Bryan O’Rourke shares his thoughts on technology, business, and consumer trends in health, fitness and more.
Digital content creation is becoming mainstream : both quality and quantity. Thus the barriers to entry around IP digital biz models are falling. If you are a new biz that is good news. If your an old biz, better get ready for the revolution.
Democratization of publishing continues with MagCloud, HP's new cloud solution to publishing magazines. It costs you nothing to publish a magazine on MagCloud. To buy a magazine costs 20¢ per page, plus shipping. For example, a 20-page magazine would be four bucks plus shipping. And you can make money! You set your issue price and all proceeds above the base price go to you. Remember "Freedom of the press is guaranteed only to those who own one." Watch the CMO of HP, Michael Mendenhall, explain the business model below. See an example of a successful fashion magazine using the tool as mentioned in the NYT here.
Saletan's recent post on Slate explores the convergence of the digital and physical world, referencing a 2007 NYT article which said...
"New technology, already in use in parts of Asia but still in development in the United States, allows [cell] phones to connect everyday objects with the Internet. In their new incarnation, cellphones become a sort of digital remote control, as one CBS executive put it. With a wave, the phone can read encoded information on everyday objects and translate that into videos, pictures or text files on its screen. ...In Japan, McDonald's customers can already point their cellphones at the wrapping on their hamburgers and get nutrition information on their screens. Users there can also point their phones at magazine ads to receive insurance quotes, and boardairplanes using their phones rather than paper tickets. And film promoters can send their movie trailers from billboards."
See My Click CEO talk about an example of this new technology.
The open system revolution is emerging with more and more content management systems delivering highly functional tools that deploy educational content rather easily. Moodle is one of these. Customizable, intuitive, and open; the system is used by 9 million participants in 200 countries with support for 80 languages. Design learning outcomes, test your participants, include a variety of content and compatibility is rarely an issue. Best of all you don't have to have an IT department to deploy your educational content around the globe. Welcome to the clouds - the view is awesome from here !
Moodle Presentation from Alja Sulčič on Vimeo.
Recent times are revealing inefficient economic models everywhere. This is not reflective of a temporary drop in demand but a more fundamental shift touching every consumer and industry. For example, during the past decade, which saw tremendous economic activity, the retail distribution of entertainment content was overcome by new models, and the culling is not yet over with. Now comes further reorganization in the retail sector. All major retail chains are unsustainable and demonstrating their ineffiencies - most will not survive with hundreds of thousands set to close this year alone. In the U.S. nearly 19 square feet of retail exists for every man women and child: the number should be half of that. New economic models are sweeping over each and every industry. Hear more from Howard Davidowitz on the state of U.S. retail today.
Copyright © 2021, Bryan K. O'Rourke. All rights reserved.
