The Network Garden - Mark Sigal's Blog

6 Takeaways from the Google IO Keynote

2013-05-15T15:35:55-07:00

"I was frightened...I was excited."
- Bono (on the vibe in England + Dublin in the '70s)

We are at the end of a cycle, and approaching the beginning of a new one.

It's post-global, post-digital, and post-commoditization.

The new cycle is about making the inefficient more efficient, and creating differentiation where commodization exists.

That we can stare at the rot that consumes so many industries, and simultaneously cheer a record stock market and wonder, "What replaces all of those jobs?" is BOTH terrifying and exciting (READ: 'The Jobs Engine' for thoughts on this topic).

Keep these dual truths in mind in reading this assessment of today's keynote. (Btw, a good capture of the transcript from the keynote is HERE.)

Six key truths stuck in my craw:

The Single Biggest 'Tell' of the Keynote: To date, there has been exactly one company that could stop the world when they held an event, and that company is Apple. While Jeff Bezos and Amazon has been pretty close in this regard, when it comes to Google, these events have been easy for the non-Google acolyte to skip. That has now changed, based upon the sheer number of NEW folks who followed the keynote today -- including a significant legion of Apple devotees...myself included.
Google is Stealing Apple's PR Mojo: One of the more interesting questions I take from the above is this. If you are Apple, how much do you care that Google is stealing your PR Mojo? What is that worth? Google is grabbing key PR inspiring narratives, be they Glass as the potential game-changing device, Android adoption numbers, self-driving cars, Google fiber, etc. It's translating into an inflated Google stock price, a deflated Apple stock price, and a fundamental shift in the number of stories being written about Google (relative to Apple). In terms of real business, these things are optics, but in the equation of 'perception has a way of becoming reality,' it's also not just pure noise to be ignored. Illustrative of this point is the fact that on StockTwits, the one-month change in message volume for Google is up 55%. For Apple, it's down 25%. It's a not-too-subtle reminder that the battle for all things post-pc is being played on a multi-dimensional chess board, and PR touches the perception domain. A side thought: Google's next thrust on the PR war front should be doing Brand Advertising around Google Maps, as it's illustrative of how Google thinks about and executes services that are great at web, great at mobile, deliver truly native experiences in either environment, and an exercise in composited logic, big data, the cloud, and great workflows. Plus it's the app everyone uses, and the best single example of what Apple does NOT do well. Food for thought.
Developer Mindshare: A primary focus of the keynote was on increasing the love and attention that Google is able to secure from software developers. While there was nothing earth shattering announced (although plenty of holes filled, to be sure), it is reflective of Google grokking the seminal truth that developers make or break a platform play. As one twitter commenter noted, "Google is basically shipping everything iOS devs have been asking for since the beginning." That stated, the event was also completely devoid of developer demos (save for Google's own demos), making this feel a bit like Google's passion is reserved for Google services alone. This truth is perhaps why Google really doesn't care what Amazon or Facebook is doing with Android. Nonetheless, it raises the question of how Apple will respond at WWDC? Same question when Amazon announces whatever they are up to next with Kindle Fire.
Get in My Belly: On twitter, I quipped, "Should we be concerned that Google's new slogan is, 'Come on, get in my belly!' or that this is the new spokesman?" I am only being slightly tongue-in-cheek, for the simple truth is that for all the platitudes about Google being so open, sometimes it seems that open is just another way of saying, 'onboarding.' After all, Google's openness is generally focused on the areas that they want to compete with and commoditize, whereas where they want to differentiate remains proprietary and protected. Where is the open sourcing of Google Search, Maps or AdWords, anyway? One observation here is that it feels like the big potential loser of all of these initiatives in Music, Play, Maps, Offers, Photos, and Conversations is...wait for it...Facebook! Why? Simply put, Google is getting better at the things Facebook does well quicker than Facebook is getting good at the things that Google does well. Similarly, for Google, social is just one job that you'll hire G+ for, whereas for Facebook, it's job one. Hence, the more Facebook feels compelled to fill your feed with suggested content (ads) or flood it with unrequested crap every time you 'like' something, the worse that Facebook's user experience becomes. Netting it out: Google is getting better at context, design, and compositing of user experience quicker than Facebook is figuring out discovery, dollars, and search. In the big picture, the bottom line is that if your product CAN be enhanced via an algorithm, Google will complete with you eventually. Daring Fireball's John Gruber deliciously picks apart this reality in assessing Larry Page's comment on the 'negativity' of everyone focusing on who Google is competing with.
A Unified Theory of Google: While there is a tendency to look at G+ as Google's lame attempt to compete with Facebook, I tend to view it differently. My take is that G+ is ground zero in Google's end-game to figure out: A) How its various services composite together; B) What those integration points look like on the inbound, outbound and metadata side; C) What the user wants to DO within those service containers; and D) How such services run natively in different user environments (iOS, Android, Chrome, Web, or Glass). Similarly, efforts like Play, Offers and Music are best seen as the company finally being ready to make a frontal assault on a billing relationship with consumers (ala Apple and Amazon). It's logical, and it speaks to the company's unlimited ambition, but for Google partners, it should be a clear reminder that the company aims to consume all. Having recently written my assessment of the prospects for Google Glass, it's also worth noting the symmetry between what I heard today and what I saw baked into the Glass user experience. Specifically, I am referring to three things. One, the company's growing arsenal of Knowledge Graphs on the backend. Two, how such graphs feed user Experiences in the form of Answering queries with richer context; Conversing with users via natural language (it's like Siri, but it's useful and it works really well); and Anticipating intent. Three, the use of a dynamic cards model in Google Now for things like reminders, public transit, music, TV, movies, books and recommendations. Everything with Google at this point is about context, meaning and flow.
Larry Page is Intense: Google CEO Larry Page closed out the keynote with a meandering sermon that encompassed a vision that was simultaneously frightening and exciting. The man is destined to either win a Nobel Peace Prize, or end up as the 'villain' in a future James Bond film -- maybe both in the same year. While it was a bit too Atlas Shrugged for my taste (it took on 'Who is John Galt?' proportions), I liked the spirit of what amounts to: A) Sensors, Sensors Everywhere; B) Want to run away and join my country? C) Optimism over Negativity and D) A killer quote: "I encourage more companies to do things that are outside their comfort zone. It gives you more scalability." Larry Page rocks, in a mondo, mega-billionaire sort of way, and I mean that as the highest compliment, I think.

Related:

Google Glass will soon be invisible – and the new normal (GigaOM)
The Jobs Engine: On Indivisibility and Integrated Systems (GigaOM)
Mobile Native Publishing: The Rise of Dynamic Content Services (O'Reilly)

Google Glass will soon be invisible – and the new normal (New Post @GigaOM)

2013-05-12T12:15:07-07:00

“There are three sides to every story: Your side, my side, and the truth. And no one is lying.”
– Robert Evans (“The Kid Stays in the Picture”)

I recently met up with my friend and one-time business partner, Steve Lee, who is product director on the Google Glass project, and before that, ran product management on Google Maps for Mobile.

Other than a quick tour of the device, Steve basically let me dive in, so as to experience Glass with a beginner’s mind. I won’t bother reviewing the basic capabilities and specs, which have been covered exhaustively already.

Instead I want to focus on some of the points that are in debate, and whether I believe that Glass is destined to succeed.

Glass is translucent; designed to be invisible

In “Waves of Power,” David Moschella shows how new disruptive industries begin as verticals, since the complete product solution requires one provider to deliver the whole enchilada.

The new industry continues on this path until the solutions finally reach the “good enough” stage, when the larger trend becomes horizontal orientation, so as to achieve ubiquity, commoditization and the broadest possible ecosystem. (In passing, one can see the battle between Apple’s iOS and Google’s Android in this light.) The endgame, so to speak, is that the technology becomes persistent, embedded and ever-present to the point of being “invisible.”

It’s a paradoxical concept to be sure. On the one hand, the technology is everywhere; how can it be invisible? On the other, it’s because it’s everywhere that we no longer think about it as exceptional – and, equally, grand solutions can anticipate and incorporate its ever-presence.

Read the full post HERE.

UPDATE: This piece has obviously struck a chord with the rank and file at GigaOM, based upon the storm of comments. Check it out.

UPDATE 2: Google just announced a bunch of third-party apps coming to the platform, including Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, CNN, Elle and Evernote.

Related:

Why Netflix is betting on Apps over Channels: It's All About Being 'Native'

2013-05-03T13:02:27-07:00

"Look at the bigger picture."
- Francis Underwood, House of Cards

Netflix CEO Reed Hastings has written an 11-page essay that's embedded below. It's quite excellent, and lays out his vision for the future of Internet TV (Peter Kafka of AllThingsD has a crisp summary of the key bullet points HERE).

In particular, it underscores why Hastings' Netflix deserves to be mentioned in the same reverential tones as Apple, Amazon and Google.

For one, there is the clear articulation of a 'North Star' that guides the company forward; namely, winning more of their members 'moments of truth' - i.e., those times when a consumer could play a game, read a book, chat on the phone or watch conventional TV, but chooses Netflix instead.

The virtue of having a North Star is that it instructs clear narrative-driven thinking, tightening focus, process and execution. It is one reason that we readily associate Apple, Amazon and Google as the gold standard companies of their industry, and so few others.

It's also one reason that it almost feels inevitable that at some point, Google (4.3% of their market cap), Apple (2.8% of their market cap) or Amazon (10.3% of their market cap) will **need** to acquire Netflix (I'd add Disney as a dark horse candidate).

After all, TV viewing captures a billion hours a day of consumers' time, and Netflix has created a model whereby 30 million of these consumers are paying a monthly subscription fee for access to the service.

In other words, despite all of the various activities that fight for consumers attention, Netflix is winning at: A) securing members; B) monetizing those members; and C) growing their base through differentiation.

Talk about **earned attention.**

Netflix is Betting BIG on Apps

It is with that backdrop that I took particular interest in Hastings' assertion that Apps -- not streams -- but Apps --will replace Channels as the primary construct for delivering Internet TV. He mentioned the term 25 times in the document, no less.

I think that there are two things that one needs to keep in mind relative to the "apps" versus "channels" topic.

One is that a channel is simply a payload, and an app is simply a wrapper for delivering that payload.

It's no different in that context from saying that Apple turned the phone into an app. We don't need to think about it in that context because the phone app does what a phone is supposed to do.

Quite the contrary. We now think of the iPhone as much more than a phone, right?

Two, is the unlike a simple envelope, the wrapper of an app can actually enable to DO stuff; namely, show you related content, extend the context with communications, enable you to share the content, rate it, excerpt it, roll it into a play list, etc.

The point is that an app can do things that a simple stream can not, and Hastings clearly groks that this is about delivering **native experiences.**

This is also why a show like 'House of Cards' launched with the entire Season 1. In Netflix, binge viewing is a native behavior, right?

Along these lines, Hastings specifically dispels the idea of Netflix even having a fixed notion of what constitutes a 'season' in their model.

It's all about being native, something that I have written extensively about, most recently HERE.

Related:

Apple’s North Star vs. Earth’s Gravity: Four Takeaways from Apple’s Earnings Call
Built-to-Thrive - The Standard Bearers: Apple, Google, Amazon
Mobile 'native' publishing: Why our concept of content must evolve in the post-PC era

Netflix Ir Letter

Reading the Tea Leaves of Apple's Q2, 2013 Earnings Call -- Four Takeaways

2013-04-23T21:58:10-07:00

"It's not real, you know, the fame thing."- Anna Scott (Notting Hill)

The hardest thing for the beleaguered Apple investor to wrap their head around is the fact that Apple exists on a schizophrenic plane like no other.

On the one hand, there is 'THE STOCK' -- i.e., the broken stock price.

It rests in the same Bargain Bin as Dell Computer, a company selling undifferentiated offerings in a commoditized segment that quite literally shrinks by the day.

On the other, there is 'THE REAL COMPANY,' an innovating, selling, marketing, leverage and cash-generating machine that has now dropped almost $100 billion dollars in revenues and $22 billion dollars of profits in just the first two quarters of Apple's fiscal year.

That this engine has fattened the company's coffers to the tune of $145 billion dollars (another $12.5 billion added this quarter) does not satisfy.

That this harvest comes from six different multi-billion dollar product lines (iPhone, iPad, Mac, iPad, iTunes & Services, Accessories) manages little more than an acknowledging shrug.

That the company has repeatedly proven its ability to create massive new markets in a quasi-predictable, highly-levered fashion (now known simply as the iOS platform), yields but a yawn.

"Where's my divvy," bitch the disappointed investors, seemingly ignorant to the fact that not only have spirtual peers, Google and Amazon, never offered up a dividend, but they've never even let the topic so much as brush the top of the table.

"Apple has an identity crisis," utter the dumbest of the dumb media, blind to the power of Apple's unique position in the market as an integrated hardware, software, services, media, tools and marketplace solution provider.

Ever clear on their North Star - i.e., delivering great consumer experiences that change people's lives - Apple has neither changed their identity, nor lost their focus, as evidenced by the best customer satisfaction and customer loyalty ratings, and consistently, the industry's highest profit margins.

Know this. If it was even remotely easy to approximate the 'Apple Way,' we'd be talking about the multiple multi-billion dollar product lines that Apple's competitors have created; we'd be talking about the breakout success of the Apple Retail Store copycats; and we'd be talking about the multitudes of developer success stories that have dropped out of the Google, RIM or Microsoft mobile ecosystems.

We aren't, and it's not (easy).

It's with this fundamental schism between THE REAL COMPANY and The STOCK that I attempted to make sense of the takeaways from Apple's earnings call.

There are four conclusions that stood out to me:

Tim Cook wants Apple to be Liked by Investors in a way that Steve Jobs never did: In the call, Cook had an almost apologetic tone with respect to how Apple has failed to beat the guidance, growth and margins expected by analysts and media. In increasing the dividend and upping buybacks, the tone was more akin to "we're trying harder" than "get on the bus or get left in the dust." By contrast, even when Apple's stock was cratering into the $80's following the crush of the 2008 financial crisis, Jobs embodied a healthy irritation for the capriciousness of investors, and the ignorance of many analysts and the media. The truth here is that no good deed goes unpunished, and far from appreciating Apple's olive branch to investors, the narrative is likely to be spun as Cook's Apple is trying to buy time, and is in defensive mode. Me personally, I wanted a bit more "F-U," and a bit less, "we're sorry."
Margins will Remain Contracted for the Foreseeable Future: If there are two product-related narratives that stood out for me, they are: 1) iPad mini unleashed an absolute torrent of first-time tablet device buyers (personally, it's their best tablet device), and if the sacrifice is lower margins (relative to the larger iPad), it's worth the trade-off. If the tablet is the replacement device for many a 'job' that users previously hired PCs for -- as I believe it is -- then any way that Apple can capture this market share is a zero-sum type of win that they must secure. Here, Cook and Apple CFO Peter Oppenheimer were quite clear that Apple executed a similar strategy in winning the media player market with iPod, so what's past is prologue; and 2) iPhone 4/4S is the smartphone device that Apple is counting on to capture market share outside of the US with first-time smartphone buyers. Unsurprisingly, these devices may be where the highest volume comes from on iPhone (especially, until the next iPhone comes out), eroding margins in the process. The alternative is to give that ground to Android based devices, a calculus between market share, revenue, user experience and the bottom line that the company has repeatedly shown the acumen to manage through. Honestly, I am not even remotely concerned that they will find the right balance here.
The New Product Pipeline will Likely Remain Dry until Fall at the earliest: Given the extreme secrecy by which the company launches new products, and manages expectations around same, Cook spoke with a metaphorical bull-horn in flatly stating that new product **categories** and new services are not expected until this Fall and throughout 2014. Needless to say, the absence of new products combined with the absence of seasonal catalysts, explains why Apple's outlook for Q3 was a flat quarter, and why the quarter behind that may not be much better.
iOS Usage Rates are Staggering in their Differential relative to Competing Platforms: If the downside of the current Apple story is absence of true catalysts to carry it aloft to new heights, the upside is that iOS stands alone in generating 75 cents of every dollar of ecosystem commerce in the mobile universe. Simply put, Apple is paying developers $1 billion dollars in revenue share every quarter, iTunes is on a $16 billion dollar run rate, and the actual usage of these devices in terms of web traffic is of a different degree than the competition. Keep that in mind next time Google touts generic Android unit count numbers. Again, that's not to say that there aren't clear scenarios where Apple gets attacked on the margins, but their core differentators, and the depth of engagement and loyalty with users is unlikely to be threatened any time soon. That's the bottom line.

So, netting it out, should you Buy, Sell, or Do Nothing? And what will Apple stock do in the intervening months ahead?

This, unfortunately is a riddle without a clear answer, a stark reminder of the famous quote that the market can stay irrational far longer than most investors can remain solvent.

Related Posts:

Cry Babies: The Strange, Confusing Path of the Apple
Apple's North Star: Four Takeaways from Apple's Q4 Earnings Call
OMG, WTF is going on with Apple Stock
What is Apple Worth: The 'Gold Standard' Thesis
Get ready for the Apple + iPhone backlash

Mobile 'native' publishing: Why our concept of content must evolve in the post-PC era (O'Reilly @TOC)

2013-03-25T10:59:53-07:00

One reason that industry disruptions prove so vexing to market leaders is that disruptive waves simultaneously barrel through assumptions about customer needs, industry economics and operational best practices.

Consider the case of the motion picture business, an industry that was disrupted when the “talkie” — once derided as a costly gimmick — subsumed the silent picture in the 1920s.

The takeaway from the film industry’s transition is instructive. The talkie not only changed how movies were made and the economics of the business itself, but critically, it changed our concept of what a movie could be.

In doing so, it transformed the medium forever (The Speed of Sound by Scott Eyman is an excellent book on this topic).

Disrupted by digital

As we move toward a post-PC universe of 10 billion mobile devices, a similar disruption is playing out in the publishing business.

Print media is patient zero in the ongoing saga of “disrupted by digital,” an unstoppable force that has decimated one time toll road businesses like newspapers, and is threatening to squeeze out the last breaths of magazine and book publishers.

That this occurs at a time when physical bookstores are also under assault is hardly a coincidence given the tight links between publishers and bookstores on book distribution, discovery and monetization. The brutal reality is that when an industry is disrupted, the entire ecosystem feels the pain.

The rise of dynamic content services

So if publishing must evolve, what does this mean for publishers?

Most basically, it suggests that whereas static text and pictures define our current concept of publishing, in the mobile era, we need to think about what is being “published” as a native app that re-configures itself based upon the content being served. Logically, this type of system autonomously generates data.

This has significant ramifications for how such content is made, what it can do, and the underlying systems required for delivering and receiving the same.

Read the full piece at O'Reilly Tools of Change for Publishing by clicking HERE.

Related:

You say you want a revolution? It’s called post-PC computing (O'Reilly Radar)
Rebooting the Book: One iPad at a Time (O'Reilly Radar)
Anatomy of an eBook App: Lessons learned building a Top 20 eBook App (O'Reilly Radar)

Number Skills (Age 5+) is the latest app launched in 'Play and Learn with Wallace'

2013-03-18T11:12:04-07:00

Number Skills (Age 5+) is the latest app launched in the 'Play and Learn with Wallace' early learning series, and it is now available in the App Store.

This app teaches children the essentials for learning simple math with activities about adding and subtracting numbers between 1 and 10. It includes six different games - Problem Train, Card Problems, Button Numbers, Raining Numbers, Bus Math and Math Class.

Like all games in Play and Learn with Wallace, Number Skills integrates with our Personalized Profile and Rewards Chart system, so kids can feel great about their progress.

Also, the content in the apps loads in randomly so kids don't get bored.

When you purchase two or more apps, the apps can be Super Shuffled together, giving kids the benefit of a blended learning experience. Learning professionals will tell you that blended learning is one of the best ways for kids to learn rapidly and retain more deeply.

As always, the full-featured trial is FREE.

To find our more about the system, watch the video below, read my original post on the topic, or better yet, download the software on your iPad.

To celebrate the launch, Number Skills is $1.99 for a limited time only (it's usually $3.99).

The series was recently cited by Today's Parent Magazine as one of the coolest apps for kids.

Chatopic 2013 Book Series Announced

2013-03-12T12:14:54-07:00

Since 2003, Chatopic (which I co-founded with Steve Lee) has been a place where you can: A) read a great book; B) beat the topic into the ground at a meetup with a good group of people, and then; C) grab grub afterwards.

Our topics have ranged from Organized Religion, Animal Rights and Marketing, to Futurism, Philosophy and Design. Each Chatopic series is comprised of 6-9 books, chosen by popular vote, and we meet every eight weeks or so. If this sounds interesting to you, give me a holler.

Here is our latest series of books:

How Will You Measure Your Life - by Clayton M. Christensen (240 Pages)
Thinking, Fast and Slow - by Daniel Kahneman (511 Pages)
Makers: The New Industrial Revolution - by Chris Anderson (272 Pages)
Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking - by Susan Cain (300 Pages)
Drift: the Unmooring of American Military Power - by Rachael Maddow (288 Pages)
Design Thinking + A Whole New Mind - by Daniel Pink (288 Pages)
Food Fight: The Citizen's Guide to the Next Food and Farm Bill - by Daniel Imhoff (356 Pages)
Braintrust: What Neuroscience Tells Us about Morality - by Patricia Churchland (288 Pages)
Exploding the Phone: The Untold Story of the Teenagers and Outlaws who Hacked Ma Bell - by Phil Lapsley (416 Pages)

You can access any of the books by clicking the items labeled as 'CHATOPIC 2013 BOOK SERIES' on the side panel at the left.

Where do good ideas come from?

2013-02-26T18:55:32-08:00

There is a buddhist axiom, 'First Thought, Best Thought' that speaks to the power of spontaneity and intuition.

When presented with conflicting internal (or inter-personal) narratives, I will always default to first thought, best thought thinking.

But default, is not destiny. Sometimes the first thought isn't the best thought.

It may be ill-advised. It may be muddy and unclear. It may confuse tail with dog. Or any number of in-between possibilities.

I thought about this today in talking with a friend, an accomplished artist and author who has sold millions of titles from original work that he has created.

The impetus was a project that looked at the onset like a really good idea...after first thought...second thought...and even third thought.

But upon careful reflection, challenged by a key litmus test question, my friend acknowledged that that one unspoken element had stuck in his craw.

He was apologetic, now finding himself at a cross-roads when heretofore, he had only seen an open road ahead.

I, on the other hand, was non-plussed.

I write a ton, have started a bunch of companies, and launched many projects, big and small, so I know how the creative process goes.

Sometimes these things drop from the heavens, a gift from the gods.

Other times, it's grope, ship the idea, tweak, iterate, finesse, re-think, re-work and then polish.

Still others, it's bury in an unmarked grave.

We can't always know when ideas are good. But unless we are willing to take that first step, we're simply standing still.

Related:

The 3 S's of a Good Partner: Smart, Strategically Aligned, Skin in the Game

2013-02-15T13:19:37-08:00

Effective partnering strategy is one of the areas that many businesses struggle with, especially startups.

Specifically, companies gravitate between two extremes. One is the wasted cycles of 'press release' partners, where the deliverable is a press release full of platitudes, but nothing tied towards product or push (i.e., growing sales or distribution).

Two is the realm where material resources are committed in the form of product development or marketing spend where the outcome goals are simply nebulous.

For startups, the dilemma of when and how to partner is doubly confusing, as entrepreneurs fight daily the often conflicting challenges of: A) Maintaining the optics of forward progress; and B) Managing the harsh truth that nothing is truly free.

Simply put, every commitment is an offset of an already precious recource, be it time, reputation or dollars.

So how to decide when a prospective partner is worth the investment of real engagement and/or dollars?

My experience has been that when the following three assertions are true, a bonafide partnership has the elements to take root.

They're Smart: In the universe of customers, partners and investors, there are smart partners, who make you better by asking the right questions, pushing the right outcomes, and opening your eyes to the big picture; and those that don't. To be clear, this isn't about IQ; it's about Contextual Intelligence.
They're Strategically Aligned: Strategy is all about where you want to get to at the end of the day. Is the partner striving to get to a place that you specifically want to go? Are they taking complementary vehicles to get there?
They have Skin in the Game: There is a great axiom about chickens and pigs. In terms of putting food on the table, both the chicken and the pig can get the job done. But there is a fundamental difference in their level of commitment. The chicken (hen) is merely engaged when it lays an egg. But the pig is truly committed, as it has real skin in the game in serving up its bacon. Moral of the story? Look for partners with real skin in the game. They are less likely to go AWOL or randomly change directions on you at the most inopportune times.

Related:

Picture Puzzles is the next app in the 'Play and Learn with Wallace' Series

2013-02-11T13:06:00-08:00

Picture Puzzles is the latest app in the 'Play and Learn with Wallace' early learning series of apps. It joins existing apps, Counting Fun, My First App and First Spelling.

It features six different puzzle games that help develop a child's creative skills, test their visual sense and build spatial awareness.

The games in Picture Puzzles are:

Follow the Lines: Ten different mini-games where a child must navigate a series of dots to complete the game
Noisy Zoo: Match the picture to the animal sound (eight different variations)
Puzzle Pieces: Touch the puzzle piece that completes the puzzle (four different puzzles)
Shadow Shapes: Find the shadowed object that matches the picture (15 different variations)
Spot the Dot: Identify the falling dot that matches the requested color (eight different variations)
Matching Twins: Find the matching twins hidden behind the cards (20 different variations)

Like all games in Play and Learn with Wallace, Picture Puzzles integrates with our Personalized Profile and Rewards Chart system, so kids can feel great about their progress.

Also, the content in the apps loads in randomly so kids don't get bored.

When you purchase two or more apps, the apps can be Super Shuffled together, giving kids the benefit of a blended learning experience. Learning professionals will tell you that blended learning is one of the best ways for kids to learn rapidly and retain more deeply.

As always, the full-featured trial is FREE.

To find our more about the system, watch the above video, read my original post on the topic, or better yet, download the software on your iPad.

To celebrate the launch, Picture Puzzles is 99 cents for a limited time only (it's usually $3.99).

Picture Puzzles Screen Shots

PCs, Media Devices and Mobile Devices: Before and After Apple

2013-02-05T11:03:37-08:00

If there is a truism about Apple's approach to innovation, it is this.

They find segments for which the existing solution is complex and kludgy, and make it simple and unified.

In doing so, they bring it to the mainstream.

There is nothing elitist in this approach. Quite the opposite.

Most would concur that after Apple, access to computers, music, and mobile computing was more broadly accessible, not less.

For every door they close in the open vs. closed debate, they open ten others. Most would concur that both the mobile web is better for the platform that Apple created, and the native app ecosystem is richer for it.

Haters are gonna hate, and it's in our nature to tire of winners winning all of the time.

But let's not confuse the essential truth of what Apple has built and continues to build.

We need more companies like Apple, not less, and we should celebrate their success, not pillory it.

Related:

Cry Babies: The Strange, Confusing Path of the Apple Investor
OMG, WTF is going on with Apple Stock
What is Apple Worth: The 'Gold Standard' Thesis

It's All About Them: Understanding Selfish Narratives

2013-01-29T11:46:04-08:00

I was talking with a friend the other day about their career aspirations. To their credit, they were REALLY clear about their bulls-eye, what they are looking for and why, which is great. I am an advocate of casting one's net narrowly and specifically, something I call a "narrow net" strategy.

But one thing that I noticed as my friend was talking was how little of their peronal narrative was focused on the selfish goals of the company that would hire them.

This underscores a fairly common truth that many struggle with. We love to hear ourselves talk - especially about ourselves. This explains why most of us are great self advocates.

But, here's the rub. Other people are focused on THEIR aspirations and their narratives.

Hence, understanding this essential truth is often the difference between getting the:

Sale
Job
Girl (or Guy)

And not.

My advice then is this. Work backwards from the "selfish narrative" of your audience, be it prospective employer, customer, new hire, publicity target or love interest.

Ask yourself: what are the selfish narratives that speak to them most clearly, compellingly and why?

What kind of story can you tell that credibly expresses that that's you?

After all, empathy and understanding are not just about being good. They are also about getting the outcomes that you want.

Related:

Career Path: The Narrow Net Strategy
Instagram, Kodak and the Selfish GeneUnder

Cry Babies: The Strange, Confusing Path of the Apple Investor

2013-01-23T17:25:22-08:00

"GODDAMNIT, APPLE IS DOOMED!! Wait… that’s profit? Carry on." - Jim Dalrymple

Let me preface my comments by saying that I am LONG Apple, so I am not real happy at the moment.

Consider, a company that:

Routinely beats its own projections, generating more revenue ($54B) in a quarter than Google generates in a year. (Side note: fuck the analysts' projections - if they knew shit, they would have anticipated the collapse of DotCom, the 2008 financial crisis, etc.)
Is consistently, mind-numbingly profitable, yielding outsized profits that have fattened their cash hoard to $137 billion dollars. You'd have to look to the gas & oil industry to find another company that is comparably profitable.
Has not one multi-billion dollar line of business, but six of them (iPhone, iPad, Mac, iPod, iTunes, Accessories), and all of these lines of businesses feed off of a common ecosystem, creating leverage, lock-in, loyalty and all sorts of halo effects. In fact, the company sold over 75 million iOS devices in this most recent quarter.
Is unequaled in terms of having an R&D engine for creating new products that generate massive new revenue sources -- not just defensive moats.
Has cracked the code to selling in China ($7B in most recent quarter; 60% year-over-year growth), something few other American companies have done.
Despite a reputation for secrecy (with new product launches - duh), sets the bar for transparency with investors, breaking out minutiae on product lines, growth rates, ASPs, sales channels, same store numbers, etc. Contrast this with comparable growth companies, like Amazon, Google and Netflix, where the details are much more surface level.

Apple Revenue by Product and Operating Segments

Thus, it is with little surprise that Apple is:

Getting tarred and feathered after hours, down $52, or 10%. As someone put so eloquently on twitter, "I never thought I would see "$54 Billion" and "light on revenues" in the same headline.
Trading at a P/E of 10.4, and excluding cash, a P/E of 7.1. By contrast, Amazon is up over 20% following a report of a LOSS in their most recent quarter, and investors loved Google's most recent revenue miss (the stock shot up 5%). Oh by the way, neither Google nor Amazon pay dividends, something to keep in mind when you hear an investor lamenting that Apple should increase their dividend.

Stock Performance: Apple vs. Amazon vs. Google

Let me net it out for you

To say that investors are idiots, really is an unfair dig at idiots.

The more nuanced truth is that we tire of winners and root for their demise. We trust so-called experts, even when all of the data suggests that not only are they clueless but hopelessly conflicted as well.

And most disappointingly, we don't reward transparency and being treated like adults when it comes to investing.

We respond best when we are teased, ignored or treated like children.

For Apple, the hard truth on this one is to:

A) Be comfortable with the bottom line that rumors and outright lies nothwithstanding (I am talking about you, iPhone 5 rumor-mongers), there is only Apple when it comes to products, customers and profits. Everyone else is in the "not exactly" bucket;

B) Give up the game of sandbagging and then beating earnings, and focus investors on a real earnings range (as they did in this call) so clueless analysts and the media that lap up their dog vomit, can't harm them;

C) Embrace the Jeff Bezos ethos about being willing to be misunderstood for long periods of time, and wear that as a badge of honor with investors.

If you are Tim Cook, and company, you sleep well knowing that your North Star is as bright as ever.

But, at the same time, knowing how many investors are hysterically blind to the potent lights emitted by that star, must sting a little, no?

UPDATE:

Jim Dalrymple, who I quoted in the entry to this piece, writes today, "How the hell does this happen? Amazon misses its earnings, income fell, sales missed Wall Street consensus and… the stock price goes up 6 percent.Apple sells a gazillion of everything, reports record revenue and profit, and its stock falls."

Related:

OMG, WTF is going on with Apple Stock
What is Apple Worth: The 'Gold Standard' Thesis
Get ready for the Apple + iPhone backlash
Apple's North Star: Four Takeaways from Apple's Q4 Earnings Call

Introducing Play and Learn with Wallace

2013-01-15T18:37:04-08:00

This short video is a superb encapsulation of what I have been working on for the past year with the good folks at Macmillan Children's Publishing, and their much beloved imprint, Priddy Books.

If you don't know them by name, Priddy is the maker of over 500 books, including First Words, ranked by Scholastic as one of the 100 Greatest Books for Kids. They have sold over 100M titles over the past decade so they really understand the early learning segment.

Working around a model known as co-creation, we called upon our own learnings from building dozens of ebooks, apps and games at Unicorn Labs, combined those learnings with the ethos and IP of Priddy, and a built that into a series of early learning apps.

These apps are delightfully fun for kids, to be sure, but in the process of play, kids develop cognitive, creative, spelling, math and drawing skills.

What's unique about the approach is that while each app can be used separately, the apps can also be "super-shuffled," or mixed together dynamically, to provide what is known as blended learning, a proven methodology that helps children learn more rapidly and more deeply.

I will write more about the system that underlies 'Play and Learn,' but in the interim, I would encourage you to watch the video, and download the app, which is free.

New titles in the series will be rolling out monthly. In fact, here's a teaser about our next title, Picture Puzzles, which launches at the end of the month.

Related:

Rebooting the Book (One iPad at a Time)
Kirkus Reviews gives Spot the Dot a Kirkus Star as a Book of Remarkable Merit

Why the mobile web vs. mobile apps debate is a false dichotomy (GigaOM)

2012-12-20T11:26:32-08:00

The mobile web versus mobile native “grudge match” rages on, with over 300 comments to Super VC Fred Wilson’s post on whether now is the time to invest in mobile web apps (and services) over mobile native ones.

But the arguments presented in favor of the mobile web over mobile native represent a false dichotomy. Simply put, there is no universal truth in the mobile web vs. mobile native debate, and no “one right way,” despite what the pontificators would have you believe.

The argument in favor of mobile web goes like this: The web is open, ubiquitous, requires no special software, is globally searchable and algorithmically discoverable. As such, it is agile, extensible and readily manageable. Plus, there are lots of proven models for development, discovery, distribution and monetization. And, of course, mobile web development offers a higher degree of symmetry to PC browser-based web development than mobile native app development does.

The argument is favor of mobile native goes like this: There are over 400 million iOS devices and over 500 million Android devices, representing almost 1 billion devices worldwide. In the case of iOS, Apple has built a well-managed development, distribution and monetization platform that has yielded tremendous innovation and user engagement in areas ranging from photography to gaming, social networking, entertainment, education, music and other rich media.

On some level, the argument comes down to “good enough” and “universal” vs. the “richest possible experience” on the device type that is subsuming the PC.

Read the full article at GigaOM.

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