The BBC Dragons Den has returned to our screens for a new series and The 3G Dating Agency has made a little history by being the first ever mobile content service to feature. In this weeks episode viewers could see a quick glimpse of me heading in to pitch the dragons – although to see my time in the den you’ll have to wait until 9pm on the 15th August!
View the entire 21st July programme here at the BBC website in which i briefly appear (as pictured at 43.37) on my way into the den!
Reuters reports today that the European Union’s consumer chief Meglena Kuneva has launched a crackdown on websites offering mobile phone services such as ringtones after a probe found most were ripping people off, notably teenagers.
Scams uncovered included:
- unclear price information where prices were incomplete, did not include taxes, or where customers were unaware that they were signing up to a subscription.
- large numbers of websites did not provide some of the required contact information about the trader.
- “hidden charges” where key information was hidden in very small print or hard to find on a website or the word “free” was used to mislead consumers into a long-term contract.
The investigation into 500 websites providing ringtones, wallpapers, news feeds or videogames worth hundreds of millions of euros found that 80 percent were “misleading” consumers.
The 3G Dating Agency is very concerned by the effects these scammers are having on consumer perception of mobile service providers. We ONLY offer prepayment and NEVER enlist customers into subscriptions or bill to their mobile phone bill.
Ultimately we’re glad to see the naming and shaming and hope the punishments of hefty fines and/or closure of sites are enforced.
Companies who were named and shamed included Jamba, VeriSign, Vodafone, Aspiro, Wiking Mobile. I only wish i had the whole list to post here!
This week saw a big UGC story hit the headlines.
Ever since YouTube was sold to Google the legal sharks have been circling to file damages as a result of the huge amount of content that is being illegally distributed.
Viacom have led these efforts and this week it appears they’re having success with their $1 Billion lawsuit – see the legal document at the Wired Blog. Google have been ordered to share with Viacom full details on all of YouTube user’ IP addresses and usernames plus the history of videos they’ve watched.
Google has also been ordered to hand over information on all videos that have been removed from YouTube along with the IP address and the username of the person who uploaded them.
Makes me wonder a few things:
> Why is Google keeping all this information in an user identifiable format?
> Why is personally identifiable information important to proving Viacom’ claim that YouTube is a hotbed of priated video content? Surely aggregate counts of views and users would be enough to prove this case?
> How many users will be directly prosecuted by Viacom as a result of this illegal uploading?
> Why does Viacom seem unconcerned with consumer backlash to their brands for this individual privacy infringement?
This also has an implication to an interesting fact I discovered this week at the Mobile Communities & UGC Conference I was speaking at in Amsterdam. 80% of ALL content uploaded to SeeMeTV (a premium mobile video site that charges customers to upload content) is deleted instead of being posted because it is “inappropriate”.
It seems certain that user generated content sites need a completely new approach.
This week I was in the beautiful city of Amsterdam speaking at Informa’s inaugural Mobile Social & UGC Conference. The event was very well attended and there was lots of evidence that communities of all shapes and sizes are going mobile!
I spoke about how brands should go about engagement with communities and used our recent work with Phones 4U to illustrate how it can add value to the user experience.
Check out the Conference website to see the full list of speakers and download the presentations.
