Flixster is a terrible thing. It’s a movie-oriented “social network” where fellow losers can rate and talk shit about shitty movies, which, by the way, are terribly expensive to produce. Over the course of a few months, I wrote capsule reviews on my Flixster profile and used their rating system to praise and/or bash a TON of otherwise unrelated movies. Then I thought, why trap these gems (ahem) within Flixster’s website? It’s my content, after all. So, I am re-posting all the stuff I ever wrote on Flixster here, on my own blog where it belongs. I’m doing this for two reasons:

• A.) This is too easy
• B.) Flixster.com asks you and me to CROWDSOURCE THEIR CONTENT OFFERING FOR THEM with-no-payoff-whatsoever (“WNPOW”) so they can pander to unsuspecting movie buffs as the “defacto” destination for the “pulse” of film-goers’ trending characteritsics (whatever the fuck that means), thus fooling me–a dude who ALREADY LOVES TRASHING SHITTY MOVIES–with complacent thoughts that my opinion matters, under the guise of (say it with me now) “Social Media” [which should by now be considered the lamest, most bullshitty term, second to "social media guru"]! Are you kidding me?! Look, I may be a loser, but I’m no full-time idiot, so let’s all tell Flixster’s smarmy biz-plan to go fuck itself. Ciao!
• C.) My capsule reviews are funny. See “A”, above.

So I am not simply a cynical jabberwocky (again!), please feel free to comment your solution to THE MOVIE PROBLEM on this blog directly. For starters, I believe that cinematic reform can be achieved thusly: Step 1: lynch actors and their agents. (except my frineds in SAG)

And something else the Irving Thalbergs and I can agree on: what you think about The Movies says something about YOU.

So, and here goes, motion picture enthusiasts, a scattering of movie comments, in no order or structured relationship to each other whatsoever (Read these, and be prepared to say “I don’t get it.” A LOT):

Pieces of April – PG-13 meh. Scientology beard-mom can act, but the plot and supposedly quirky people and experiences in the flick were not so outrageous as the filmmakers seem to think they were.

Knocked Up – R Well, I’m gonna go ahead and say it: I’d tear that ass up, too.

Juno – PG-13 Used to play hockey with Jason Reitman. Went up to him and said “hi” at a party and he snubbed me. What a silver spoon asshole. Oh, the movie? Yeah, Juno was good and the Ellen chick made me laugh. Some good lines, too. Tatted-up Hooker can WRITE, yo.

Nick and Norah’s Infinite Playlist – PG-13 Pleasantly surprised at its charm. You’d think we’d run out of gas on the Aw-Shucks-Uber-Dork Michael Cera, but he’s engaging. Best part is Ari Graynor–pretty fearless in the part of the intoxicated best friend.

Cloverfield – PG-13 Interested, but not swayed by the headless Stat. o’ Lib. (Not even the one at Paramount, 3 blocks from my home, was impressive.) Remember blowing up the Whitehouse in Independence Day? Oh, one other thing I’ll bet they never thought of: these creeps have based an entire movie’s premise on the belief that folks in NYC have easy access to affordable mobile phone and camcorder batteries (apoligies to Bangladeshi shop owners)…

Look Who’s Talking – PG-13 Perhaps the “Two Thumbs Up” blessing by Siskel and Ebert (opportunistically touted on the DVD’s box cover) actually refers to the fact that Siskel and Ebert had their thumbs up EACHOTHERS’ ass. Pass.

The Family Stone – PG-13 I want to give this one NEGATIVE stars, because it’s ALWAYS FRIGGIN’ ON my dozen HBO channels.

Monty Python’s The Meaning of Life – R Laugh at John Cleese and look at boobs. Sounds like a nice afternoon.

Scooby-Doo 2 – Monsters Unleashed – PG This sequel-to-the-remake-of-a-cartoon [SCRMC] is not quite as good as the original remake-of-a-cartoon.

Willow – PG Midget alert. Random Val Kilmer role alert, too.

Cliffhanger – R Lithgow’s P.G. Wodehouse-like villain squeezes one more star out of my rating with the line: “You want to kill me, Walker? Take a number and stand in line.”

The Darjeeling Limited – R Wes’ best. By far. The kinetic quirkiness of his almost Marx Brothers-like lead trio is suddenly arrested by the most touching and striking sober sequence Anderson could have ever pulled off. I’ll see it again and again.

Crocodile Dundee – PG-13 Hey, what can I say? I was entertained.

While You Were Sleeping – PG Oh please! Sandra Bullock tries ONCE AGAIN to fool us into thinking that she’s NOT a lesbian…just kidding. Seriously, I was surprisingly charmed, even though I expected little from this one. See? I can be nice every now and then. You dikes.

Office Space – R A classic, especially for those of us who work in technology. Stephen root’s physical characterization is as good as any by DeNiro, Hoffman, or Olivier. I’m serious.

Contact – PG Very involving storyline with fine, intelligent acting by Foster. However, the concept of the McCarthy-like government figure smothering science for “national security reasons” (and we’re talking pre-9/11 Bushiness) is a tired and obvious plot element, made even more annoying with Woods’ cartoonish portrayal.

Monty Python’s Life of Brian – R Some decent gags, but not as freshly silly as Holy Grail. Oh, and Ladies….you get to see Graham Chapman’s late dong!

The Hitcher – R Any time you find yourself saying “the C. Thomas Howell one was waaaay better”, you know the remake is in trouble.

Bram Stoker’s Dracula – R Francis Ford Stinker’s Suckula.

Tomorrow Never Dies – PG-13 Jesus, the Bond flicks were such snoozers with Pierce Brosnan. All hail Daniel Craig!

The Incredible Mr. Limpet – G Not many people know this, but the working title was “Mr. Furley Swims In His Own Poop.” They revised it before wide release.

Barb Wire – R Come on.

Down Periscope – PG-13 Really? Kelsey Grammer got to be the LEAD in a movie?! Jesus.

Dr. Strangelove Or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb – PG I’m stuck. I want to say that Scorsese or Elia Kazan are my favorite directors, but it’s Kubrick’s great, diverse body of work (including gems like Strangelove) that perhaps gives him the dark horse lead. And the prize? I’ll write kind shit about him on Flixster when I should actually be getting some work done.

The Lady Eve – Unrated Again, Preston Sturges: exceedingly smart and witty. Barbara Stanwyck is both sexy and sufficiently silly in this great movie. Henry Fonda is hilarious as the “aw shucks” target of her con.

My Left Foot – R But i would have liked it better if Daniel Day Lewis didn’t mumble and wobble so much….What? Oh.

Stick It – PG-13 “a rebellious 17 year-old who is forced to return to the regimented world of gymnastics after a run-in with the law. ” That’s a bad enough opening statement of the Flixster writeup to make me not want to read the REST of the writeup…or, subsequently, see the movie.

Homeward Bound – The Incredible Journey – G This movie credits Michael J. Fox, Sally Field and Don Ameche as being in it. Must have been a hell of a time getting them fitted in those animal suits.

Adam Sandler’s Eight Crazy Nights – PG-13 Hey! I thought I marked this one NOT INTERESTED two weeks ago!

World Trade Center – PG-13 Dunno…part of me says it’s utterly inappropriate to let ANYONE (especially Hollywood) profit from 9/11. Then again, United 93 was handled fairly respectfully. So I’m torn. I’ll leave it as a precarious Want To See It for now…

A Night at the Roxbury – PG-13 Since this thing came out and has since become available on cable and dvd, I’ve availed myself of the many opportunities to skip it. Now, however, after finally succumbing to the giggly delight that is watching Will Ferrell, I may someday …(gulp)… decide to watch it. (I’ll let you know how it works out.)

What Women Want – PG-13 Alan Alda’s presence notwithstanding, I will GLEEFULLY mark this one “Not Interested.”

I Know What You Did Last Summer – R But if only I could find out WHO you did….

The Crow: City of Angels – R I worked on the Crow CD-Rom while they were making this movie (ahem, well, I wrote, designed, and produced it–and can out-distant spit anyone else involved with the flick), and got to see how much interesting research and thinking went into trying to create something special with a kind of Crow mythology. And then they cast Mia Kirshner, Vincent Perez, Richard Brooks and Iggy Pop. And then they left all the interesting research out. The final cut was so unbelievably bad that Brandon Lee came back as the Crow himself and got revenge on everyone involved in making the film. Except me. Thank God.

High Fidelity – R Normally a Cusack-respecter, but the character they wrote for him was utterly unsympathetic. And the fact that he approached it with so much gusto makes me wonder about my said respecting of Cusack.

Evil Dead 2 – R I hate horror films (even deliberately campy ones), but this one succeeded in amusing. Bruce Campbell looked like he was going to take off for a while there, but his career kinda sputtered. Dunno what happened–he was great in this movie.

Blazing Saddles – R Saw it again after having NOT seen it for several years. Not as funny as when I was younger, but you have to give it props for the jokes the first time around (when I was 12). Harvey Korman’s hysterical.

The Producers – PG So they just made a movie of the stage play that was based on the movie. This is the original version, with Gene Wilder (always curiously hilarious) and the late GREAT Zero Mostel.

The Great Dictator – G A masterpiece of both Chaplin’s signature physical comedy and his sensitive commitment to making his art stand for something bigger than himself.

The Verdict – R Unbelievably great. In my humble opinion, this is Newman’s best work, and James Mason is fantastic. Add a Mamet script and Lumet direction, and this is one of my top 10. Easily.

Gattaca – PG-13 Per Flixster’s writeup: “In the near future, where corporations screen their employees based on their genetic makeup…” Tell me about it, and it ain’t so “futuristic” as it seems. Why, if I didn’t fake being a four foot tall druid with a growth on my neck, MySpace would have NEVER hired me.

Bambi – G Hey. The Flixter review just ruined it by saying Bambi’s mother dies. Oh well. May as well ruin the rest of it: they take Old Yeller out back and shoot him. July 2, 2007

Anger Management – PG-13 This movie is anything BUT therapy! Get it? Bwahahahahahahahahahahaha!…..ahem….can I have a cookie now?

Rat Race – PG-13 It’s got Breckin Meyer, Whoopie Goldberg, and Cuba Gooding, and the intent is to make it FUNNIER than the somewhat amusing Mad Mad Mad World. I don’t think it’s gonna happen, and to PROVE it, I’ll simply refuse to see it. Or believe that it was even made in the first place.

Home Alone 3 – PG Is it possible to give a movie a rating of .5 stars AND “not interested.”? Maybe in Flixter 2.0.

Imagine Me & You – R Surprisingly, Piper Peraboo (whatever her name is…) is actually pretty good in this movie.

Never Been Kissed – PG-13 Never been kissed? What do you expect (if you have the charisma of a spatula, as dumb Drew Barrymore does.)

Pride and Prejudice (the Kiera Knightly one) – PG One of those movies that is so well acted and well-paced that, if I come across it while flipping premium channels, I stop and watch it.

Elizabethtown – PG-13 I got bored in this movie quicker than Orlando Bloom did.

The Sea Hawk – Unrated Errol Flynn directed by Michael Curtiz. Perfect 40’s escapism.

The Life and Death of Peter Sellers – Unrated Ho-hum biopic. (But I won’t hold it against the always great Geoffrey Rush.)

The Longest Yard – PG-13 How can they think that they’re going to improve the original with a less charistmatic lead than Burt Reynolds?! Kinda arrogant, huh?

It’s All Gone Pete Tong – R Wait? World class DJs spinning records for a bunch of naked ravers in Ibiza every night until 6am get involved with drugs? You don’t say! (Bonus trash talk: why did they have to take the fake documentary approach? Such a tired and unnecessary device. If it’s a fake documentary and Christopher Guest is not involved, it most likely sucks.)

The Cherry Orchard – Unrated Take my favorite author (Chekhov) and my favorite play (Cherry Orchard) and one of my favorite actresses (Rampling) and ruin the whole thing by missing Chekhov’s humor. Such a shame.

Orca – The Killer Whale – PG Some interesting action, but let’s face it: this is a cheap attempt to ride the success of Jaws.

Moby Dick – Unrated Though I much prefer this Movie to the Melville novel, I much prefer the Cliffs Notes to Melville’s novel more than the Cliffs Notes to the movie. Weird, huh?

Always – PG Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz……

Cleopatra – Unrated here are crowd scenes in this “epic” where you can actually see extras wearing wrist watches and sneakers. No foolin’.

Inspector Gadget – PG Inspect her gadget?! I barely KNOW her.

Bringing Down The House – PG-13 Steve Martin is one of the world’s great comedic talents. So much so that the mere poster alone showing him cringing from Queen Latifa is enough comedy for now. Therefore, I’ll skip any part of this movie that is not integrally related to the poster.

The Messengers – PG-13 Here’s the deal. I hate horror films (gratuitous waste of time and frequently unpleasant to sit thorugh). However, for some reason, I like ghost films (mainly because I like dispelling the illusion that ghosts even exist in the first place). Having said that, this one looks like it could go wither way. It could be either a Children of The Corny (bad) or Field of Wet Dreams (good). (Puns for all….)

Crash – NC-17 “NC-17″ is supposed to mean no one under 17 admitted, but for this fetishist piece of shit they should invent a new rating: NC-NO ONE SHOULD BE ADMITTED AT ALL.

The Pianist – R Another overlooked, charming holiday classic. (OK, now let’s hide and watch as people actually rent this movie based on my recommendation here. Hee hee.)

The Parent Trap – PG One of the actresses playing one of the twins was clean. The other one was already on coke. Sadly, they were both played by Lindsay Lohan.

Chitty Chitty Bang Bang – G The child-catcher character gave me the willies. (Incidentally, I think his name may actually have been “Willy”.)

Grizzly Man – R One of the most painfully pathetic characters in movie history, the title character is not a “character” at all, but a real person. See this movie, and you’ll know what I mean. It will make your stomach churn at the capacity for a real person to exhibit total hubris. (see also: Bush, George W.)

Team America – World Police – R When I saw the puppet start to vomit in the alley, I thought to myself “please let it vomit an impossibly large quantity of liquid, and let it go on stupidly for at least 90 seconds.” And I was rewarded. I love the pure indulgence in sophomoric euphoria. Did I forget to mention the puppet hot karl?

On the Waterfront – Unrated They just don’t seem to make too many like this one any more. And in the 50’s, you got about 30 of these gems. Oh yeah, Elia Kazan was still directing back then.

Three Colors: Blue (Trois couleurs: Bleu) – R Hmmm…boring histrionic Euros. And we get THREE of these movies. (get it? it’s the 3 colors of the French flag! in art, we call this a gimmick)

How the Grinch Stole Christmas – PG I prefer the sequel: How The Grinch Talked Christmas Into Losing Its Retirement Nest Egg, starring Ben Stein in the title role. (OK, reaching?)

Scooby-Doo – PG Jesus, that dog was perfectly cast. What? Oh.

The Goonies – PG An odd assortment of anti-social kids find a treasure map and then get caught up with gangsters. Remind me again why this movie was made?

Monty Python and the Holy Grail – PG Although at this point, it’s a lot more fun to quote the movie than it is to actually watch the movie. On second thought, let’s stop quoting the movie, too.

Scarface – R There are many reasons to hate this movie. But I like it because it strictly adheres to the structure of a classical tragedy (a la Macbeth), and for that, I applaud it.

Glengarry Glen Ross – R Hard to pick a best performance among all the great ones in this movie (even Baldwin’s scene), but I’m giving it to Jack Lemmon. And not just for lifetime achievement. The way his face changes on the phone is as good as any actor who has had to chew through one of those otherwise tired devices: the “monologue” into the phone.

Crimes and Misdemeanors – PG-13 My comments have really sucked today, so i’ll just come out and say it: masterful.

Life Is Beautiful (La Vita è bella) – PG-13 Believe the Jump-On-Spielberg-At-The-Oscars hype: this movie is wonderful. (Warning: reading involved, stoners)

Hannah and Her Sisters – PG-13 This is a perfect movie. Script, acting, cinematography on a small budget, and (unusual for a Woody Allen flick) EVERYONE ends up happy.

Rent-A-Cop – R Burt Reynolds and Liza Minelli? I had almost as much fun marking this one “Not Interested” as I did marking Quigley Down Under Not Interested.

Quiz Show – PG-13 or those of you who enjoy well-executed, compelling polemics, go see this movie. For everyone else, go look up “polemic” in a dictionary.

This Is Spinal Tap – R I really enjoyed laughing at the funny words and sequences from this movie, too. But please stop walking up to me and repeating–in a real poor accent–your favorite lines. I know it “goes to 11,” stoner.

Amelie (Le Fabuleux destin d’Amélie Poulain) – R Loved this movie so much that I chose the setting of one of the scenes as the place I proposed to my wife (now don’t tell that ho that i got the idea from a movie…)

The Bad News Bears – PG MATTHAU!

An American in Paris – Unrated 2.5 without Gershwin’s score. Buy the orchestral suite, conducted by Bernstein: you’ll be glad you did.

My Architect – Unrated So damn self-indulgent. Boo-hoo, the filmmaker didn’t ever get to know his father. Grow up.

The Man Who Fell to Earth – R You think Bowie’s scary in this movie? Just wait ’til he starts casting spells n’ shit in Labyrinth!

All That Jazz – R Scheider, Scheider, Scheider! One of my preferred white dorks who can somehow carry a movie.

Short Cuts – R Wow. That’s a lot of movie. Some of it’s a bit seen-it-before. The Tom Waits-Lily Tomlin trailer trash relationship, for example. The best part: Julianne Moore’s 30′ tall vagina. (though must be seen in an actual theatre to fully appreciate the effect)

Jaws – PG Why 5 stars? Because it’s got great storytelling, great archetypical (yet lively) characters, engrossing suspense, a trio of awesome actors (though reyfuss is certainly annoying), and who can forget that score? (Now, if only they could have made a 3-D remake…what?)

The Shop Around the Corner – Unrated Pass You’ve Got Mail and go directly to this movie.

Dog Day Afternoon – R Another unheralded performance by John Cazale. Damn, he died too young.

Kill Bill, Volume 2 – R Revising my rating. Saw it again last night. The last scene is torturously long — I need LESS Carradine in my life, not more.

The Quick and the Dead – R I saw this in the theatre in 1995 with 4 other friends, who were all film students at the time, and I was the only one who liked it. And none of us had girlfriends at the time, either. What the fuck did I DO with my 90’s?!…

Porky’s – R Don’t you hate it when a 1.5-Star movie serves as the model for a whole series of shitty .5-star copycats?

Family Business – R What a watse of three great talents in this limp caper. (I’m talking of course about Key Rigging Technician James Malone, Extras Casting Director Joy Todd, and, not to be overlooked, assistant to Mr. Hoffman Bonnie Kurt.)

The Boys from Brazil – R All you have to do is say “Gregory Peck” and I think “Nazi.” But seriously, the Hitler-youth kid is appropriately creepy, and this is a good thriller.

Lost In Translation – R Here’s an observation (that’s only interesting to me, probably). In Rushmore, Murray plays this deadpan Quixote who’s life is essentially over (read: Basil Fawlty). But in Lost In Translation, he plays essentially the same character, but with an arc towards pulling himself out of it. It’s interesting, because it occurs to me that an actor can do something with his career and make sort of an arc out it–as if he’s playing one character through a series of otherwise unrelated movies. Hm? You couldn’t give a rat’s ass, Flixter? OK. I’ll shut up now…

She’s the Man – PG-13 So this makes one more lousy production of Twelfth Night I’ve seen.

Without A Paddle – PG-13 Without a refund for HBO the month I saw it.

Winged Migration (Le Peuple Migrateur) – G Engaging and exquisite. Warning: it’s also brutal, in some segments.

That’s Entertainment – G Si. Mucho fun-o.

An Evening with Kevin Smith – Unrated But I decidedly ABHOR Kevin Smith movies!

Long Way Round – Unrated Now, normally I disdain self-congratulatory celebrities who are privileged to undertake an adventure like this simply by virtue of their status as celebrities. HOWEVER, it is not an illusion that Ewan McGregor and Charlie Boorman gets themselves in some truly dangerous situations and are truly affected and grateful for the opportunity to ride sponsored motorcycles around the world. What we get is an objective, informative, and exciting travel-encyclopedia entry of every location they pass through, for better or worse. We’re invited into the home of a Khazak organized crime lord who makes Borat look like a fake character played by an English jewish guy with a fake moustache. We see the sad street waifs of Ulan Bator–forgotten orphans of one of the world’s most remote metropolises. Russian truckers who suddenly double as bear trappers. And some of the best scenery ever filmed for reality TV.

The Whole Nine Yards – R Yay! Fun. (And Amanda Peet’s boobies! Huzzah!)

You Can Count On Me – R Mark Ruffalo is brilliant as the self-destructive anti-hero who allows his wallowing in pain to overflow and endanger his long-suffering sister and nephew. Lonergan’s pace is sweet torture, that you can’t pull your eyes away from.

The Mighty Ducks – PG *sigh*…Really?…then they go on to make an NHL team….then they go on to win the Stanley Cup before my beloved LA Kings. I blame Michael Eisner.

Casper – PG I was haunted by this one on an airplane. eek!

Dude, Where’s My Car? – PG-13 Stupid, but I survived seeing it.

Pretty in Pink – PG-13 The fight between James Spader and Jon “Duckie” Cryer is a real donnybrook.

Antz – PG What a waste of Woody Allen’s talents. (Come to think of it, 80% of Woody Allen’s own movies since 1986 have been wastes of Woody Allen’s talent…)

The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe – PG Churchie nonsense, for sure, but nice special effects.

Heat – R I like the scene where the one guy with the big gun shoots the other guy, but then he can still run away and shoot these other people. And then another guy shoots a guy behind a cop car, and these other guys shoot someone else. And then one of the characters played by an actor who’s currently in prison shoots someone else. And then….Aw, fuck it. This is awesome cops n’ robbers shootout fun.

Sexy Beast – R Everyone raves about how menacing Ben Kingsley is (and deservedly so). But how scary is Ian McShane?! Holy shit.

Monsoon Wedding – R Bollywood Chekhov. I love it!

The Jungle Book – PG You had me at “Sebastian Cabot AND Louis Prima”

The Garbage Pail Kids Movie – PG But you could also give it 3.5 stars for shittiness-enjoyment factor. (Also fun note: Flixter currently has Schindler’s List as a “More Like This.”)

The Bishop’s Wife – Unrated Very charming, sometimes forgotten Holiday classic.

The Da Vinci Code – PG-13 Hated the book. Got the gist of the Brown’s revisionist historical agenda from any number of History Channel documentaries.

Cape Fear – Unrated I’m going out on a limb, but this is one of the rare instances where you can say the remake is better than the original. (Of course, it helps to have Scorsese in your corner.)

Kindergarten Cop – PG-13 Dunno why, but i still like saying “it’s not a tumor” in my German accent.

A.I. Artificial Intelligence – PG-13 We had to get as much mileage as we could from Haley Joel while he was still a creepy little quasi-butterball kid. Robot is an apt character study, in this regard. (Now that he’s hit puberty, however, what the hell are we gonna do with him?)

Fired! – Unrated Haven’t seen it yet, and I’m real skeptical about this movie, based on the writeup. First, she’s an actress, and (as a qualified failed actor myself) I can say that being fired as an actor is not like being fired from another profession. Second, the people she interviews (some of whom I’ve worked for) are also actors/writers/entertainers, so they, too, may have a relationship with labor that is too verticalized in the entertainment industry. Essentially, I’m concerned that this “documentary” is not really all-encompassing about labor, but yet another piece of entertainment about entertainers. I mean, I already had to sit through friggin’ Chorus Line, for chrissake…

Weekend at Bernie’s II – PG Adroitly defines the word “shitty.”

Glory – R I’m bummed: James Horner’s wonderful score wasn’t even nominated.

Watership Down – PG Shouldn’t be in the Kids’ section. This movie is as dark as a novel about violent, pissed-off bunnies can possibly be.

You Kill Me – R Brilliant, subtle comedic performance by Kingsley! This movie is wisely funny without being too dark, and without being overly sentimental. Awesome.

Closer - R Clive Owen: brilliant. Natalie Portman: disastrously miscast. Equals = 2 out of 5 stars June 22, 2007

Gandhi - PG Great epic biopic. (Although check this out: Flixter’s current suggestion for “More Like This”: UHF. No joke.)

Gallipoli - PG May be the best anti-war pic I’ve seen.

Shakespeare in Love – R Do not forget that Tom Stoppard is still the world’s best living playwright!

The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy – PG Nowhere NEAR as good as the UK mini-series on PBS in the 80’s. Oh well, at least it’s got Bill Nighy in it.

Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest – PG-13 Pretty decent continuation of the terrific first movie. And it’s got Bill Nighy in it.

Pirates of the Caribbean: At Worlds End – PG-13 Too long and too hard to figure out wtf was going on. Oh well, at least it has Bill Nighy in it.

Lethal Weapon – R Gotta say it: nice mullet.

Road Trip – R Yes, it was the Chad.

Die Hard – R Alan Rickman is correct: he is a very good thief, in this very fun movie.

Demolition Man – R 3 sea shells, now all restaurants are Taco Bell, and a young Sandra Bullock in tight stretch pants…someone finally made a movie just for me!

Open Water – R Just TRY watching this on the plane while flying to a tropical paradise for vacation. I did, and wished I hadn’t (because it’s so effectively scary). Very realistic, and compelling, despite the low-budget digital video cinematography.

Twister - PG-13 Bush: “These, uh, the hurrincanes are out to get us, and, uh, they hate freedom. But we’re gonna get ‘em–we’re gonna smoke ‘em out.” Seriously?–Ron Howard wants us to anthropomorphize the tornado as The Tornado: the invading Nazi Panzer division sweeping murderously down upon a poor, unsuspecting community that it is! Metaphors for everyone!

Van Helsing – PG-13 Wow, this makes four ultra-shitty Kate Beckinsale movies – Underworld 1 & 2, Pearl Harbor, and this stinker. Isn’t there some flick where we get to see her naked, just to make up for it?

At the Earth’s Core – PG Doug McClure and Peter Cushing. Now there’s a B-movie pairing.

UHF - PG Guilty pleasure, including pre-Seinfeld, pre-Bigot weirdness from Michael Richards.

Class - R This movie Rob-lowes. Get it?

Support Your Local Sheriff – G James Garner has a great blend of urbane slyness and earthy carousal. A fine, subtle comic performance.

The Muse – PG-13 Sharon Stone at her most utterly charmless. Not enough to prop up Albert Brooks’ down-in-the-dumps character.

Sullivan’s Travels – Unrated Pretty much give ANY Preston Sturges movie 4-stars.

Tapeheads – R Obscure, and unexpectedly satisfying. Go figure.

Grease 2 – PG Move over Kevin Bacon: it’s time to start playing 6-Degrees-Of-Christopher-MacDonald.

The Girl Next Door – R Is Elisha still screwing hockey player Dion Phaneuf? (this comment has nothing to do with the movie—but i was just curious…)

You’ve Got Mail - PG Do yourself a favor: skip this and go back to the original, The Shop Around The Corner, with James Stewart.

Underworld: Evolution – R There’s a wonderful scene where Scott Speedman (still love that name) chokes on foul-looking meat and potatoes in a Rumanian tavern. Now that’s entertainment. (OK, that’s an unfair slam, as I happened to watch this gem while on a choppy 3+ hour ferry ride in Thailand.) Oh, and one other thing: there’s an action sequence where they’re trying to escape from a vampire by stealing a truck. They look in the rear-view mirror to find the vampire in hot pursuit. The only problem with this: VAMPIRES DON’T HAVE REFLECTIONS. It’s one of the prime tenets of frickin’ vampire movies. Oh well, at least it had Bill Nighy in it.

A League of Their Own – PG PLEASE don’t dictate to me what you think I’m SUPPOSED to be sentimental about. I can figure it out for myself, thank you.

Underworld - R Oh well, at least it had Bill Nighy in it.

Pearl Harbor – PG-13 Ref: one of many singing puppets in Team America World Police. That marionette speaketh the truth.

Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves – PG-13 This is the Kevin Kostner p.o.s. I was referring to in my Robin Hood: Men In Tights comment.

Armageddon - PG-13 Don’t let the 1/2 star fool you when i rate a movie. This movie is so egregiously implausible and insultingly infantile, that it’s so fun, I’m actually tempted to give it 4.5 stars. For example, when Buschemi’s character goes nuts, someone utters the miraculous quote: “Oh no–he’s got SPACE DEMENTIA.” Wha?

Soylent Green – PG “Soylent Green is…government surplus cheese!”

The Ten Commandments – G Umm…golly. (Best part: Edward G. Robinson: “Now see here, Moses…”)

Earthquake - PG Rad. Cheeseball soap opera meets Irwin Allen type disaster (wait, was Allen actually involved with this one?). So, when I was a kid I went to see this in the theatre, and they had a new sensationalized technology called “Sensaround”, which actually MADE THE DAMN SEATS IN THE THEATRE SHAKE! I kid you not. For all of this, I bestow: 2.5 stars.

25th Hour – R Wow: Spike didn’t piss me off too much in this movie. And, the Terence Blanchard score is one of the best ever (so I bought it on ITunes).

Primal Fear – R Above average thriller, with three of my favorite actroids: Andre Braugher, Ed Norton, and Laura Linney.

Finding Neverland – PG Everyone already knows that Depp is a great talent, but can we talk about how versatile and always-flawless Kate Winslett is? She’s overlooked WAY too often. This movie was unexpectedly moving for me, and I’d recommend it to Dick Cheney (that fuckin’ asshole).

Robin Hood – Men in Tights – PG-13 At least it’s better than that Kevin Kostner p.o.s.

Ever After – A Cinderella Story – PG-13 Barrymore provides one of the worst fake accents of all time.

Bad Santa – R Not what I want for Christmas, but a guilty pleasure, nonetheless. The Graduate – PG Even Norman Fell is fine in this movie (and he only gets a total of 90 seconds’ screen time).

The Mummy Returns – PG-13 I admit it–it’s a fun series.

Jurassic Park III – PG-13 Wait, they made a Jurassic Park TWO?! There are moments where the film is disturbing and moving. I’d give it 5 stars were it not for the fact that Moore HAS to stop undermining his own credibility by pulling off stunts and pranks. The subject matter’s too important.

Broken Flowers – R Started off excellent (Jeffrey Wright is one of the best character actors in the game), but the momentum and interest fell off the table after Lolita put her clothes back on…

Swingers - R …but if i have to hear any Big Bad Voodoo Daddy song ever again, i’ll shit in their trombone.

Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas – R Gilliam is great, but not with this annoying and vastly uninteresting recreation of a vastly interesting person.

Traffic - R Overrated. Del Toro kicked ass, though. Jim Carrey was grossly snubbed in this movie (just as he was in Eternal Sunshine, Truman Show, etc.). Not even a nomination?!

Dogma - R Kevin Smith adds his usual inability to direct otherwise fine actors (or act, himself, for that matter) to a supposedly revisionist thinking of religion and ends up with a sanctimonious and dynamically bankrupt movie-going experience. Fuck him!

Captain Ron – PG-13 Shitty, but awesome. And quotable. For example: “Incentives are important, boss. Learned that in rehab.”

Tu 1/5 – W 1/6, Th 1/7 – Su 1/10
CONSUMER ELECTRONICS SHOW
110,000 expected, 2500 exhibitors, 800 speakers, 250 conference sessions incl Digital Hollywood, Connections, and Digital Media Wire, it’s the largest digital media event of the year!
Las Vegas Convention Center, Hilton, Venetian, spanning the Las Vegas Strip
www.cesweb.org

Tu 1/5
12-4, V Titian 2202, LVCC S229 – press room open
1:30, V Murano 3301-3 – ASUS press event
2-3, V Bellini 2105 – CEA US Trends
3-4, V Bellini 2105 – CEA Global Trends
4-7, V Ballroom – CES Unveiled: Best Buy, Hannspree, Lenovo, Powermat…
7-10, Sands Expo shuttle – StartUp Debut – VCs, press, eats, drinks,startupdebut@gmail.com

W 1/6
7:30-9, V Titian 2202, LVCC S229 -press room open
8-8:45, V Casanova 501 – LG press event
9-9:45, V Marco Polo 706 – Monster press event, V Sands 201 Netgear press event
10-10:45, V Casanova 504 – Toshiba press event
11-11:45, V Sands 206 Pioneer press event
12-12:45, V Sands 102 – Sharp press event
1-1:45, V Bellini 2105 – Casio press event
2-2:45, V Marco Polo 801 – Samsung press event
3-3:45, V Marco Polo 705 – JVC press event
3-3:45, V Bellini 2101 – Panasonic press event
*****
8-10:30, LVCC N262 P2P Breakfast, N260 Paramount, BitTorrent, N262 Snacks
11:30-12:30, LVCC N261 NVP Saatchi,N253 SpikeTV BBDO MTV,N258 A&E, TwitVid
12:30, LVCC N262 Lunch
1-2, LVCC N253 Lego, IMVU, Gaia, WW Biggies, N258 IODA, Napster
1:30-2:15, LVCC N260 Melike Amjarv, WB, BMI, SAG
2:30-3:30, LVCC N258 Discovery, Paramount, N253 ngmoco, N261 NBCU, MTV
3:30-4:15, LVCC N256 Qualcomm, Ericsson
4-5, LVCC N253 Viximo WB,N258 Fandango, Flixster, Freeverse,N261 TiVo
5-7:30, LVCC N262 P2P Cocktails
4:15-5:30, LVCC Central Hall 14200 – Sony press event
6:30-7:30, Hilton Center – Keynote – Steve Ballmer, Microsoft

Th 1/7
8-5, LVCC S229, V Titian 2202 -press room open
8:30, Hilton Theater – Keynote, Alan Mulally, Ford
10-6, Exhibit Hours
10-12, Hilton Shimmer Cabaret – Jen-Hsung Huang, NVIDIA press event
10-11, LVCC S227 DISH press event, S224 4G Verizon, Samsung, Clearwire
10-12, LVCC N250* Autonet, Pandora
10:30, LVCC N264* CEA Outlook, , N255* Kodak, Scoble
10:30-11:30, LVCC N256 AVOD, TiVo, Panasonic, N259 DISH, Merv Griffin, Starz
11-12, LVCC N253* ABC, LeapFrog, Vtech, Build-A-Bear, Lunch
11:20-12:10, LVCC N260* 3D – WB, Disney, CinemaNOW, Dolby
12-1, LVCC N254 Autonet, N259 Hearst, Rovi, N262* WaPo, N256 Roku, Z, Intel
12-1, LVCC S224 EA, RIM, ATT, TI, Sony
12:20-1:10+, LVCC N260* 3D RealD, LG, Panasonic, Sony, N253* MyYearbook
1:30-2:15+, LVCC N250* CBS counting viewers, N262* CBS, Pampelmoose
1:30-2:30, LVCC N259 Lionsgate, YouTube, FB, Fox, Disc, N261 Fremantle
2-3, LVCC N253* Cartoon Network, PBS, Nokia
2:30-3:20, LVCC N260* Y!, NBCU, Vizio, WB, DIVX
3-4, LVCC N259 Interactive – Sony, Sharp, Y!, N256 LG, Samsung, Sharp, Panasonic
3-4, LVCC S224 Netbooks – Lenovo, Laptop Mag, Intel, Microsoft, AMD
3-5, LVCC N253* Toy Demos, KAPi Awards – Sesame Workshop
3:45-4:30, LVCC N250 Monetizing Content – Tubefilter, FOD, NBCU, CJP
4:30-5:30, LVCC N250* CESup Search – TiVo, CBS, CTAM
4:30-5:30, Hilton Theater – Keynote, Paul Otelini, Intel
5-6, LVCC S227 – Sanyo press event
6-7, LVCC N237* CESup Reception
7-9, LVCC MGM shuttle* Tour of CBS Television City
6-10, Wynn Lafite Ballroom – Showstoppers (invite only)
6:30, Mandalay Bay – Tech & Engineering Emmy’s, events@emmyonline.tv

F 1/8
TBD AllThingsD short program
8-5, LVCC S229, V Titian 2202 -press room open
8:30-9, LVCC N250* Ben Silverman, Electus
9-10:15, LVCC N250*Illeana Douglas, Thomas Schlamme,ShoeMoney,NBCU
9-11, LVCC N262* MommyTech-GMA, Tina Sharkey, BabyCenter, N260 HBO
9, Hilton Theater, Keynote – Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo, Nokia
9-6, Exhibit Hours
10:30-11:30, LVCC N250* Scripps, NBCU, N253* EnergyTech
11, Hilton Theater, Keynote – Dr Paul E Jacobs, Qualcomm
11:30-12:30, LVCC N250* Ken Howard, SAG, Sony, LG, Nielsen
12-1, LVCC N262* Lunch – MySpace, N255* FCC Chair, N261 Bravo, N259 FLO TV
12-1, LVCC S225 Powermat, S224 Handango, ATT, Intel, Samsung
1-2, LVCC N262* Mommy Memorykeepers – Eye-Fi, N255* CinemaNow
1:30-2:30+, LVCC N262*OnStar,Fox,N261 Z, Arts&Labs,N259 Metacafe,Redbox,JWT
1:30-2:30, LVCC S224 Untethering TV – Qualcomm, Broadcom, Sony
3-4, LVCC S224 ION, FLO TV, MobiTV, NatGeo, LG, S225 Samsung
3-4, LVCC N260 GPS Garmin, TomTom, N261 Lionsgate, MSNBC, N259 Blip.tv
3:30-4:15-5, LVCC N262* Marketing to Digital Moms/Gala Product Showcase – Kodak
4, Hilton Theater – Keynote – Zhou Houjian, Hisense
4:30, LVCC South Hall EHX CE PRO reception
6-7, LVCC North Hall – Kenwood press event
*****
3, V Casanova 501 – Shuttle press event, wearenotalienbware.com
3-7:30, V Ballrooms 3001-3101, Digital Media Insider
3:15, CES scoop – CEA, Parks, Intepret, Wired.com, Ogilvy 360
4, Distribution – Oxygen, MyDamnChannel, CMSG, redbox, withoutabox
5, Monetization – NVP, Vindica, IBM
5:45, Keynote
6:15 – 7:30, Awards for 25 Executives to Watch in Digital Entertainment

• David Anderman, General Counsel, Lucasfilm
• Rob Barnett, Founder & CEO, My Damn Channel
• Rio Caraeff, President & CEO, VEVO
• Kevin Conroy, President, Univision Interactive Media
• Allen DeBevoise, Chairman & CEO, Machinima Inc.
• Denzyl Feigelson, CEO, AWAL (Artists Without a Label)
• Ashley Fenwick-Naditch, Producer, Sesame Workshop
• Kristin Frank, General Manager, MTV.com and VH1.com
• Ed Leonard, CTO, DreamWorks
• Zahavah Levine, Chief Counsel, YouTube
• Mitch Lowe, CEO, redbox
• Robb McDaniels, Founder, President & CEO, INgrooves
• Tero Ojanpera, EVP, Services, Nokia
• Jean-Briac Perrette, President, Content Distribution Strategy, NBCU
• Mark Pincus, CEO & Founder, Zynga
• John Pleasants, CEO, Playdom
• Nanea Reeves, SVP, EA Online Group
• Rohit Bhargava, SVP, Digital Strategy & Marketing, Ogilvy 360
  (Author, Personality Not Included)
• Avner Ronen, CEO, Boxee
• Richard Rosenblatt, Co-Founder, Chairman & CEO, Demand Media
• Sheryl Sandberg, Chief Operating Officer, Facebook
• David Straus, Co-Founder & CEO, Withoutabox (IMDB/Amazon)
• Robert Tercek, President, Digital Media, OWN
• Phil Wiser, Co-Founder, Chairman & President, Sezmi
• Philip Yun, CEO, NHN USA

Sa 1/9
8-5, LVCC S229, V Titian 2202 -press room open
9-6, Exhibit Hours
10:30-11:30, LVCC S224 Revision3, N261 Big Fuel, N255* Last Gadget Standing
11, LVCC South Hall Lobby 3 CNET Stage – Best of CES
12-1, LVCC N260 Napster
1:30-2:30, LVCC N258 Warren Packard, DFJ, Kuk Yi, Best Buy, S224 Sprint, Comcast
2:15-5:30, LVCC N253* Silvers Summit Gadgets – Fox
3-4, LVCC N260 Netbooks – Harris Interactive

Su 1/10
8-3, LVCC S229, V Titian 2202 -press room open
9-4, Exhibit Hours

*FREE
**Shuttles:  http://cesweb.org/docs/2010_CES_Shuttle_Map_for_CESweb.pdf
***Maps: www.cesweb.org/exhibits/facilities/default.asp,  http://www.cesweb.org/docs/2010_CES_Show_Locations_Map.pdf
*** Parties:  http://www.thomas-pr.com/01/ces2010.html

This is it!  The last week of conferences for the year and what a way to go out. Digital Living Room will be celebrating connected devices at Sun Microsystems, Santa Clara tomorrow and on Wednesday HRTS is lunching with the showrunners of Modern Family, Glee, Mad Men, How I Met Your Mother and Rescue Me at the Hyatt Regency Century Plaza. Try catching the stream if you can’t make it live.  Below are the guides to these events as well as CES which is now just around the corner:

Tu 12/15
DIGITAL LIVING ROOM
PSN, Sezmi, Epix, Y!, ZillionTV, Vimeo, ClipSync, Dolby, Panasonic..
Sun Microsystems, 4030 George Sellon Circle, Santa Clara 95054
12/14 Tech Supper Club-SF, Blumberg Capital, 580 Howard
12/15 Tech Supper Club-Santa Clara
12/16 Tech Supper Club-Santa Monica, Playground Media, 1813 Centinela
www.digitallivingroom.com

8:45  Welcoming Remarks

9:00  Competitive Landscape
An examination of how cable, satellite and telco providers are faring in the pitched battle for consumers.
- Ben Bajarin, Director of Consumer Technology, Creative Strategies
- Colin Dixon, Senior Analyst, The Diffusion Group

10:00  Keynote
- Susan Panico, Senior Director, PlayStation Network

10:30  3D’s Televised Future
3D television sets will be on display at this year’s CES, and models without glasses may be just a few years away. Jeffrey Katzenberg, for one, has said that 3D TV is inevitable.
- Joshua Greer, President and Co-Founder, RealD
- John Rubey, President, AEG Live
- Patrick Griffis, Senior Director, Technology Policy, Dolby Laboratories Inc.
- David Broberg, Vice President of Consumer Video Technology, CableLabs

11:30  Social TV
The connected living room makes seamless the interaction consumers are already having about their favorite programming over the Internet and on mobile devices. How long until Facebook Television?
- Blake Whitman, Community Director, Vimeo
- Itzik Cohen, founder and CEO, ClipSync
- Emil Rensing, Chief Digital Officer, EpixHD
- Bill Binenstock, Vice President and Manager, CBS.com
- Moderator: Michael Stroud, Founder, iHollywood Forum

12:30  Lunch

1:30- 2  Keynote
- William O. Leszinske, Jr., GM, Digital Home Group, Intel

2  Cloud in the Living Room
The ability to access any content, any time is fundamentally changing the dynamics of television watching and the economics of broadcasting and cable. As DVRs and subscription VOD become standard, are ad-supported television networks at a fundamental disadvantage? Can cable and satellite companies keep their iron group on the consumer’s wallet when a la carte offerings are available over the Internet?
- Pat Dunbar, Director, Advertising TV, Video & Music Business Group, Microsoft Corporation
- Mitch Berman, Co-Founder & Executive Chairman, ZillionTV
- Mitch Weinraub, Executive Director – Business Development, Comcast Media Center
- Rob Schonfeld, VP, Pay Television and Interactive Media, Disney ABC Domestic Television
- Buno Pati, Co-Founder and CEO, Sezmi
- Moderator: Jimmy Schaeffler, Chairman & CSO, The Carmel Group

3  The Music Powered Living Room
Description: The music business has gone from wondering where the next paycheck is to how many ways can the same song be monetized. The new album is the Rock Star music pack and the new single is a mashup. This panel will explore how interactive music technology – from video games to mashups – are creating new revenue opportunities for the music, video game, video entertainment and marketing industries.
- Gilles Babinet, Chairman, MXP4
- Jason Henderson, Games Product Manager, Verizon Communications
- Jordan Greenhall, Co-Founder and former CEO, DivX
- Carmen Rizzo, two-time Grammy Nominee and electronic musician
- Moderator: Ephraim Cohen, President, Fortex Group

4  The Connected Living Room
The long-heralded integration between TVs, the broadband Internet, DVD players, game consoles, telephony, portable devices and wireless data is beginning to happen. What type of content will pull in consumers and what are the roadblocks to mass adoption?
- Russ Schafer, Senior Director of Product Marketing, Yahoo! Connected TV
- Alan Hoff, Vice President of Product Marketing, SeaChange International
- David Bryant, Senior Director of Java Marketing, Sun Microsystems
- Tushar Saxena, Director of Home Networking Technologies, Verizon Communications
- Moderator: Amy Friedlander Hoffman, President, Priority Digital Media

5  Venture Forum
Startups pitch products for the digital living room to a panel of venture capitalists and strategic investors
- Len Rand, Managing Director, Granite Ventures
- Brad McManus, Director of Investments, Panasonic
- David J. Blumberg, Managing Partner, Blumberg Capital

6  Reception

*****************************************************************
W 12/16  12-2
HRTS HITMAKERS LUNCHEON
Hyatt Regency Century Plaza, 2025 Avenue of the Stars, Los Angeles
www.hrts.org
(1pm Live-stream: HRTS Online Video Central)

• Peter Tolan, Rescue Me
• Matthew Weiner, Mad Men
• Steven Levitan, Modern Family
• Ryan Murphy, Glee, Nip/Tuck
• Carter Bays, How I Met Your Mother
• Craig Thomas, How I Met Your Mother
  

*******************************************************************
Th 12/17 6-9
SGN MOBCLIX MIXER
Silicon Valley
(invite only)

******************************************************
Tu 1/5 – W 1/6, Th 1/7 – Su 1/10
CONSUMER ELECTRONICS SHOW
110,000 expected, 2500 exhibitors, 800 speakers, 250 conference sessions incl Digital Hollywood, Connections, and Digital Media Wire, it’s the largest digital media event of the year!
Las Vegas Convention Center, Hilton, Venetian..
www.cesweb.org

Tu 1/5
12-4, V Titian 2202, LVCC S229 – press room open
1:30, V Murano 3301-3 – ASUS press event
2-3, V Bellini 2105 – CEA US Trends
3-4, V Bellini 2105 – CEA Global Trends
4-7, V Ballroom – CES Unveiled: Best Buy, Hannspree, Lenovo, Powermat…
7-10, Sands Expo shuttle – StartUp Debut – VCs, press, eats, drinks, startupdebut@gmail.com

W 1/6
7:30-9, V Titian 2202, LVCC S229 -press room open
8-8:45, V Casanova 501 – LG press event
9-9:45, V Marco Polo 706 – Monster press event, V Sands 201 Netgear press event
10-10:45, V Casanova 504 – Toshiba press event
11-11:45, V Sands 206 Pioneer press event
12-12:45, V Sands 102 – Sharp press event
1-1:45, V Bellini 2105 – Casio press event
2-2:45, V Marco Polo 801 – Samsung press event
3-3:45, V Marco Polo 705 – JVC press event
3-3:45, V Bellini 2101 – Panasonic press event
*****
8-10:30, LVCC N262 P2P Breakfast, N260 Paramount, BitTorrent, N262 Snacks
11:30-12:30, LVCC N261 NVP Saatchi,N253 SpikeTV BBDO MTV,N258 A&E, TwitVid
12:30, LVCC N262 Lunch
1-2, LVCC N253 Lego, IMVU, Gaia, WW Biggies, N258 IODA, Napster
1:30-2:15, LVCC N260 Melike Amjarv, WB, BMI, SAG
2:30-3:30, LVCC N258 Discovery, Paramount, N253 ngmoco, N261 NBCU, MTV
3:30-4:15, LVCC N256 Qualcomm, Ericsson
4-5, LVCC N253 Viximo WB,N258 Fandango, Flixster, Freeverse,N261 TiVo
5-7:30, LVCC N262 P2P Cocktails
4:15-5:30, LVCC Central Hall 14200 – Sony press event
6:30-7:30, Hilton Center – Keynote – Steve Ballmer, Microsoft

Th 1/7
8-5, LVCC S229, V Titian 2202 -press room open
8:30, Hilton Theater – Keynote, Alan Mulally, Ford
10-6, Exhibit Hours
10-12, Hilton Shimmer Cabaret – Jen-Hsung Huang, NVIDIA press event
10-11, LVCC S227 DISH press event, S224 4G Verizon, Samsung, Clearwire
10-12, LVCC N250* Autonet, Pandora
10:30, LVCC N264* CEA Outlook, , N255* Kodak, Scoble
10:30-11:30, LVCC N256 AVOD, TiVo, Panasonic, N259 DISH, Merv Griffin, Starz
11-12, LVCC N253* ABC, LeapFrog, Vtech, Build-A-Bear, Lunch
11:20-12:10, LVCC N260* 3D – WB, Disney, CinemaNOW, Dolby
12-1, LVCC N254 Autonet, N259 Hearst, Rovi, N262* WaPo, N256 Roku, Z, Intel
12-1, LVCC S224 EA, RIM, ATT, TI, Sony
12:20-1:10+, LVCC N260* 3D RealD, LG, Panasonic, Sony, N253* MyYearbook
1:30-2:15+, LVCC N250* CBS counting viewers, N262* CBS, Pampelmoose
1:30-2:30, LVCC N259 Lionsgate, YouTube, FB, Fox, Disc, N261 Fremantle
2-3, LVCC N253* Cartoon Network, PBS, Nokia
2:30-3:20, LVCC N260* Y!, NBCU, Vizio, WB, DIVX
3-4, LVCC N259 Interactive – Sony, Sharp, Y!, N256 LG, Samsung, Sharp, Panasonic
3-4, LVCC S224 Netbooks – Lenovo, Laptop Mag, Intel, Microsoft, AMD
3-5, LVCC N253* Toy Demos, KAPi Awards – Sesame Workshop
3:45-4:30, LVCC N250 Monetizing Content – Tubefilter, FOD, NBCU, CJP
4:30-5:30, LVCC N250* CESup Search – TiVo, CBS, CTAM
4:30-5:30, Hilton Theater – Keynote, Paul Otelini, Intel
5-6, LVCC S227 – Sanyo press event
6-7, LVCC N237* CESup Reception
7-9, LVCC MGM shuttle* Tour of CBS Television City
6-10, Wynn Lafite Ballroom – Showstoppers (invite only)
6:30, Mandalay Bay – Tech & Engineering Emmy’s, events@emmyonline.tv

F 1/8
TBD AllThingsD short program
8-5, LVCC S229, V Titian 2202 -press room open
8:30-9, LVCC N250* Ben Silverman, Electus
9-10:15, LVCC N250*Illeana Douglas, Thomas Schlamme,ShoeMoney,NBCU
9-11, LVCC N262* MommyTech-GMA, Tina Sharkey, BabyCenter, N260 HBO
9, Hilton Theater, Keynote – Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo, Nokia
9-6, Exhibit Hours
10:30-11:30, LVCC N250* Scripps, NBCU, N253* EnergyTech
11, Hilton Theater, Keynote – Dr Paul E Jacobs, Qualcomm
11:30-12:30, LVCC N250* Ken Howard, SAG, Sony, LG, Nielsen
12-1, LVCC N262* Lunch – MySpace, N255* FCC Chair, N261 Bravo, N259 FLO TV
12-1, LVCC S225 Powermat, S224 Handango, ATT, Intel, Samsung
1-2, LVCC N262* Mommy Memorykeepers – Eye-Fi, N255* CinemaNOW
1:30-2:30+, LVCC N262*OnStar,Fox,N261 Z, Arts&Labs,N259 Metacafe,Redbox,JWT
1:30-2:30, LVCC S224 Untethering TV – Qualcomm, Broadcom, Sony
3-4, LVCC S224 ION, FLO TV, MobiTV, NatGeo, LG, S225 Samsung
3-4, LVCC N260 GPS Garmin, TomTom, N261 Lionsgate, MSNBC, N259 Blip.tv
3:30-4:15-5, LVCC N262* Marketing to Digital Moms/Gala Product Showcase – Kodak
4, Hilton Theater – Keynote – Zhou Houjian, Hisense
4:30, LVCC South Hall EHX CE PRO reception
6-7, LVCC North Hall – Kenwood press event
*****
2:30-7:30, V Ballrooms 3001-3101 – Digital Media Insider sessions/awards party
3, V Casanova 501 – Shuttle press event, wearenotalienbware.com
5:30-8:30, Atomic Museum, It Won’t Stay in Vegas party
TBD Paris Hotel, Monster 2010 Dealer Awards – John Legends Concert (invite)

Sa 1/9
8-5, LVCC S229, V Titian 2202 -press room open
9-6, Exhibit Hours
10:30-11:30, LVCC S224 Revision3, N261 Big Fuel, N255* Last Gadget Standing
11, LVCC South Hall Lobby 3 CNET Stage – Best of CES
12-1, LVCC N260 Napster
1:30-2:30, LVCC N258 Warren Packard, DFJ, Kuk Yi, Best Buy, S224 Sprint, Comcast
2:15-5:30, LVCC N253* Silvers Summit Gadgets – Fox
3-4, LVCC N260 Netbooks – Harris Interactive

Su 1/10
8-3, LVCC S229, V Titian 2202 -press room open
9-4, Exhibit Hours

*FREE
**Shuttles:  http://cesweb.org/docs/2010_CES_Shuttle_Map_for_CESweb.pdf
***Maps: www.cesweb.org/exhibits/facilities/default.asp,  http://www.cesweb.org/docs/2010_CES_Show_Locations_Map.pdf
*** Parties:  http://www.thomas-pr.com/01/ces2010.html

In the day today life, we professional use lots of Social Media Networks for our amusements such as connecting friends, Share your knowledge/Thoughts and so on. This article is the place where you can choose your favorite social media network. I had assessed most of the social media networks used by the peoples in the below. Kindly choose your favorite  Social Media Networks and share your thoughts in comments. So that it would be very helpful for the folks who don’t aware of your favorite social media network features.

Ứng dụng Flixster Movies cập nhật thông tin mới nhất về phim đang chiếu, phim sắp ra mắt… với đầy đủ thông tin, và có thể xem trailer trực tuyến (yêu cầu kết nối mạng)

Bạn cũng có thể đánh giá, viết bình luận, kết nối với bạn bè qua Facebook để ‘tám’ về những bộ phim bạn yêu thích

Trang web chủ: http://www.flixster.com/

Xem trailer trực tuyến trên điện thoại (The Twilight Saga: New Moon)

Nếu bạn là người yêu thích xem phim, bạn không nên bỏ qua ứng dụng này

Quét để cài đặt

Of all the movie apps I have come across, I have grown the fondest of Flixster. When you start the app, it automatically informs you of the theaters near you. If you click on the theater, it gives you several options by giving you show times, the phone number of the theater and even restaurants nearby! My favorite features of flixster show up once you click on the movie you are interested in. The options it gives you includes adding your own ratings for the movie, getting showtimes, viewing related photos and even watching the trailer!!

I know the YouTube app on the iPhone provides the same trailers; however, having all the relevant information in one place is what makes flixster so awesome! It allows you to plan your whole day without having to go on any other resource. It fascinates me that it even gives you a list of restaurants that are close to the movie hall. I logged into my app right now and I couldn’t help clicking on the “2012″ trailer. This trailer really shows off the quality of the trailer because of the graphics involved and I am very impressed with the quality! It is almost as good as watching movies you buy for your iPod.

Whenever I have used this app though, I have the unrealistic desire to watch almost every movie playing in the hall. Even though this app is supposed to help me choose a movie, it makes it confusing at times because it provides you with the resources to check out every movie’s trailers and decide for yourself. It is very difficult to log out of the app too because I always get tempted to watch more trailers!  

Other features on the Flixster app are lists of upcoming movies and upcoming dvd releases. There is also a feature for you to make lists of the movies you want to see, the movies you have rated and the ones your friends have rated. You can also sync this with your Facebook, Flixster or Netflix accounts. This is particularly helpful if you are like me and always have a long long list of movies to watch!

Moreover, guess what, it’s FREE. So even if you like watching movies once in a while or even just watch movies at home, flixster is a great iPhone app to have. It is wonderfully functional and provides you with all the resources you need to make a decision.

Check out Flixster online to get a feel of what the app may be like at  http://www.flixster.com/

Does anyone have an app they prefer to use? Let me know because I will love to check it out!

Till next time!

Today I got up & watched The Bodyguard on Oxygen. Then I watched a little bit of Disclosure (it was made the same year I was born lol. Nothing much is going on right now just checking Facebook & Flixster and looking at pictures from the Bodyguard . Going out to sell in a little stuff for Athena in a little bit. Homework later too. So gotta go, so peace out!

~beautifulballerina15 aka Cassie

GigaOm’s Mobilize is live streaming right now (19,000 viewers), so if you can’t be there, tune in at http://www.livestream.com/gigaomtv.  If you can be there, drop by the Mission Bay Conference Center in San Francisco where close to 1000 industry execs are discussing the future of the mobile web. Great networking with Accenture, Adobe, Adaptive Path, AllThingsD.com, Ars Technica, Benchmark Capital, Business Week, CBS Market Watch, Cisco, CNET, Economist, Engadget, Finanical Times, Flixster, Forbes, Foundation Capital, French Maid TV, frog design, GameFly, GDGT.com, Geek Sugar, GetJar, Gizmodo, Google, Granite Ventures, Handango, HP, InfoWorld, Intel, InterWest Partners, Khosla Ventures,LG Mobile, Lightspeed Venture Partners, Mashable, Mayfield Fund, mig33, Mobile Monday, MEF, MobiTV, Moconews, MocoSpace, Motorola, Mozes, NATPE, NYT, Nielsen, Nokia, Opus Capital, Palm, PayPal, PC World, Qualcomm, Samsung, SF Chronicle, SJ Merc, Scobleizer, Sony Ericsson, SVB Capital, Sprint, Sun, TechCrunch, Thom Weisel, T-Mobile, USVP, Ubergizmo,  USA Today, Venrock, Venture Beat, Verizon, WSJ, WF, Wired, Y!, Zannel, ZDNet and others.

Om Malik opened the conference.  His research venture, GigaOM Pro, which provides subscribers research on-demand, reports that the US is on track to produce by end of 2009:  280mm wireless subscribers, $160B in service revenues, $45B of that in data revenues, 2.3T minutes of voice use and 1.7T text messages, translating to $160 per subscriber of data plan spending per year and 829 minutes per user.  A huge opportunity.

MONETIZING MOBILE APPS

Raven Zachary, Small Society
Considering Apple’s event yesterday it seemed fitting to have Raven lead with the first panel who advises companies like ZipCar and Whole Foods on their mobile strategies, and is known well to these parts as one of the pied pipers of iPhoneDevCamp – Seeing more carriers wanting to have their own app store, look at Verizon with VDC, it makes sense, they have the billing relationship with the end user.  Vodafone ramping up too.

Mark Curtis, Flirtomatic
There’s been a dramatic rise in popularity of the freemium model, free monetize with ad network although CPCs and CPMs have come way down in this economy, belive in time mobile ad marketplace will be massive.  See freemium as a walk in the park, every now and then you’ll want an ice cream, it’s nice to have the option.  At Flirtomatic, have had great success selling users greater visibility on site, they’re willing to pay if there profile will be seen by more women, experiencing 4x the CPMs from user-based ads.

Mark Jacobstein, iSkoot
There used to be enormous expenses associated with porting/QA of mobile games.  Focusing just on iPhone makes things easier, and yet for all it does so well (powerful SDK, screen real estate) there is so much that iPhone doesn’t do.  iPhone can’t multitask, apps don’t run in the background.  Few client based apps like time-wasting games.  Not going to make much selling a $2 app, money is in client/server services, free to end user like Skype (big applause from panel). MMS limitations, photos via SMS from a friend are sent with password and link – that’s a huge turnoff.  Mobile increases web engagement, those that access sites via phone are twice as engaged.  Developers now building in social context/gifting of virtual goods into game mechanics to take advantage of in-app commerce.

Dorrian Porter, Mozes
Most marketers not sure what to do with the mobile consumer, have yet to see mobile as a point of inspiration for impulse buy.  Most market with voice and SMS.  (Recently became a huge fan of SMS, now can text kids whenever he wants.) Mozes focuses on the browser-based experience.  There are SMS limitations to web-clipping

Adam Zbar, Zannel
ATT networks are slammed with data.  Will see services becoming more interoperable than islands.  Carriers for the longest time wanted to be entertainment companies and content creators, now some like Comcast are starting to see themselves more as a distribution platform – good for the developer community.

LOCATION:  CONTEXT IS MONEY
4000 LBS apps today, a small % but impressive considering 18 months ago there were only 5 LBS apps in the world.

KEYNOTE:  Innovation on Android – Introducing MotoBlur
Dr. Sanjay Jha, Co-CEO, Motorola
Number of mobile users doubled between 2008-9 from 10.8mm to 22mm devices accessing daily.  20% access web via mobile device.  Going from 1:1 SMS to 1:Many Social collaboration.  Ubiquitous availability of wireless broadband.  Rapid expansion.  Mobilizing the internet is the single biggest opportunity today.  Netbooks, eBooks, gaming devices, smartphones.  Smartphones being the backbone where mobilization will occur. Broadband definition – minimum 500kb data connectivity to mulitple users without regard of location.  What makes a smartphone – larger high-res display, anytime anywhere broadband connectivity, over the air updates (key), rich media, voice quality, coverage, multi-thread, multitasking operating system.  Android gives us a platform to mobilize the internet, enhance consumer experience, mulitple simultaneous transaction, competitive differentiation, Motorola supporting development of Android, have put meaningful resources behind the Android ecosystem, consumers overwhelmed by options.  Half of US mobile traffic is 180mm social networkers, will grow to 800mm (Gartner).   Aggregate media, music, address books, email addresses.  MotoBlur service allows your entire life to exist on a single stream, enables you to focus on being social, syncs contacts, posts, media, photos, FB, Twitter, Myspace, Gmail, Y!, corporate email customized on home screen and integrated deep into corners of device, so consumer can focus on being social not on how its sent.  Have it all one finger swipe away.  Widgets:  Social status, happenings (feeds, tweets, updates), messages, weather, Android marketplace and browser.  Create rich text email.  Easy to navigate streams, syncing push contacts into address book photos, birthdates. Integrates contact info through device, receive a call and caller’s profile info pops onscreen, get turn by turn direction to where they are, and it’s worry free – phone can be found by GPS in case its off on a cab ride without you – remote wipe – wipes device but keeps data in the cloud, set up once, good to go.  Phone as primary computer device, if it doesn’t fit in your pocket, the consumer won’t use it.  price points and memory costs are drivers to computing becoming mobile.  Regarding palm, it’s not a zero sum game, all boats float, with 300mm smartphones, its the biggest technology opportunity there is, MotoBlur will eventually evolve, this is just the starting point, the first step in a long journey.   Motorola is excited to integrate location, social graph and web info in an easily digestible way, Motorola does both sw and hw and can decide how to integrate, solve problems and deliver experience that simplifies life, health, fitness, media, build trust to share info, no rationale for 4G if its not for multimedia.

Cole Brodman, T-Mobile
Watch for Cliq with MotoBlur in time for the holidays, next chapter in Android innovation, open highly customizable platform, inviting 3P innovation to the network, first phone with social skills, always on connection, glance on the go, network can handle the traffic, T-Mobile has invested $9B in last 4y, has 200mm US customers with 3G coverage, T-Mobile customers text more than anyone in the world started with Sidekick, connected socializers 30-somethings like to stay in touch, have lead the smartphone adoption. T-Mobile will have product out in time for holidays with the best value, coverage, must have alwayson devices, Cliq in two colors white and titanium, with google browser, video capture.

(Very cool demo – if only iPhone would push birthday reminders to home screen when turned on, and autoemailed birthday wishes)

Andy Rubin, Google
Smartphone is a communications device first and voice device second, data differentiates the smartphone but still need voice to carry it around with you at all time, interface with mobile internet, as powerful as a desktop PC from 15 years ago, internet is the destination, the window to the world, now cloud computing, network connected devices, we’re all personally participating in the ecosystem, what is good for the internet is good for Google, the bigger the base the better it is for Google’s primary ad business, the modern os brings the webto people’s pockets.  As for Palm and Symbian, let the best OS win.  Regarding which came first Android or iPhone OS – os developers have long history and have worked everywhere, who knows which came first, the important thing is that they came together to develop an open system.  Moving web forward as a platform, modern browsers more capable with HTML 5.

ULTRABAND:  Fast Platform for Innovation
How will we be at 100mbps or 1gbps wireless broadband by 2012.  In 1991 Xerox ParC stated its vision for pervasive computing.  18 years later still discussing what broadband is, what bandwidth is needed to be broadband, always there, omnipresent, delivering compelling user experiences at the speed of thought, a world in which the consumer knows that they desire it and suddenly it’s there.

Phil Asmundson, Deloitte
Exciting time for mobile, phones are our remote control to the world, look out 5-10y, fundamental changes to the marketplace, will find that apps that require ultraband eat up spectrum, as we watch video, primary entertainment devices for the millennials and gen xers, mobile mobile and fixed mobile still dont play with each other, two separate worlds, need to play together, cause of spectrum issues.  (Chetan Sharma:  The term smartphone will be an oxymoron in 5 years)  There is an innovation iceberg, the more broadband you provide, the more they’ll use, sw is driving the market, advances far faster than hw, then there are FCC challenges around spectrum, cells are going to be gone, need something more powerful than finite spectrum.  SW is driving force for mobile, need more partnerships, not one company can do it alone.  carriers rpus will increase, innovation cycle will advance, great new world coming sooner than you think.

Ken Denman, Openwave Systems
An all IP world is slave to consumer experience, beyond phones and smartphones there is a data tsunami coming, all things non-phones, all connected devices including things not mobile, appliances, cars , netbooks, wonderful soup coming up, exciting times, the key enabler is all IP environment, convergence will absolutely happen with mobile as the default.  Ethernet will appear to have more relevance.  There will be tiering of price around bundled services for a particular experience like Kindle.    As market evolves and consumers get snappy apps they may not have a problem with price tiering.  Offloading of multiple networks is key middleware solution, #1 RFP of CXOs.

Abhi Ingle, ATT
Increasing speeds and feeds with wireless broadband, 5y widely deployed LTE 100mbps, 10y fungibility of networks become more transparent switching the networks, evolve beyond cell tower, go way beyond phones to connected devices, internet of things, explosion of innovation, ATT Austin lab, connectivity extend to things never even imagined before, connected 30-somethings used to cloud computing environments, ATT has 38 data centers for cloud computing alone, powerful networks.  You need massive amounts of capital to achieve 1gbps, there is not enough spectrum to achieve those speeds, need capital, spectrum and transformation of network, unimaginable costs ($100B?).  One approach is to blend the networks, make it transparent to end user.

Rick Keith, Motorola
Underlying principle of delivery of apps (Twitter, FB), what is broadband relative to those apps, taking experience already familiar with moving to airwaves, to that thing previously known as cell phone, broadband is a marketing term, we’ve had wimax since 2007, for Pakistan and Brazil its the first connection ever had to home, what is broadband to them is not broadband to us.  Its an issue of latency, needs to be a subsecond from send to receive, must be snappy, cost doesn’t stop at capex, there is enormous operating expense as well. Hybrid networks need be transparent to user, right now if you have Boingo can use ATT wireless at airport, that doesn’t make sense.  Must be a bridge service.

THE NETBOOKS & ULTRAPORTABLE BOOM

Mark Spoonauer, LAPTOP Magazine
1 of 5 pcs sold are netbooks, not funny Apple yesterday showing pocket ripping from Dell Inspiron not fitting, netbooks outgrowing notebooks 2:1.  Cheap notebooks have existed before, small, easy to carry, low cost, voting with dollars due to economy, is there a cannibalization threat, netbook integrated broadband 3g attaching $60 fee to go unlimited data makes it not a low cost, carriers need to subsidize netbooks to take off

Noury Al-Khaledy, Intel

Price point needed for internet use, compact, companion, evolving of the mobile web, different form factors and uses, dependent on different devices for different needs, infrastructure to provide bandwidth is key, bill monthly per user or per device, majority shipping are wifi, open econsystem platform, battery life better and better CPU not draining battery, netbooks with 8hrs, sw ecosystem will grow,chrome runs best on pc, better battery life, integration, lower power, new processors handle full flash.

LOCATION, MEDIA & MONEY:  The Next Enablers

Len Lauer, Qualcomm
Qualcomm is starting with Smartbooks moving to broader consumer electronics category.  Problem with netbooks is that they don’t last all day.  Want a Smartbook that lasts all day, always on, email pushed, no need for fan to cool off, very sleek design.   (Three kids (18/16/13) and three netbooks not enough) Right now Smartbooks do not have full support of office environment, Microsoft not porting XP86 yet.  Adding connectivity to everything.  Amazon Kindle makes network connectivity invisible, built into price of book.  Opportunity of machine to machine.  Smart Grid technology, energy companies putting in mobile radio into thermostat in home, intelligence in smart cars where to recharge, digital cameras, navigation devices.  Lots of opportunities.  US/Europe carriers embracing machine to machine arpu higher, Verizon, ATT, Sprint, T-Mobile.  Start out with thin file apps without user involvement (not large PPT decks or media files) 4-5% royalty rate on CDMA for 3G (830mm of 4B are 3G, 3.25% royalty rate for 4G when LTE comes out.)  Interconnectivity multimode when not connected on 4G still get 3G, voice will run out on 3G til 2020.  Rate needs to come down from $60 for mass adoption, balance economics, higher cost of bandwidth costs.  Amount of data being consumed going up.  Qualcomm helping operators with network offload, Media FLO sits on its own network.  Data traffic up 400%, half from video streaming.  FLO is 1:Many, can push out top ten YouTube videos over broadcast/datacast network, or P2P if two are within a kilometer to have handsets talk to each other and send info to each other different spectrum band, low power and fast – new radio technology – going point to point via phones.  Longer R&D project.  Can also get it on to cable networks to offload but need to manage interference.  Media Flo $10-15/month subscription – 15 channels of linear feeds – Qualcomm pays for content from ESPN..  (CDN offload)  700mhz auction 10 years to get that spectrum out.  Think about lots of devices in your home being connected should be P2P, better to manage on a licensed spectrum basis.  Where its most populated is where its free – Korea, Japan, China – 45% devices watching tv.  Italy, Germany, US not hitting expectations, Qualcomm doesn’t have nationwide network yet, need to be on more devices, expand next year, platform capability not just restricted to mobile devices, should be on other consumer electronics like MP3, live tv in car (on fridge?).  Launching with AudioVox this month for cars, rear screen videos in cars will go live tv.  Watch for MP3 device with FLO coming out soon.

INNOVATION THROUGH OBSERVATION & DESIGN

Denise Gershbein, frog design
Take products from strategy to market, brand, design, physical, digital.  Augmented reality has a lot to do with context that’s the moment when you move from looking down at a device toward holding up a lens to the world.  Likes Evernote.  Looks to Twitter for creative sources, inspiration, follows interesting people.  Envisioning LTE 4G, look at parallel and analogous paths make meaning out of cultural chaos so you can meet the market.  Arthur C Clark, Childhood’s End – getting into one universal consciusness.  What does it mean that you can be connected and have access to knowledge at the same time.

Jesse James Garrett, Adaptive Path
Observational research can be misused to dictate design and not room for innovation.  Design is a greater differentiator to stand out in crowded marketplace.  Integration of mobile platforms into larger universe as barriers to technologies and networks breakdown will start seeing new opportunities to be exploited for services to work across platforms.  Uncovering patterns in people’s behavior and psych, extend beyond how they interact with your product.  Be inspired by things beyond the technology space.

Crysta Metcalf, Motorola
Team tying different devices to each other, tying mobile device to tv.  Looking at how you would use mobile device in social tv experience.

Prashant Agarwal, Fjord
Noone has cracked mobile marketing yet.  Context is huge.  My phone knows my tweets, contacts..  Best experience is Amazon Kindle, get it, turn it on and there is nothing else to do except buy books.  Last time you bought a phone, just to get voice is not that simple.

Robin Boyar, thinktank research and strategy
Don’t always have a pencil but always have your phone.  Mobile device can monitor your health, use as tool to make life easier, better.  Young kids aren’t using smartphones, using the free feature phones.  Apps need to match 30y+ audience who own the smartphones.  How do you beat Apple at its game – recognize how to make user experience easier and cooler – build the brand experience – with Apple have extended relationship with them via iTunes, the store.  Used to head up research for gaming company, to get holistic view need all stakeholders in the focus group. If 7 year old and 70 year old gets it, you have a great product.

CARRIER PERSPECTIVE ON THE EVOLVING MOBILE ECOSYSTEM

Cole Brodman, T-Mobile
Social communications root of T-Mobile.  Largest per user text base than any other carriers in the world – 600 messages per user per month – more texting than calls.  Update FB status many times a week.  (Om asks if its possible we one day see voice as an add-on)  Android 10,000 apps, average T-Mobile user 40 apps per user in last 11 months.  Abundance use of apps.   Front home screen always on with context and location so info is relevant is very powerful, allows user to act quickly without logging in to web page.  Too many apps, over 60,000 apps, only a few make money.  Google working on how to make apps more discoverable as app store inventory grows.  T-Mobile to use retail footprint, 1700 stores, sales reps can aid discovery.  Paid and new apps, categorizing and merchandising stores need to be improved.  Once they discover an app make it easier to recommend to friends and family, word of mouth is key.  Not setting up T-Mobile app store, working with Android for an open marketplace but playing a role in discovery, and of course improve ways for app developers to leverage carrier billing, make it more frictionless, to pay with one click, next accelerant for app store consumption.  Phone company has to evolve from closed telco mindset to open web-based infrastructures to allow more rapid development to get things to market, allow application innovation.   T-Mobile is a communications company, it’s what occurs on the desktop, internet, devices we haven’t even thought of yet, need to breakdown the way we’ve traditionally gone to market.  Mobile internet 3-5y from today, starts with ubiquitous wireless broadband network $9B investment in 3G married with increasingly open operating systems, open APIs, increases in memory, battery life, processing power.   Front screen access mashed up with location and context, social graph, offer smarter network in the future, won’t have to keep re-entering data.  Likes Android as the first one to live up to expectations – open to carriers, manufacturing partners, developers to innovate.  Give consumers opportunity to personalize and customize, make it their own.  Apple viewpoint – everything is the same.  (Om – PCs guys don’t make that much money, Mac guys makes lots of money on same product) Consumers will have viable choices, different price points.  Customization without fragmentation.  That’s the work the ecosystem needs to do.  (Om – problem with iPhone is ATT network)  T-Mobile network will hold up, existing customers over-consume, set us up for increased capacity to handle increased consumption.  No announced plans for LTE in US, but its a natural migration, T-Mobile International leader in LTE early on. Thoughts on VOIP – not a threat, wireless pricing will continue to evolve, future consumption is moving away from voice, can only talk so much, first carrier to launch voice over wifi, concern so far has been quality, 3G not built for latency needed for VOIP.  Forgone conclusion, matter of timing, T-Mobile has embraced voice apps in Android market.  Front counter for services, thoughts on DRM – makes it easier if there is no DRM, important to share with others (limit time-sharing), leans toward a DRM-free world to allow sharing, subscription models naturally fit that way consumers want to consume media vs. transactional formats.

FACEBOOK PHONE AND SOCIAL MOBILE

Frank Meehan, INQ Mobile
GSM Wolrd Congress winner of best handsets designed around Skype and Facebook.  Carrier developed phone that aloowed you to make Skype calls.  Old voice and text handset manufacturers are stuck  - got to be fast, stay ahead, have to be able to put next FB on your phone quickly.  Brand naming has to be cool and catchy, need great distribution, retail, marketing – Apple does it very well, not many others.  Nokia is a very big company, they’ll fight their way back, what’s going to happen operators are keen to differentiate, each carrier has segmented behind a handset, INQ gives operator great customization.  Sony Ericcson and Nokia nder $200 feature phone market are competitors – boring, dull, most users don’t get data, INQ phones very easy.  INQ is now also moving into Android.  Android phones has struggled to compete on networks that carry iPhone.  User experience has to be better to get that iPhone out of user’s hand.  Need a hit handset every year.  Owner of INQ is investor in Spotify, Meehan sits on board of Spotify, huge in Europe.  (Om: $50 Peek email device, BB for everyone) Location not there yet but coming.  iPhone sells well to 35y+ who buys Macs.  But iPod market is under 35y, sell INQ phones to that market.

JUST A BROWSER OR FUTURE OF MOBILE OS

Jon von Tetzchner, Opera Software
Browser has potential to be a unifying force to deploy across wide range of mobile devices without having to create a whole bunch of native apps.  80% of phones not running OS, thus web is natural choice for these phones, HTML 5 local storage and drag and drop, deliver rich app experience.  Browser started as a document viewer, then added Java, developers moving faster than that, now running applications.  Scalable vector graphics is coming in the browser.  Microsoft held the browser market back for years.  If doing it web-based, it will run everywhere.  Widget is a web app running in a separate window, can run everywhere, PC, Wii, TVs, media players. Webkit vs Opera mini.  Opera Unite service – there is just one web, see all devices working together.  People haven’t really taken to MMS, hard to get photos over to PC, bluetooth is a hurdle.Opera 10 downloaded 10mm times in the first week.  More than 700ees in 10 countries.  Still focus on the end-user, make peoples lives easier, FF, rewind, speed dial..people expect that, now 40mm active users.  In some countries, #1.  Touch based gestures, mouse gestures very popular.  Take pride on running on 10 year old PCs.  Core of the browser hasn’t changed.  Apps will be web-based, more power to play with.

INVESTMENT OUTLOOK:  THE VC PANEL

Lawrence Aragon, Venture Capital Journal
Panel raised $2B need to invest.  Seed and Series A not looking good for 2009.

Mitch Lasky, Benchmark Capital
Infatuated by iPhone comes out of being burnt.  App store has been great for developers and Apple but not venture, opportunity to aggregate market share hasn’t materialized, will soon be back in multi-platform world, will need to be on more than just iPhone.  Would invest in a company contingent on partnering with carrier.  Did 200,000 store keeping units serving global wireless market.  Now 27,000 games on iPhone, noone can make money.  Don’t mind high-friction environment. ARPU has been flat at $50 for years.  Will see higher RPUs when virtual goods comes to iphone apps.  ATT $18B to built out network to support data consumption.  Network build out is a significant issue.

Dixon Doll, DCM
Portfolio includes mig 33.  Series B in mig33 last mobile investment, in the midst of a Series A not announced.  Can’t justify monetization on advertising – wont get VCs excited.  Must look beyond US, US carriers at best are 3rd best in the world, lots of innovation in China and Japan.  Cynical about business model where carrier determines outcome of business, better to create competitive environment, e.g. MLB.com doing well with its subscription on multiplatforms, competitive dynamic is useful.  Economist talks about innovative mobile apps:  augmented reality.  DC does not understand job creation role of the VCs.  Primitive emerging market nations live off their mobile phones, creating microeconomies, money transfer payments exciting new applications.

Rob Coneybeer, Shasta Ventures
Portfolio includes Eye-Fi.  Prefer companies that don’t require carrier relationship, then can focus on value of partnership instead of imbalance of power.  When both parties have alternatives, its best.  People get hung up on ARPUs, want revenues higher than cost, voice down, data up, wave of growth around the corner, some new business models of advertising and promotion enabled by location and intent, can be explosive, developers can write to a platform without talking to carriers to see if it will go on a deck.  New features (accelerometers, touch screens) to get to a multibillion dollar industry.  Seek to build a portfolio of 25 exciting companies.  Plays Foursquare, gaming + location drives explosive adoption.

Bob Borchers, Opus Capital
(Fmr Apple iPhone exec) Portfolio includes Eye-Fi.  Mobile startups don’t require as much capital as before.  Can easily get fulfillment on your own, may need capital for awareness.  Venture community is so burned by the 500 feature phones they tried, soured on the space.  Many have great proof of concept. iPhone 2+ years old and App Store 1 year old.  Traditional carrier-focused metrics voice RPU, data RPU may be $50, other ecosystems $80 ARPUs on iPhone apps.  All do seed deal, have to have money to add people, need capital to keep company going.

John Balen, Canaan Partners
Last Series A India mobile company.  Series A is down because the whole market is down.  Seeing now an upswing in deals.  Activity level will rise in 2010.  Coming out of recession.  Every web app has to have mobile window because browser is so prevalent.  Not everything is showing up as mobile, might be categorized as web app.  Change is happening.  Need leverage with carrier.  Carriers operate differently abroad.  iPhone best over the top payment system and the outsourcing of cell phone business.  Watch the unbundling of what a cell phone company is.  Disaggregation of cell phones towers.  Win-win for consumer.  Happened in India even with low RPUs.  Augmented reality is next.  New ventures around location, cameras..

We all have those days where the TV, chick flicks, and trashy magazines can’t even cure our never-ending boredom. I am one of those people who get bored extremely easily. Usually, TV can help. But when there’s nothing on – which is pretty much never – I really don’t know what to do. Seriously. All I do is sit there, wallowing in my own boredom. Now, I would never wish for that to happen to anyone. Here a couple of boredom-curing websites… But feel free to post your boredom cures and stories

1. The Onion 
   “America’s Finest New Source”… Apparently. It’s not my cup of tea, but to people who like reading the news and learning new things it’s excellent. With their endless categories, The Onion just can’t make you any more bored than you already are… Unless you can’t read. Then that would be a bummer.
2. Pandora
   The ultimate source for listening to music online, Pandora really does cure your boredom… If you’re obsessed with music and radio and reading about all those celebrities. If you live outside America, however, Pandora is not available to you. Sorry, all you folks outside of the U.S.
3. Flixster
   I know, I know… We’ve all heard of Flixster, but it is truly a boredom-curing website. And I’m 100% serious. You can spend hours of Flixster just rating your favourite movies. Well, if you’re not into movies then this is not the website for you. Don’t worry, I’m sure you can find something else. But who in their right mind does not like movies? However, Flixster does not only talk about movies, it has plenty of fun and games. No, really… The category is named “Fun & Games”.
4. Lifehacker
   Completely self-explanatory. Lifehacker.com is really a life-hacker. From free iPhone application downloads to simply learning the basics of regular expressions, Lifehacker is fun Finally. A website that’s fun! Who knew you could make computers so entertaining?
5. Weatherbonk
   Okay, you can pretty much tell what Weatherbonk is like… Full of weather. Mm-hm, I know. When I think of the word “Weather”, I think of typical British ladies sipping their tea discussing the constant raining. Well, Weatherbonk is similar to that. It provides webcams around every city in the world… Well, almost every city. And guess what? You can also see traffic on Weatherbook. I know! The traffic. It’s amazing.
6. GoogleFight
   This site is actually pretty cool. Although it’s not really a boredom-curing website, GoogleFight is rather entertaining. I mean, you can make George W. Bush fight Osama Bin Laden. Apparently, George W. Bush won. I wonder why… Or how. That’s insane. Has anyone seen Osama lately? Just kidding.
7. Coolest Gizmo
   Can’t you pretty much guess what this site is all about? If you’re a fan of the latest gadgets – or the oldest – then this is the perfect site for you. From the just-plain-crazy gizmos to the oh-so-lame ones, Coolest Gizmo is the place to be for nerds like that. No offense. I, myself, am a perfectly pure nerd… And proud to be.
8. Uncyclopedia
   Totally entertaining. Exactly like Wikipedia, but there’s one big difference… It’s the total opposite. Well, the information is anyway. The layout is exactly the same, but all the information given on Uncyclopedia is twisted into tabloid dirt. Fake, obviously. But entertaining nonetheless. Just search for Jennifer Aniston on Uncyclopedia and the info that pops up is truly breathtaking. Go on, I dare you.
9. GameHuddle
   Okay, GameHuddle is pretty much a lovely game site. “But there’s millions of others”, you say… Well, this is just another one of those millions. You can either play on this one, or the 999,999 others. But seriously… Would you rather game on GameHuddle; a gaming/social networking site that I’ve provided for you and have recommend? Or would you rather spend another 10 minutes googling “amazing game sites” until you come all the way back to GameHuddle? Your choice.
10. Bored.com
    I really did save the best for last. Bored.com offers everything. And I mean everything. Okay, maybe not weather forecasts and news. But it’s pretty much a gaming, music, and romance site. It also includes “dumb” and “weird” categories. Wow, can’t wait to take a look at those. Oh, my God! A picture of George W. Bush just popped up in the “dumb” category! Okay, I was totally kidding. Or not

Thanks for reading this, guys. And make sure you tell me all about your boredom days, and how to cured them… Hopefully with my help.

DB.

Birçok popüler sosyal ağ kendi ilgi alanlarınız ile ilgili gruplarkurmanıza olanak sağlayacak imkanları/özellikleri size sunsa da, ilgialanınıza giren konuyu temel alarak hazırlanmış bir sosyal sitenin yerini tam olarak tutamayacaktır.

Web’te son dönemdemeydana gelen sosyal patlama neticesinde oluşan parçacıkların, web’ineteklerine dağılmaya başladığı şimdilerde; genel içerikli ve nicelikveriler (kullanıcı sayısı/kullanıcı sayısı artış oranları) iledeğerlendirilen popüler sosyal ağlarla beraber belli bir konu etrafındaşekillenen nitelik özellikleri ile değerlendirilen tematik sosyal ağlar da anılmaya başlandı.

İçeriği hem site yöneticileri tarafından hem de siteye üye kullanıcılar tarafından eklenen ve film tutkunlarını birarayagetirerek; vizyona giren veya girecek olan filmler hakkında çeşitlibilgilerin paylaşıldığı ve kulanıcıların çeşitli fimler hakkıda görüşalışverişlerinde bulunabiledikleri bir ortam sunan Sosyal Sitelerden 10tanesi:

1 – IMDb(The Internet Movie Database)

2 – Flixster

3 – FilmCrave

4 – Criticker

5 – Flickchart

6 – I Heart Movies

7 – Spout

8 – Netflix

9 – The Auteurs

10 – BoxOfficeMojo

VentureBeat outdid itself yesterday with a class affair at the Parc 55 in San Francisco. If you wanted a good look at the players of the mobile ecosystem this was the place to be, replete with pitch fest, cocktails, jazz and killer schwag to bring home to the kids, including SGN’s plush pandas and Symbian’s rubber duckies.  There were about 500 suits comfortably seated as carriers, handset manufacturers, and app developers took the stage to share their thoughts on the phone. Together they cheered: Bell dogma is dead, it’s all about apps! Stitcher got it on audio:  http://stitcher.com/listen.php?sid=588199 and Ooyala should be posting video soon.  Here’s what they had to say:

I.  Handsets:  

Tero Ojanpera, Nokia
3D Strategy: Development, Distribution, Discovery – make app development easier, work with carrier on unlimited data, push to home screen.  Goal is $100 unsubsidized smart phone, market is moving to smartphones with better browsers and unlimited data.  India, China no unlimited data plans, most are $30 feature phones. (Nokia’s profit’s down 66%, NYT:  http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/2009/07/16/business/AP-EU-Finland-Earns-Nokia.html?_r=2&hpw)

John Ellis, Motorola
Motorola in just 13 months went from 17 platforms to just 1 – Android. Developer community at developer.motorola.com. (see MOTODEV Studio-better tools for app creation, App Accelerator Program-bringing apps to market faster). Voice is primary.  The phone still needs to be able to make a call, most fail.  Bell Dogma was lift phone, get dialtone, comes down to delivering a kicka.. experience.  Asking are we moving fast enough, replied:  not sure I can go any faster, but need to recognize when perhaps certain innovation is not working and its time to move on, been in business 83y, aiming to get to 100y.

Marc Faucher, Blackberry Partners Fund
Everyone rushing into the app store business is net good for the industry, the app stores are a point of distribution, one piece of a bigger puzzle, still need to sift through it to unlock value, developers go in to make money.   Fund is under 1y, looking for breakthrough. RIM is different than Apple, legacy is enterprise, security DNA in SDK, core base 200,000 enterprise customers.  iPhone is a beachhead platform features innovation.

Chipsets: 

Nagraj Kashyap, Qualcomm Ventures
Barriers to entry are low right now.  80% of investing done outside the US, looking at China and Israel.  In 2-3y we’ll all be coexisting and markets will be open direct to consumers.  App model is never truly open, even Apple has cert process, they curate, there are apps out there that can brick the phone, must protect the user experience.  iPhone only has 5% penetration.  Then there are a whole other class of consumer devices like the Kindle.

II.  OS

Vic Ghundotra, Google
Even Google isn’t rich enough to develop native apps for all mobile, that’s why focusing on mobile web.  Unlimited data takes math out of the equation, makes web happen, tsunami of growth.  Not plotting how to cut people out of markets (Nokia elbowed with a wink – aw, cmon now, big laugh).  Web apps will overcome OS fragmentation.  India mobile search usage spikes 50x when AirTel offers unlimited data for 100 rupees.  The future is in building for the web, not Windows, etc.  Last 12 months huge innovations in the browser, iPhone 3.0 just added geolocation.  Apple brilliant in making bookmarks appear as native apps on the home screen.

Lee Williams, Symbian
 5-7 points of presence where value sits for the consumer: email, SMS, MMS, image sharing, content discovery, listening, entertainment.  

III.  Carriers

Russ McGuire, Sprint 
Carriers are not the most innovative companies, needs to enable others to innovate, get out of the way.  Sprint needs to be open, innovative and fast. Openness means not asking for permission.  Need to let go of control to not be an impediment.  You don’t want to move at carrier speed, you want to move a valley speed.  5 years from now the majority will still be on feature phones, need to make them more of a portal.  Sprint has been in the apps market longer than anyone, one of the oldest developer communities with the 9th Annual Developers Conference 9/09.  Need to protect network, consumer privacy and must be economically sustainable.  Sprint’s plans for Palm Pre are $1200 less over the life of the contract that ATT’s for iPhone.   Sprint wants to be the best backbone in the industry, other carriers have aspirations to be a media company.  Sprint control points in place so one customer can’t bring down the whole network.  It’s in everyone’s interest to keep the network up, don’t want the pipes to go out of business, all need to work together on the ecosystem.

Peter Barry, Vodafone
Permissionless, open ecosystem invites viruses, there is more personal info on phone than web, need carrier cert for trust.  We don’t want to control everything.  Vodafone distributes phones and apps (offers developers 70/30 split).  SMS still growing phenomenally, integrated with web experience, mix and match phone with web.

Aditya Khurjekar, Verizon
Dynamic and exciting phase.  1st developers conference next week.  FiOS apps market developing too.  Ultimately will merge mobile and living room for full three screen experience.  Openness vs. choice, consume on device or network.  Developer time from concept to launch is very short now.  So much can be done with the new consumer-centric devices.   There is room for innovation in pricing plans.  Increasing commonality and consistency across three screens.

Venetia Espinoza, T-Mobile
T-Mobile has a Partner Network Program, like a developers program: http://developer.t-mobile.com/site/global/home/p_program_faq.jsp
Embraced Android.  MyTouch phone.  Accessory pack to MyTouch as a way to make money.  Bundle of accessories and apps like music pack incl headphones, music apps.  Data plans competitive.  Success lies in partnering.  22 partnerships to date … Virgin, Sony Ericsson.  All will thrive with cooperation in ecosystem.  T-Mobile embraces open platform but have to preserve business margins to stay in business and protect customers. which is why Skype and VoIP was removed.  Need to create a win-win for carrier, device manufacturers, developers and consumers.

Luke Bao, China Mobile
Developing Android-based OS called OMS Open Mobile System.  Don’t use credit card, bank cahrges 2-3% fee.  China Mobile does micropayment billing.

IV.  Markets

Ilja Laurs & Patrick Mork, GetJar
GetJar is the premier market for free java apps, has more BB apps than BB Apps World, connects mobile app developer with the consumer.  .5B downloads globally on 1500 devices, largest percent from emerging markets.  Expect 1mm apps by 2011.  1.2mm downloads/day, majority under 25y.  50,000 apps in store.  12mm consumers/month.  iPhone and BB less quantity, high repeat usage.  From India to Indonesia, most are feature phones with java apps.  Market is larger than that for smartphones, intensity of usage makes ad driven models viable, need to take speed bumps out of purchasing, make it as simple as buying a song off of iTunes.   At one point Verizon was charging $8 game, the days of selling a $5 game are over.  Monetize with in-app advertising.  Market creates a new middle class.  7%-30%-40% developers earning $7000+/month, making a living wage, few like EA, top 1%.  Discoverabilty is major issue.

Eric Chu, Google
Google to enable the long tail.  4-6000 Android apps in 20 countries to date, with over 200 apps adding weekly.  Total # of apps not the right number.  Look at relevant apps in each category and paid v free.  iPhone has first mover advantage.  iPhone is good for all platforms.  Need to work on making porting easier.  What is the addressable market.   How are users downloading, single # not enough.  The app stores are a nascent market now.  Direct to consumer business.  Need to land a sustainable business model.  Goal is to get as many handsets out as possible.  18-20 handsets to ship this year.  To add social features to app store including friends and family recommnendations.  Cater to casual browsing and hunters.  Let new apps see the light of day.  Android keeps an infinite list not just hte top 50, keep scrolling down, working hard on UI for discoverability.  Removed Skype and VoIP because it put users in violation of TOS with carrier.  Commenting on www.inmobile.org report on 2011 OS that shows Android dominating over iPhone, Symbian (Nokia), Web OS (Palm Pre), BB, Windows Mobile – MS is royalty bearing, not consortium free.  Also Symbian (Nokia) is 3x the size of iPhone (others remarking MS is not going to sit back and be relegated to nothing in the marketplace).  Android has already had 3 iterations, one more before end of year.  Working with developers to make apps exceptional.  UI can’t be too varied or too schlocky, or it won’t compare.  Working on billing integration with T-Mobile.  Direct carrier billing.  There is room for all to prosper.  
Android SDK:   http://developer.android.com/index.html

http://www.stumbleupon.com/s/#1TsBV6/www.telecomcircle.com/2009/05/the-economics-of-mobile-application-stores//

V.  Apps

Tom Conrad, Pandora
Question is whether carriers will be content to be pipes, or try to be a media company and control user experience.  3 years ago was ondeck with Sprint in the pre-iphone days.  Sprint told Pandora that 1 hour of Pandora costs $.40 for the network (proration of Sprint’s $6B investment in spectrum).  If there was ever an issue of bandwidth consumption being excessive could just bury app in deck.  Control point is our own bad, developers still work with Apple despite the gatekeeping because the audience and monetization is there.  25% of audience from mobile, now moving to STB, TV, stereo, even kitchen devices just like Netflix, CinemaNOW, its getting very complex.  We’re a small company and need to prioritize our resources right, small company can’t do it all, need to move fast on the right priorities.

Andrew Lacy, Tapulous
15mm uniques, 500,000 games played, the Guitar Hero of iPhone world is on 1/3 of all iPhones. Tapulous has 10mm free users, had tehy charged it would have only had .5MM. Market leader in a space that reinvents itself every three months.  On freemium, uses upselling to $.99 game where can buy extra songs, in app commerce only allowed on paid apps not free apps.  (With Apple, free means always free, paid means ok to pay more)  Coldplay, 9 Inch Nails, Lady Gaga, Dave Matthews $4.99 in app store, play along to the music, can invite friends to play along.  Much easier to sell inside app than a new app.  So there is Free, $.99 lowest price point for microtransactions, and upsell, navigate the right price point.  Lose 95% of audience going from free to paid, but no drop off between $.99-$4.99.  Only on one platform, iPhone, doesn’t have the virality of FB where you can easily invite friends and acquire customers for nothing, aggresively cross promote free to paid.  On launch day, the entire company is in on a Google doc  with 100 things to do to get the title in the Top 20 for that upboost to make it self-sustaining.  Work with PR.  Second tier involves hundreds of blogs who collectively have a very loud voice.  Like a movie launch.  Twitter RT when launch a new app is major, Lady Gaga was twending at 1mm RT in a 2 hr window, Twitter works very fast, very effective.  Not currently encouraging existing user base to post positive reviews but are sensitive to hate mail.  Bigger audience on iPod Touch than iPhone.  iPhone and iPod Touch markets are different.  iPod Touch don’t buy anything so extract ad value from free.  Publishers are dead, what do you need them for when you can go direct to difficult markets like Iran, Cuba, now the app store is the intermediary.  iPhone velocity is due to desktop app + billing relationship.

Nikao Yang, Jirbo/EpicTilt
50 apps, 55mm impressions/month, Just came out with clone of Tapulous’ Tap Tap called Tap Star.  Doing very well.  Jirbo is the family friendly division, Epic Tilt is more pop culture/mature.  LA based.  15apps, 6mm downloads.  Free grabs mindshare, goal is to go forward with as many free apps, freemiums to microtransactions.  Tap Star integrates microtransactions where you can download 23 tracks for $4.99.  The three Cs and four Ps of marketing still apply.  Work with ad mob to promote new apps and sell space in-app to sell to others, cross-promotion strategy, acquisition + retention = success, need a strong relationship with Apple to get featured, use global leader board where users upload scores and have UGC galleries for the social viral effect. Jirbo does do blog outreach.  When www.boygeniusreport.com tweeted he loved Tap Star, downloads spiked.  Recent WSJ article:  best practices not engaging in iTunes SEO, that said SEO is critical on iTunes landing page.  Comb through comments for constructive feedback, make changes when there is substantial chatter for added functionality.  On pricing dynamics:  believe price points will all go to zero – FREE with monetization via advertising.  iTunes gives a # of promo codes to give to seed prelaunch, give to reviewers.  But nothing gets posted before it goes live, at Apple live is live.

Anil Dharni, Storm8
Company has 10 employees, 4 from FB, he’s from hi5.  SF based.  In 4 months released 7 RPG titles on iPhone, 10mm downloads.  Zombies. Rockstars. World War.  Every title has hit the top ten on free, 30% of users have downloaded all 7 games, RPG games by nature are social, need a mob or clan to level up, users go to forums to recruit clan members, the social elements are fundamental to game mechanics, keeps in good ranking in app store.  Shelf space theory, where you are in the ranking begets more downloads – organic effect of staying in the top 25.  On freemium, let users get immersed use microtransactions to level up, use time or energy constraints, they did 1mm downloads in 10 days, some breeze through the free 85-90 levels in 2-3 days, power levelers will pay to upgrade, points give power in game.  Storm8 is profitable, haven’t had the need to raise capital yet.  Building virtual currency, microtransactions like hi5 coins.  Unfortunately iTunes isn’t a wallet system and asks users everytime “are you sure you want to buy this”, better to sell packages of $5, $10 and let them spend freely.  Launched 4 months ago with no press outreach.  Clone iMobsters reached Top 10.  No press, no PR, no marketing, barely AdMob, content can make it happen organically.  Only featured apps are allowed to skin landing page.  Look at reviews seriously but they don’t play into rankings.  Look at MoronTest, the #1 free app with 2* ratings.  Reviews are great to allow community to band together.  Racing Live, a text-based RPG get really good/bad reviews.  Bad reviews were from those that thought it was going to be a fast racing app.  Value of umbrella brand, fan sites being built.  RPG players tend to stick with umbrella brand be it Storm8, Zynga, PlayMesh or SGN.  

Shervin Pishevar, SGN
#1 spot on iTunes store is 30,000-40,000 downloads a day.  Frictionless payments are key for social gaming.

Steve Boom, MIGG33
Venture backed by Accel.  Offer fremium with premium element, monetizing exclusively with virtual goods economy.  Free to paid is 30-40:1.  Some will pay to control color of text.  There is money to be had in social expression, status.  VG RPUs (revenue per user) is very attractive.  Nokia commands 70% of market abraod, particularly in SE Asia, world’s largest mobile first community.  Low RPUs get neglected.  India has 10mm subscribers/month, not a big mobile ad market, eventhough it is 1/6 that of the UK’s entire population of 60mm.

Steve Polsky, Flixster
On iPhone, Palm, Android, of course FB and web.  Customers go to website for entertainment, to mobile app for utility, to decide what movie to see (ad driven media property).  40% iphone uses also use Flixster.com or FB, try to leverage installed base to iphone with social features to recommend to or invite friends, bring the legacy community to mobile.  Haven’t quantified press impact but do spike marketing in big short bursts, more self-reinforcing than ongoing marketing.  Use FB Connect to invite friends.

Scott Jampol, OpenTable
Sat 500,000 through iPhone app since October, only 33% web users know about app.  Goal is to put butts in seats, get paid for each.  Use app as a transaction engine, extension of web buisness. It’s incremental business, will use mobile closer to the time of reservation, phone (voice) is biggest competitor, iphone is bigger than WAP audience.  We are in a bubble, many users still don’t know what an app is but most have iTunes on their PC, promote app on confirmation page.  Rankings and download #s are meaningless, usage in very important, its transactional so its about LTV lifetime value.  Want users to be aware of products when they need to use it.  Use comments as market research, aggregate results, respond with changes, audience wanted to be able to search by name, added in that feature as a response.    Strive to be platform agnostic.  Loyalty program helps.

AJ Rhodes, Disney
Disney mobile is not repurposed content, it is mobile-specific content, and is seen as a revenue opportunity.  Mobile is becoming an entertainment device.  There is a rebranding of the phone as a media device, watch video, play games, mom to play games with kids, iPhone overindexes on consumption, more kids have iPod Touch.  There has been a 30% increase month over month of video viewing at Disney mobile.  There is an audience that wants text alerts.  Pushing Radio Disney Live event tour location info to phones.  Disney’s philosophy is to be in the forefront of technology from Iger down.  Creative integrated technology, king of synergy, first place to hear Hannah Montana music is on mobile.  For Disney , traffic is built off deck with major media integration, going right to the consumer, mom wants more utility on the site, rich media experience is driving traffic, video is huge for mobile.  Attach sweepstakes to mobile alerts 1-2x week, video and games drives traffic and engagement, flipping the switch on entertainment content.  Create awareness that Disney is available on handset, invite in and always cognizant of children, provide a safe entertaining experience with high level verifiable consent, tremendous level of customer care as with all of the Disney properties.  Screen size is not an issue for branding campaigns on mobile, especially when targeting those who grew up playing Pokemon on a tiny screen.  People don’t want to read text, want visuals, the simpler the better, 1-2 easy fresh call to actions, repetitively works.  Brands tend to want it more complex.  

Sam Altman, Loopt
Some carriers free, some pay.  Brands don’t buy ads on feature phones, data bundling, one time license paid on feature phones.  Advertisers will pay much morefor iPhone vs. noniPhone.  Apple can drive huge traffic to featured apps.  In app payment for virtual goods will be huge.    SMS is $100B+ market bigger than search, don’t need to charge a lot to make $ with recurring business and now you can do subscription as an in-app charge, monthly recurring fee.  Apps now trending to $.99 the lowest Apple allows you to charge to have in-app transactions.

*Digital Chocolate, 9 games have charted in Top 10 for unit volume on paid games:  http://www.pocketgamer.co.uk/frontend/r/iMobile/Digital+Chocolate+news/m_news.asp?c=13959 

VI.  Advertising

Jason Spero, AdMob
Acquire users by charging a license fee, advertising, freemium, driving off mobile result like lead gen, pay for service, access point – different places to engage the user.  Check out iPhone app review sites: www.148apps.com, www.appcraver.com, a good review here goes along way.  Ad Mob has detect and sniff capiabilities meaning the ad network can see if a user already has an app, and if so serve up an ad for a different app.  Google AdWords too expensive at $.80 per click, expensive to acquire via mobile search, AdMob is more reasonable and more qualified a click.  On pricing dynamics:  install rate doesn’t change much from $.99-$4.99, but there is only a 10% retention from free to paid.

Alex Moukas, Velti
Mobile marketing is what happens after the click, couponing can drive instore traffic.  Til recently, mobile phone thought of utility.  Velti is 50% Europe, 30% Asia (CPA-don’t make $ til clients do), 20% US.  Brands run campaigns in US because its sexy, but also moving toward performance based campaigns.  USSR targeting postpaid data subscriptions, promotional giveaways targeted at 16-24y free 100min prepaid cards in exchange for participating in mobile marketing campaigns.  J&J spends billions on marketing, moms can text in due date and receive coupons from birth.  Brand spends for engagement on mobile piggybacks traditional media.  Twitter mobile marketing powerful search can target certain conversations.  

David Smith, Mediasmith
Privacy laws coming to the web in the next 90 days regarding targeting, should have had an opt-in to allow serving 3rd party cookies.  Hopefully mobile can avoid privacy penalties but being more upfront with opt ins to monetize consumer base.  Cars and Coke have spent all they could on tv have money for online buys.  People who do billboard advertising have $ for online.  Great integrated campaign is NetApp, demandgen, web search, print, mobile mix.  iPhone is only 5% of market  (but 37% of data traffic).  Innovators looking to do the next big thing should focus on turnkey solutions for agencies to port creatives across platforms.  Need better tools to support fragmented infrastructure.  Clients are experimenting.  (Until consolidation) it will be hard to amass a significant audience, critical mass.  Mobile is small in the mix, not going to get much brand love eventhough phone is a trackabke medium, a metrics device.  70% of google search is navigation.  Twitter is more interactive than banners.  Dell uses Twitter instead of eBay to blowout inventory, see Twitter ultimately taking a commission.

VII.  Analytics/Research

Mark Donovan, comScore
Apple ecosystem humming along but not easy to get a break out hit, its a hit driven business.  Verizon appstore – thought that’s what brew was.  Larger audience web browsing over apps (mobile shortcuts).  40mm web users brwosing for news, 12mm using apps.  Outside of US, Symbian most prevalent OS.  Largest category of mobile growth are users that spend $100+/month.  In-app advertising works.  Tiny head for long tail, what apps most downloaded, Tapulous, Pandora, Facebook.  Greystripe in-app advertising drives $ for free apps.  Per mobclicks the vast number of apps are under $2.99.  Slash price get volume.  Not going to get a big fat check from ad networks, CPMs are way down.  Top newspaper gets 27mm, less than the eyeballs on mobile.  Ovi solves carrier billing issue.

VIII.  VC$

Matt Murphy, KPCB iFund
Platform fragmentation keeps me up at night.  1.5B downloads, apps are still snackable, not immersive yet.  Used to be people might buy 1-2 over the lifetime, now 40 per iPhone with a 30% retention rate, apps with high personal utility like Mint.com, UrbanSpoon, and Shazam seems to last the longest.  Apps that retain users are most appealing to VCs.  App store 70,000 apps deployed.  Ad ecosystem is interesting, acclerating due to iPhone 3.0.  Future of mobile apps is browser-based not device-based.  Subscriber acquisition – infection point, monetization next biggest catalyst.  90% of apps are lifestyle or extension of existing companies.  VCs are looking for the next Amazon of mobile.  FB mobile drives 50% more page views than web users.  Media companies need to be on 3 screens.   

Rich Wong, Accel Partners
Monetization models:  ad supported, paid subscription or one-time payments for premium services, traffic sharing/bundling, traffic generation, virtual goods.   You can still sell navigation apps for $4.99, e.g. networks in motion.  J2.com efax charges $6/month.  $1.2B market.  There is money in subscription, it adds up.  Anything with 100-200,000 users, recurring model.

PitchFest 
Many interesting companies pitching including Touchnote, a printed postcard application, BustedLoop, free iPhone app store data, Boku servicing the $8B virtual goods market with mobile payments, and Zos, a geolocator solution.  SMS voting was provided by Mozes.  The popular vote went to Touchnote.  The VC pick was AppStoreHQ, Amazon-like discovery tool to sift through the volume and velocity of app stores.  But the best opening line went to Zos with “9 people are born every second, 6 die every second, 40 cell phones are sold every second, 17 are Nokia.”  Had lunch with the Z guys and they were equally enjoyable offstage.   They have many exciting enterprise accounts but I was most interested in hearing about their apps that enable parents to know the precise location of their child wherever s/he is with the phone.

What an exciting month in the mobile space!  Today MEF hosted the Telecom Council at Microsoft.  Verizon’s Developers Conference is coming up.  iPhone Developers Camp is at month end.  And tomorrow is VentureBeat’s MobileBeat at the Parc 55 Hotel on 55 Cyril Magnin Street in San Francisco.  From 8-8 everyone in the industry is talking.  Follow #MobileBeat.  Here’s the guide:

7:30-8:30
Breakfast

8:30-8:45
Opening 

8:45-9:30
Recipe for Winning Mobile Platform
Nokia, Palm, Google,VentureBeat

9:30-10:15
Battle for the Mobile Ecosystem
Vodafone, Pandora, Motorola, Sprint, Symbian

10:15-10:45  
Mobile Startup Competition
T-Mobile, Qualcomm, Microsoft, Opus Capital, Cross-Pacific Capital, CNET

10:45-11:00
Break

11:00-12:00
Breakout #1:  iPhone App Marketing
Tapulous, Flixster, Jirbo, OpenTable, Storm8, AdMob
Breakout #2:  Netbooks
Qualcomm, Nvidia, Samsung, Microsoft, Tertius Advisory
Breakout #3  Social Mobile
SGN, Zynga, Zong, Facebook, VentureBeat

12:00-1:30    
Lunch

1:30-2:15        
Where’s The ROI?
KPCB iFund, JLA Ventures, Verizon, Qualcomm…

2:15-3:00    
Taking Mobile Mainstream
Disney Mobile, Mediasmith, Velti, NYT

3:00-3:15    
Break

3:15-4:15      
Breakout #4:  Paid v Free:  Growing Your App into a Real Business
Loopt, EA, comScore, Accel, GetJar
Breakout #5:  Are Data Intensive Apps in Danger?
Sprint, GoTV, iSkoot, Zer01 Mobile, NVP
Breakout #6:  Bringing Brand $ into Mobile
CBS, Quattro Wireless, PHD, Velti, Forrester

4:15-4:30
Break

4:30-5:15      
Gatekeepers:  Apps Store and Beyond
T-Mobile, GetJar, Google, China Mobile, VentureBeat

5:15-5:45      
Mobile Startup Competition
Skydeck, Lightspeed, ATT, Intel Capital, Redpoint, CNET TV

5:45-6:00
Closing

6:00-8:00
El Desayuno Latin Jazz, Salsa & Soul Reception

From 3rd Power LLC, the producers of the iGames Summit 2009 and Virtual Goods Summit 2009, comes the Social Gaming Summit 2009, tomorrow at the Hotel Nikko, 222 Mason, San Francisco.  And what a blast it will be. It’s going to be an awesome crowd with over 450 expected including EA, GigaOm, socialDeck, Viximo, VentureWire, Friendster, IAC, Atari, Gaia Interactive, Gazillion, PlayFirst, iWin, Booyah, Fremantle, USVP, RealNetworks, Disney Interactive Media Group, Sierra Ventures, Superfan.com, Hands-On Mobile, TripAdvisor, Draper Fisher Jurvetson, Sony, Blackberry Partners Fund, SVB Capital, Flixster, IMVU, twofish, Financial Times, Examiner, SJ Mercury, Interwest, GirlGamer.com, Meebo, Gigya, Slide, SmallWorlds.com, WSJ, Adobe, MyYearbook and Tencent America.  Twitter hashtag is #sgs09.  The following is the guide.

8:30-9:20am
Breakfast

9:20am
Opening Remarks with Charles Hudson, 3rd Power LLC

9:30am
Industry Insights with Justin Smith, Inside Social Games

10-10:50am
Building Social Games at Scale with Mark Pincus, Zynga, Dan Yue, Playdom, Sebastien de Halleux, Playfish, Jeremy Liew, Lightspeed Venture Partners

11-11:50am
Social Games – A Platform Perspective with Jason Oberfest, MySpace, Gareth Davis, Facebook, Andrew Sheppard, hi5, Joe Chen, Xiaonei (Oak Pacific Interactive), Michael Arrington, TechCrunch

12-1:15pm
Lunch

1:15-2pm
Monetization Infrastructure with Erikka Arone, Zong, Adam Caplan, Super Rewards, Rob Goldberg, GMG Entertainment, Renata Dionello, PayPal, Charles Hudson, 3rd Power LLC

2-2:45pm
Customer Acquisition and Retention with James Currier, WonderHill, Jia Shen, RockYou, Anu Shukla, Offerpal, Greg Tseng, Tagged, Sean Ryan

2:45-3:15pm
Snacks

3:15-4pm
Viral Metrics with Siqi Chen, Serious Business
Getting the Most Out of Your IP:  Extend or Be Cloned with David King, (Lil) Green Patch

4-4:45pm
Social Games in the Wild:  Living Outside of Social Networks with Andrew Busey, Challenge Games, Jim Greer, Kongregate, Daniel James, Three Rings, Matt Mihaly, Sparkplay Media, Jeremy Liew, Lightspeed Venture Partners

4:45pm
Closing Remarks with Charles Hudson, 3rd Power LLC

5pm
Drinks

Following the event are two awesome after-parties.  One from 7-10pm with the Richter Scales at The Ambassador, 673 Geary/Jones-Leavenworth.  Sponsored by PeanutLabsMedia and AllPass.  And the other sponsoed by boxee at  Mezzanine, 444 Jessie Street @ Mint (bw 5th/6th, Market/Mission).  Giveaways galore include boxee tees, pogoplugs and tune-up software.  RSVP at boxee dev challenge:

6pm  
Dance Party with DJ Reverend Underpants

7-9pm
Tekzilla’s Veronica Belmont, Chris Pirillo, Cali Lewis, and Ryan Block present the winners of the boxee dev challenge and features of the upcoming beta

9-10pm
Mixer

I expected to compare two profoundly different websites. The first, Flixster, is dedicated to reviewing movies. Members socialize by comparing interests and associating with the like-minded. Goodreads is similarly premised, only replace “movies” with “books”.  I assumed the intellectualism identified with literature and the unpretentiousness identified with movies would transfer to their corresponding sites. Books translates to utility and movies to entertainment – a stereotype tiresome and tireless simultaneously.

Unfortunately, these differences are borne solely out of branding and its resultant subscribers. Flixster and Goodreads share many social features, responsible for the bulk of their entertainment values: both spotlight “MeetPeople” tabs which permit nearby users to convene and converse; there are messaging systems, forums, and quiz-apps for larger platforms like Facebook. Likewise, book/movie shelves and taste-assessment questionnaires are common to both services and greatly contribute to their utilities.

What distinguishes Flixster, the entertaining website, from Goodreads, the practical website, is user-interface. Goodreads is adorned in beige, and ever-earnest Times Roman is the site’s font of choice. There’s much more text on Goodreads’ homepage than Flixster’s, which lists in pictures. The trendiness of AmerAppar’s favorite font, Helvetica, is Flixster’s, too.

Subscribers followed the code-monkeys’ examples: Goodreads is populated by publishers, librarians, and nerds – people branded as boring-but-useful on a site branded equivalently. Flixster looks flirty, fun — as does its constituency. On websites like these, where sociability is the coin of entertainment, that only perpetuates the assumption that movies are fun and books, useful, with little intermingling between categories.