Digital+Media

**Evaluating Emerging IT Business Opportunities: Digital Media**
Sunday, November 27, 2011 <>

Topic overview:
In today's class we will introduce a simple analytical framework for evaluating emerging information technologies. We will then apply the framework to explore business opportunities and risks that the emergence of Digital Media has introduced for businesses over the past decade. We will consider both media producing companies (music publishers, movie studios, television networks, camera and film companies, newspapers, news organizations, book publishers, book stores, etc.), as well as businesses that create new information technologies for digital media. Both categories of businesses have been (and will continue to be) significantly affected by the emergence and pervasive spread of digital media.

By the end of today's class you should be able to:
 * Make elementary use of the provided analytic framework to evaluate emerging information technologies.
 * Be able to describe the key implications that the emergence of pervasive digital media on a variety of different kinds of businesses.
 * Understand and explain the key benefits and costs associated with digital media for consumers, media (content) producing companies, and information technology companies.

**Preparation for class:** Prior to class you need to read the following brief white-paper describing a simple, qualitative analysis framework for evaluating emerging information technologies.
 * [Monroe06] Robert Monroe, Emerging Information Technologies Analysis Framework, 2006 (updated 2010).



**Reference materials:** Slides:

**Pre-class exercise:** Select a product or service with which you are familiar that is built around, or based on, digital media. Name and briefly describe the product or service. Do some research prior to class on the effect that the product you've identified has had on its business competitors. Briefly describe how that product has required other businesses to adapt (or the consequences of their failure to adapt). Come to class prepared to discuss your example.

Each person needs to select an example that has not already been posted.

[Bob Monroe] Digital cameras. Over the past fifteen years or so digital cameras have all but eliminated the film-based imaging business. The worlds two largest film companies - Kodak and Fuji have had to dramatically alter their basic business model to survive. They have moved away from a repeated sale of film to an emphasis on developing digital images, providing online digital services, and producing digital cameras. None of these businesses have come close to replacing the revenue and profits that their old film businesses generated so both companies have shrunk significantly in the past decade.

[M Hammad Abbasi] TiVo. TiVo is a DVR (Digital Video Recorder) that allows you to watch TV shows in your spare time. What is really industry-breaking was the ability to skip advertisements. The media industry at that time relied heavily on advertisements on television because of sponsorship and as TiVo and other similar services and technology became mainstream, the media industry faced a giant drop in their advertisement revenue because viewers would simply skip advertisements. It forced the media industry to move advertising to either the TiVo screens, ad-placements within TV shows or use other media such as the internet for advertising revenue. In addition, mainstream cable services moved from offering simple live time showing to offering TiVo features by purchasing DVR technology and allowing their customers to avail exclusive features off of it.

[Hind Al Khulaifi] E-Books. E-Books has transformed the way people read after its introduction to the world through Amazon Kindle and followed by Apple's e-book apps. E-Books are increasingly competiting against paperback and hard cover books. For authors and famous titles that aim to increase their widespread availability to customers and interested readers, adopting to creating electronic versions is a must. Bookstores to stay in business are required to host electronic versions of the titles they hold to meet customer demand. Although their is a large group of people who have converted to reading everything electronically, there still remains a crowd that prefer paper and hard cover books. The benefit of literally holding as well as turning the pages is part of the reading experience and to many e-books does not provide that.

[Firas Bata] iPod.The Apple iPod is a portable media player that stores and plays back large amounts of media including video, audio, and pictures. Although it was not the first portable media player, it was yet a very unique one in terms of software and hardware design. The release of the ipod was followed by many companies adopting to the different file formats. Sony Ericson and Nokia for example started supporting AAC files instead of WMA(Microsoft's). The use of the iPod was not limited to personal use only. It was also used as a business communication tool amongst governments and big organizations.Governments. Some universities also started using it as an educational tool.

[Maryam Al-Subaie] Apple TV. Apple TV is a device that is designed to play digital content obtained from iTunes Store. Users can watch blockbuster movies, TV shows, photo slideshows and other digital content that stream wirelessly to widescreen TV. As Apple TV becomes increasingly popular, other businesses that previously sold the same content on DVDs (e.g virgin, fnac etc) have attempted to adapt to this digital distribution trend. While some of them have launched digital retail websites to cater for the changes in demand, others have either downsized or re-positioned their businesses in order to survive in this fast-changing entertainment industry.

[Orkhan Rustamzade] IPad. IPad is a tablet computer which is designed to play music or games, watch videos, read eBooks and etc. Because of these features and availability IPads are being used in a lot of sectors of business. As IPads weight less and have broad features they can be used for different purposes. For example some airlines started offering applications for IPads where you can book your flight and then show the ticket at the airport without printing it. Moreover, some airlines also offer inflight journals as downloadable application for IPads. The successes of IPads have led other manufactures to release their own version.

[Fatima Abdulla]: E-newsletter. E-newsletter is an e-mail that allows companies to propose messages, press releases, product launches, and much more using only an email or newsletter system. Today most of the companies or business are communicating through emails rather than hard copy mails or notes about their business. And that makes e-newsletter a good resource for the company, not to mention the advantages or the benefits that a company can have such as reduce cost, increase the revenue, build customer loyalty, and also provide an immediate response or result. I think providing e-newsletter will give a competitive advantage to those who still use newspaper in their business and i doubt if there is still a company that is using the traditional way.

[Maryam Al-Thani] IPhone. The iPhone is a smartphone which has revolutionized smartphones during the last 5 years. It is one of the first phones to incorporate audio, video and applications into one phone. The iPhone has enforced competitors such as Blackberry, Samsung, and HTC to incorporate audio, video and applications into one phone. Competitors have not been able to produce a phone with such an advanced operating system such as the iOS software and advanced graphics. Apple was the first in the market to introduce an App store where iPhone users can download apps directly to their smartphone.

[Ayah Abujarbou] Electronic commerce. it is the process of buying or selling product through electronic systems such as the internet. this service allows companies to expand its businesses to reach new customers either in the same country or other countries. That gave businesses an advantage where the customers didn't need to actually go to a store to get something but they instead got while staying at home. Thus, more and more companies are now expanding their business to allow this service so that they stay in the market.

[Walied El Hag Ali]: Mobile payment systems. This system allows its users to pay for a diverse number of services or products by using their mobile devices. In the past people found it unsafe to carry loads of cash in their wallets, and so most people nowadays use credit cards. With the breakthrough of the mobile payment systems, people find it even easier to pay using their mobile phones which they have at all times instead of having to use a credit card. The competitors who will be mostly affected by this new technology are of course the banks. The number of people who will prefer to have credit cards will most probably decrease by a huge percentage.

[Nahan Arif]: CD/DVD players. This emerging technology completely eliminated the use of the video cassette players in the past 15 years. It is a device that plays discs in a number of different technical standards. It was fairly easy for competitors to copy the emerging technology. the leading companies were Sony, Toshiba, Kodak and Samsung. This technology was a significant improvement to the previous video cassettes since the quality of videos was greatly improved along with the additional features such a fast forwarding etc. There are now a lot of new additional competitors who are trying to replace this technology by an even more complex High Definition video players.

[Dua'a Althabatah] Flash Memory. USB flash memory is a non- volatile memory that allows us to store huge amount of electronic data and files, It can be erased and reprogrammed. We can plug them in many other electronic devices such as printers to print pictures and documents, a stereo to play mp3 and other format music and even in some cellphones. Flash memory are very practical and we can carry then anywhere to help us quickly store important data and files. Also, flash memory are available in different sizes, they can be very tiny. I think flash memories made our life much easier as they have eliminated the usage of floppy discs and almost CDs.

[Ahmad Al-Sarraf] Microsoft Office. Microsoft Office is a set of applications that was introduced in 1990 by Microsoft. These applications were designed to help the users to do specific tasks in their computers and it includes: Word, Excel, PowerPoint, ---etc. As these applications became important in all computers, one of Microsoft competitors, Apple, decided to launch its own set of applications that provides similar functions, which is iWork. Even though iWork has many great features, the majority of users, including Mac users, prefer to use Microsoft Office due to its compatibility with both Windows and Macintosh operating systems.

[Amal Osman] Blackberry, BlackBerry devices are smartphones that are portable media players and digital assistants, designed to provide holders with internet browsers, gaming devices, and much more. it also provide its holders with a service that allows them to access the internet 24/7 and gives them the ability to chat with other blackberry holders through blackberry messenger. This technology or digital media has changed the way how people communicate with one another. previously, people used to use their computers to check emails or to log into their messenger. With the blackberry ,people have changed their way of communication where everything is done via their phone, sending email, chatting with friends or playing games.

[Fatima Al-Khayat] Sony PlayStation 3 (PS3). The well-known videos game console that is produced by Sony Computer Entertainment and this is the third series of the PlayStation series. PS3 is a device designed to play game disc, DVDs, it has the feature of playing Blu-ray Discs and it provides an online gaming service through PlayStation Network and PlayStation Store where the user can download games, movies, exclusive shows and TV series. PlayStation 3 competes with the “Xbox 360” and “Wii” as it offers a set of features that makes it so popular. One of the main features that made PS3 so popular and successful is that it went beyond of being just a device for video games, it’s a device that you can also use to watch DVDs, buy game and movies and much more.

[Haya Al-Mannai] The first high-speed printer was invented or developed at the year 1953. Before that and specifically at the year 1938 the electrophotographic (Xerox) was invented. Printers used to be used in educational or business purposes, but today printers are available in almost every house. It helps it users to print anything they want from their computers and make it in papers. Today, the major manufacturer of printers are Epson and HP, but with the increase in awareness of global warming, some people started to decrease their usage of printing papers and read whatever they want directly from their computers.

[Sara Al-Mannai] Online ticket reservations opened the window to people to reserve tickets from the comfort of their homes and get the confirmation printed from the regular home printer reducing cost to companies that used to print costly fancy tickets and also affected businesses that used to make profit by being the middleman between customers and the ticket sellers. Online tickets ranging from flights to basic concerts and events revolutionized the booking systems worldwide, the services saved a lot of money to businesses which made them adapt to it and made it comfortable for people to book whatever they want from their homes without having to go to vendors and all the troubles that comes with it

[Al-Jawhra Al-Mana] Vodafone is a telecommunication service in qatar. Before Vodafone, Q-tel was the only telecommunication service in qatar, and this fact gave them the privilege to control the prices of all the services they offer without worrying about losing customers because the customers didn't have any other options. Customers were stuck with Q-tel's bad customer services and high prices for ten years, but in 2009 when Vodafone first launched it's services a lot of Q-tel's customers switched to using Vodafone instead, so Q-tel had to adjust it prices, lower them and give more special offers in order to gain back their customers. Vodafone changed the privileges that Q-tel had of being the price maker to be a price taker.

[Khadeejah Al-Husseiny] Laptops. Laptops are portable micro computer that small enough to rest on someones lap and usually battery powered. Portable computer were first invented by Alan Kay, Adele Goldberg and others, and it was called the Xerox Note-Taker, and they were not sold commercially. Adam Osbern was inspired and created the first laptop which took over both Xerox Note-Taker, and now desktop computers. Today homes are quickly replacing desktop with computers, due to its lightness and since they are cheaper than desktops.

[Mughees Ahmed] Artificial Intelligence: It is primarily the ability of a machine to perform tasks thought to require human intelligence. It is the subfield of computer science concerned with understanding the nature of intelligence and constructing computer systems capable of intelligent action. Over the years, Artificial Intelligence has expanded its applications that include mdeicine, computer science, transport, avaiation etc. Recently, banks have started to use artificial intelligence systems to organize operations, invest in stocks and manage properties. It was recorded that robots beat humans in a simulated financial trading competition. Financial institutions have long used artificial neural network systems to detect charges or claims outside the norm, flagging these for human investigation. This technology keeps growing and promises to influence many decisions in the future.

[Mohammed Al-Rawahi] Navigation systems. Navigation is a system that uses satellite to provide maps to drivers and allow drivers to view maps and select routes for their trip, and gives the driver directions to reach his destination. Navigation systems replaced paper maps, because navigation systems are more accurate and efficient. Today, many new cars are fitted with navigation, but it is also possible to buy a separate handset and fit it to the car.

[Layal Al-Alami]: Email Service, which enables people to communicate through the internet by sending text and pictures without the need of paper-based letters and photos. This was a disadvantage to companies that depended on delivering letters to people. Ir forced those companies to adapt sending items through mail, in addition to the letters. Nowadays, only few people use these services to send letters, while the majority uses them to send items.

[Nasser Al-Khori] Social networks. Twitter, works by the user constantly updating his/his status, allowing followers to stay up-to-date with current events. Facebook allows people to connect through writing on each others walls, liking posts, updating status, posting pictures, and many more features that allow other (friends) to stay up-to-date with the users day to day life. These social networks have caused businesses to move from traditional advertising and marketing efforts (billboard, newspaper adds, etc), to more modern efforts where the businesses set up either Facebook or Twitter accounts and directly interact with customers allowing them to communicate with customers and get instant feedback therefore, creating a stronger realtionship with their customers.

[Abdullrahman Al-Muftah] HD Television. It is without doubt, that HD televisions are everywhere. More companies today are beginning to transform their TV models to make sure that they are equipped with HD. One example of a company that has specialized in HD Tv's is, samsung. Because of this large increase in TV's that are now HD, this has not only forced other Tv companies to re-engineer their products, but also allowed for a new source of competition, satellite companies. Many satellite companies like OSN Showtime have added several new channels in HD, where they offer viewers only the best quality channels. This, has undeniably increased competition in this sector.

[Mohammed Kamal] CD players. A CD player or compact disc player is an electronic device that can read audio data on a CD. The player reads the data on the disc and decodes it into audio sounds that are then transmitted to the attached speakers. This technology completely eliminated the cassette tape industry. Before, when you buy a car, it was equipped with a cassette tape player and all the singers produced their records in cassette tapes, but now all the cars just have a CD player and all singer produce their records in CDs only.

[Jevika Shetty] Smartphones have definitely gained a strong competitive edge over all other kinds of cellular phones. Smartphones make all sorts of operations such as texting, calender use, etc quick and easy. Also using the web through smartphones is much simple due to the availability of touchscreens and QWERTY keypad in most of them, which also helps in case of operating social networks such as Facebook, Twitter, etc. Also, there are a wide range of apps which can be installed in the smartphones that improve the utilization standards of the smartphone to a whole new level. Smartphones such as iPhone, Blackberry, etc have raised the bars of competition for other kinds of cellular phones.

[Laura Jaber] Apple App store is an online store to buy application for the numerous Apple products (e.g.: apple laptops, iPads, iPods, iPhone). Consumers can purchase games, documents, lifestyle guidance apps and more from the store. The way it affected businesses around it is by informally making them open similar stores. A good example is Google's Android store which launched as a competitor to the Apple App Store.

[Patrick Steinhagen] GPS Navigation devices. The development of navigation via satellite has had a huge impact on the traditional map printing industry, largely shifting from the paper-based product to the on-board device. This has presented a challenge, as it involves largely new technologies and capabilities, which were not part of mapmakers' ability. Instead, most of the work on GPS devices today is done by a handful of companies which initially penetrated the market with these devices, as well as car manufacturers and providers of satellite imagery. Compared to maps, there is also a stronger prevalence of competition from cheap knock-offs, whereas paper maps were usually provided by a small range of companies.

[Ognjen Popovic] Personal Computers (PCs). Over the course of almost 40 years, PCs have travelled a long distance from an emerging technology, and in combination with the Internet they have changed the world forever. There are only several products that made such an impact on the humankind as the PC did. In 1972 the first commercial, non-kit computer called Micral N entered the market, and it started one of the biggest "revolutions" in the history. Computers have changed the way people and companies do work, and they have revolutionized the world of business. It has made it possible for corporation to increase productivity on evert level and also change the way information and data are handled and shared. Today, it is virtually impossible to imagine a business that can work without the use of PCs. But when computers came around, they had less processing power than most of the devices that we use today e.g. smartphone, digital cameras, etc. It has created one of the biggest industries that exists today because people were not afraid to adopt this new technologie, which enabled producers to keep creating faster, more powerful, and obviously more useful PCs.

[Mohammed Hadi Takiddin] Mobile phone market was dominated by NOKIA when the technology was first introduced. After all of the success that Nokia has made, many different new companies have entered the market and with new innovative ideas. Therefore, companies started competing with each others. These days, Mobile phones have cameras and some have two. Now you can listen to music and have a very high storage capabilities to save all of the pictures and Music files.

[Dalia Saleh Hassan]: Mobile network has improved a lot in the last 10 years. 10 years ago, we were only able to make phone calls and send text messages. after two years of success Mobile network has introduced a new generation of mobile phone network which enables customers to make customers able to send pictures and some sort of internet browsing. Now days most of the mobile phone network companies started dealing with other mobile phone companies like Blackberry which is a smart phone and make the customers able to connect to internet 24/7 for relatively cheap cost.

[Najla Al-Madhadi]: Broadband is a service provided by telecommunication companies that allows customers to connect easily to the internet from different places. This service is aimed to allow the customers to share information in a fast and easy way. People having broadband don't need to access internet from places where wireless internet connections exist or a landline. In addition, people using broadband can download stuff from the internet at different sizes and capacities using a good speed service.

[Mohammed Al Ahmadani]: Amazon.com is a website where people can buy products ranging from books to electronic devices online. For many years, people needed to actually go to one store to buy books and another to buy an ipod, for example. Amazon changed made it possible for people to shop for their favorite products from the comfort of their home. What also makes it attractive is that, in most cases at least, they would actually have the products one is looking for as opposed to, say, a book store, which might not have a specific book that one might be looking for.

[Hamsa M Al-Massri] weather app on ipad uses digital media (pictures of weather changes; rain, wind, etc.). It also depends on weather forecasting companies, from where it takes the data to update weather news. This has a big effect on business competitors because of its easy use and its simple user interface.