Posted on

Getting the Jump on Technology Has Its Advantages

I got to thinking the other day about how when certain new ideas in our market get a head start, they manage to get a virtual monopoly. Take the Microsoft operating system. Sure, it wasn’t the first out there, but thanks to Bill Gates, it has dominated the O/S market since its launch. Having tie-ins with PCs has helped, even though some of the Windows operating systems have been dogged by bugs. People buy it because they don’t know any different, or cant’ be bothered trying out other systems, or don’t have a choice if it is preinstalled on their PC.

Another example is the iPod. Once digital music superseded the discman, Apple’s iPod was up and running and every other player has been trying to play catch up since. It’s not just a case of having a product that people like, it is giving new iterations extras, so that by the time the competition does catch up, they are one step ahead by offering more features and functionality.

Being first in the cue doesn’t necessarily mean the most success. Yahoo! was launched a good two years ahead of Google. It managed to get a huge slice of the search engine pie, but over the past 10 years Google has dominated in the lucrative western world markets – in some cases by as much as 70-80 percent. Microsoft’s recently launched Bing search engine is claimed to be making inroads in some areas, but again, it is due to the company giving it more features than Google is currently offering.

These days, the speed of change can either hinder or help a company. The lead times between a new product, and something else coming along making it passe is getting shorter. What will make a company a market leader, it not only a funky new product, but one that not only has technology that the competition doesn’t have, but the ability to build on it in a quick timely fashion, and therefore keeping one step ahead of rivals.

Posted on

Tweeters Become Primary Media Source?

There’s nothing like the death of a superstar to show how far we’ve come in terms of sending and receiving information in the digital age.

Both the internet and Twitter suffered under the strain after the death of Michael Jackson. If you googled his name last Friday, the internet was returning an error because it thought it was under attack from malware/spyware. Twitter also crashed, with some outlets reporting at one stage there was over 100,000 tweets an hour related to the subject.

What this also brings up is something else – have individuals become their own media outlets? Ashton Kutcher for one, was telling everybody “I plea to the press to respect his wishes of maintaining the anonymity of his children,” and even telling users to boycott news outlets by asking them “to refuse to consume media that does not respect the anonymity of Michaels (sic) children.”

With over a million followers, has the likes of Kutcher become the first port of call when huge stories break, as opposed to traditional news outlets?

Probably. I’m sure when people want more in-depth coverage they look on traditional media sites, or buy a newspaper, but I’m seeing evidence that with breaking news, more and more people are getting their info from social networking sites – especially the younger generation.

There is good and bad with this. The good is that the information is out there quickly, which keeps us informed. With Twitter in particular, it is instantaneous, which even with the fast uploads of most news sites, cannot be beaten.

The biggest downfall will be the lack of accuracy, as was proven with reports on Friday that actor Jeff Goldblum had died falling down a cliff while filming in New Zealand. A few news agencies reported it as fact, before retracting the stories later in the day.

I don’t think this is going to change any time soon, but I think a mixture of both is a good thing.