In the first part of this article ‘A Picture’s Worth a Thousand Words – stock photography & the shifting market‘ we looked at the challenges facing the stock photography market. In this second instalment we’ll take a quick look at the approaches that some of the stock photography agencies are taking to adjust the settings…
‘A picture’s worth a thousand words’, or so the saying goes. It’s a phrase that is rumoured to have come from an ancient Chinese proverb and which became more prevalent in the 20th Century. Whilst we’ve grown up used to seeing illustrated books, it’s a concept that has become even more powerful in the digital…
Following on from my recent article on the challenges in the broadcast media space, it was interesting to see the data released by Nielsen SoundScan relating to music consumption trends. It showed that in the first half of the year there’s been an almost 12% drop in digital album sales, alongside a 13% drop in…
One industry that isn’t a stranger to commercial innovation is the music industry. Taking recording formats as an example, since the late 19th century there have been several waves of advancement, including: – Phonograph cylinder (1888-1920’s) – Vinyl (1920’s – early 1990s ) – Cassettes (Late 1970’s – early 2000’s) – CD’s (1982 – )…
One of the key battlegrounds between Google and Apple over the next few months will be in the area of music streaming. The companies are likely to take subtly different approaches in terms of service offering and business model. Google’s recently launched ‘Play Music All Access’ is a subscription based service similar to Spotify and…
Back in October 2012 I wrote an article titled “Software by the Month – A better proposition than your gym membership?” in which I highlighted the increasing trend towards subscription based business models in terms of software licensing. In the article I investigated the opportunities for software publishers and users alike that the model could open…
One of the great examples of recent time that is used when people talk about innovation is the iPhone, however, in recent times the iPhone has been under stiff competition from other handset manufacturers and platform providers. It is widely acknowledged that the last iPhone didn’t really wow the world in the way that previous…
The Ubiquity of Apps – An Opportunity in Education (via innov8-Ed) It’s difficult to think about a world without apps, however, it is only five years since the launch of the iTunes App Store. In this time apps have become ubiquitous and found across all platforms and not just the Apple iOS. Over the past…
I recently wrote an article on the investigation by the UK telecoms regulator of mobile phone contracts, only a day later it was publicised that the Office of Fair Trading (OFT) is going to be looking at free web and phone games aimed at children and that charge for extras through in game purchases. I…
Almost every organisation has somewhere in its values a statement that equates to “people are our greatest asset” yet from experience, many employees read such a statement with cynicism and many employers don’t truly mean it. Interestingly both are probably right in their views of such a sweeping statement, yet a good match between employees and employer…