Sprint needs to run a few extra laps, to catch up with the carrier pack. While Skydeck research shows that overall the majority of consumers (68%) are positive about their carrier’s performance, Sprint is consistently lagging behind Verizon, AT&T, and T-Mobile. Here are four supporting examples from our research:
1) General satisfaction: Is my carrier fair and honest? Are bills predictable? Would I recommend them… or switch?
For these questions, Verizon fairs the best, receiving positive feedback from 75% of its customers and negative feedback from only 9%. T-Mobile and AT&T receive negative marks from 12% of their customers, while Sprint’s customers were unsatisfied 19% of the time.
Skydeck isn’t working with Google. We’ve read the same articles and heard the same rumors that you have. So these are just educated guesses. But everybody else is doing it, so why not us?
Following a class-action lawsuit, Sprint Nextel has agreed to unlock customers’ phones at the end of their contracts and to activate non-Sprint phones on the network. This will allow consumers to take their handsets from one CDMA network to another. Sprint and Verizon Wireless are the big ones in the US, but Alltel, MetroPCS, and Leap have almost 20 million subscribers between them who are also affected by this — assuming the phone operates on the right frequency bands and that the new carrier agrees to activate the phone (MetroPCS and Leap definitely will).
If true, this is a big departure for Sprint, which had the most restrictions until now. But if Sprint agrees to activate any CDMA handset on its network going forward and Verizon Wireless continues to hold the line, Sprint could benefit from this change, in net adds and lower CPGA.
Data services may not work, but those looking for the cheapest option in the market won’t care that they can’t subscribe to VCast.
My first Mobile 2.0 was an overall positive experience. Thank you Mobile Monday and The Open Group.
The organizers of the event, Daniel Appelquist, Mike Rowehl, Rudy de Waele and Peter Vesterbacka, did an excellent job of pulling together a veritable Who’s Who of mobile into an intimate, cohesive, and on-schedule performance. While the venue was standing room only, the approachable setting and laid-back atmosphere of the community allowed me to ‘do business’ while enjoying the whole experience: Productive business networking, a plethora of perspectives on the mobile industry, and the chance to see and meet (in person) the forces that are driving change in our market. For the price, it was a bargain.
Photo by: Rudy de Waele
A number of blogs have done a very nice job of producing a general summary of the event agenda. Instead of that, I’m going to focus on a few highlights and key take-aways, followed with some thoughts for next year’s conference and ideas for improvement.
Highlights:
User Experience, Usability, and Design panel: “Get rid of the keypads”, Kelly Goto. Apple started it, but where does it end? Beyond the incorporation of a touch screen, what are all of the other ways that one can pass information to / from a device (sound, temperature, movement, pressure, distance, object angle, etc). Its time to re-visit this.
Seams in User Interface: “Identify the seams in a product’s user experience. Where do they need to be? Where should they never be?”, Christian Lindholm This has nearly universal application in design, but is underrepresented in the practical application. How close to zero seams can/should a product be?
The Equation to Go Viral = [Design panel says "If you want consumers to use something, it needs to be on-deck or viral"] + [Rich Wong from Accell Partners and other VCs say "Best investments today are off-deck"] The VCs hammered home one point. They believe the best investments are those that don’t rely solely on the carrier, and are off-deck. To make off-deck fly, you need viral, community support.
Don’t think mobile apps. Think mobile web apps. Mobile applications are too difficult to build for the entire variety of existing (and future) devices. In many cases, they also need to be on-deck to fully function, creating an even bigger challenge. Improvements in mobile browsers will reduce these barriers, and offer access to the phones. Think iPhone.
What would you remove today?
The distinction between SMS and MMS, Risto Lahdesmaki
The cost of data (please!), Christian Lindholm
Personal data management, add personal life management, Carlos Domingo
The keypad, Kelly Goto
You can’t live with ‘em, you can’t live without ‘em: On the Emerging Technologies Panel “We need to embrace, not fight the carriers… Don’t fight their data rate plans”. On the VC side, “My goal is to work with people who want to deride the carriers” Voytek Siewierski For now, I vote with the VCs. Businesses behave rationally to protect their own interests, and those of their shareholders. The carriers are no different… as the next point shows.
Sprint’s honest truth: “My company makes $11B in operating profits, and why would we want to share that with the people in this room! … If we started giving this away, our shareholders would have a problem with that… We don’t want to be a dumb pipe” Russ McGuire, Sprint (only major USA carrier that I saw in attendance) This shouldn’t be a surprise to any entrepreneur.
Most interactive presentation: Kyte.tv: It was fast, fun, interactive, and easy to use. It also provided on-going entertainment, by broadcasting the attendees photos and videos in the background. Check it out. Kyte’s product is simple, easy to access, and available to use without a formal account. This is a competitive space, but their focus on simplicity will go far.
One Click. We need to get consumers to a point where they have ‘one-click’ access on their mobile, to the things that they value… this requires an open platform.
Open, open, open. Things are “so closed, people can’t even give failing a shot” Enrique Ortiz, eZee We agree, and so do the event’s organizers.
VC conundrum: The VCs said, “the best investments are off deck… don’t build something that relies completely on the carriers”… but the investments they said they are looking for were quite carrier dependent, including “build an EVNO… Enterprise Virtual Network Operator… to disrupt and improve network offerings to enterprises”. Do major corporations really need a middle-man, between them and the carriers? Would the EVNO even work with smaller businesses? We’re skeptics.
Show me the $. Should I get paid for giving companies (e.g., LinkedIN, Facebook, Google) access to my professional and social networks? Seriously. Someone has to feed the social network hubs.
Tomi Ahonen kicked things off with flair, presence, and a top-hat. During his engaging keynote, he gave many interesting factoids regarding the advances of web and mobile in progressive Asian nations (e.g., S. Korea) . Two interesting nuggets were:
Almost every Korean under 30 is registered in the virtual community of Cyworld
Cell phones in Japan are able to translate text real-time via the camera and display it in the user’s language on their mobile device’s screen
Just the Facts, Please. During his speech, Tomi’s voice over impressed the point that nearly half (44%) of the population of Japan or S. Korea (I can’t remember which) “regularly” or “actively” clicks on mobile ads. He went on to use this to support his arguments for mobile advertising. Fine, but the facts need to be true. The slide was that “44% of people have clicked on an interactive mobile ad”. This is VERY different from “actively” click.
Final Thoughts:
Overall, it was a very well organized one-day conference, peppered with industry specialists, and heavy on bloggers, who were oftentimes blogging out loud. It was savvy, down-to-earth, and light hearted, with high-level discussions covering the major topics of today. However, there were a few things that I think could improve the event for next year.
There was a noticeable lack of hard data, real-life examples, or case-studies used by the speakers and panelists to support what they said or claimed, or to help ground the thoughts they were discussing. By adding these in, generated from their typically vast networks personal experience, it would help the audience to better understand and remember their messages. This thought was also voiced to me independently by two people I met at the event.
The lobby, lunch, and coffee breaks were some of the highlights, because they helped the attendees address some of the biggest reasons they came: To network for business development, discuss their own ideas, and get feedback. The panels and moderators were well stocked, and did hold the attention of the audience. However, I could help but think… would people prefer to sit and listen for 8 hours, or interact? Maybe next time there could be a combination of the standard panel discussions & keynote speakers, with moderated small group sessions that report back to the group at large.
Steve Jobs just announced on the Apple blog that Apple will release an SDK for the iPhone in February, subject to some form of digital signing scheme (like Symbian Signed).
We hope that this isn’t limited to dashboard widgets. We hope that all we have to do to get an application signed is to prove that it is not malicious or harmful to the network (as opposed to getting commercial approval from Apple and/or AT&T). Assuming this is the case, it’s another important step towards open access.
Presidential primaries are drawing near and pollsters are dialing up homes from New York to Los Angeles to test which way the political wind is blowing. But who is picking up the phone? (more…)
We saw the HTC poster outside a branch of Phones4Free on Baker Street in London. The iPhone is not yet for sale in the UK, so this is a case of getting your retaliation in first.
Two of us just received a notice from Verizon Wireless about CPNI. CPNI stands for Customer Proprietary Network Information: our call records, essentially. What numbers we called, how often, how long we spent on the phone, and how much it cost us. (It does not include our own names, numbers, or addresses.)
Verizon wants to share this data with third parties, and of course they need our permission: “you have a right, and we have a duty, under federal and state law, to protect the confidentiality of your CPNI.”
But that duty only goes so far: “Unless you provide us [Verizon Wireless] with notice that you wish to opt out within 30 days of receiving this letter, we will assume that you give the Verizon Companies the right to share your CPNI with the authorized companies as described above.”
@XIPRELAY Not broken; turned off 2 months ago due to lack of interest. Thought we contacted all affected users, sorry if we missed you. in reply to XIPRELAY12 hrs ago
Glad we could help!RT @JohnPaul_Jr: Skydeck for #BB saved allllll my contacts!!!! 1 day ago
Glad to hear it! RT @grits78: Skydeck is my fav #bb app it auto adds new contacts to my phbk from calls or text msg 2 days ago
