Nic Fulton is the Chief Scientist of Reuters Media with a responsibility for designing and architecting multi-media products and investigating how the company can take advantage of new and emerging technologies.
Nic Fulton will be speaking at Media 2010 in Sydney on 19th February. More info at http://www.media2010.com.au/
First web memory? I first used the web in the very
early days around 1992. This was during my PhD when I was the de facto
sys-admin for a small theoretical physics group. I setup a web server
and wrote some simple web pages for the group to post papers, profiles
etc. We were all using Unix-based computers, so things were a little
different. There weren’t any search engines, and the main starting
point was a page at CERN, which I think Tim Berners-Lee ran, and this
had a directory of other web sites - all of them, I think!
Favourite website that nobody knows about?
My favourite web site is naturally Reuters.com, but I think
people know about that! A site that I love since it really stretches
the brain’s muscles is the physics arXiv blog at Technology Review. I’m
pretty sure not enough people know about that site. Not quite a
website, but I really like the free academic lectures you can get on
iTunes. I’m currently studying Quantum Entanglement while commuting on
CityRail!
Current mobile handset?
Nokia N82. Reuters did a research project with Nokia called MoJo
(Mobile Journalism) a couple of years ago, and this was the phone we
handed out to our journalist to capture stories, photos and video all
while on the go. The project has matured considerably, but I really
like the capabilities of the phone – 5meg camera with Xenon flash, web
browsing, small size etc – and will happily be a 3G modem when I plug
in my laptop.
Mac or PC?
PC most of the time. It’s a business thing as that’s what
Thomson Reuters has standardized on, but I find them effective
work-horses without a need to be too fashionable. However, with the
increasing standardization of HTML-5, the maturing of cloud-computing
and increase in bandwidth availability, I think the operating system is
set to become far less relevant as web-applications take over. The
Chrome OS that Google has announced seems set to take advantage of this
evolution.
What social media platforms do you use and how? ?I
use Facebook socially - especially keeping in touch with friends in New
York City now I’m in Sydney. LinkedIn remains somewhere to keep a
current virtual resumé and to find business contacts and partnership
leads. Twitter I dabble with, and get some interesting links from but
I’ll admit to finding it ‘too much information’. I think I’m too old
for MySpace. I pop in and out of smaller social networks and also
corporate ones (Yammer, Reuters Space) and I also comment on blogs when
I feel the need. I think there’ll be some networks that go vertical (as
an example look at Sermo) and that’ll be interesting but right now
Facebook is the elephant in the room.
Google or Bing Google for now but it’s nice to know
there’s a potential alternative. When I find Google deficient I often
try Bing and have been pleasantly satisfied on occasion – but not yet
enough to switch.
Paywalls for news - gifted or misguided People
pay for things in two ways. With money and with time. People are also
pretty good at minimizing their overall payment. If you have a surplus
of time over money paywalls won’t work – the advertiser will pay for
you and take up your time in return.
If you have a surplus of
money over time, the paywall may exist. But the information you receive
in return needs to be of value, and the overall user and brand
experience must be superior to non-paywall competitors.
But
there’s a problem with paywalls. Readers are far less brand loyal than
they used to be, and news aggregators have taught them to search and
seek news rather than be captured by one brand. The way people discover
much of their news now is through links. So it’s no good putting up a
paywall and just expecting people to come. You have to get people to
come and sample the goods. This introduces a middle ground where the
paywall is more invisible, but where a link-economy thrives. Valuable
audiences, e.g. affluent professionals, are then brought to valuable
information because the advertiser wants to reach them there.
In
summary – for commoditized content paywalls probably can’t work. For
specialized content where there’s inherent value to the subscriber
paywalls can work. Getting an audience to discover that value will
involve hybrid models and a link-economy.
What do you think is the next big thing in 2010
I see 2010 a very exciting year in mobile with many new
innovations coming and enormous growth in web and Internet usage on
mobile. But I’m not sure this will be ‘the next big thing’. Related to
mobile, augmented reality seems set for consumer adoption in 2010 which
will enhance the value of location based services.
2010 may be
the year web-apps go main stream in business – already we’re seeing
Saleforce.com a major driving force but also Google Docs displacing
Microsoft Office in the smaller enterprises.
Social media
remains a current darling although revenue still predominantly comes
from advertising. 2010 may be the year that social media impacts
businesses by making them more ‘people’ efficient – and business will
pay for this. Automation and communications have made business more
‘process’ efficient, but ‘people’ efficiency remains a challenge.
If/when this happens social media may begin to merge with enterprise
applications – Google Wave is perhaps a contender here.
Will paid content via tablets and e-readers be the saviour of 'quality journalism'
I think my quick answer is ‘no’, or at least not in a simple
way. Print journalism was first impacted when classified advertising
went online taking away that revenue. The fact that impression adverts
are now going online isn’t helping. TV journalism was hit when people
started time-shifting and reading the news (and viewing videos) online.
Tablets and e-readers aren’t the same as printed newspapers - these
devices are interactive, and networked. In that world the ecosystem is
different. Users expect alerts, aggregators, and dynamic multi-media
experiences. So quality journalism may thrive in tablets and e-readers
since people will have more constant access to news. But in terms of
easy money from e-reader/tablet “news subscriptions” I don’t think so.
It’s really much the same as the paywall question at this point.
What, if anything, is holding IPTV back? I’m
not sure anything particular is holding IPTV back. Consumers will
demand either a lower price or a better product in order to switch from
cable, satellite or upgrade from free-to-air broadcast. Until there is
enough IP infrastructure in place the cost will remain high relative to
broadcast architectures. IPTV promises some very advanced product
features but it isn’t entirely clear consumers want these bells and
whistles especially since TV remains a relative passive ‘lean-back’
experience.
Nic Fulton will be speaking at Media 2010 in Sydney on 19th February
