See the News Of the Future At Starbucks

By: Steve Outing A milestone was reached recently with the formal introduction of wireless or "Wi-Fi" broadband Internet access in Starbucks coffeehouses across the U.S. (and on a trial basis in Europe). Another milestone, connected to Starbucks Wi-Fi, is a couple of months away: the introduction of the Tablet PC.

If you're a news publisher -- online, print, or both -- these developments are important to your future.

We'll start with Wi-Fi, also known as the technical standard 802.11b (and its faster cousin, 802.11a), which has caught the Internet world by storm in the last year or so. Home broadband Internet subscribers can now buy a wireless network access point for as little as $100. Wi-Fi hardware prices are modest enough that wireless networks are turning up in offices everywhere. Public Wi-Fi networks are being built by a variety of organizations -- and in some locations you can tap into public networks for free. As home, apartment, and office Wi-Fi networks proliferate, there's even "free" wireless broadband available to anyone with a wireless-card-equipped laptop PC (or handheld PDA) who's near an unsecured Wi-Fi network.

Now that Starbucks has entered the picture, public Wi-Fi is getting commercialized. The biggest name in wireless public networks now is T-Mobile, the wireless division of Deutsche Telekom. T-Mobile's official rollout of 1,200 "HotSpots" at Starbucks coffeehouses, after a year of beta testing, makes it (for now) the player with the largest footprint in the public Wi-Fi industry. The other big name is Boingo, an aggregator of for-fee (and some free) public Wi-Fi access points, which has a total of about 700 Wi-Fi hot spots across the U.S. in its network, which charges daily and monthly access fees.

This is just the beginning of the Wi-Fi craze. The wireless Internet will be ubiquitous in a few years -- especially in the major metro areas in the U.S. and parts of Europe. Writing for CNET's News.com recently, former IBM executive John Patrick said: "When people go downtown, they naturally expect the local infrastructure to include streetlights, fire hydrants, and parking spaces. Soon, I believe, they also will expect Wi-Fi connectivity. Sitting on a city park bench and checking e-mail will not seem so strange; in fact, it will be something people demand."

For the mobile professional

Wi-Fi to accompany your Starbucks caramel macchiato is just the beginning. T-Mobile and Boingo also offer Wi-Fi connectivity at some airports, hotel lobbies, convention halls, and restaurants -- places where mobile business professionals tend to congregate. Boingo also supports some "free community hot spots," which laptop users might be able to access in public areas -- possibly libraries, universities, plazas, parks, etc. -- without charge.

Public Wi-Fi will most likely be limited to where business people and students go. According to Yankee Group wireless analyst Sarah Kim, the optimum public access points will vary by country. While in the U.S. Starbucks coffeehouses are a common congregation point for business people, in Japan McDonald's fast-food restaurants are getting Wi-Fi hot spots -- because in that country McDonald's are used more frequently by business people than is the case in the U.S.

To be sure, we're still in the baby stages of this technology. The majority of online users are still tethered to their desks because they use desktop PCs. Laptops are not yet as common, and a minority of laptop users have the wireless cards necessary to tap into Wi-Fi networks. Yankee Group research estimates that one-quarter of all enterprise workers are considered mobile, spending 20% of their time away from the workplace -- or about 40 million mobile professionals in the U.S.

But pushing the wireless trend forward are new-model laptops that have Wi-Fi functionality built in. It's even possible to add a Wi-Fi card to PDAs (personal digital assistants) like Handspring's Visor, turning it into a broadband Internet device. Eventually, most future-model PDAs likely will have Wi-Fi included.

For now, the target markets for Wi-Fi are early adopters and trendy business people who travel with laptops. T-Mobile spokesman Bryan Zidar says his company's plans are to expand to cover more airports, business hotels, and convention centers. In time, such services will reach a broader consumer audience. But that will take a while.

An initial problem with public Wi-Fi is pricing set by the commercial players. T-Mobile is charging $29.99 a month for an account that will allow access to Wi-Fi networks at a consumer's local Starbucks, and $49.99 a month for an account that will access any T-Mobile HotSpot in the U.S. There's also a $12 per hour option. Boingo charges $25 to $75 a month, or $7.95 per log-in day, for access to its network of Wi-Fi access points.

That's pricey when you consider that the typical home Internet user already pays $20 to $50 a month to a traditional ISP for online access. While business users will be able to expense such costs, the paid public Wi-Fi services probably won't take off in the mass market until packages are available offering traditional ISP and Wi-Fi network access for one price. T-Mobile's spokesman says what's likely from his company is packaging of wireless phone and Wi-Fi services -- the assumption being that mobile professionals will access Wi-Fi in HotSpot locales, and use their mobile phones for Internet access otherwise, as "3G"-and-beyond technology increases wireless modem access speeds.

While public Wi-Fi networks aren't new, the addition of the powerful Starbucks brand takes them to a new level. Kim points out that few consumers are yet aware of Boingo, and T-Mobile is likewise a mostly invisible brand name now. The Starbucks name gives the concept of public Wi-Fi a significant boost, adds some serious marketing muscle, and brings it back to center stage, she says.

Public Wi-Fi perhaps represents opportunity for local media participation. Online news consultant Mark Potts suggests that local newspapers could approach Starbucks about being included or hosting a local-news start or home page, which Starbucks HotSpot Wi-Fi users would see upon logging on. T-Mobile's spokesman says that's not possible currently, because the pages are served to HotSpot users centrally. But he didn't dismiss the possibility of local-content partnerships down the road.

It's coming soon!

Closely related to the proliferation of public Wi-Fi is the forthcoming introduction of the Tablet PC -- for which Microsoft has developed a Windows XP operating system to run on the devices. Expected to hit stores in October or November by several hardware manufacturers (at an estimated cost in the $2,000 range), the Tablet PC is a cross between a laptop computer and a PDA. It's a magazine- or book-size handheld, portable computing device -- with Wi-Fi connectivity built in -- that will be perfect for sitting in a Starbucks and reading electronic publications, or performing all other computing tasks.

The vision of news-industry futurist Roger Fidler is finally coming into focus. Fidler, who spent much of his career at Knight Ridder and now directs the Institute for CyberInformation at Kent State University, first began writing about the use of portable digital tablets as news-reading devices back in 1981. What he envisioned in the 1980s and '90s looks much like what is coming to pass with the Tablet PC and the proliferation of public Wi-Fi -- though for many of those years, "people thought I was pretty crazy," he says.

Fidler expected his portable tablets to be able to receive large amounts of data via either a wired or wireless network connection, and then the content read while either on- or off-line -- and that appears to be happening. What's different from his vision is that the first tablets of serious commercial value are turning out to be full-fledged computers -- capable of doing what laptops do, as well as serving as digital-media-consumption devices. Fidler's early visions had the tablets being primarily digital reading devices for periodicals, not fully capable computers.

Fidler's institute is currently working on a digital-newspaper prototype for the Tablet PC. The research is being underwritten by Adobe and conducted in cooperation with a "major publisher" (whose executives are not yet ready to reveal themselves). He says the prototype is designed to take a newspaper and make appropriate conversions -- initially using human editors and designers -- for presentation on a Tablet PC. It blends the best of newspaper and Web design into a new format.

Tablet PC content presentation is not simply a matter of creating a digital replica of a print edition -- the approach taken by companies such as NewsStand, which convert print periodical content into digital-replica format and add a few interactive bells and whistles. Fidler's team is reworking the content so that it fits in the portrait-format tablet screen, and adding multimedia and interactive elements that will be attractive enough to get advertisers to pay extra to be included in the digital editions. It's about adapting the newspaper or periodical to the device -- not cramming existing content formats into a new device -- and designing with a profitable business model in mind.

Fidler says the expectation is that the prototype will be used by other newspapers (and magazines) to create Tablet PC editions, once it's rolled out with by his partner publisher. He expects the final prototype to make its debut sometime next year.

For many years, newspaper executives may have considered Fidler's research pie in the sky. While the day when most people read their news on small tablets is still far off, the coming release of the Tablet PC and the growth of public Wi-Fi networks are signs that the day is at least within sight.

Fidler says that news publishers should be thinking now about producing multiple news products -- not just for print, and not just for the Web. "They need to think about the Web not being the only form of electronic publishing that they need to be addressing," he says.

For a peek at this media future, you now only have to step into a nearby Starbucks -- and chances are, there's one very nearby.

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Letters

My previous column, Examining Paid Content's Future, brought these responses:

Right on!

I had to put my two cents in on your article last week about content networks (one payment, access to multiple sites) being an idea whose time as come. I think you're right on!

I tried for years to get the other premium-content sites to band together in an experiment to create such a thing, and I also tried to get Yahoo! Finance to do it for all the premium financial content out there. The big guys didn't want to share customers or revenue (or branding), and Yahoo! just didn't get it at all. (It always seemed to me this was the perfect business for Yahoo! to run.)

I hadn't heard about Qtik -- looks like a pretty cool experiment although they don't have any of the majors in the mix.

Thomas Baker
Open Field Partners
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The competitors are here

I agree with most everything you said. In your point #2, 'Share with us the money,' you mentioned Qtik as a business that's going in the right direction and that competitors should soon appear. I happen to be one of those competitors and I also operate a start-up company called vtechmedia.com (but on the opposite side of the country from Qtik in California).

I actually think that Qtik's business model is a good one, but I think that it might be ahead of it's time. Since the concept of Qtik has its origins in the adult content space, let's examine what happened over there first to get a sense of why I might think this.

Back when adult content was selling on the Web, every site one wanted to view, one had to subscribe to individually. At first, this system worked fine when there were only a few, high quality sites with content worth the subscription price. But eventually (and quickly, for that matter), the adult content sites became numerous and competition was fierce for individual subscriptions. Then, along came AdultCheck (and others) which offered the adult content consumer better value, more choice, and more variety per dollar than the previous way of buying content. Because AdultCheck was seen as an improvement over the previous method of buying content, it began to grow as a useable network.

Now, non-adult content is just beginning to test the 'pay-for-content' waters. People are not used to buying it yet. Just like the early adult content Web site days, there are issues of trust, branding, etc. to overcome. Only after Web surfers become accustomed to paying regularly for content will a system like Qtik really be able to gain ground. And the reason is simply because (as in the case for adult content) by that time, Qtik will offer value and convenience over the previous methods of buying content. This is why I think their model may be ahead of its time.

On the other hand, as a competitor of theirs, I'm just trying to provide a publishing service that lets content authors work together in groups to monetize their own content (the idea being that working together to sell content is going to be easier and better than working alone). I've also created a network of content publishers who use one system and members of this system can purchase from any author in the vtechmedia network. But unlike Qtik, vtechmedia's system is 'pay-per-use' in order to help acclimate the Web surfer to the idea of buying content in the first place.

We need a pay-per-use system to start with to get people used to the habit of buying non-adult content products. Only afterward, when buying content becomes accepted and commonplace, then subscriptions will evolve from that because they'll offer greater value and convenience. And finally, we'll arrive at a Qtik solution that offers even greater value and convenience.

David Ho
vtechmedia.com
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Letters continue to arrive commenting on my column about the ill effects of ISP spam filters on legitimate e-mail publishers:

Twice the trouble?

One possible response to this sort of filtering would be to send out two sets of messages to your subscribers. One would be your newsletter -- the other would be a short note, with text that doesn't attract spam filters, saying in effect, "The newsletter you're expecting has been sent at the same time as this message; if you do not receive it, contact your ISP."

Steve Bryant
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To err is human

I agree with a number of the points in your column, but I have to believe the issues you're having with SpamAssassin are due to misuse or misconfiguration.

I have been using it for about a month now and I absolutely love it. I was gone for the weekend and checked my junk e-mail folder -- I had 60 messages tagged as "junk" with zero "false positives." At the same time, SpamAssassin missed exactly zero messages. Of course, because in the end it's still a computer making decisions on what humans have "told" it to do -- there is always the chance of an error. But it's one I'm willing to risk, given the success rate I have seen.

Bill Lloyd
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Cringing again

I cringe every time I read a piece on attempts to stop spam. Invariably, the piece goes on and on about some new and improved method to kill spam -- a better mousetrap. In my opinion, every method I have read so far misses the mark. Consider this: Would you allow intruders into your home and then decide you want to kick them out? That appears to be the widely accepted solution in dealing with spam. But why let the junk mail in in the first place? All e-mail clients have address books which we use to keep track of our contacts. A simple solution to the spam problem would be to have e-mail clients offer the user an option to only accept e-mail from contacts listed in their address books. (Modifications would need to be made to allow e-mail to enter from an entire domain.) Yes, the user now has to bear some of the responsibility in the fight against spam but that is a good thing. Using this method is, in my opinion, the only effective way to rid your e-mail of spam. If you're not on my list, you don't get in -- period. What if someone is trying to send you an important e-mail? If it's that important, chances are that individual has your phone number anyway.

Why don't any of the major e-mail clients employ this method? I believe it's because there is already an existing patent on this method which means royalties would have to be paid. It also means not being able to take the credit. So until someone comes out with a client that gives the user this level of control, we can expect no real relief to this problem.

Chris Wilson
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Report directly to the spambox

Enjoyed your column on spam and the follow-up e-mails people sent you.

Here's my suggestion for another anti-spam tool: The makers of e-mail clients could do a few things, I think. For one, what if incoming mail went to the inbox only if it was from a sender listed in your address book or from the sender of an e-mail already in your inbox? Everything else would (unless directed elsewhere by a user-created filter) go into the spambox, where the user could inspect it, then delete it, or transfer it to the inbox.

It seems to me this would in pretty short order result in the mail client learning to deliver almost everything you want to your inbox while routing almost all spam to the spambox, with few enough exceptions to make the thing bearable.

No doubt there are other ways a mail client could infer user preferences from user behavior, but this seems to me a good and powerful way to start.

Stan Jones

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Other recent columns

Examing Paid Content's Future, Wednesday, Aug. 14
I'm Sick and Tired Of Spam (Filters), Wednesday, July 31
Knight Ridder Digital Cedes Some Control, Wednesday, July 17
Board The Weblog Bandwagon Now, Please, Wednesday, June 26
Experts Offer Tips On Usability, Wednesday, June 12
Libraries Threaten Paid Online Archives, Wednesday, May 29
Previous columns

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