The actual gameplay and technologies behind Pokémon Go
I was fascinated and hyped when I saw the promotional video (see below) of Pokémon Go, but at the same time I was skeptical and interested how the actual gameplay will look like. So I decided to look more into which technologies they use, how they make use of it and how they combine the technology with the real world.
You can define Pokémon GO as an augmented reality game that combines virtual and real-world gameplay. The game allows users to explore their own neighbourhoods and cities, powered by GPS, to locate Pokémon or other people to battle or trade with on their phones. For example, maybe you’ll find Bulbasaur at Tokyo’s Shinjuku Station or Pikachu beneath the Eiffel Tower. Judging from the trailer, it looks like users will as well be able to battle and cooperate with large groups to defeat rarer creatures from the game.
It sounds cool and the promotional video looks awesome. But screen captures really do show a game that takes place on your smartphone’s screen alone, so while there may be GPS components and interactivity, you’ll still need decent service and still be staring at a screen most of the time. That was true of co-creator company Niantic’s last gaming experience as well, a niche AR mobile game called Ingress, which asked users to join two sides and use their smartphones to claim territory around portals of energy (actually just real-world buildings and sculptures).
Nintendo is trying to reduce this amount of time that players spend staring at their smart devices in order to play the game by a Bluetooth-powered device called Pokémon Go Plus. Players can wear the device on their wrist or pinned to their clothing. It has a built-in LED light and a vibration function that will notify players that something important is happening in the game, such as a Pokémon appearing nearby.
This is what we know up till now about which technologies are involved in the game and how the gameplay will look like. I’m curious how it will work out when the game is released (2016). Above all, it’s interesting to see what is possible with combining the latest technologies.
Sources:
http://www.polygon.com/2015/9/10/9300011/pokemon-go-android-ios-smartphones-nintendo
http://www.popsci.com/nintendos-new-pokemon-could-bring-augmented-reality-to-masses
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2015-09-11/pokemon-steps-into-augmented-reality/6767272
http://www.cnet.com/news/pokemon-go-nintendo-first-augmented-reality-mobile-game-tomorrow-daily-240/
Drone-mediated Reality
The unmanned aerial vehicle (drone) is the technological invention that turns more and more industries around today. Every day the news reports for a new innovative use of the drones, unheard and unbelievable, which could be a disruptive innovation in a certain field. Military forces, media, archeology, and businesses – they all change because of the drones. The question, though, is what is the nature of this change? Are drones making our lives easier, or are they solving short-term problems, thus creating long-term disasters?
There is no answer to these questions. As every genius technological invention, the drone has its pros and cons. For sure its development benefits one, and harms other, but it is not about the drone itself, but the usage different people make of it. So, answering these questions, would be answering the question about the nature of human behavior. It just depends.
A week ago, BBC posted an article describing an interesting event in Dubai – a competition on the demonstration of the different usages of the drone technology which can benefit civilians. This competition challenged different teams to think how society can actually benefit of the unmanned aerial vehicles, and presented solutions which bear unbelievable changes for the society. A competition, or only one prize, can incentivize teams to deliver solutions that could change the nature (clear fog, plant trees), automate human labor, and be the ears and eyes on places and events, where no man can go. This two-day challenge serves as evidence that drone technology could be beneficial, and that is indeed a great invention.
However, a simple adjustment to all these drones shown on the competition, can convert them into an invisible human enemies. On a London drone exhibition, Superflux showed how a drone can basically: “see a man, scan his face, and quickly look up his criminal record. Elsewhere, a traffic drone spies on vans and cars, checking their emissions and identifying illegal drivers. Another hovers in a living room, sees a little girl has a cat on her T-shirt, makes an algorithmic decision, and feeds a cat-related advert to her parent’s phone”, BBC reports. Drones thus create an invisible world of information – drone-mediated reality, where every kind of data is accessible. This is an example of the usage of an existing technology to understand the material world, and collect the information behind it. A simple drone can meet us on the street and report all available information about ourselves and in addition report our current emotions.
The inaccessible is now accessible, yet controllable and uncontrollable. Drones interfere in wars, media, archeology, society and make a change. How one perceives this change is just a matter of point of view.
Ekaterina Marinova
SID: 436554
Sources:
http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20150910-the-futuristic-city-that-wants-to-rule-from-the-sky
http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20150410-the-invisible-world-viewed-by-drones
Food, Shelter, Smartphone: Why do refugees have smartphones?
The current refugee crisis has led to many controversial and often uninformed debates in Europe. Very often, people tend to question the ‘real’ intentions of these asylum seekers that are often travelling thousands of kilometers to eventually reach Europe. A very popular argument among critics of the current immigration policies is the “smartphone argument”.
“Why do almost all of these refugees own smartphones?”
While the question itself is quiet ignorant, as it indicates that refugees who might have lived wealthy lives are somehow deserving less items than you, it does present an interesting topic when thinking about the actual use of the phones during the long journey to Europe.
The massive amounts of refugees that are on their way to Europe this year, are heavily relying on smartphone applications, as they are exposed to perilous sea crossings, unfriendly boarder crossings and need to stay in touch with their loved ones.
Facebook: A travelling agency
How do you find a huma
n trafficker that will take you across the Mediterranean sea, and where can you find more information about his service? – Exactly, on Facebook.
Human traffickers advertise their services on Facebook like any legitimate travel agency. On the arabic language Facebook group “Trafficking to Europe”, one trafficker offers a 50% discount for children. Another post, asking for a group discount for families gets 32 likes. As brutal and unethical as this practice sounds, thinking about the Information Strategy topic of Session 2, it also becomes evident that the opportunity for refugees to post pictures and discuss their experiences is quiet liberating. More specific, the effects of word-of-mouth and observational learning also apply in the human trafficking industry. While Facebook helps human traffickers to grow their business, it also helps refugees to evaluate their option when travelling to Europe.
A map, a guidebook, and an instruction manual
The current refugees can use GPS and mapping services like Google Maps, in order to navigate themselves to Europe. Additionally, many refugees that already made their safe journey have used Facebook groups and the WhatsApp messenger to spread their experiences in different locations. In this way, refugees can inform themselves about current issues such as boarder patrols for specific locations on their smartphones, and independently navigate their way to Europe. This behaviour has made an extensive cut into the business of human traffickers. While most refugees were dependent on human traffickers for the entire way to Europe in the beginning, the only trafficking services that is still extensively used route from Turkey into Greece. Compared to a few months ago, prices of human traffickers have halved. Follow this link to see the obstacles refugees have to overcome, region by region.
A measure of last resort
The use of smartphones has saved many lives since the outbreak of the refugee crisis. An article by Quartz Magazine has described the way a young man saved his life by sending his GPS location to the Greek boarder patrol once his sinking ship has entered the Greek territory. According to numeral reports, this technique has saved many lives, as refugees are able to contact the outside world in case of emergencies. According to Greek officials, this behaviour is actually encouraged, in order to prevent future catastrophes of sinking boats, as have been occurred on several occasions in the past months. In order to take advantage of these benefits and in order to be able to organize big groups of people more efficiently, the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees has started to give out sim-cards for phones and solar-power lanterns that can also charge phones in refugee camps in Jordan.
What to do once you are there?
Once you are on the run, you have to decide which country to aim for in Europe. Different legislations provide different benefits to asylum seekers, such as the preferred treatment of families that are reunited in Germany, or the fast bureaucratic processing in Sweden and the Netherlands. Since the availability of internet in Syria, for instance, is very limited, people need to make these decision on the journeys, rather than in their home country. Additionally, many refugees tend to organize a smartphone only after having left Syria, since many people who are captured at the Syrian boarder are forced to present their Facebook password and pictures, in order to determine their allegiance, when a smartphone is found in their possession. Hence, a smartphone becomes essential for refugees to speed up their asylum process upon arrival.
Additionally, a website and smartphone app of the red cross, called Trace the Face helps refugees to reconnect with their family members by uploading their pictures through their phones.
Syrian migrants take a picture after their safe arrival on an overcrowded dinghy to the coast of the southeastern Greek island of Kos from Turkey, on August 15, 2015.
http://www.cnbc.com/2015/09/11/how-smartphones-are-helping-refugees-in-europe.html
http://familylinks.icrc.org/europe/en/Pages/Home.aspx
http://qz.com/500062/the-most-crucial-item-that-migrants-and-refugees-carry-is-a-smartphone/
http://www.timesofisrael.com/facebook-whatsapp-and-viber-light-way-to-europe-for-syrian-refugees/
How to cope with office politics as a data scientist?
Office politics is a phenomenon that exists in every company ranging from SME’s to multinationals. Many describe it as the political landscape of a firm that structures the hierarchy between departments, teams, and individuals. Moreover, office politics is often interpreted as a negative phenomenon and associated with the power game that is constantly at play (Vigoda-Gadot & Drory, 2006). Active practitioners use it to tactically manipulate co-workers to gain individual prestige (Vigoda-Gadot & Drory, 2006). However, in some cases office politics stimulates the efficiency, especially when working on cross-departmental projects because it can strengthen interpersonal relationships that oils the decision-making process. Nevertheless, to avoid the discussion whether office politics has a positive or negative effect, it is important to be aware of the phenomena and to posses the basic skills make advantage of it.
Data scientists are often subject to strong negative office politics because they provide empirical evidence for business problems that are usually approached from a gut-feel and experience perspective (Penn, 2013) Since both approaches are usually not resulting in similar solutions, data scientists get the reputation of disrupting the status quo, hence challenged with heavy resistance (Penn, 2013). Additionally, data scientists are regularly working on projects with a cross-departmental scope, whereof the agenda’s of the departments are not aligned, which again result in strong office politics (Glassman, 2014).
Although ignoring office politics is not an option, using basic tactics to make use of it can be exploited and benefitted. One basic tactic, which is well known and often classified as ‘kiss-ass-behavior’, is to engage with and gain trust from the person in power (Pfeffer, 2011). Consequently, this can function as leverage when running into problems or when having disagreements with the staff (Penn, 2013). Another successful approach, when working on cross-departmental projects, is to fully understand the different agenda’s at play, because this enriches the capability to restate goals in such a way that all parties are respected and collaborate willingly. Additionally, engaging in discussions with co-workers may be necessary but trade-offs are always made (Truter, 2008). Therefore, it is important that data scientists pick their battles cautiously and take into to account the trade-offs at hand (Pfeffer, 2011).
To summarize, data scientists are confronted with strong office politics because of the potential disturbance of the status quo and the cross-departmental nature of their activities. Nevertheless, engaging with the person in power and using it as leverage can minimize office politics. Similarly, by fully understanding the different agenda’s and by carefully considering the discussion to engage in, office politics can be used as an advantage.
My question to the reader: Which other skills can be practiced to positively make use of office politics by data scientists in your opinion?
Bibliography
Vigoda-Gadot, E. & Drory, A., 2006. Handbook of Organisational Politics. 1st ed. Massachutts: Edward Elgar Publishing.
Glassman, J., 2014. Workplace Politics Hinder Data Driven Initiatives. [Online] Available at: https://www.umbel.com/blog/big-data/workplace-politics-data-driven-initiatives/ [Accessed 20 September 2015].
Penn, S., 2013. Data Science Central. [Online] Available at: http://www.datasciencecentral.com/profiles/blogs/how-the-data-scientist-should-navigate-office-politics [Accessed 20 September 2015].
Pfeffer, J., 2011. Don’t Dismiss Office Politics – Teach it. Wall Street Journal.
Truter, I., 2008. Power in the Workplace. SA Pharmaceutical Journal, 75(1), pp.50-52, 70.
How to lose your Internet weight!
Ever wonder why seemingly simple web pages take long to load? Chances are it’s not the content that is weighing you down, but third party trackers. These parties track your movement over several websites, analyzing your behavior and record your browsing habits.
To put things into perspective the following example from a Guardian article provides some figures. In loading the popular tech site ‘The Verge,’ the actual content only ran 8k, whereas the surrounding ads ran to 6MB. During a second study, it was discovered that almost an order of magnitude more data is needed for the trackers than the article itself. A more recent study explained this ‘weight’ in a measure more familiar to the everyday user; seconds. By turning off third party scripts, the homepage loaded within 2 seconds, down from 11 seconds.
We can therefore conclude that third party trackers take up more data (and thus more time) not only during the launch of a page, but throughout the entire duration of our browsing. These are two luxuries few of us can afford on our mobile contracts nor during our busy lives. An additional consequence for portable devices is less battery.
But fear not, solutions are available, with my personal favorite being Ghostery! This extension for your browser identifies which services are trying to track you and then gives you the option to block them. When first installing the extension the following categories are given; Advertising, Analytics, Beacons, category_iso, privacy and widgets. Given you full control of where you would like to make exceptions.
I like the newly found control I was previously unaware of. Since installing I can say I have observed a slight increase in speed. However, I do enjoy it when I load specific websites that a customized experience is opened for my profile, for example making my purchase recommendations better or my preferred settings more familiar. This customization is reduced if not lost when disabling all the trackers, therefore in the future I might consider allowing certain websites to use third party trackers for my own benefit.
Remember; “if you’re not paying for something, you’re not the customer, but the product!”
Questions?
-Is this something you would install?
-What are some additional trade-offs of these services?
-If adopted on a grand scale could these extensions create problems?
Sources:
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/aug/23/beginning-of-the-end-for-web-ads
http://www.networkworld.com/article/2226989/security/ghostery-a-tool-for-paranoiacs-everywhere.html
https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2009/09/online-trackers-and-social-networks
http://murphyapps.co/blog/2015/6/24/an-hour-with-safari-content-blocker-in-ios-9
Quantum computing: technological holy grail or dystopian nightmare?
Our daily overdose of news shows us the myriad inventions that have the potential to revolutionize industries. One such invention that is subtly appearing, yet gaining fast popularity is the possibility of quantum computers. What is this technology and what is its potential?
As you may know, a classical computer uses binary bits to perform calculations. They are the smallest unit of information in a classical computer and can hold one of two forms: 0 or 1. A quantum bit (abbreviated as qubit) exploits one of the quirks of quantum mechanics, allowing it to be in a state of both 1 and 0 at the same time. This allows multiple simultaneous calculations, which is in complete contrast to current computers. As you can imagine, this means that a fully functioning quantum computer would increase the number of potential calculations by an almost unimaginable amount. There are still many issues which stop quantum computers from appearing in the next 5 years (such as coherence limits, phase errors just to name a few), however researchers are confident that the golden age of quantum computing will arise within the next 10-30 years.
So what does this mean for business?
Big Data and Quantum Computing
The possibilities that quantum computing present are endless. One field that would be impacted by quantum computing and bring huge contributions to the business domain is big data.
Big data is an advancing field, but it is meeting some limitations which have slowed down its rise to glory. Such limitations include:
- integrating sets that have completely different structures
- moving large amounts of data efficiently through a highly distributed network
Moore’s law is still in effect but for how long? Already since 2005 has this law still existed only due to changes in processor architecture, since it is not humanly possible to make transistors much smaller than they currently are. At this point, the quantum computer seems to be the only solution on the horizon. As explained above, the significant increase in computational volume would almost instantly solve current problems in the big data domain.
This is just one potential use of quantum computers. There are many more (for example drug discovery and design for pharmaceutical industries). However, can only good come out of quantum computing?
The Quantum Arms Race
Quantum computing could potentially be very dangerous as well. One form of danger it poses is its potential to crack many of today’s used forms of encryption. Should such powerful computers fall into the hands of the wrong people, companies’ records, users’ bank accounts and many more forms of private information could become publicly available. Events such as the Ashley Madison hack could become commonplace.
Even if this prediction is on an extreme level and might not happen, quantum computing will be an incredibly disruptive innovation in an industry that has only benefited from incremental innovations since the Web 2.0. Consider how expensive it would be for a company to replace most of their systems with quantum ones. Would all companies be able to afford such technologies? It is highly unlikely, and yet the corporate giants will upgrade and gain a considerable advantage against startups, potentially stifling innovation.
There is no way to tell if quantum computer evolution will follow the same growth path as classical computers did. Hopefully commercialization will happen faster. At this point in time, all we can do is speculate.
What do you think?
References
http://www.wired.com/2015/09/tricky-encryption-stump-quantum-computers/
http://www.fastcompany.com/3045708/big-tiny-problems-for-quantum-computing
I would have come up with an appropriate title, but my cellphone distracted me
A lot of us know we spend too much time on our cellphone. We check Facebook, Twitter and the News regularly, especially during the moments we are not being occupied by anything exciting. But aren’t things getting a little out of hand here? Recent studies show that we spend three hours and sixteen minutes on average on our cellphone every day. That is eleven minutes of every hour staring at a 5 inch screen (assuming an 7 hour sleep at night).
As you probably would have guessed, the majority of this time we are occupied with Social Media and communication. We send about 65 messages and check out Facebook 14 times per day. I believe that our mobile phone takes a too important place in our lives
SHARE OF TIME SPENT USING SMARTPHONE APPS BY CATEGORY
| U.S. | U.K. | Japan | |
| Communications | 12% | 9% | 16% |
| Shopping/Commerce | 2% | 5% | 6% |
| News/Info | 2% | 5% | 5% |
| Productivity/Function | 11% | 7% | 6% |
| Entertainment | 6% | 15% | 9% |
| Games | 9% | 18% | 16% |
| Social | 28% | 29% | 24% |
| Others | 29% | 12% | 17% |
| Source: Nielsen | |||
Table one: Share of time spent using smartphone apps by category
Given these extreme statistics, I believe that it would improve your life is you install “Moment” on you smartphones and use Moment to take control over your mobile internet time spent.
First, a little introduction of Moment, in case you have not heard of this application before (like me before I started doing research on this topic). The only thing that the free version of Moment does is monitoring you daily time spent on your cellphone.
However, if you do the € 4,99 upgrade, additional functions are unlocked. These are typically the functions that you are looking for when actively taking control over the time you spend on your cellphone. In the pro version of Moment, it can activate your smartphone’s alarm when you pass the time limit of the day. You can set and decrease this time limit yourself. More rigorously, Moment can deactivate your mobile phone, and limit its functions to emergency calls when you pass the daily time limit. This evidently forces you to decrease the time you spend on your mobile.
The reasons you want to decrease the amount of time you are occupied with your smartphone are obvious.
First of all, unlimited and uncontrolled mobile internet usage can cause psychological and social distortions. This is due to the fact that you (unconsciously) feel that information streams can continuously be exposed to you, which decreases the feeling of privacy and makes relaxation more difficult. Moreover, being occupied with your smartphone all the time, decreases the time you spend on face-to-face social interaction. Studies show that this can cause social isolation. Both are important drivers behind stress.
Secondly, as has been demonstrated above, social media is an important category that we spend our time one while using our smartphone. Social media is often perceived as harmless media with infinite possibilities.
Figure 1: Interaction between actors of a social media network.
However, there are dangers behind the usage of Facebook, Twitter etcetera. This is due of a couple of factors. First, one could think of the world as presented on the social media as the real world, where people’s life are a continuum of highlights and successes. Studies show that people project this distorted “real world” on his or her own life unconsciously, decreasing his/her self-image. If you would limit the amount of time you spend on looking at these social media, there is more time to put the updates, tweets etc. into perspective.
Secondly, too much social media can get people addicted to the mini ego-boosts (caused by little endorphin shots) from every like or comment that is being given by someone else. This leads to a decreased capability to deal with setbacks, which causes stress. Third, research has shown that one is only capable of maintaining 150 social relations. Without going into detail about the evolutionary implication of this study, due to social media we exceed that number significantly. This is another driver behind stress.
Figure 2: Ambient intimacy when having more than 150 “friends”
Limiting your time spent on your smartphone does obviously not decrease the number of friends you have, but it does force you to only look at the posts of friends that are really relevant to you.
Last but not least, excessive smartphone usage has a negative effect on your concentration. Knowing that an exciting message from your friend might pop up every moment decreases the ability to isolate yourself from the outside world and focus on work or education-related materials. A study conducted by the Whittemore School of Business and Economics shows that 51% of students experience a decrease in their performance due to the activity on their smartphone.
So there are convincing arguments that excessive smartphone time spent leads to a variety of negative implications. Fortunately, Moment can help you in a very practical way to gain control over this problem. It is momentarily only available for Iphone. However, the “Quality Time” application is a good substitute for Android users.
Fabian Dekker
332721fd
http://www.unh.edu/news/docs/2010CellphoneUsageStudy.pdf
http://tweakers.net/nieuws/93268/nederlandse-facebook-gebruikers-bijna-uur-per-dag-op-facebook.html
http://www.scientias.nl/waarom-facebook-een-deel-van-ons-leven-opeist/
http://www.besocialized.nl/blog/social-media-cijfers/
http://twittermania.nl/wp-content/uploads/2010/01/Dunbars-number.jpg
http://www.telegraaf.nl/digitaal/23174776/__Gemiddeld_221_keer_per_dag_op_smartphone__.html
Addicted to likes
More than 50% of the youth spends over three hours a day on social media. When we wake up, two out of three, looks directly on their mobile phone to check their social media accounts and pages. Roeland Dietvorst (neuroscientist), argues that when we use social media we use the so called pleasure centre of our brains. This centre also plays a major role in addictions. When people ‘like’ your Facebook message or photo, it feels like a reward to our brain, it gives us some kind of satisfaction. Because of this satisfaction we want to get more and more likes. We keep on looking over and over again for the confirmation, that other people ‘like’ what we share on social media. 30% of the youth admits, that they are addicted to social media. On the other hand one out of four argues that they feel negative about being online all the time. They think it can be a huge distraction. For a part I really understand that, sometimes I really put my phone away for a few hours, so I don’t have to worry about it. It can be quite annoying, when people are asking for your attention while you’re busy.
Personally, I think social media plays a major role in our lives. We can see this on a daily basis, when we are in class, waiting for the bus or sitting in the public transport. There are always people around you using social media, even when we are going out or during dinner. For me it can be a big frustration, when I’m talking to someone and they are playing on their phones during the conversation. But sometimes I detect myself doing exactly the same thing.
I’m online for almost two hours a day, but I don’t feel like I’m addicted to social media. How do you feel about this? Are you addicted to social media?
References
http://www.eenvandaag.nl/uploads/doc/Sociale%20media%20rapportage.pdf
From ownership to membership
In the past few years we have seen several examples of industries that have changed the way consumers search, buy and use products or services. In this blog I will short look at some influences on IT in the consumer market, but also the B2B-market.
Around the 1950’s, mass production came up and led to more efficiency, lower prices and higher wages. As a result, the average household gained acces to expensive products that, for decades long, were only available to the elite.
These days, the Internet has made the access to all kind of services much simpler: a small investment is enough to use a certain service, and a big investment to own a product is nog longer needed (think of the Sharing Economy). This applies, for example, to cars, but also in relatively low-cost products such as CD’s and DVD’s. Spotify and Netflix have changed the way people consume their media. Why should you buy a DVD if you want to watch the film only once?
We thus see a shift in the consumer market from the ownership-model to the subscription-model. This also applies in the B2B-market. IT-infrastructure therefore has to change quickly as a result of this new reality, but, in practice, this is often a gradual process. This is because of the fact that companies have spent much, and long time, on developing their IT-infrastructure to meet business needs. They are therefore unable to respond flexibly to changing market conditions (subscription-model).
The changing market conditions has an impact on IT:
- From procurement perspective: a flexible subscription-based contract with a software supplier gives the IT-department the power to use services that can be deployed rapidly. User licenses are scalable, responding to the need. Through the cloud, companies can expand their infrastructure an applications, with new business processes, more insights, creating more value.
- The demand of 24/4 availability. IT-systems therefore always have to be online, to offer the promised services. This asks for an investment in the infrastructure that guarantees high availability and security.
- Companies that deliver products or services based on subscription or membership, are using a different way of (financial) administration. Customers don’t invest in the product or service at the beginning, but are paying a fixed payment per month. From the business perspective, this provides more opportunities for customer retention, loyalty and upselling. Also, when analyzing the customer behavior it is much easier to offer customized products or services.
It is certain that the digital revolution will bring further dramatic changes in the future. Forward looking firms are seeing the changing technologies as opportunities rather than threats. They can benefit from these disruptive technologies by standing in front by using or delivering them.
Harm-Jan Rijneveld
SN: 370370hr.
Sources:
http://cooperativegrocer.coop/articles/2009-01-19/membership-ownership
http://blog.unit4.nl/2014/10/effect-veranderende-economie-it-3-eigendom-lidmaatschap/
Belk, R. (2013) ‘You are what you can access: Sharing and collaborative consumption online’, Journal of Business Research, 67, pp. 1595-1600.
E-Book Subscription Service Oyster To Shut Down
Is the ebook market only for big players?
Article: http://techcrunch.com/2015/09/21/oyster-shuts-down/
Oyster, founded in 2012, is a platform that allows users to read books on their smartphone, tablet or in the web-browser – online and offline (US only). This sounds familiar, right? However, what made them stand out was their, at the time, unique business model in this industry. They allowed users to sign up for an ‘unlimited plan’, a subscription service that let users read (open…) as many books as they liked for a monthly fee.
With its business model, and numerous unique features in its reading app, Oyster set itself apart from competitors such as Scribd, and the one dominant player in the industry: Amazon. This helped it gather numerous investors, resulting in USD 17 million of funding, and a name in the industry.
In July 2014, Amazon launched Kindle Unlimited (KU), its own e-book subscription service at USD 9.99. This left the last untouched playing field for smaller companies and startups with a bad taste. At first, Oyster seemed to have an advantage, because they had numerous titles of the ‘Big Five’ publishers, while most of Amazon’s selection was made up of KDP (Kindle Direct Publishing) titles. Oyster even tried to fight back by launching an e-book store outside of its unlimited product, hoping to increase the customer base and revenues.
| Kindle Unlimited | Oyster Unlimited | |
| Price (USD) | 9.99 | 9.95 |
| Trial period | 30-day | 14-day |
| eBooks | +1,000,000 | +1,000,000 |
| Big Five titles | No | Yes |
| Platforms | Web, Kindle devices, Android, iOS, Windows Phone and BlackBerry | Web, Android, iOS and Kindle Fire |
However, Amazon took the market by storm and never let the small player reach a significant market share. According to a consumer survey, by April 2015, 12.4% of ebook readers had a KU subscription, while under 1.4% had an Oyster subscription.
On September 22nd, after an aqui-hire by Google, Oyster announced that it would close down its service by early 2016.
It makes me wonder, did the founders give up hope, because there simply was no chance of building a sustainable (profitable!) business in this industry? Or do they plan to use Google’s resources to launch an even stronger competitor in combination with the currently existing ‘Google Books’ platform?
This leaves two important questions;
- Is there any amount of innovation that can allow small players to survive in the ebook industry?
- Can small firms co-exist in this industry, or do the big players want to take it all?
Seeing how Scribd continues as the only significant competitor, can give an answer to some of these questions.
SN: 353884mk
Sources:
http://techcrunch.com/2015/09/21/oyster-shuts-down/
http://appraisingpages.com/2015/08/26/huge-giveaway-a-free-year-of-oyster/
http://www.cnet.com/how-to/amazon-kindle-unlimited-vs-scribd-vs-oyster-e-book-subscriptions/
http://techcrunch.com/2015/04/08/oyster-e-book-store/
http://the-digital-reader.com/2015/05/04/amazon-is-killing-it-in-the-subscription-ebook-market/
Hyperloop: Another Great Idea of Elon Musk?
Elon Musk is the man behind Paypal, Tesla Motors and SpaceX and showed that he is a game changer in the world of technology. For example, SpaceX is outcompeting NASA by building cheaper spaceships in less time by using new technologies. And Tesla Motors is shifting electric cars and battery endurance to a higher level. Is Hyperloop the next bright idea of Elon Musk that will find its way in society?
What is Hyperloop?
Hyperloop is a reaction to the California High-speed Rail system (CHR), which is currently under development to provide fast transportation between San Francisco (SF) and Los Angeles (LA). Hyperloop consists of two massive tubes stretching between SF and LA wherein pods carrying passengers would travel through those tubes. The most important feautures of Hyperloop are lower costs, higher speed, immune to weather, sustainable self-powering and resistance to earthquakes. See the table 1 for a comparison with the CHR.
TABLE 1: COMPARISON HYPERLOOP AND CALIFORNIA HIGH-SPEED RAIL SYSTEM
| Hyperloop | California High-speed Rail system | |
| Costs | 6 billion | 68 billion (!) |
| Speed | 1120 km/h | 130 km/h |
| Immune to weather | Yes | No |
| Sustainable self-powering | Yes | No |
| Resistant to earthquakes | Yes | No |
These features suggest that traveling from SF to LA by Hyperloop will only take 35 minutes instead of 6 hours by CHR. On the other hand, there are of course some drawbacks. The high speed will make it hard to take large turns or to deal with elevation. Public approval, legislation, regulations and contractors are something else to worry about when Hyperloop technically can be realized.
The Hyperloop developments
Elon Musk is not developing the pods for the Hyperloop himself. SpaceX only provided a test track for the producers of pods. SpaceX engineers provide feedback on the engineers and students who participate in the competition to develop the best pods. The applicants will get the opportunity to test their pods on the Hyperloop test track in June 2016.
This will probably the most impressive competition ever. However, there is no promise that anything concrete will arise out of the competition. As Will Nicol of Digital Trends said: ‘the contest is a way for engineers and companies to exchange knowledge and maybe get the ball rolling to make the Hyperloop system a reality. Like a world’s fair expo, it’s a place for visions of the future to become a little bit clearer’.
The future will show whether commercial Hyperloop systems will ever be widely adopted. As the population will grow, better mass transportation systems will become useful. Pods developing companies are now receiving funds (Hyperloop Technologies raised 80 million dollar), so a wider trust in a success is real. Lets see what the pods competition for the Hyperloop will bring is in June 2016.
A presentation on Hyperloop is shown below if you like to know more about it:
References:
http://www.digitaltrends.com/cool-tech/hyperloop-news/#/8
Hyperloop Technologies Is Raising $80M, Names Ex-Cisco Pres Rob Lloyd CEO, Emily White As Advisor
https://www.rt.com/usa/313071-hyperloop-musk-pneumatic-spacex/
http://www.wired.com/2015/02/construction-hyperloop-track-starts/
BUX: Stock broker and game combined
Many young people consider the stock market as boring, and as ‘mainly for older people’. BUX is a new smartphone application, available in Dutch, English and German, which is aiming to combine investing with a game. BUX believes that the stock market is the biggest and best game in the world. They aim to give access to the stock market for everyone, not just the ‘big boy bankers’.
How is BUX different from traditional stock brokers?
BUX picked a few popular listed companies (including Heineken, Facebook, Twitter, Tesla, etc.). Therefore, it is not possible to invest in any listed company you want, just the ones that were selected by BUX. Also, while using BUX, you do not actually purchase the stocks. The application works with derivatives, which are securities with a price that is dependent on the underlying asset (in this case: the stock)(Investopedia, 2015). You actually sign a ‘contract of difference’ (CFD), which is an arrangement made in a futures contract whereby differences in settlement are made through cash payments, rather than the delivery of physical goods or securities (Investopedia, 2015) with Ayondo Markets, the stock broker BUX works with, for every transaction you make. To summarize: you pick one of the selected companies, estimate if the stock price will rise or fall, and make a profit of loss with your CFD based on the actual stock price.
Stock broker or game app?
After hearing about BUX, I was instantly interested; I wondered if BUX was really about investing. After some research I found out that the answer is rather simple; BUX is more a gambling game than a stock broker. Investing is about making sure that your savings have a better return compared to a savings account at a bank. An extensive risk profile should be made and companies should be evaluated on their fundamentals. BUX on the other side, is about short term ‘investing’, which makes evaluating the fundamentals of the company useless. Therefore, BUX is, in my opinion, more a gambling game than a stock broker.
BUX as a game
Even though BUX cannot be seen as a real stock broker, BUX still has the potential to grow a lot larger. There are many people interested in the stock market and BUX could be an easy way to learn the basics of stock trading. However, commercials by BUX stating that you can play with the ‘big boy bankers’ and get rich are misleading and incorrect. BUX is fun, but only works with small cash amounts and over a short period of time.
Niels van der Wolf
355821nw
Sources
Van der Vliet, H (2014) Hoe ik niet rijk werd van beleggen op mijn telefoon, NRCQ, 03-10-2014, Available at http://www.nrcq.nl/2014/10/03/hoe-ik-niet-rijk-werd-van-beleggen-op-mijn-telefoon, last reviewed on 22-09-2015
Spelier, P. (2014) BUX maakt aandelenhandel toegankelijker en leuker, Emerce Innovatie, 06-10-2014, Available at http://www.emerce.nl/achtergrond/bux-maakt-aandelenhandel-toegankelijker-vooral-leuker, last reviewed at 22-09-2015
Investopedia (2015), Derivative, Available at http://www.investopedia.com/terms/d/derivative.asp, last reviewed at 22-09-2015
Investopedia (2015), CFD, Available at http://www.investopedia.com/terms/c/contractfordifferences.asp, last reviewed at 22-09-2015
Pokémon Go
Pokémon is probably one of the first games everyone in our generation has played (on a Gameboy). The original game was created in 1995 by Satoshi Tajiri, and has been a great success selling 270 million games. The game started on a Gameboy, and has been turned into different versions for all Nintendo platforms and consoles, an anime television show, card games, comics, movies and magazines. And although it has been 20 years and most people have forgotten about all the fun they had playing this game, the creators of Pokémon didn’t forget about us. They teamed up with Niantic (developer of an augmented reality game called Ingress) and are putting their game in a very 2.0 or even 3.0 jacket, and with some help of new technologies are going to release this new and improved version of the game in 2016 for android and iOS.
As you can see in the video above, the creators of Pokémon Go have used augmented reality, to create a PokéWorld within our own. This enables you to actually walk out the door and start catching Pokémon. The game will probably be using GPS to determine where players are, what Pokémon are near them and what possible opponents are near them. You will use your smartphone’s camera to see the world around you, and the application will add an extra layer to reality, featuring your favourite game. Players can trade Pokémon with other players via their smartphones, and are able to fight each other. And although the game is going to be nowhere near as cool as the trailer, this entire new way of gaming gives a great view of the future of this branch, especially when combined with technologies like Google Glass, or the even better Microsoft Hololens.
The video has been watched more than fifteen million times since it was uploaded two weeks ago and has become a viral success. The game will also be accompanied by a wearable technology called Pokémon Go Plus, which will enable players to play, without having to look at their smartphone non-stop. It’s connected to the game via Bluetooth, and will let you know if a Pokémon is nearby. The device, which is shaped like a Pokéball, also lets you catch Pokémon and perform other simple tasks by pressing the button.
The game developer Niantic is looking to update the world of gaming with all new technologies that have become available, and are successfully looking for new ways of gameplay.
Sjoerd Poppelaars
361339sp
Sources:
http://www.pokemon.com/us/pokemon-video-games/pokemon-go/
http://tweakers.net/nieuws/105208/augmented-reality-game-pokemon-go-komt-in-2016-naar-android-en-ios.html
http://www.techtimes.com/articles/85475/20150918/gaming-on-the-go-augmented-reality-game-pok%C3%A9mon-teases-nintendos-potential-mobile.htm
Apple has been targeted
The apps in the Google Play Store has grown with more than 50% since last year. This is more than the Apple’s App Store performed. But this is not their only problem. This week’s news showed that the applications of Apple are not always save.
The problem started in China where it can take a long time to download large files from Apple’s servers. This counts the same for Xcode. Xcode is used by developers to design applications. But because Xcode is nearly 3 GB, Chinese developers choose to download it from somewhere else. Links were found on Google which you can use to download Xcode.
Figure 1: Search results for downloading Xcode (Google)
Unfortunately most of them were infected with malware, called XcodeGhost. When designing an iOS app it is relying on the CoreServices which contains many of the fundamental system services. A malicious code was implemented in the CoreServices which was used by any application developer who downloaded the wrong Xcode links.
The biggest problem of this malware is that it can read your login details and more personal information from your phone without noticing.
It is a surprise that this could actually happen in the App Store, because Apple handles a very strict submissions code review. I can imagine that people are shocked by this news. Especially because it is not certain yet in which applications the malware is already implemented and which personal details are disclosed. Reuters: ‘Apple declined to say how many apps it had uncovered.’
They say more harm has been done to Asia because ‘sometimes network speeds are very slow when downloading large files from Apple’s servers,’ which was said by Claud Xiao (researcher of Palo Alto Networks), and they turn to unofficial services. For example the popular WeChat app has been infected which is widely used in Asia.
Palo Alto Networks Director of Threat Intelligence Ryan Olson:
“Other attackers may copy that approach, which is hard to defend against.”
“Developers are now a huge target.”
What does Apple need to do to make sure that in the future we can still download iOS applications without the risk of getting malware on our device and being scared about our personal details? How can they change their system?
http://www.apparata.nl/nieuws/honderden-apps-voor-ios-besmet-met-malware-14924
http://www.apparata.nl/nieuws/google-play-store-groeit-apples-app-store-voorbij-11167
http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-34311203
http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-34312692
http://www.cbc.ca/news/technology/apple-malware-canada-follo-1.3236970
http://nos.nl/uitzending/8766-uitzending.html
http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/09/21/us-apple-china-malware-idUSKCN0RK0ZB20150921
Information & Education – Coursera and KhanAcademy
At present, there are many e-learning platforms and sites that someone can watch classes and lessons and gain knowledge on matters that will benefit him/her either in work or in his/her personal life. Examples are: edX, Coursera, MIT OpenCourseWare, Open Yale Courses, Open Learning Initiative, Khan Academy, Canvas Network, NovoEd and many others. Having had experience with Coursera and KhanAcademy I choose to emphasize and analyze those two educational organizations.
Founded in 2012 by computer science professors Andrew Ng and Daphne Koller from Stanford University, Coursera is a for-profit technology education company that offers massive open online courses in many fields and in accordance with many top universities. Its subscribers can either watch a lesson for free or sometimes take a statement of accomplishment but in many cases they can pay a fixed fee so that they can get a verified certificate of the completion of the course. Personally, in 2014, I followed and completed five lessons with success (in all of them earned a statement of accomplishment) and many other which I left in the middle or in even at the start. This was one of Coursera’s positives that you could actually subscribe to lessons and if you did not find them interesting you could just leave them. Nowadays, Coursera still offers free lessons but there are also many for which you have to pay from the start such as its specialization track courses.
Concerning KhanAcademy we must notice that it is a non-profit educational organization. It was created in 2006 by Bengali-American educator and teacher, Salman Khan, who was former a hedge fund analyst, having had graduated both from MIT and Harvard. The organization produces micro-lectures in the form of YouTube videos and also provides practice exercises. KhanAcademy is free to anyone in the world, provided of course they have an Internet connection. My experience with KhanAcademy occurred also in 2014, when I was preparing to give my GMAT exam. Some of its videos actually proved to be very useful for me as they helped me grasp some mathematical concepts and contributed in a positive way to my final score in the GMAT. Also, KhanAcademy’s practice exercises with their reward point system proved to be very useful as well and helped towards the consolidation of the mathematical ideas discussed in the videos (crucial when running out of time in a test).
If i were to compare those two learning platforms I would have to say that while Coursera did offer me some very interesting and well documented lessons (such as Dan Ariely’s guide to irrational behavior and Luc de Brabandere’s lessons on strategy), I am a bigger fan of the KhanAcademy project not only because it gives people around the world the choice to study in their own terms and pace but because it also does it for free, which actually gives a chance to people not having the same access to physical learning environments to compete and evolve alongside others that do. We could even say that KhanAcademy places the motto “Free education to everyone ” in a new base. Don’t you agree?
Sources:
https://www.khanacademy.org/contribute
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salman_Khan_(educator)
https://www.khanacademy.org/about
Student: Anargyros Michaletos
Technology of the week – Zalando vs. ASOS
Who has not used the Internet to purchase something, is more an exception than a normality these days. The Internet has forced companies to be more innovative as competition increases fiercely. In this article, we will provide you with an analysis of two pure e-commerce business models, namely Zalando and ASOS, and see how they compete through technological innovations.
Zalando business model.
In 2008, inspired by the American Zappos, Zalando was born. What started as an online retailer for shoes, become soon one of the biggest fashion web shops in Europe. Zalando is now active in 15 countries in Europe and offers over 1.500 different brands for men, woman and children. With a revenue of €2.214 million in 2014 and a customer base of 14.7 million people, it is hard to image the e-commerce business without Zalando. To stay a head of the competition, Zalando created a new feature, namely the “Image Search”. With this tool, customers are able to make a photo of a piece of clothing they want to posses, and the Zalando database will show all the possible options that are in line with this photo.
ASOS business model.
Another famous player in the online fashion industry is ASOS, AsSeenOnScreen. This UK based company is started in 2000 with selling beauty products and clothes, it now has more than 850 different brands and delivers in 237 countries all over the world. ASOS provides as they call it “Fashion Lovers” with the newest fashion. To achieve this, they added short movies of a model wearing the clothes, so that the customers know how the clothes move when wearing them. Furthermore, ASOS developed a new platform, called “Marketplace, where young designers and small vintages boutiques can trade their products. Even though ASOS has a large reach around the world, with 8,8 active customers and a revenue of €1.324 million, Zalando has caught up quite well these past years.
Future perspectives.
Even though the business models of these two major players in the fashion industry are very alike, there are some difference that may be the key to outperform the other. Both companies try to be as creative as possible in discovering new technologies to make the life’s of their customers even more easy. For ASOS, it might be a good idea to discover the options of expanding to other segments as well, meaning the less highly fashionable customers. Furthermore, in terms of marketing, they should consider also offline marketing, as it will expand their customer base. To keep up with Zalando’s image search, ASOS need to stay innovative, as otherwise will lose their market share.
Zalando on the other hand, has to be careful that it does not become too general, as it will lose their focus on the services they provide. Zalando needs to try to expand to the rest of Europe and even beyond to be able to keep up with the growing competition.
For both companies there are different challenges that needs to be tackled in order to maintain their position in this fast changing industry.
Team 19
Mark Smeitink 344571
Philip van Zadelhoff 352591
Nikki Bueno de Mesquita 356897
Eva van Baarle 357812
Vera Suijkerbuijk 371212
Getting a Convenient Ride: Car2Go and Yandex.Taxi
Who could imagine that discovery of the internet in the late 20th century would have such a dramatic effect on the business world? While some companies found a way to take an advantage of the internet, others were driven out of business completely. This post will focus on the first category, and describe two remarkable B2C e-commerce companies that are changing the transportation industry at this moment.
Car2Go
Founded in 2008 by Daimler AG, Car2Go represents an online platform for renting cars at users’ own convenience. Company’s founders were looking for an innovative way for allowing a quick and easy rent of cars for less money. Needless to say that they did a great job with achieving this goal. Business model of Car2Go is pretty straightforward: give people access to cars anywhere and at any time once registration is completed and charge them at the end of the journey (Car2Go 2015). Company offers value to its customers in terms of price and convenience of the renting process. That’s how it works: user makes an online reservation via App or Website and is directed towards the closest available car. He uses car as much time as he needs and leaves it at the point where his journey ends. In the end he gets charged based on duration of the journey (Osterwalder 2010).
Yandex Taxi
Russian analogue of popular online taxi ordering platform Uber, Yandex Taxi is steadily increasing its market share in Russia since its inception. Founded in 2011 by Lev Voloj, son of the founder of Yandex corporation, Arkadiy Voloj, Yandex Taxi represents an online platform for ordering taxies and is mostly active in three major Russian cities: Moscow, St. Petersburg and Yekaterinburg. Business model of Yandex Taxi is also pretty straightforward: allow users to quickly order a taxi for an affordable price and charge partnering taxi service companies a commission for each order. That’s the interesting part. Yandex Taxi works solely with taxi service companies. Private taxi drivers don’t have access to the platform, which is one of the main differences between Yandex Taxi and Uber.
The platform functions as follows: users select taxi type (economy, comfort, business) via App or Website, place an online order and get a taxi in 5-7 minutes. Yandex taxi then charges a fixed commission of 8% of the order amount from taxi-service company that provided the taxi (Forbes 2014).
Comparison of two companies
Despite the fact that both Car2Go and Yandex Taxi are backed up by powerful corporations, Daimler AG has a significant expertise in dealing with cars in general, while Yandex corporation, with its focus on IT and technology sectors, has never worked in taxi industry. Speaking of the nature of these companies, both of them operate on digital platforms and represent B2C e-commerce businesses. In regard to the roles of both companies in suppliers-buyers relationships, Car2Go offers customers its own services while Yandex Taxi matches costumers with taxi service providers. Speaking of the service price structure, Car2Go charges its customers a fixed rated per minute of their journey, while Yandex Taxi charges an initial fixed price for the first 10 minutes of the journey, and then a fixed rate per minute from minute 11 and onwards.
References:
Alexander Osterwalder, “Business Model Generation: A Handbook for Visionaries, Game Changers, and Challengers”, John Wiley & Sons, June 2010
https://www.car2go.com/en/austin/
http://m.forbes.ru/article.php?id=261825
https://www.car2go.com/en/austin/
Another implication of a community [Part 2]
Before reading this blog post, I would like to refer you to ‘Another implication of a community [Part 1]’.
How to set-up a community
A community is very much dependent on the top users of the community, also called; superusers. From my point of view, a superuser is a user in the community how is very active in creating valuable content for the community and shares his/her knowledge. More important, how do you attract these so called superusers and make them achieve your business goals? According to Malone et al. (2010) members of the community act because of money, love or glory. Money stands for a financial reward, love stand for social interaction and glory for reorganization.
If you have provided an environment which offers at least 1 of the above mentioned motivators, you can start attracting people to your community. In the case you’re a business, use your company website (e.g. frontpage, footer, etc.), and especially the service section of your website to promote your community. For example, on your contact page, place a big search field with the line: Search the community for your answer’’.
The Drivers for superusers
As said, superuser are very important and motivated by several factors. From my point of view, you don’t want to pay the community to achieve your business goals, you rather trigger them by implementing gamification in your community. According to Wu (Lithium.com, 2015) gamification is “the use of game mechanics and dynamics to drive game like engagement in a non-game context’’. In a community, gamification can be applied by implementing different ranks, badges, persons of the week, special access (e.g. VIP place), moderation functions, and so on, which al triggers the ‘’glory’’ motivational part. However, although gamification does a lot in motivating your community to help each other, a personal message or a ‘behind the scene’ session at your company probably makes them feel even more special.
There are a lot of different ways to set up the gamification part, and of course, for every business it is different. Some like Giffgaff decided to financially reward their superusers, which in their scenario is logical. However, at for example TomTom they don’t reward them financially, but rather motivate them with their gamification part or personal attention.
Other business gains
Since I don’t know very much about this, I just want to mention some other possible advantages. Firstly, higher search results in a search engine for your website as a whole (because of user generated content). Secondly, the possibility to use your community as an idea generation for your company. Thirdly, you can get all kinds of information from your target group such as geographical, age, gender, etc.. Finally, you have the possibility to ask your community (or superusers specifically) to give feedback on your new service or product.
My goal was to give you a general introduction in another implication of a community. If you’ve enjoyed it, and like to read some other interesting stories about communities in a customer service environment, I would recommend you to check out the links below.
PS. Let’s share thoughts, comments can be written below 😉
https://community.lithium.com/t5/Science-of-Social-blog/bg-p/scienceofsocial
Author: Ivar van der Lugt
S.I.D.: 418691il
References
Malone, T., Laubacher, R. and Dellarocas, C. (2010). The collective intelligence genome. MITSloen Management Review, 51(3), pp.20-31.
Wu, M. (2011). What is Gamification, Really?. [online] lithium.com. Available at: https://community.lithium.com/t5/Science-of-Social-blog/What-is-Gamification-Really/ba-p/30447 [Accessed 16 Sep. 2015].
Technology of the Week: B2C e-commerce (Facebook Buy Button vs Google Buy Button) Team 16
The Internet, as both a commercial and a communication channel, has created opportunities for multiple purchasing channels and interactions, developing into a huge worldwide marketplace for e-commerce. Social media providers and search engines have noticed customer needs for faster purchasing and in the past few years there has been a surge of new technologies to simplify the customer purchase funnel. In particular, this has been the launch of a ‘Buy Button’ that offers a direct purchasing mechanism on Facebook and Google, a one stop shop element. The Buy Buttons have the potential to revolutionize e-commerce and lower search costs and purchasing time for online consumers.
The Facebook Buy Button was officially introduced on September 16th 2015 in collaboration with Shopify (Kanwar, Shopify, 2015). Shopify is a platform owned by Facebook, where mostly small and medium sized retailers can offer their products (Kanwar, Shopify, 2015). The retailers who are registered on Shopify can decide to add Facebook Shop as a sales channel, and only those who register with Shopify are able to use the Facebook Buy Button function (Kanwar, Shopify, 2015). With this option consumers will receive several recommended product offerings on their News Feeds based on their customer profile, likes, and shares. Furthermore, Facebook offers users the option to subscribe to brands. When new products are added by those brands the user gets notified and will be able to click on the Buy Button, allowing them to buy the product directly (Kanwar, Shopify, 2015).
A similar option may be added to Google’s platform, however this technology is still in the beta phase. The new Google Purchase Buy Button will provide customers with the option to purchase goods directly from the search results on Google, based on the specific search words, no longer redirecting customers to the retailer’s website to place an order. During the testing phase, Google will only test the Buy Button on mobile devices (Reader, 2015), as m-commerce still has a huge growth potential for online shopping compared to shopping online on a PC (Robinson, 2015). Google wants to target these customers to also shop through their mobile devices.
Comparison
Both companies are a perfect example of newly entering the e-commerce market using their own strengths to their advantage, and offering a whole new shopping experience online for online shoppers. In essence, the technologies of both Facebook and Google are the same. However, these companies will use the technology in different ways, Google will recommend products based on a direct search call-to-action from the consumer, whereas Facebook will recommend products based on customer profiles, likes, and shares. Furthermore, Facebook users have different goals when entering the social media platform than Google users have when entering certain search words into the search engine.
In conclusion, both companies have collected a huge amount of customer data over the years, which they will use to personalize the online shopping experience, by showing users more relevant advertisements and suggestions. It remains to be seen, whether the Buy Buttons will be able to establish in and disrupt the e- commerce market.
Natalie Jonasova – 356767
Svenja Stein – 370033
Teresa Stacey – 441696
Matilde Zanoli – 437890
Milou Saraber – 366867
References:
Kanwar, S. (2015, 9 16). Shopify. Retrieved 9 17, 2015, from Shopify: https://www.shopify.co.uk/blog/52697733-shopify-introduces-the-shop-section-on-facebook-pages
Kanwar, S. (2015, 6 10). Shopify. Retrieved 9 9, 2015, from Shopify: https://www.shopify.com/blog/33764868-shopify-and-facebook-announce-expanded-beta-test-for-buy-call-to-action-button
Reader, R. (2015, 7 15). Venturebeat. Retrieved 9 17, 2015, from Venturebeat: http://venturebeat.com/2015/07/15/google-announces-a-new-buy-button-that-lets-you-easily-purchase-goods-directly-from-ads/
Robinson, J. (2015, 11 19). Practical E-Commerce. Retrieved 9 17, 2015, from Practical E-Commerce: http://www.practicalecommerce.com/articles/75772-Mobile-Commerce-vs-Desktop-7-Differences
A guide to Search Engine Optimization (SEO) for your website!
Search Engine Optimization (SEO) caught my attention when I spoke to the CEO of a small company in Rotterdam in 2014. He mentioned that his company won a lot of assignments from clients since he engaged in SEO. His small company was the first result on Google whenever clients searched for companies in his industry (for privacy reasons I leave the industry, company and his name anonymous).
SEO is another perfect example of how small and medium-sized companies are able to build a reputation and compete with larger organizations thanks to technology. The ultimately aim of SEO is to build an online brand reputation and influence online consumer behavior.
Why engage in SEO:
- It is cost-effective: unlike paid-advertisements on the search engine
- Customers increasingly search online for reviews
- Your competitors are doing it (Olenski 2015)
However, one must remember that SEO is a long-term strategy and not equal to a temporary marketing campaign
How it works:
Underneath Google, Bing and other search engines there are algorithms. These algorithms scan each website and translate the information into useful search results. The principle of SEO is understanding this algorithm and creating your website in such a way that it exactly accompanies these algorithms. The higher you are ranked, the more likely consumers or businesses will find you.
The basics:
- Make sure the words on your website equal common search key words
- Give each page a page title, that is clear and descriptive of the page
- If possible, construct your URLs as clear and descriptive as possible
- The more websites provide links to your websites, the higher you will be ranked.
However:
- The context in which they refer to your website matters!
- Do not try to create fake websites that refer to yours, as some algorithms will pick this up!
- The reputation (incl. cleanness) of your website is analyzed by the algorithm (Search Engine Land 2015)
- Make sure your website is easy to navigate (categories, folders)
- Search engines update their algorithms, for optimal SEO: analyze the changes in the algorithm and the impact it will have on your website. Then adjust your website accordingly. You have to stay on the move (Small Business Trends 2015).
Detailed guide:
Here is a detailed starter guide for all your website components written by Google (Google.com 2010): http://static.googleusercontent.com/media/www.google.com/nl//webmasters/docs/search-engine-optimization-starter-guide.pdf
How to track your SEO performance:
This is possible through e.g. Google Analytics (Valk 2014; Google.com 2015):
– For a demonstration see: https://yoast.com/tracking-seo-google-analytics/
– Google Analytics website: http://www.google.com/analytics/
Overview of the factors in the algorithms (Search Engine Land 2015):
Author: Dilara Okci
Student number: 366348ao
References:
Google.com, (2010). Search Engine Optimization Starter Guide. [online] Available at: http://static.googleusercontent.com/media/www.google.com/nl//webmasters/docs/search-engine-optimization-starter-guide.pdf [Accessed 21 Sep. 2015].
Google.com, (2015). Google Analytics – Mobile, Premium and Free Website Analytics – Google. [online] Available at: http://www.google.com/analytics/ [Accessed 21 Sep. 2015].
Olenski, S. (2015). 7 Reasons Why Your Business Should Invest In SEO. [online] Forbes. Available at: http://www.forbes.com/sites/steveolenski/2014/03/26/7-reasons-why-your-business-should-invest-in-seo/ [Accessed 21 Sep. 2015].
Search Engine Land, (2015). What Is SEO / Search Engine Optimization?. [online] Available at: http://searchengineland.com/guide/what-is-seo [Accessed 21 Sep. 2015].
Small Business Trends, (2015). One Year In, Is Your SEO Effort Paying Off?. [online] Available at: http://smallbiztrends.com/2015/06/analyzing-seo-performance.html [Accessed 21 Sep. 2015].
Thinkbig.marketing, (2015). SEO. [online] Available at: http://thinkbig.marketing/wp-content/uploads/2015/01/seo-company-tampa.jpg [Accessed 21 Sep. 2015]. SOURCE FEATURED IMAGE
Valk, T. (2014). How To: Tracking your SEO using Google Analytics • Yoast. [online] Yoast. Available at: https://yoast.com/tracking-seo-google-analytics/ [Accessed 21 Sep. 2015].
Duolingo: learning a language whenever, wherever, for free!
‘I wanted to create a way to learn languages for free’ – Luis von Ahn (CEO Duolingo)
Due to the Internet, people are becoming more and more self-educated. Do you want to learn how to play guitar? Or do you want to know how to repair your flat tyre? No problem, all information is available online through the use of search engines (e.g. Google, Bing). ‘With this technology, people are able to receive information and learn new things instantaneously; online learning has tremendous potential to empower all sections of society’ (Karadkar, 2015). While companies are already offering university courses online (e.g. Coursera), the popularity of learning a language online has increased as well.
Duolingo is one of the highest rated apps available when it comes to learning a foreign language (Ranosa, 2015). Duolingo offers a wide range of language-learning courses for people with different native languages and at the moment, they offer 10 fully developed languages (Danish, Dutch, French, German, Irish, Italian, Portuguese, Spanish, Swedish and Turkish)(Duffy, 2015). It is a great example of a straightforward language app and its use is very simple. Each course is made up of modules; these represent different groups of skills (see picture below).
Duolingo shows you the order in which you need to complete the different modules. New modules become active only after completing the previous one.
Each lesson consists of several activities, such as translating words and sentences and matching words to foreign equivalents.
New vocabulary is taught with images, and grammar is explained in speech bubbles. You also have to complete listening and speaking exercises, where you need to writedown or say what you hear. Due to the progress bar (ranging from 0-100%), you will be able to check your language improvement.
Another great feature is that Duolingo offers you the option to strengthen your weakest words. The following screen will pop up after completing a module.
According to Duolingo (2015), an average of 34 hours of Duolingo are equivalent to a full university semester of language education. Around 70 million people have already signed up to Duolingo and this number is increasing daily.
Currently, Duolingo is partnering with Uber to certify drivers in English (i.e. UberEnglish) and they recently raised $45 million from Google Capital. In the past few years, Duolingo has tremendously grown and with their current movements, Duolingo might pose a serious threat to traditional language learning providers.
As I am fond of learning foreign languages, I downloaded the Duolingo app a while ago in order to maintain my language skills. However, I am wondering what you think about this online language-learning platform? Do you already use it? Would you use it? Do you think these online platforms pose a threat to traditional language-learning providers? What about the benefits and constraints?
Sources:
http://www.technicianonline.com/opinion/article_7b7a5cc4-4f8f-11e5-a0e1-1b25bccc87b5.html
http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2402570,00.asp
http://www.fluentin3months.com/duolingo/
http://uk.businessinsider.com/duolingo-raises-45-million-from-google-capital-2015-6?r=US&IR=T
http://www.theguardian.com/education/2014/aug/27/luis-von-ahn-ceo-duolingo-interview
Technology of the week: E-commerce B2C (Airbnb vs Uber) Team 17
The internet has changed the way of doing business, everything is faster and more efficient. These online markets are called E-markets, where buyers and suppliers can exchange information, products or services.
Airbnb and Uber
Airbnb is a platform where people in search of a hotel or hostel can connect with people who offer a room or an apartment. Like the name suggest it is an online bed and breakfast/marketplace for hosts and travellers. The next market creator is Uber. This online platform connects people who need a ride with people who have time and a car available to give them a ride in exchange for money. Compared to traditional taxi companies Uber is cheaper and because of the reviews on the Uber-driver you can see what kind of driver you are dealing with.
Profitability
Although Airbnb is growing fast, the company is not yet profitable. The operating loss over 2015 is $150 million, due to its high spending to grow even faster. It is expected that Airbnb will become profitable in 2020 when their revenue is $10 billion, but in order for that to happen the market share needs to grow from 1% to 10% (Bizjournals.com, 2015).
Similarly to Airbnb, Uber is valued at $17 billion, with only about $ 300 million in revenue in 2014, and no profits. The reason Uber is also valued at such a high amount without profits, and a revenue much lower than other companies of similar value, is the rapidity of which their revenues and market share are increasing and the large scale disruption of the existing markets that the company caused.
Future prediction
Google CEO Eric Schmidt predicts that technology will change whole markets over the next decade, Uber and Airbnb are the frontrunners of this development, as software and technology focused companies having a wide scale effect on the existing industries (Venturebeat.com,2015)As more companies emerge that let people rent out their homes, we expect Airbnb and its competitors to take a larger stake of the hotel industry. As the amount of users will rise, so does the pressure for governments to work together with Airbnb to come to a solution to local legislative problems.The more these type of companies will be able to make the governments treat them purely as technology firms instead of taxi or hotels firms, the larger the opportunities for other companies to grow in the asset sharing, or platform only economy (theverge.com, 2015)
As technology advances and companies with similar services are also emerging, we expect the market to be disrupted even more by new concepts based on new technology. In the future, as technology advances and becomes cheaper, smaller assets may become part of the sharing economy as well.
Yorick van de Riet 357297yr
Maikel Ooms 341182mo
Mathijs Daalderop 360013md
Sjoerd Poppelaars 361339sp
Babet van der Giesen 363995bg
Bizjournals, (2015). [online] Available at: 16. http://www.bizjournals.com/sanfrancisco/morning_call/2015/06/airbnb-24-billion-valuation-revenue-forecast.html [Accessed 18 Sep. 2015].
Venturebeat, (2015). [online] Available at: http://venturebeat.com/2015/01/29/googles-eric-schmidt-has-a-10-year-prediction-of-how-tech-will-disrupt-whole-industries/ [Accessed 18 Sep. 2015].
Theverge, (2015). [online] Available at: 20. http://www.theverge.com/2015/7/27/9035731/future-of-uber-regulation-illegal-violations [Accessed 18 Sep. 2015].
Technology of the Week- NFC vs. BLE
One of the most important trends within B2C e-commerce is its offspring mobile commerce, also known as m-commerce. Only in the U.S. this market has grown with 19% during the last four years.
Within both B2C e-commerce and mobile commerce Near Field Communications (NFC) and Bluetooth low Energy technology (BLE) are trending technologies. Whereas NFC technologies are already in a more mature state, the BLE technology is still in its infancy.
What are NFC and BLE?
Both of them are wireless communication technologies currently installed in a lot of smartphones.
NFC
NFC smartphones communicate with wireless transmitters in very close proximity. They are usually a one on one experience, meaning that one transmitter (the NFC tag) communicates with one phone at a time. The transmitter can be a NFC tag positioned somewhere in a store or other place. Upon tapping your phone onto the tag, the tag recognizes you phone and interacts with it. Possible applications are as follows:
- Smart device automation and NFC tags:
- Transportation passes
- Event ticketing
- Access cards
- Smart homes
- Data sharing (retail marketing)
NFC is also being used as a technology for cardless payment but seems to be slowly replaced by the BLE technology. One of its greatest weakness is the increased power usage of smartphones.
BLE
BLE smartphones communicate via Low Energy Bluetooth in distances up to 100m. It is a one to many experiences, where the phone detects the beacon and triggers an app that then communicates with the user. The Beacon is the size of a matchbox and can also be placed in any position. Contrary to the NFC tag the two devices interacting do not have to touch, thus allowing the user to leave the smartphone in their bag and out of reach while still interacting. Following markets serve as an opportunity:
- Retail, B2C marketing:
- Indoor positioning system
- Contactless payment
- Advertising
- Smart homes
- Industrial applications
The greatest threat of the BLE technology in retail is the threat of “overbeaconing“ the customer. Research has found that 45% of users being beaconed once were interacting with the app. In the contrary, companies that beaconed their users twice during an experience (e.g. one shopping trip) saw a 313% drop in app usage.
An outlook into the future
Looking at Gartner’s Hype Cycle, it can be said that the NFC technology is expected to soon reach the plateau of productivity in Gartner’s hype cycle. This will mean within 1 to 4 years the technology will be widely implemented and well known amongst its users (Gartner, 2014). The Beacon technology as a sub-part of the Internet of Things is depicted at the peak of inflated expectations (Gartner). However we believe the technology is still exploring its possibilities and hence is still very much in its infancy (TechCrunch, 2015). Hence beacon technology is yet to reach the through of disillusionment before approaching the plateau of productivity. At this moment early adopters are implementing the Beacon technology. In the near future the focus will shift from the possibilities of the technology to the failures and flaws the technology possesses.
All in all we believe that both applications will establish a market and serve as a great opportunity to make e-commerce more efficient.
Team 14:
Jepma 367048bj, Lei 365616ml, Müller 371369dm, Penot 371082fp, van Rijn 355921ir
LeHong, Hung, and Alfonso Velosa. ‘Hype Cycle For The Internet Of Things, 2014’. Gartner.com. N.p., 2014. Web. 19 Sept. 2015.
Loiwal, Navneet. ‘The Potential Of Beacon Technology’. TechCrunch. N.p., 2015. Web. 19 Sept. 2015.
The Google Logo Change
Roughly 2 weeks ago the whole world was introduced to a new logo we are going to see a lot every day. The big and famous Google changed its logo to be more universal for all its brands. This logo change comes together with the structural change Google went through, making it an entity under its new parent; Alphabet. In this post I will show Google’s intentional meaning of the style, the practical use of it and provide you with the effect on the stock prices and shareholder sentiment.
The old logo, introduced in 1999, was famous for its sharp turns, hard edges and slightly medieval look. The ‘little tails’ on these letters, the so called serifs, are replaced by an entire new font called ‘Product Sans’. Google profiled the style as ‘simple, uncluttered, colourful and friendly’ and stated that the logo is the start of a new future for Google (which makes sense with the earlier mentioned structural change). Twitter exploded on the first of September, the day of the change, shouting that the logo was awfully childish or that the logo was perfectly balanced with the letters flowing into each other. A big plus for me is that Google kept its logo youthful and dynamic for such a big corporation but created a playful touch with the ‘Heineken-e’.
For me all these style statements do not say very much. In my eyes you like or dislike the new style, but bear in mind that everyone’s opinion will change over time. What is undeniably true is that the new style is much more practical than the old one. This is where Google is doing business. The old logo was designed for a desktop screen in 1999. Now, the logo has to appear on different sized screens (computer or TV), smartphones, watches and so on. The logo is much more scalable and adaptable than the old one, which makes it much more efficient to change it for any type of interface. Besides the size of a screen, Google also has to work with multiple different applications and add-ons like Gmail, Google Drive, Maps and Chrome. With the new logo, all different logos have the same style (maybe you remember the blue app for Google which was completely out of style).
When looking at stock prices and sentiment, I cannot conclude anything shocking. What you see in stock price is that traders were holding back awaiting the release on September first. After the release, prices are increasing including today. This shows that the logo has more positive than negative influence. The analyst sentiment is at the maximum and this has been so for the last 3 months.
All in all, I had to look at the logo a couple of times before liking it but I think it is a very clever move of Google. Since the company is digital, the physical changes of the logo in offices will not be that costly if you compare it with all the benefits.
Juliën Mets (357789jm)
Resources
http://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-34126251
http://www.marketwatch.com/investing/stock/goog
http://www.slate.com/blogs/browbeat/2015/09/01/new_google_logo_reviewed_by_a_web_designer.html
http://googleblog.blogspot.co.uk/2015/09/google-update.html
http://www.marketwatch.com/investing/stock/GOOG/analystestimates
http://www.theverge.com/2015/9/1/9239769/new-google-logo-announced
Technology of the week – Amazon Dash and HelloFresh
In our technology of the week project we took a look at two services that target the “modern day’s customer” who demands to get things done fast, with as little trouble as possible, in a convenient and as much as possible fun way.
When watching the commercials (below) of both HelloFresh and Amazon Dash it really stands out much they resonate with what bothers the customer. They build their messages on how they provide solutions to the pains of everyday busy people. Both services aim to make a task that is a regular and time consuming part of everyday life “easy” or “simple” (Their taglines are extremely similar: “Cooking made easy” and “Shopping made simple”)
HelloFresh, a three year old start-up, which currently operates in seven countries (the Netherlands being one of them) promises to give customer everything that they need for a delicious, healthy, home-made dinner except the chef. They create easy step-by-step receipt, select organic, seasonal ingredients from local providers, and send the exact amounts needed from those ingredients for a meal that can be ready in a maximum of 30 minutes. Apart from the convenience piece HelloFresh also builds on the very common desire of today’s customers to eat healthy and on the environmental friendly packaging and recycling trend. They use word of mouth in an extremely smart way by on one hand providing customers and their friends discounts if they start using the service based on recommendation and on the other hand encouraging the users to share their ready meals on social media. HelloFresh operates in a market where the bargaining power of the buyer is high and of the suppliers low, where – the threat of new entrants is high, given the low barriers to entry, and the lack of switching cost, and last, but not least, where the threat of substitutes is also high so the number of competitors is high and that is one of the reasons why they build a loyal community of customers. After certain amount of meals cooked with HelloFresh users get certificates, can attend breakfasts and dinners where they get to know the providers and share their opinion about the receipts and ingredients.
Amazon Dash is the newest innovation of Amazon, it is a wand with which customers can scan the barcode of anything that runs out in their household or simply just say the missing item “into” the device. These orders are automatically recorded in the user’s AmazonFresh account and once the customer clicks approve it is delivered within 24 hours. In very simple words the Dash ’s promise is that you will never run out of morning coffee or toilet paper ever again. When providing this service Amazon builds on it’s reliable brand, extremely streamline processes and more than 20 years experience in online shopping. On the long run Amazon’s goal with the Dash is to completely eliminate brick and mortar stores and moving shopping entirely online.
Despite being quite different at first look the Amazon Dash and HelloFresh target almost the same customer segment, and both the channels in which they reach their users (delivery and online platforms), their key activities (finding and managing suppliers, storing perishable goods, delivering) key resources (drivers, carriers, packaging, IT systems) and basic cost structure are comparable. Even in their value proposition they both aim to create a convenient experience and save time for their customers, their main difference lies in what exact problem they want to solve for their customer: making it possible to cook home healthy food without the hassles around cooking or never running out of the basic groceries and never forgetting anything during shopping again.
Both have a strong market presence but while HelloFresh has many similar competitors, the Dash has no direct competitor currently. Amazon Dash and HelloFresh work with a business to customer model currently and have the potential to expand to the business to business sector. Although the discussed business models are both innovative, have the potential to decrease or almost eliminate the importance of brick and mortar stores and change the relation we have to shopping, the Amazon Dash has potential to do even more than that and disrupt whole sectors in the future.
Authors: Group 15
Ekaterina Marinova – 436554
Anargyros Michaletos – 436750
László Nedeczky – 416837
Lina Nota – 440733
Gabriella Pimpão – 437021
Information Strategy 
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