definitely not for the younger demographic, the adult market has long made social networking pay – we used to call it chat and dating, wife swapping and even swinging. The sector is also making UGC viable too.

Again it’s the grown ups that make this possible. It might be my advancing years, but why is everything targeted at the young? Most of them are in college or (currently) unemployed. When I was a student (and a Dole-ite in the holidays back in the day) I had no money to spare and got all my content – music – by taping it off the radio or other people’s records. The channels may have changed now, but the principle is the same. Roll on getting kids off social networking and hoorah for a world where the web is for grown-ups – it will also help usher in the new world order where people pay for content.

Advertising falls through the floor, media companies look to make money from content – T360 has the answer

Hello and Happy Friday! Three very important things happened this week. Firstly, the UK’s largest commercial broadcaster ITV posted a massive £11million loss for the first half of the year. That’s better than the same time in 2008, but is still a horrible reminder of how tough the advertising market is out there.

The second monumental thing comes on the coat tails of another loss: at mighty News International. Murdoch’s publishing empire made a loss, too, because the bottom has dropped out of the display ad markets around the world. The move has prompted Rupert to bare (geddit?) all and go head long into charging for news content through new channels.

These two things are linked by more than just the fact that advertising isn’t dong so well in the ‘old’ media. In fact these two losses exemplify how the old world is being hammered by the new and how something really has to be done to drag the old media into the 20^th Century – if we can find a way to make it make money while remaining attractive to consumers.

Murdoch’s desire to charge for content has long been mooted, but this year’s losses have cemented the plan in his mind. Like most media outlets, News International used the internet as a free channel from day one. Now it, and everyone else, is ruing that decision.

The Financial Times has always charged for content and is, while not growing, makes money from it’s online content and is accepted as a paid for site. The others aren’t.

And therein lies the rub. Consumers want their media content free online. Moving from this expectation to a paid-for model is going to be hard. Murdoch rightly believes that his company’s content is of high value and costs a lot to produce, so why give it away for free. TV companies are in the same position. And these days, apart from the novelty of mobile, ad-funding is looking like a busted flush.

Micro-billing for things – I mean the order of cents – is one options. Combining this with being able to earn from UGC posting in cents too is another. But how can that be brought to bear on the likes of ITV, News International, and other massive mainstream media outlets? And will consumers buy it?

The answer is to look at how the telemedia industry monetises services and how that can be applied to media content.

Which brings us to the third important thing to happen this week: the launch of the Telemedia 360 event, which is taking place on 21 October in Liverpool. The event aims to bring together the media – print, TV, online, everyone – and show them how, through innovative billing, innovating services, and the power of the mobile web, they can start to look at monetising their content and using new channels to market profitably.

Running in conjunction with the International News Media Association (INMA) and the Online Publishing Association (OPA)’s annual European conference on the 22 and 23 October, Telemedia 360 is open to all their delegates, as well as our own and looks set to be the place that the media industry and the telemedia industry can get together to mutual benefit in these tough times.

Of course there are more details to come, and they will be up here in due course. But for now, check out the brochure online here and do drop us a line if you want to take part.

Taking billing power away from operators?

For years I have been waiting for the killer app. Literally years. And now it might be here, though not everyone agrees, largely because it has come along in the form of a nebulous sort of ball of change that is sweeping over the telecoms, content, entertainment and marketing industries like a rolling summer storm.

I talk of the change ushered in by the iPhone, Android and the apps store revolution. Oh no, not bloody apps again, I hear you shriek. Like girls. But bear with me, I think we are in the middle of something special here.

The iPhone has raised the bar in what consumers – whether they have a smartphone of not – expect. This has had a knock on consequence of changing how brands want to interact with those consumers. It has also fundamentally shifted power away from mobile network operators both in terms of network use and in billing.

And to my mind these shifts are a very good thing at a very tough time.

Take networks first. The wifi capability of smartphones is seeing more and more surfing being done outside of the control of the MNO. They can’t see what you are up to and it is also offering a blast of self determinism among customers. As this trend increases, the veracity of offering wider wifi (Wimax) networks in cities and other shared spaced gathers pace. The once seemingly unshakable qunitopoly grip (in the UK) on network – and therefore price – is being relaxed.

Which leads nicely to the second thing that this revolution is, err, revolutionising: billing. Operator billing has some advantages. But it has many, many disadvantages. And these are now being capably addressed in our brave new world.

Mobile web and wifi, apps and smartphones are all making other microbilling tools viable for use. Credit card services run by TxtTrans, TxtNation, TeleBilling and others are suddenly all the rage. Per minute credit card billing is now also possible with Core. And Wallets and even bankless payments – courtesy of PayPal and UKash – are also gaining ground.

The mantra that operator billing is easy and trusted is slowly being blown out of the water. People now trust new billing tools, because they work with their smart device, which they trust. And indeed, right now it is. TxtNation reports that PSMS is still the biggest billing tool for microbilling on merchant websites, but it is early days. This will change.

And yet, still there are some that argue that Apps And All That (A3T, as I like think of it) is not a mass market and that really the old way is the best way – and will stay as the best way. It can be no coincidence that within a week of each other, both Bango and Netsize – now pretty much 'the establishment' when it comes to billing – have released solutions that aim to bring the new world back into the grubby mits of the old. Bango is offering operator billing over wifi and Netsize is doing the same for in app billing.

Both cite that operator billing still brings about more sales and that people trust it. But I am not so sure. To me it seems that the old guard are determined not to be outflanked by the new. As we reveal in our features in the inaugural issue of T360, the final part of the A3T revolution is that it is shaking up business models. Things aren’t like they used to be. And that is good.

READ MORE ON THIS IN THE LATEST ISSUE OF TELEMEDIA360 NEWSLETTER OUT NOW