Paul Papadimitriou

Twitter To Charge Audiences In Japan

Twitter had its first language localization in Japan, its first ads (and profitable ones), its first groups (not exactly lists), and now, the "What's happening" company is trying out a payment model.

“We are noticing more companies using Twitter and individuals following them. We can identify ways to make this experience even more valuable and charge for commercial accounts.”

This is what Biz Stone apparently said last February. With his pledge to focus on revenue for 2010, it seems that the Japan market is, once more, used as a test market.

DG Mobile, which already introduced twitvideo.jp and subsidiary of Digital Garage, the Joi Ito company responsible for Twitter's foray in the Land of the Rising Sun, announced the advent of subscription models that will charge users to look at tweets and access links starting January 2010.

It is very interesting to learn that the model seems to have reversed the initial logic, as rumored plans did mention charging companies to tweet, not users to read tweets.

Twitter will remain free to use by everyone—individuals, companies, celebrities, etc. What we’re thinking about is adding value in places where we are already seeing traction, not imposing fees on existing services.

Yes, Biz Stone seems to be true to his words, tweets will remain partially free. The complex model will allow everyone to see partial texts, but links and images and selected texts will be behind a pay wall. Unblocking will come with the payment of a small fee.

The announced but yet to-be-confirmed monthly pricing model will range from JYP 100 to JPY 1,000 (USD 1.15 to USD 11.55 at today's exchange rates), Twitter pocketing 30% on every transaction. It is however unclear how these amounts will be segmented exactly, either per tweet, per link, per group of images or else.

While the pricing structure is similar to what Apple applies for its App Store, it is evidently less clear how will the audience react to paid content, if, as Chris Anderson advocated it, content wants to be free. The Economist and other news structure have recently rolled back their pricing model to a premium one. They might be the ones first in line interested in activating a paid model for their real-time updates.

Brands who offer coupons -a widely successful model in Japan- and deals through the platform will certainly also look up to the new model as a way to gain more revenue, while hoping the users stick with them.

Kenichi Sugi also hinted at artists and education content as accounts that might be interested in the new system.

Payment will be done either by credit card, mobile billing or pre-paid cards, those already being a widely-used form of billing available through every convenient store in the country.

Here is one of Sugi-san's slides providing a more visual look into the premium model (image from ITMedia.co.jp)

The question remains: is this model applicable anywhere else than Japan? Or, to put it bluntly, will the world and the USA in particular experience the same model in 2010?

Japan has a somewhat different structure in terms of its internet culture, with Japanese users being accustomed to pay for some content, such as mobile books or game applications through their keitai, the Japanese mobile phones, which is why I believe the system could gain some traction.

I wouldn't however put my money on such a system elsewhere in the very short-term. While, on paper, it seems like an attractive model for brands willing to offer some business value through Twitter (again, those offering specials deals to the Twitter-only audience come to mind), users have yet to get used to pay for content, especially through mobile billing in many countries.

It is also unclear if the new Retweet API is adapted to these premium tweets and if people outside of Japan will actually be able to see those updates at all or have any way to access them.

Lots of questions, but this is surely an exciting experiment to follow. News organizations, brands and the Twitter competition should keep an eye on the story.

Let's also see if Facebook, which will finally be opening offices in Tokyo in 2010, will follow suit and experiment different models.

UPDATE:

Media Asia's take on the story with comments bt Infinita's CEO Kei Shimada.

The Next Web Asia's entry.

Interesting article on the future Twitter business model by Daniele Beccari

TechCrunch's news (thanks for the mention, Robin)

French TV Report on Japan Startup Scene

Early October, I was contacted by Cedric Ingrand, famous news tech anchor of the biggest TV network in France, TF1, about the possibility to do a special report on the Japanese startup/tech scene for Plein Ecran on LCI, a French 24/7 news channel.

Since I've regularly witnessed that most people cannot even name one single startup from Japan, as those, more often than not, only operate in the country, this idea seemed like a brilliant one. I dove in.

Here's the result. It's in French and was aired on October 24th.

Oh, one thing. Cedric contacted me on a Wednesday night. I was in Manila. The filming had to take place on the following Monday in Tokyo :-)

So many thanks to the promptness of Cedric to give me the details I needed (even with the timezone difference), my large network of connections and friends in Tokyo and to one man in particular, Nobuyuki Hayashi, a fantastic freelance journalist in Tokyo, for helping me getting the line-up I had in mind:

- a pure Japanese startup, the #2 social networking site in Japan, with the CEO of Gree, Yoshikazu Tanaka,

- a Silicon Valley entrepreneur in Japan working exclusively with locals, with the CEO of Bluebridge, Kristopher Tate, and

- an entrepreneur (and otaku icon) based in Tokyo but whose audience is largely international, with the CEO of Mirai, Danny Choo.

Many thanks to technology specialist and Tokyo live blogger Steve Nagata for his always invaluable help.

I really had lots of fun being with these cool and acute journalists (Danny had fun too). I appreciated how kind, professional and fun Cedric was throughout the whole process. How Guillaume Delalande, LCI Journalist, had to suffer to film such a tall guy like me (he got to see Astro Boy in Tokyo as a reward) --and make no mistake, he knows a lot about tech!

How knowledgeable Olivier Levard, the MUJI fan, LCI blogger and author of a future book in French about social networks, was about cultural differences over the use of the social web, a passion of mine.

Don't hesitate to work with them. Really.

[Re]Think:Hawaii - Day 0

I might have landed in Honolulu sleep-deprived, after a very bumpy flight from Tokyo and being too soon for an early check-in at the hotel, but none of this mattered as the [Re]Think:Hawaii group of great people sat together for the first time.

Christine Lu was right, when good people get together, great things happen. This immediately was the case, as I met again with Dave McClure or Dan Martell from Geeks on a Plane, old Tokyo friend Ken Brady, finally met with Jeremiah Owyang in person, but also new inspiring people, like Kris Krug or Sarah Prevette.

This marks my first time back in the US since December 2007 and my very first time in Hawaii, an island I wanted to visit since seeing Magnum PI (yeah, yeah) on TV back in the 80s.

I'm blessed to have been a small part of the organization of an event that would have never happened if not for the immense dedication from Christine. Thank you!

Can't wait to experience this whole week.

Feedburner Support in Posterous

Posterous improves again: there's finally a Feedburner feed support!

I love this!

Yahoo! Meme

As Techcrunch reported a few hours ago, Yahoo! is launching its Meme service in English (it existed only in Portuguese until now) Reminds me of now-dead Pownce, but also, evidently, of Tumblr.

I registered this morning. Who's that dog?

Here's my first share, in the dashboard view.

Sharing is easy, see the four pics gallery at the end of this post.

The settings panel doesn't have that many features yet.

...some themes

There's a Tumblr-like reblog feature called repost. Most popular items are listed on a Popular page.

Not many users I know, which is why I invited some friends to join me...

Yup, I've ran out of my 15 invites :-(

I don't know where Yahoo! wants to go with this and if it'll get traction. All features are similar to what's already in the market. Let's see where this goes and if the company can tap in its millions of users to make this some kind of success.

Click here to download:

Yahoo_Meme_tags_Yahoo_Meme.zip (104 KB)

My Online Characterization

Not sure about the accuracy, but it's fun to try. Love these visualizations.

http://personas.media.mit.edu/personasWeb

Twitter And The Race To Zero Or The Rebirth Of Context

You are so unfollowed.

The race to zero has started. A race towards quality. A race toward real connections. A race towards intimate yet broadcasted bridges. To a real social architecture on the web.

Twitter is on the verge of becoming a huge link machine, a vast broadcast microphone. I'm not sure it's lost some if its appeal that brought me there in the first place, but it's certainly changing, making me alter the way I'm using it.

Like many, I've tried auto-following people that were following me for a very short while -when SocialToo appeared --I even tried the auto-dm, what a nightmare. It was unsatisfying. I ended up not knowing the people I was following and those didn't seem to be interested in what I was writing.

That was in 2008.
Fast forward today.
I was right. Somewhat unknowingly.

Here’s the rub: who you follow defines you.

Robert Scoble's views about endorsement are correct. As far as last week, I was trying to convince myself that following someone on Twitter wasn't a gesture of endorsement.

It is.

It definitively is. And how can I endorse random people connecting to me without even really knowing them? Without having a sense of who they are.

True, Chris Brogan has a point when he goes into explaining his endorsement strategy. It's valid, however only to those who see it that way:

the line between endorsement and friending varies on a person-by-person case

I might not consider a follow an endorsement, I might not consider a LinkedIn connection an endorsement, but if the other thinks it is, my point is lost.

The major shift for Twitter is when it became a massive discovery machine with both its search engine and the users embracing retweets (I'm on the fence about hasthags, though).

I don't need to follow people to find content anymore, I don't need to follow people to be listened.

Will listen only those interested. Will listen only those who care. Nice if mutual care, but with both overlapping and different interests every person possess, there is actually no need for reciprocal follow.

I don't care if people I'm interested in don't follow me. It doesn't matter. I can still interact with them, there's no limiting factor as in the Facebook reciprocal world --which is why I'm moving towards a Page, whatever people think about it. Point is:

I’m getting smarter again so want to share what I’m seeing with other people.

Sorry, if you're some affiliate marketer promising me massive returns, I'm not interested. You might have a valid message. But not interesting enough to me.

You might even have an interesting message buried in so many updates, but I'm not willing to cope with the noise. And I ask you to do the same with me.

This all boils down to noise and absence of context.

I had a debate over noise with Rick Martin. His blogging, like mine, is sometimes all over the place --again, because of many interests. He said that it was hard to know where I resided online and he was right.

Joseph Tame even jokingly mentioned my numerous domains.

Yet, what I want is only what Rick rightly points out:

you can be on as many social networks as you want — but if you’re not taking the time to share the shit that matters most to you, then you really aren’t being very social at all.

It was an attempt to cut the noise. By allowing people to chose amongst my blogs, I wanted to filter my outputs through various prisms.

Most of the current tools, from Feedly reading to the hide function in Friendfeed puts the recipient in the noise-fine-tuning cockpit. It shouldn't be this way. It's up to everyone of us to define our own social architecture. It should be the responsibility of the sender to sort his messages.

That's today biggest flaw about lifestreams platforms. The output can be overwhelming, to the point of becoming useless.

Same goes for Twitter, a lifestream of sorts. Do you really care about everything I say? You probably don't:

What can be said in 140 characters is either trivial or abridged; in the first case it would be better not to say it at all, and in the second case it would be better to give it the space it deserves.

The evolution of blogging is a necessity, but it has to go further than Posterous (for all the love I have towards this service). Having a central command to share news is only the first step.

The second step will be more complex. The tools will have to evolve with better management of tagging or labels, to allow selective content to be displayed to selected recipients and the bloggers and lifestreamers alike will have to responsibly use them.

tweets are broadcast indiscriminately. I think this further devalues them

Context doesn't need endorsement. Only people do. By freeing yourself of the 140 character limit from time to time, you'll allow your content to be the endorser and reduce the noise.

It’s not enough to create content. As you know, anyone with an opinion, a keyboard, camera, or microphone, fueled by the desire to freely and perpetually share it, can do so at will nowadays. The question is, how do you as an authentic and genuine aficionado or maestro convince me that you’re believable, qualified, and ready to lead? Build the bridges that connect you to those whom you can soundly advise… Once we understand how to build the bridges that connect knowledge and aspiration, we ultimately become accomplished and experienced social architects.

--link: Building Bridges Between Knowledge and Aspiration | PR2.0

To be honest, I still haven't found the appropriate way to cut my own noise. Until I do, please accept my apologies.

Xerox Is Not Another Word For Copy

Found this while reading the Business Mirror the other day.

It seems Fuji Xerox doesn't want to be that yet another common name... Wait. Is it not only already too late, but also not that bad for business?

Brands are what people make of them, companies have to let go.

Whatever Xerox wants to be, this commoditization of its name is helping. It keeps the brand unique. Fuji should use it for its advantage.

Google doesn't fight not to be mistaken for search.

TwiLog Gives Your Twitter a Blog Look

As Twitter becomes more popular by the day in Japan, I start to see more developers trying their hands on applications based on its API.

The latest interesting project I've stumbled upon is Twilog, which basically reformats the user Twitter page into a blog-like experience.

The updates become organized by dates, with a day archive in the right-hand column.
By clicking on friends, one can see the recent replies exchanged with that user, although retweets are also included. The list seems to go 200 tweets back.

Same goes with #hashtags. Sorting through tweets an user made with one tag is a breeze.

There's also the ability to search the tweets archive with keywords.

Registration is not mandatory, as people can just try the service as I did. If you wish to have more features, like a calendar "widget" added to the sidebar, just send the word start to @twilog_bot (and wait for 10 minutes, the cycle time of the bot).

Current settings that are available when you register are limited, besides the added calendar: you can ask the bot to modify the order of the tweets by asking him @twilog_bot Order asc (from older to newer) and @twilog_bot Order desc (to go back to newer first).

Images from services like Twipic will be extracted.

What I really also like with this service is the ability to simply copy the HTML code of a day full of tweets.

This can be handy to incorporate some tweets in your blog.

You can get in touch with the developer on Twitter at @ropross [JA].

Twitter Japan Gets Its Own Song

via asiajin.com

You might have seen me tweeting about it, but I didn't blog about it. Here's a nice recap from Asiajin.com about an unofficial Japanese Twitter song that made the headlines in the country.

The song Hirose Kohmi has written has no link with Twitter Japan or Digital Garage, the company that helped it set foot in the country.

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