Here’s number 11 in my series of predictions for 2005:
11. Mobile Video
Unlike mobile TV, I think short clips of video sent to your phone could be a big and exciting market. For instance, sports highlights, comedy, even trailers of new films.
Chances are though that these will be pretty costly in both data download costs and content costs, so maybe that’ll slow take-off.
We also have the launch of Premium Rate Video, which should logically go gang-busters. With the caveat the content providers mustn’t get too greedy.
One of the prevalent myths of the mobile sector is that unlike the online world people are “happy” to pay for content. Well, no one is happy to be ripped off (buyer perception is all) and it’s one of the factors holding back MMS, for instance.
So if this is to take off, operators must price for volume and look at promotions to encourage trial. The market for $5 downloads (plus data charges) for a couple of minutes of video is going to be small. The market for $2 will be much bigger and for $0.99 – hey, that’s when we’ll have a business. With the further caveat that the clip is prime quality.
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