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The Big Ten Network expands to Mobile Devices with BTN2Go

March 2, 2012 by

Fans of Big Ten sports who are on the road can now take a piece of the conference with them, a sporting piece as the conference has expanded its Big Ten Network (BTN) presence to cover both mobile users as well as expanding its footprint on the Internet.

The BTN2Go features the live sports feed of the programming that fills BTN, it is simply made available to users of smartphones, tablets or access the site via the Internet. The BTN has done a staged rollout of the program, it debuted with the start of the football season last year as an Internet-only feature and then expanded to the iPad and iPhone quickly afterwards. A version for Android-based phones is expected within the next month or so.

The goal of the effort to provide fans of Big Ten sports access to games anywhere, at any time on any device, said Michael Calderon, BTN’s vice president of digital and interactive media. The network is currently looking at other platforms such as Windows Phone and connected devices including game consoles and expects to launch a new platform with the start of next year’s football season, Calderon said.

Users have to be subscribers of the participating cable or broadband providers, a list that includes Bright House Networks, Charter, Cox Communications, DIRECTV, Dish Network, Time Warner Cable and Verizon.

If you fall into that category then BTN2Go is free with no addition subscription needed and this gives you access to a huge amount of both current and past programming. First and foremost for many fans is the ability to watch live games. However games that are broadcast by BTN’s partners such as ABC and ESPN will be available the following day on-demand.

Calderon noted that a real benefit the program brings is for fans that do not live in the Big Ten area, where a game that are interested might not be broadcast, it will still be available on BTN2Go. Also when an event runs long, say the first of a basketball doubleheader, a user can still go to BTN2Go to watch the opening of the second game if that is the one they are interested in viewing.

The BTN has benefited from its founders foresight. When it was founded five years ago in ensured that it had control of all its digital rights so that the licensing issues that have the potential to stymie a program such as this do not exist.

Then there is also access to archival footage from earlier this season broadcast by both BTN and its partners. Of course there is highlight reels and coaches shows on a regular basis. The BTN also creates home grown series such as Original series such as The Journey, Big Ten Icons, Big Ten’s Best and The Big Ten’s Greatest Games that are also available for viewing.

Going forward the network is looking to add additional features to BNT2Go including possibly a social media module for Facebook and Twitter users, but for the first generation of the platform it focused on delivering a top video experience, Caldera said.

Filed Under: ABC, Android, Apple, Apps, Big Ten Network, ESPN, Facebook, iPad, iPhone, Live sports via mobile, Live Sports Video Consumption, NCAA Football, NCAA Hoops, Time Warner Cable Television Tagged With: , , , ,

Friday Grab Bag: ESPN3 and Facebook Team for Hoops Tournaments

March 2, 2012 by

Facebook and ESPN Team on Conference Tournaments
For much of the next two weeks ESPN3 and Facebook will combine to show coverage of all of the myriad college conference basketball games in both the men’s and women’s brackets. This means that users will have access to all 225 live broadcasts.

ESPN3 has indicated that while this is its first partnering with Facebook it will not be its last as it seeks to leverage the huge audience that the social media giant commands. As ESPN3 vice president Damon Phillips said “We see this as a big opportunity. You fish where the fish are.”

However in keeping with the mantra that there is no such thing as a free lunch not all users will be able to access the games from Facebook. If you have a cable TC carrier or a broadband hookup from a carrier that broadcasts ESPN3, then you get the games for. If not, you are on the outside looking in with no games.

Siri now more insufferable?
I actually like Siri and have found the voice to be very helpful when I have used someone’s iPhone that has the technology, it is just the people showing me how many tricks that they can make it do that really annoys me.

Well now they have a new venue as Mercedes-Benz has integrated the Siri into it’s a-Class cars. The Drive Kit Plus will integrate the iPhone with the cars’ electronic platform. This will allow the Mercedes-Benz’ Digital DriveStyle App to display iPhone apps on the infotainment system screen, according to Cnet.

It will be at Mercedes-Benz’ discretion as to which apps the user can add and control but there will be some such as Twitter, Facebook and Aupeo Personal Radio will be available.

Yahoo joins in the patent fun!
Yahoo has been meeting with Facebook to resolve issues regarding a group of Yahoo patents that it asserts are being used by Facebook in a variety of applications including ads, privacy controls, news feeds, and messaging services.

The exact number of patents is not clear and has been reported as being between 10-20, now is the dollar value that Yahoo is placing on these patents. Yahoo has not taken the step of filing suit and the move is being widely viewed as an attempt to paint a positive picture of Yahoo’s overall patent portfolio as a positioning move in case the company can find a suitor to buy it.

Apps can steal your photos?
It is starting to seem that every new day brings a new manner in which data can ‘leak’ from your smartphone. The latest, courtesy of the New York Times, is that there is a group of apps that can copy a user’s entire photo library with no alert.

The problem is, at least so far, confined to iOS devices such as the iPad and the iPhone and appears to ask a user for location information and if that is approved it not only gathers that information but also downloads photos as well to a remote server. I hope it gets mine in focus, I never can

Mozilla helps you track who is tracking you
In a case of turning the tables on data trackers, Mozilla has created a Firefox add-on called Collusion, an experimental program that is designed to enable you to see who is tracking your activity across the web.

The program uses a simple, easy to understand format. As you browse the web a graph is produced showing sites represented as dots. Red for ones that are known trackers, gray for ones that might track you. You can hover your cursor over a dot for more information. It is interesting to see the interplay between sites and how fast sites that you do not visit are now tracking you. The program also allows you to turn off tracking.

Intel Capital Launches Connected Car Fund
Intel Capital has launched a $100 million fund that is dedicated to developing new technologies in automobiles. The Connected Car Fund will invest across the board in hardware, software and service companies that are developing technologies for cars.

The range of areas is large with the company expecting to invest in areas such as information and entertainment systems, wireless connectivity, mobile devices and driver assist technologies. The global fund will seek to invest in all stage companies over the next three to five years.

Filed Under: Apple, Apps, ESPN3, Facebook, Intel Capital, Live Sports Video Consumption, NCAA Hoops, Smartphone, The New York Times, Yahoo Tagged With: , ,

Facebook makes Mobile Push at Mobile World Congress

February 29, 2012 by

One of the interesting things about the discovery period for Facebook’s initial public offering was that the social media giant reported that it had literally no income from the mobile environment. Since mobile is the top form of access this is surprising.

It is obvious that this is one of the most important market segments for the company to monetize as the opportunities are huge. And it has started to lay out its plans during a public speech by Bret Taylor, Facebook’s chief technology officer at this week’s Mobile World Conference in Barcelona.

In its push it is also striking a blow against a number of companies such as Apple that have been able to cash in on the markets demand for apps. Apple reaps as much as 30% of the revenue from app sales.

Taylor laid out a series of moves the company is currently working on that could tremendously enhance its position in the mobile market, including an effort to partner with mobile carriers for billing on Facebook transactions and the establishment of cross platform standards.

In the mobile payments market it is working with carriers to fix a process that it calls broken and fragmented. It is talking with a number of players including Vodafone, AT&T, Deutsche Telekom, Orange, Telefónica, T-Mobile USA, Verizon, KDDI and Softbank.

It wants to streamline the process and reduce the number of steps needed to make mobile payments. App developers would sell their offerings from the carriers via Facebook, allowing carriers to garner some of the revenue for the apps that are often used on their networks and allow app developers to avoid paying Apple, Sony and others a portion of their revenue.

It seems to me that the issue here is that this is letting Facebook become a partner in this, how do you then later stop them from gaining a more controlling position and adding on revenue for themselves from the users and or carriers as well?

On the standards side Facebook is part of a workgroup called W3C Mobile Web Platform Core Community Group that is seeking to develop HTML5 standards for the mobile web. The recently formed group has 30 members that come from a wide spectrum of mobile players from carriers to web browser developers according to its web site.

The current members of the group have a very impressive lineup. Samsung, HTC, Sony Mobile Communications, Nokia, Huawei, ZTE, TCL Communication, AT&T, Verizon, Vodafone, Orange, Telefónica, KDDI, SOFTBANK MOBILE Corp., Qualcomm Innovation Center, Inc., NVIDIA, ST-Ericsson, Intel, Texas Instruments, Broadcom, Mozilla, Opera, Microsoft, Adobe, Netflix, VEVO, Zynga, @WalmartLabs, Electronic Arts, Sencha and Bocoup.

Of course a prestigious lineup is no guarantee of a successful solution but it seems that it is the interest of these players to have a more efficient mobile web and as long as there are no hidden agendas in the group hopefully we will see a stead stream of updates from the W3C showing progress.

Filed Under: Apple, Apps, AT&T, Facebook, Motorola, Samsung, Social Media Tagged With:

Government Intervention in On-line Privacy Issue Likely

February 23, 2012 by

Users to have select rights about when and how data is collected

With growing reports of data harvesting from people’s accounts with and without permission coming out in a constant stream, and many major on-line players only paying lip service to the idea of individual privacy it now looks like state and Federal Governments will intervene to differing degrees.

Google will be changing privacy rules March 1.

From California to Federal level efforts are now being made to rein in the app developers and afford a level of privacy, or at least provide upfront information about information sharing policies prior to purchase and installation.

On the Federal level the Obama administration has proposed Consumer Privacy Bill of Rights, a seven point proposal that will seek to dramatically increase the privacy of users of the Internet that seeks to protect Americans’ privacy as they use the internet.

The core of the Bill of Rights has seven points:
INDIVIDUAL CONTROL: Consumers have a right to exercise control over what personal data companies collect from them and how they use it.
TRANSPARENCY: Consumers have a right to easily understandable and accessible information about privacy and security practices.
RESPECT FOR CONTEXT: Consumers have a right to expect that companies will collect, use, and disclose personal data in ways that are consistent with the context in which consumers provide the data.
SECURITY: Consumers have a right to secure and responsible handling of personal data.
ACCESS AND ACCURACY: Consumers have a right to access and correct personal data in usable formats, in a manner that is appropriate to the sensitivity of the data and the risk of adverse consequences to consumers if the data is inaccurate.
FOCUSED COLLECTION: Consumers have a right to reasonable limits on the personal data that companies collect and retain
ACCOUNTABILITY: Consumers have a right to have personal data handled by companies with appropriate measures in place to assure they adhere to the Consumer Privacy Bill of Rights.

While this is only a guideline it is being proposed as a regulation that would be administered by the Federal Trade Commission after details of each of these is worked out. The White House has said that it will be working with industry groups and web app developers and publishers on this issue.

In at least one case a state is simply enforcing privacy standards that are on its books. In California the State Attorney General Kamala Harris has announced a deal with the state’s six largest mobile web app providers.

The companies, Apple, Google, Hewlett-Packard, Microsoft, Research-in-Motion and Amazon, which according to Harris account for 95% of all mobile apps distributed worldwide, must now adhere to the California Online Privacy Protection Act that was passed in 2004.

Under the agreement, the companies will place prominent and easy to understand privacy disclosures before a user downloads an app. The push will cover both app developers as well as the larger players such as Apple that distribute the apps.

A lot of players have a vested interest in this. Google and Facebook are massive data harvesters and in a number of ways they will remain unaffected. However Google’s recent move to change its privacy policies looks like one of the many events that have helped quickly push this to the forefront.

Another issue was the discovery that a number of apps were downloading users’ cell phone contacts and address books without clearly letting the user know that they were losing that information.

Filed Under: Amazon, Apple, Apps, Facebook, FTC, Google, Microsoft, Research in Morion, Sports Social Media Data Tagged With: , , , , ,

Battle of the E-Reader Tablets: Nook vs Kindle Round II

February 22, 2012 by

Barnes & Noble has unveiled its next generation Nook tablet

Barnes & Noble, seeking to provide a much more cost effective product to the market, has released its next generation Nook e-reader that will feature 8GB of memory in a 7-inch format with a $199 price tag, significantly lower than its $249 previous offering.

The tablet will feature a 1020 by 600 pixel display, has 1GB of RAM and a 1GHz processor. It includes a microSD card slot that permits the user to add as much as 32GB of additional storage. It has a longer battery life than the earlier version, now running for 11.5 hours reading time or 9 hours viewing videos.

The specs are almost identical to that offered by rival Amazon in some of its Kindle models, which is obviously the player that the Nook is targeted at, but could also erode sales of the company’s Nook Color, which is also very similar. That could be why at the same time as the rollout Barnes & Noble cut the price of its Nook Color, which had been priced at $199, down to $169.

Amazon’s Kindle, driven by the Kindle Fire has been a runaway best seller for the company and has propelled that platform into the second spot in the overall tablet space. Barnes & Noble is generally viewed as the 4th place device manufacturer, but had very strong sales during the holidays, so much so that the company has talked about possibly spinning off the tablet group as a wholly owned subsidiary.

Others not idle

At the same time Research-in-Motion, struggling to make inroads in the tablet space after the poor reception of its initial offering has released the BlackBerry OS 2.0 for its PlayBook tablet. The updated OS includes a greater degree of integration with social media platforms such as Twitter and Facebook.

More importantly it also addresses some of the major deficits that the original version contains including a native calendar, contact and messaging apps. The company also said that there is a growing number of apps in its BlackBerry App World site for the PlayBook.

Tablet market leader Apple is expected to revamp its lineup with the iPad 3 on March 7th, as you may have read, well everywhere. Since it is the market leader it almost inevitably it gets compared to every other offering in the tablet space I believe that the Kindles and Nooks of the world serve a slightly different market.

There is of course overlap, but most users that I know with an e-reader use it for only that, and that is all they want. 10-inch tablet users are often looking for a great deal more in terms of function and applications, a reason that probably helped lead to the poor reception of the initial PlayBook, for instance.

Filed Under: Amazon, Apple, Barnes & Noble, Facebook, iPad, Kindle, Tablets Tagged With: , , ,

Daytona 500 features Huge Mobile and Social Media Push

February 21, 2012 by

The Daytona International Speedway (DIS), home of this week’s 54th Daytona 500 has been working to expand the sports appeal to the users of social media and has launched a series of programs that will enable fans both at the track and at home to follow the race.

The effort actual started last Saturday night with the first event of the NASCAR season, the Budweiser Shootout, which kicks off its annual Speedweek push. In case you missed the race it was won in spectacular style by Kyle Busch.

Speedweek has something for just about any racing fan and a quick look at its web site shows a comprehensive wealth of information for the fans including overall schedules, FANZONE schedule, track activity and appearances by drivers to list just a few of the events.

However the outreach to directly interact with fans is on Twitter, where fans can join into conversations with drivers, teams, DIS and the media that track this sport. Look to add these onto your Twitter feed – with @DISupdates, #DAYTONA500, #BudweiserShootout, #GatoradeDuel, @NextEra_Energy Resources 250, #DRIVE4COPD300, #Speedweeks. For fans at the track on race day there is also contact @DIS_help and #DIShelp for customer service questions.

The track has been working to enhance its online and social media presence for some time and this push is a continuation of that effort. NASCAR’s Facebook page has over 2.5 million likes while Daytona’s has over 400,000.

“There’s a reason why Daytona International Speedway boasts the largest social media following of any racetrack in NASCAR,” said Daytona International Speedway President Joie Chitwood III said in a release. “During Speedweeks, we’ll continue our efforts to make it easy and enjoyable for fans to get closer to the sport, while also reaching out to our younger, more technologically savvy race fans.”

DIS said on Monday that they plan to make the 54th Daytona 500 and Speedweeks a memorable event in many ways, starting with the largest and most expansive social media effort in NASCAR to further engage fans at the “World Center of Racing” and at home.

“There’s a reason why Daytona International Speedway boasts the largest social media following of any racetrack in NASCAR,” said Daytona International Speedway President Joie Chitwood III. “During Speedweeks, we’ll continue our efforts to make it easy and enjoyable for fans to get closer to the sport, while also reaching out to our younger, more technologically savvy race fans.”

Join the conversation with DIS, media, teams and drivers on Twitter with @DISupdates, #DAYTONA500, #BudweiserShootout, #GatoradeDuel, @NextEra_Energy Resources 250, #DRIVE4COPD300, #Speedweeks, and contact @DIS_help and #DIShelp for customer service questions on race days. Don’t forget to also follow @NASCAR, and #NASCAR.

There is a free DIS app for both Android and Apple iOS smartphone users that will enable fans at the race as well as the less fortunate than could not make the journey track a wide range of events including receiving new articles.

For fans at the race the app includes a great deal of basic information of the type that can be invaluable including daily schedules, gate policies, directions, and interactive GPS facility and parking maps with search capabilities. There is even a feature called ‘friend finder’ to help locate friends at the various events. There will be QR codes located prominently all around the track that connect to the DIS app.

In addition there will be special QR that fans can use to enter a sweepstakes with NASCAR.COM to win tickets to the 2013 DAYTONA 500. Texting has not been forgotten as well as fans at the race can text DISINFO to 69050 for updates during events as well as information relating to gate opening times, parking and more. For information on specific questions fans can text DISFAN to 69050 and a live attendant will be on hand to respond.

I really like this proactive outreaching to fans by the DIS. For first time fans at the race the mobile app can be a life saver rather her than walking around lost and constantly asking for help. The range of information and content will likely augment fans enjoyment of the race regardless of if they are in attendance or not. I just hope that the tracks network is up to handling the increased traffic this push is likely to generate. I am sure we will hear the complaints if it does not.

Filed Under: Android, Apple, Apps, Daytona 500, Facebook, iPhone, NASCAR, Smartphone, Twitter Tagged With: ,
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