The Web is Dead! Long Live the Internet

Michael Wolff and Chris Anderson co-wrote a very interesting and slightly controversial piece on why the web is dead, but the internet run by services and apps will continue to live on. You can read the article here

Two decades after its birth, the World Wide Web is in decline, as simpler, sleeker services — think apps — are less about the searching and more about the getting. Chris Anderson explains how this new paradigm reflects the inevitable course of capitalism. And Michael Wolff explains why the new breed of media titan is forsaking the Web for more promising (and profitable) pastures.

In summary, they present a case where:

- we are living in a world dominated by few people. The top 10 sites in the US account for 75% of page views in 2010.

- Google isn’t able to wield its magic in this world. May be AdMob is changing that a little, but the search spider hasn’t made its stronghold in the app world yet, partly because of the disconnection and defragmentation of the Internet world

- every company is a media company, partly because of the relationship, partly because of the business model (ads dominated), partly because of data content and channel strategies

- the future of this media world looks a lot like traditional media, because it was born out of the same embryo but has taken a different path. If Apple is dominating this media world, it was because Jobs and hence Apple have always aligned themselves with the traditional media (Think Pixar, Disney). And hence, iTunes, Apple TV and iPads all make sense in this new age of consumption.

I think its a fantastic case in point capturing the dawn of the world where unconsciously and unseemingly we have welcomed a new friend and consumption mechanism amongst us.

Key Take Away's from SIME Helsinki 10!

The third edition of SIME Helsinki was held on October 19. And in a Moulin Rouge setting. Talk about rock star treatment with champagne and digital paparazzi (#sime10). With over 300 people, in a nice cozy atmosphere, the mood was perfect for a day of discussions, debates, panels, workshops. A special thanks to our partner Trade Doubler Finland, Hasan and Partners, Qualcomm and all the others. And a big thanks to one of the key drivers behind SIME Helsinki, Joakim Lonnroth and his wonderful team.

What were the key take aways from the day? Here is my list.

Global Trends today!

• Change is not a choice, but a necessity.
• Thinking and being global has never made more sense that now. We might have had a bad market, but that doesn’t stop the internet from growing. In fact, the growth rate has been over 45%  YOY.
• Facebook is becoming the global glue. It has become the standard almost defacto vector of connecting and interacting
• Look outside your comfort zone for the good ideas. Cf. QQ / Tencent or Rakuten – these guys are present in only their home markets (China and Japan respectively) and have morphed into more than a social network or a e-commerce giant. And they are thinking global with over 100 business models within their hood.

Marketing and Advertising

• Marketing and Media needs to be paid, owned and earned. Paid for higher reach and scale, earned through word of mouth, virality and entertaining / informative content. And owned through relationships, crowd-wisdom.
• Most marketing is moving towards performance based rather than a percentage of the marketing budget
• Agencies and Bureaus are moving towards being more towards the creative business as they need to innovate and be part of sharing the risk and success of new tools, campaigns and models, unlike before where they managed various properties and traffic
• Technology and Marketing is becoming seamless. Retargeting is hot
• Creativity and Marketing seem to have a happy marriage. Any creative, interesting and innovative content always seems to win most brandshare though not necessarily in sales. Cf. Old Spice Campaign and a very cool campaign in Finland by Hasan and Partners

E-Commerce, Micro-Commerce and Gaming

• E-Commerce is morphing into Me-Commerce: my movies, my preferences, my interaction, my favorites, my activities and hence my purchase
• Micro-Commerce in the music, entertainment and media business is transforming the industry and consumption patterns
• Gaming has never been this hot. Angry Birds was on stage to talk about their awesome app. They just got acquired by EA last Thursday (2 days after SIME Helsinki) . Cf. Angry Birds Acquisition

From a 18 -24 month futuristic stand point

• Innovation is in the Air – vision based augmented reality is the next realm in our interaction cf. Qualcomm used a mobile health app to monitor the health and heart rate of the trapped miners in Chile. When technology is connected with utility / real value, we are enabling technology to really make a difference to our lives.
• The blurring line between content, media and marketing cf. Demand Media
• The ubiquity  of media – every thing you touch, consume, like, interact with is media

All in all, great learnings, great discussions and knowledge tidbits from the day at Helsinki. Thanks guys for making SIME Helsinki rock! See you at SIME Stockholm, November 17, 18.

SIME Non-Profit in one of the leading news site in Sweden [in Swedish]

[Dagensmedia.se, one of the leading news sites in Sweden ran an article about SIME Non-Profit that we are launching this year. The original article in Swedish is here and the repost is below]

Organisatörerna bakom Sime drar igång Sime Non-Profit Summit.

Tanken är att bygga en plattform där sociala entreprenörer och ideella organisationer kan lära av varandra och få kunskap om hur digitala kanaler, it och sociala medier kan användas för förbättra människors liv.

– Vi känner att det behövs ett forum dit ideella organisationer och sociala entreprenörer kan vända sig, säger Therese Engström, verksamhetschef och grundare till Sime Non-Profit tillsammans med Claudia Gonzalez och Sime.

Konferensen hålls parallellt med Sime 17-18 november. På programmet står bland annat utbildning kring hur man använder Facebook, Google och Microsofts kanaler för att engagera potentiella kontakter, hur Obamas valkampanj drevs i sociala medier, kampanjoptimering och ett seminarium om hur FN:s flyktingorgan fått över en miljon Twitter-anhängare.

– Målsättningen är att Sime Non-Profit ska bli ännu större de kommande åren.

Under Sime Non-Profit delas även ett pris ut som ska belöna en inspirerande och visionär marknadsföringsinsats. Priset sponsras av Microsoft Advertising som bidrar med utrymme i sina kanaler till ett värde av 100 000 kronor.

CEO of Gowalla is coming to SIME. Where will you be checking in on November 17-18?

We have invited Gowalla’s founder and CEO Josh Williams to talk us through the mobile geo-location boom – how there are endless opportunities for marketers using hyperlocal information to target and send out relevant information for users. Have we found an important piece in the holy grail to connect marketing and advertising to the right eye balls and segments? Welcome to join our quest in finding out at SIME Stockholm!

So, now where will you be checking in on November 17 and 18?

Josh Williams is cofounder and CEO of Gowalla, a social network inspiring people to discover and share amazing places with their friends. People around the world have now visited, commented on and photographed over 1.8 million places in 170 countries with Gowalla. Like a passport on your phone, Gowalla was born out of a desire to share remarkable places and life journeys in a fun, easy and social way. The service was launched in 2009 and is backed by Greylock Partners, Founders Fund and Alsop-Louie Partners. Prior to Gowalla, Josh was cofounder and CEO of Blinksale, an online invoicing service, as well as Firewheel Design, an award-winning digital and mobile design consultancy whose clients included Microsoft, Samsung and Hewlett Packard. An avid skier and snowboarder, Josh’s favorite places include Taos, New Mexico; Park City, Utah; and Whistler, British Columbia. He lives in Austin, TX with his wife and two young daughters where he enjoys plenty of live music and breakfast tacos.

Extension of SIME 10 bloggers pass deadline

Dear friends, we have decided to extend the bloggers pass deadline by a little bit more time. So if you have not applied, here is your chance to enjoy 2 days of SIME on us as a press attendee or blogger. And do spread your word to your friends.

Fill in the application form here

Infographic: Facebook Mobile Growth – Hysteric!

SIME Powered Day – The Power of Information on October 28!

QuickSearch, appointed by the Gartner Group as one of the world leader in Enterprise Feedback Management together with SIME, Northern Europe’s leading event on digital opportunities invite you to an evening where we explore the power of information, looking at trends in feedback management, and provides a glimpse of the hottest tools and companies

Date: October 28, 2010

Time: 1400 – 1730

Venue: O-bar, Sturehof, Stureplan - Save in your calendar!

You can Register here

We have gathered leading industry experts, companies and tools, to provide promising insights into how better information could reveal the potential and get an organization to develop faster than the competition by having the right information to right person at the right time!

SIME Moderator Ola Ahlvarsson will be the host along with speakers, leaders and motivators like Philip Hallenborg, MD Tradedoubler, George Sällfeldt, President Morningstar, Sebastian Wettemark, Quick Search, and many more. Participants include President, Marketing, HR, IT, sales and business development managers who are interested in using information to compete.

Welcome to the Power of Information! Welcome to QuickSearch and SIME!

SIME Helsinki in a Moulin Rouge setting, speaker catch up and details

Eureka, the realization just hit us hard. SIME Helsinki is here and the best of it all, its held in a moulin rouge setting. Its amazing when you look at the surrounds – a bar, photos from the action hours at the venue, dazzling colors, low lights and a big SIME logo. Its a great combination. The speakers have started calling it adult entertainment – a la a marketing terminology.

The hashtag to use is #sime10. And our twitter handel is @simeblog. Photos on flickr are tagged with SIME, SIME 10. And if you are at the venue, the wifi password is sime0.

Anyways, we caught up with couple of the speakers yesterday and asked them:
- who they are, what they do
- why they are at SIME Helsinki? And what they are speaking about
- And what is the one thing they would put their money on today

Richard Savage is the MD of Qualcomm, pioneering some cool innovations around vision based augmented reality, remote health monitoring amongst other things. Rupert Schaefer – you can find a detailed write up about him here.

Creativity and the Internet lived happily ever after

This amazing campaign ranks right up there as one of the best campaigns I have seen. Created by Finnish company Hasan Partners, they touched all points of the internet and marketing ecosystem and made it work including banner campaigns. I know. Truly, creativity and internet can live happily ever after.

SIME Helsinki is just 24 hours away!

SIME Helsinki is just 1 day away and the crew is very excited to leave Stockholm today to give the last bit of SIME coating to our ground team there.

Some details:
Venue – Fredan Tivoli, Fredrikinkatu 51, Helsinki. See the location on Google Maps.
Agenda
Speaker Line up

From what we hear, the town is spiced up to listen to some riveting talks and debates, participate in workshops and help their businesses take the leap. We have a strong line up of speakers and I am curious to see case studies, numbers on how far we have come in the Nordics with adoption of new technologies in marketing, advertising and social media.  The format is similar to Stockholm but a stripped down version with debates, keynotes and discussions on main stage keynotes from 0900 – 1430 followed by workshops and to end with a fireside chat with a surprise guest. My guess is as good as yours on who this surprise guest will be.

Helsinki are you ready?