Author: Contributor
There have been a number of suggestions to explain the slowdown in Netflix’s subscriber growth that resulted in its share price falling by 14.5%. By David Glance Netflix’s own theory is that users were put off by a price rise as Netflix phased out legacy price deals for early subscribers. Certainly, the press covered the impending rise extensively and so this may have caused people to cancel subscriptions. A second theory is that subscribers have abandoned the service because of the lack of content. Netflix has been spending its budget on its own content at the expense of licensing deals with…
In 2014, as part of its traditional April Fool’s pranks, Google released a video in which Google Maps VP Brian McClendon announced a job opening for a Pokémon Master. By Eduardo Velloso and Marcus Carter The video showed candidates travelling around the world, from the tallest mountains to the middle of the ocean in their search for the rarest creatures. Instead of pokéballs, they used their phones to capture them. Google’s prank captured viewers imaginations and became a reality. Fast forward two years and the video that started as a tongue-in-cheek prank became reality with the release of Pokémon GO, a…
Ask around – everyone has an opinion about their email and their inbox, and it’s not always positive. By Esther Milne and Scott Ewing From information overload, zero inbox and leaked email scandals to the much-hyped triumph of workflow software like Slack and Asana, email has certainly had a bad rap recently. Email has been with us for about 45 years, since the first such electronic message was sent in 1971. The death of email was first predicted in 1989. Back then, it was the fax that apparently signalled its ultimate end. Yet despite stories of its demise, virtually every internet user…
By Andy Tattersal To consider how being constantly connected through computers and mobile devices has encroached on our working lives, consider the experiment about the frog in a pan of boiling water. A frog in a pan of cold water that is gently heated will not realise it’s boiling to death if the change is sufficiently gradual. In the same way, the web has affected our attention span and so our productivity – slowly but surely the heat of distraction has increased as decades of internet evolution has added email, websites, instant messaging, forums, social media and video. Striving to…
By Tony Smith, CEO at Oxygen8 Traditional retailers are caught up in an intense battle against the world of online shopping in a desperate fight to save the high street. Right at the forefront of the battle is the mobile phone, and retail marketers and brand owners are just beginning to realise the key role it can play in reversing the trend of reduced store footfall and redressing the odds back in their favour. A key element in this fight back is harnessing the power of location-based marketing. By targetting mobile phones with relevant and personalised offers – location-based services…
With its ultra-dynamic proportions, elegantly sporty lines, low-slung silhouette and innovative design features, the new BMW i8 represents a new generation of sports car. Bringing together hallmark features of the BMW brand with the design language developed specially for BMW i cars creates a progressive aesthetic which faithfully communicates the performance attributes, efficiency and innovative premium character of the plug-in hybrid sports car. The launch of the new BMW i8 sees the world’s first sports car to be purpose-built with sustainability in mind complete its journey from vision to reality. Its unmistakable, emotion-stirring looks can be put down to a prototype design that was first…
To help capture and share more of life’s moments on-the-go, Lenovo today introduced three new exciting devices to the smartphone portfolio: the new VIBE Shot and A7000 smartphones and the Lenovo Pocket Projector. The company said with connectivity and mobility driving consumers to record and share more of life’s moments, it designed the VIBE Shot to help them capture every moment. “Our first 2-in-1 camera smartphone, we developed the Lenovo VIBE Shot to be a true crossover device. It’s first a fabulous camera that shutterbugs will love, and secondly, a performance-laden, standalone smartphone,” the company said. “Our latest Lenovo smartphones…
This summer Samsung will launch a secure and easy-to-use mobile payment service at more merchant locations than competing offerings Today Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd. announced the latest in mobile payment services, Samsung Pay, which allows consumers to transition to secure mobile payments at nearly all merchant locations. To date, mobile wallets have had extremely low acceptance with merchants utilizing conventional magstripe terminals. With Samsung Pay, consumers can now utilize their mobile devices to pay at existing point-of-sale terminals. To achieve this, Samsung leverages both Near Field Communication (NFC) and a new proprietary technology called Magnetic Secure Transmission (MST) to make…
17 February 2015 MTN launches unlimited cloud service MTN has launched a cloud service that provides customers with unlimited storage capacity across a range of devices for a monthly fee of R99. This service which is available to both prepaid and post-paid customers, is payable with airtime, a first in the industry. Currently, end user customers who subscribe to a cloud service have a limited storage capacity and any storage beyond the prescribed threshold is payable, often run by an international OTT usually paid using a credit card. Larry Annetts, Chief Marketing Officer: MTN South Africa, says information stored on…
21 January 2015 MTN transforms enterprise business unit in South Africa to enhance overall client experience MTN South Africa today announced the start of a process to reorganise its MTN Business unit, to strengthen its competitive advantage in the enterprise business solutions market. MTN is reorganising the unit to implement a new go-to-market structure that will enable MTN Business to optimally serve its customers and partners. This is in line with a revised group-wide business model that seeks to reposition MTN’s enterprise business unit for future growth and service excellence. “We are reorganising to enhance our customer service and market…