Mobile phone and wireless

Richard Robinson on the future of mobile media

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Danwei's event tonight on the future of mobile media is now fully booked and registration is closed.

Today we published the last in a series of short Q&A pieces with media and digital experts. Today's answers are by Richard Robinson.

Robinson is founder and CEO of Kooky Panda mobile gaming company and a serial China tech entrepreneur dating back to the first dot com boom when he co-founded Renren.com. He is also the man behind ChopSchticks, which organizes stand up comedy events in China.

1. What will the biggest thing in mobile media in 2010 be?
Media includes games, news, apps, video, podcasts, SMS novels etc. etc. An information or entertainment product that can be viewed, played or interacted withon a mobile phone.

If you look at Japan after the uptake of 3G, then gaming and novels saw huge increases. Video has been mainly a disappointment (can't really even make money online...) and apps will continue to grow, but I think in the longterm the whole app store concept will lose steam and most everything will be done through the browser just as it's done in Japan and in the PC based internet universe.

2. How is the job market going to change because of mobile media?

Hmm, in the short term I don't see any dramatic changes, but according to a Morgan Stanley Mobile Internet Report by Mary Meeker, mobile internet will be more than double the size of fixed line internet in the coming years so that rising tide will lift all boats and increase the overall market size directly affecting jobs of course.

3. What type of companies will make money? Examples?

The bigger, established players like Kong Zhong and QQ will continue to do well in the mobile space and I believe that the mobile gaming companies focusing on socially connected mobile games will virtual items will do well also.


See also Thomas Crampton, Tangos Chan, Benjamin Joffe and Lu Gang's answers to the same questions.

This Danwei event is brought to you by Danwei Jobs, The Opposite House and Waggener Edstrom.

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