Nice Mobile Services do not Fly. Observations of Mobile Services and the Finnish Consumers

When the short message service (SMS), was first initiated in 1992 nobody could foresee its tremendous popularity. Simple in design, easy to adapt and effortless to employ it rapidly became a profitable, matchless, globally used mobile service – referred to as a “killer application”. Ever since the quest for the next mobile service “killer application” has continued. Year after year the mobile service market(s) produce(s) new services and applications that due to complexity or lack of relevance fail to meet the consumers’ expectations. In this paper we will discuss three mobile services that commonly have been described as promising and innovative: mobile games, mobile television and snapshots with mobile phones, in an attempt to understand their potential for becoming successful services. We will study the Finnish mobile services market from two different viewpoints: on the one hand what Finnish experts and professionals on mobile commerce think the consumers want, and on the other hand, what the consumers actually use and will use in the future. In his way we will show some identifiable reasons for the discrepancies between mobile services offered and mobile services actually used. The analysis is based on our 2004-5 consumer surveys of mobile services com

From MCom Visions to Mobile Value Services

The first papers on mobile commerce were offered to the Bled conference commencing in 2000. Initially, they were not received with enthusiasm; the reviewers were rather sceptical as to the research methods used and the visions of a global m-commerce offered. Nevertheless, the first panel sessions were overcrowded and the eBled organizers quickly recognized a new and exciting movement taking shape. The rest is – as the saying goes – history. There are around 6 billion mobile phone users in the world but the mobile services in actual use are – besides voice calls and SMS – rather few (at least in comparison to the hype around smart phones). Based on our experience from annual series of consumer studies we argue that there are fundamental misunderstandings in relation to both the mobile service concept and the basis for building user value. By following the development of mobile technology over a 10 year interval we have found out – much to our surprise - that not much has changed in the actual use of mobile services despite the fact that we have had about three generations of mobile phones during these 10 years. We have summarized insight from panels run at the eBled conferences and from a number of papers presented at the conference and worked out a description of the development of mobile commerce and mobile services

Evaluation of Future Mobile Services Based on the Technology Acceptance Model

Mobile telecommunication operators are under great pressure to launch new profitable data services. However, most of the mobile data services have fallen short of the expectation and have failed on the market. One important reason for the failure of mobile data services is the difficulty to assess user needs and requirements in advance. This paper suggests to use the Technology Acceptance Model (TAM) to approximate the user acceptance of non-existing mobile services. The TAM model is applied to assess the potential future acceptance of five mobile broadcasting service scenario. The results show that TAM is a helpful model to evaluate the user acceptance of future services. However, the more innovative the new service is, the less accurate is the model. The results show furthermore that the most influential aspect on the future intention to use is the perceived value of the future prod

User Acceptance of Electronic Commerce: Contributions from the Bled eConference

User acceptance of electronic commerce continues to be a popular topic at the Bled eConference. The paper reviews the past contributions of the conference in this specific area. The review deals with those studies that have an empirical and quantitative component, and those studies where the emphasis has been on testing theories of user acceptance. The paper establishes three phases in which Bled delegates have gradually extended generic user acceptance models to deal with issues of electronic commerce. The first phase (20012003) is one of theory application. The second phase (2004-2007) is one of theory extension. In the third phase, (2008-2011), Bled delegates move beyond traditional models and adopt alternative theoretical approaches. The review ends with three promising avenues for further research in electronic commerce

Medios de Comunicación en Internet móvil: La televisión como modelo aún pendiente de éxito

La televisión en el móvil no ha acabado de arrancar comercialmente en la mayor parte de los países europeos. No existe una única razón que explique esta situación. Antes bien, cabe referirse a un conjunto de causas complejas (e interrelacionadas). En el lado de la oferta, deben analizarse aspectos técnicos (infraestructuras, estándares), económicos (modelos de negocio, disponibilidad de contenido) y normativos. En el lado de la demanda, es necesario investigar cuál es la utilidad que el servicio realmente (y no teóricamente) ofrece al consumidor y las circunstancias en que lo usaría. El estudio de todos estos factores es el objetivo de este artículo. Se concluye que la televisión móvil asentará su presencia en el mercado sólo si se sortean algunos de los obstáculos descritos, se pone el foco en el posible usuario (y no en el producto) y se cuenta con cierto apoyo institucional

Understanding user experience of mobile video: Framework, measurement, and optimization

Since users have become the focus of product/service design in last decade, the term User eXperience (UX) has been frequently used in the field of Human-Computer-Interaction (HCI). Research on UX facilitates a better understanding of the various aspects of the user’s interaction with the product or service. Mobile video, as a new and promising service and research field, has attracted great attention. Due to the significance of UX in the success of mobile video (Jordan, 2002), many researchers have centered on this area, examining users’ expectations, motivations, requirements, and usage context. As a result, many influencing factors have been explored (Buchinger, Kriglstein, Brandt & Hlavacs, 2011; Buchinger, Kriglstein & Hlavacs, 2009). However, a general framework for specific mobile video service is lacking for structuring such a great number of factors. To measure user experience of multimedia services such as mobile video, quality of experience (QoE) has recently become a prominent concept. In contrast to the traditionally used concept quality of service (QoS), QoE not only involves objectively measuring the delivered service but also takes into account user’s needs and desires when using the service, emphasizing the user’s overall acceptability on the service. Many QoE metrics are able to estimate the user perceived quality or acceptability of mobile video, but may be not enough accurate for the overall UX prediction due to the complexity of UX. Only a few frameworks of QoE have addressed more aspects of UX for mobile multimedia applications but need be transformed into practical measures. The challenge of optimizing UX remains adaptations to the resource constrains (e.g., network conditions, mobile device capabilities, and heterogeneous usage contexts) as well as meeting complicated user requirements (e.g., usage purposes and personal preferences). In this chapter, we investigate the existing important UX frameworks, compare their similarities and discuss some important features that fit in the mobile video service. Based on the previous research, we propose a simple UX framework for mobile video application by mapping a variety of influencing factors of UX upon a typical mobile video delivery system. Each component and its factors are explored with comprehensive literature reviews. The proposed framework may benefit in user-centred design of mobile video through taking a complete consideration of UX influences and in improvement of mobile videoservice quality by adjusting the values of certain factors to produce a positive user experience. It may also facilitate relative research in the way of locating important issues to study, clarifying research scopes, and setting up proper study procedures. We then review a great deal of research on UX measurement, including QoE metrics and QoE frameworks of mobile multimedia. Finally, we discuss how to achieve an optimal quality of user experience by focusing on the issues of various aspects of UX of mobile video. In the conclusion, we suggest some open issues for future study

Media in mobile internet: The still unsuccessful case of television

Market response to mobile television usage is quite modest in most European countries. No single reason explains this situation. On the contrary, a set of complex and interrelated causes can be found. On the supply side, the potential hurdles are in the technical (infrastructures, standards), economic (revenue models, content availability) and normative domains. On the demand side, companies must understand the (real) utility derived by consumers and the circumstances in which they intend to use the service. The conditions for mobile television success are, therefore, the research question of this paper. It is concluded that removal of these barriers, focus on the user (rather than on the product), and stronger institutional commitment are key factors for mobile television development

The Impact of Social Computing on the EU Information Society and Economy

This report provides a systematic empirical assessment of the creation, use and adoption of specific social computing applications and its impact on ICT/media industries, personal identity, social inclusion, education and training, healthcare and public health, and government services and public governance.JRC.J.4-Information Societ