With coming Postal Service Changes, Are You Prepared?

Expected reduction in services will impact small businesses

With the numerous reports of problems at the US Postal Service, we can expect to see changes which are going to impact just about everyone in the US. There are probably going to be closures of distribution centers, closer of some local post offices and first class mail taking longer to be delivered. If you rely on the US Postal Service for sending and receiving mail, now is the time to take a hard look at what other options you may have. With obvious delays in getting mail delivered, alternatives may make you more efficient.

The US Postal Service has a monopoly for mail delivery, but there are some other alternatives, such as UPS or FedEx. These are obviously more expense than what the post office provides, but you are pretty much assured that it will arrive by a specific time. With delays by the post office, that may longer be the case. And for your small business, relying solely on them is going to make it more difficult in the future. You need to move as much of your business dealings as possible to electronic transaction instead of paper based involving US Mail services.

Paying your personal bills online through your bank is very common place now and this is a free service being provided by them. You are already comfortable working with email and if you are reading this, you are comfortable accessing the web. Now is the time to look atlternatives to reduce your reliance on the post office. Paying your business bills electronically is the first place you should start. While not everyone can receive electronic payments, if they have a bank account, there is a way to move money around.

PayPal is another alternative which a growing number of businesses are using to receive and send payments. There are other like services if you do not want to take advantage of the services of your bank. All of these are related to receiving payments or sending payments. You should move to using email to communicate with clients when sending them invoices for payments and not US Mail.

If you are using US Mail to advertise your business in mailers or through other services, now is the time to look at alternatives. There is Google Places for instance which you can use to show your business locally in Google searches for like services. You can advertise through online services, such as Google’s AdSense. There are varying costs and methods on how that process works. If you are interested, there are a number of resources on the web. You can also create mailing lists just like some have done years in the past collecting addresses. Instead you are collecting email addresses. You can then send out emails to promote your business.

Obviously, having a web site to represent your business is key to your strategy. People need to be able to find your business. With the move to mobile devices and searching for things on those devices, you need to make sure you consider making your web site readable by mobile devices. In a few more years, searching on mobile devices is going to exceed searches by computers. You must be prepared for that.

With changing technology, things are changing from what has been done from over 10 years ago. And it is the continuing changing of technology that you must keep up with. UPS, FedEx and others will still be around to deliver packages to destination, but your concern should be methods to reduce your dependence on US Mail as its future is uncertain. You can expect to see costs increase and service levels decreased. As a business owner, now is the time to reevaluate how your business is using technology and how you might use more of it.

Patent Infringement Cases In The news

Battles between Samsung and Apple around the world.

It seems that this year has been taken up with news of patent infringement cases between Apple and Samsung around the world. And things do not look like they are going to be letting up anytime soon. These battles have been going on between the two at the same time they are doing business with each other. Samsung supplies chips to Apple for their popular mobile devices. And yet they have chosen to attack each other over patents and patent infringements around the globe. Most of this can be seen because of Samsung’s growth in mobile devices which is threatening Apple.

Last week, there were a number of things going on between these two. One was a decision by a court in the Netherlands where they ruled that Apple infringed on a 3G patent held by Samsung. Samsung only got the ruling on 1 of 4 patents which they were claiming Apple had infringed on. They had hoped for much more than that. This ruling is in opposition to one in Germany last March where the court there ruled that Apple did not infringe on the exact same patent. How this difference gets worked out is unknown.

The big case between Apple and Samsung is the one in Northern California which is currently scheduled to be heard by a jury on July 30th. The judge in the case, Judge Koh, has restricted the number of exhibits by each party to 125 exhibits which can be presented in court. She has also restricted each party to no more than 25 hours of arguments before the court. It is hoped that this will force both parties to focus on the strengths of their case and not burden the court with unnecessary information. This particular case, when decided, will bear heavily on settlement talks between the two companies. All of this comes after court mandated settlement discussions failed.

Patent infringement cases have become problematic and are now being seen as a way to stop or slow your competition. In the case of Apple, Samsung’s successes are threatening Apple’s product lines. This is especially true with recent Samsung products, such as the Galaxy S3. At some point, the way that patent infringement cases are handled is going to have to change as it ties up the courts and the decisions are slow to come.

In the end, these cost consumers as the legal costs are passed on to consumers in the form of higher prices.

US Postal Service Losses Threaten Service Levels

Mail deliveries may no longer occur in a timely manner

We have been hearing for the past few years about the financial troubles with the US Postal Service and the continuing operating losses with no end in sight. Current plans are talking about reducing the losses, but not doing anything to move to profitability. Businesses can only survive for a few years with mounting losses such as what is being reported by the Postal Service. The 4th quarter loss was reported as $3.3 billion with no signs of being corrected.

There have been talks about closing some distribution centers and local post offices which will result in delays. People get up in arms and say that the Post Office cannot do that as they must deliver the mail as it is currently being done. Unions complain loudly as it will result in a loss of members. But, here we are in the middle of the year and we still do not have concrete solutions to implement. All of this is because the Post Office is being over seen by Congress. And it is precisely that oversight which makes it all but impossible for them to make the adjustments to the changing technologies which are impacting their future.

There is talk of changing how first class mail is being delivered today to add a day or two to the time to get a letter delivered. But the bureaucracy surrounding the Postal Service means that nothing is going to get decided quickly on this. And that is exactly where the problem is. How can any business turn around when they have to answer to an authority which does not decide pretty much anything in a timely manner?

For the Post Office to survive in these changing times, it is going to require freedom from the constraints that they are currently under. If closing distribution centers is going to save them money to get closer to profitability, then they need to do that and do it now. If closing local post offices is necessary because there are too many in an area and are not being utilized, then close those locations. The post office is a business which enjoys a monopoly and for that business to survive, it needs to operate as a business and make decisions for their survival.

Changing technology has created a declining business model and will continue to decline without change. Email has replaced letters. Bills being delivered to the home and paid by mail are being replaced by “Bill Pay”. And those are going to continue to increase while the Post Office continues to decline.

If they are not given the freedom to make the needed changes, then Congress is going to have to provide funding for the post office to prop them up so they can continue operating to serve the US population. Raising rates is an alternative, but the legislative requirements to get one are far too cumbersome for any business. Competition from the likes of UPS and FedEx make it even more challenging for the Postal Service.

It is time for radical changes and there is talk of completely reorganizing the Postal Service which would be a good thing. But, if it involves legislative oversight by Congress, it will take years to complete and will probably not meet the needs for the long term outlook for the service.

The Postal Service needs to have a radical overhaul proposed and completed by the end of the year. Anything else is going to result in continued losses and rising deficits.

Microsoft Creates Fragmentation For Windows Phone 7

Microsoft joins Google and Apple with fragmentation.

Microsoft has long been known as a company who continues to support older equipment with their OS software. They have done that for many years with their backward compatible phrase which meant that the latest version of the OS would work with your computer. Even now as they start to have hardware requirements which require you to make sure that your computer is compatible, they did not leave people hanging. That is until it came to announcing the latest version of the Windows Phone OS. And with that, they are announcing that there is no upgrade path for Windows Phone 7 owners.

What this all means is that only new hardware will be able to support Windows Phone 8. Any phone which is sold with Windows Phone 7 is stuck with that version and has no hope of upgrading to the latest OS from Microsoft which is coming this year. That is horrible news for those who have purchased their phone in the last 6 months. Even Google with their Android OS has provided an upgrade path to Ice Cream Sandwich for most of the phones recently purchased. Apple, who does things much better than Google, supports back to the iPhone 3GS with the latest version of iOS.

While we do expect to see some fragmentation over time where some owners are able to upgrade their smart phone to the latest OS and others purchase a new phone which contains the latest OS, we have not seen this kind of a situation quite like this. It is unlike Microsoft to deliver horrible news to those who have recently purchased a Windows Phone OS mobile device.

That is unless you look at Nokia who has abandoned their Symbian OS to partner with Microsoft and their Windows Phone 7. Even those who have purchased the recent Nokia handsets are out of luck for Windows Phone 8 and do not have an upgrade path. What they will get is a Windows Phone 7.8 version which is supposed to have a closer look and feel to Windows Phone 8. Not much consolation for them.

It is very unlike Microsoft to draw a line in the sand like this and create this kind of fragmentation which Google has been taking heat over for a long time. If this is the "New" Microsoft, they are going to be doing similar things in the future which may leave some people hanging when Microsoft comes out with new versions of their software.

TecTile Tags May Be QR Code Alternative For NFC phones

TecTiles can do far more than QR Codes

With the expected proliferation of NFC enabled phones this year and much wider adoption next year, Samsung has released TecTiles. What are TecTiles, you might ask. The simple answer is that they are small squares (TecTile Tags) which can be programmed to perform tasks on a smart phone when they are read by an NFC enabled phone. They contain a small chip which can be programmed to perform a function, such as opening your mobile browser and taking you to a web site. And it is on that simplicity that they threaten the existing usage of QR Codes. QR Codes have been around for a few years and are just now starting to see a growing usage. With Samsung's TecTiles, the future for QR Codes may well be threatened.

Samsung has chosen to include the feature on the Galaxy S3 when they ship here in the US. Other NFC enabled phones will be able to download an app (TecTile) to handle the process when an NFC phone clicks on the TecTile. For those NFC enabled phones, you can go out to Google Play and download the TecTile app when Samsung puts it up.

For QR Codes, this is going to present a growing problem. While NFC enable devices are few right now, QR Codes are not threatened. But as they expand, the usage of TecTiles, and their competitors, is going to grow. And it is the simplicity of the TecTiles which poses the biggest threat to QR Codes and their future. With QR Codes, you have to scan the QR Code whcih requires you to take a picture of the QR Code and then it is read and takes you to the web site embedded in the QR Code.

For TecTiles, you do not have to go to the trouble of taking a picture. You only have to tap the TecTile with your NFC enabled smart phone and the NFC process takes over and processes the commands embedded in the TecTile. That removes the need to take a picture which may see QR Codes lose their growing usage. The growth of TecTiles is not currently understood as it is not in use, but based on what we are seeing from Samsung and various reports, this is going to be huge. It is the flexibility of them which is going to create interest and usage.

The TecTiles are programmable to do just about anything beyond taking you to a mobile web site. They can be programmed to do things like take you to Facebook and log you on. But those are specific to an individual phone. Since these can be reprogrammed, you can reuse them over and over. You can also lock them so that they cannot be reprogrammed. For technology, these could be great for things like checking in to a technology conference. The variations on what they can do almost seems unlimited.

One area where TecTiles are not going to take over is in public where QR Codes are used today. A TecTile contains a chip which can be damaged easily where a QR Code is just a picture. There is no technology embedded in it. And it is that simplicity for QR Codes which may have them survive in many situations. Things like movie posters are not going to benefit from TecTiles, but QR Codes can be used for that. The reality looks like QR Codes are going to be around, but potentially a lessor growth than was expected a few months ago. We are going to have need for both of these communication mechanisms for the future.

Square Credit Card Processor Sees Significant Growth

Mobile credit card payment provider sees significant growth

If you are a small business owner and have not heard of Square, you probably need to look into this company. The are reporting a milestone of 2 million people who are using their services to accept credit card payments from customers. If you are a small business who is mobile this is a great idea for you. Even if you have a store front, Square can get you up and running to accept credit card payments in a matter of minutes. Then they will send you, for free, one of their square credit card readers for your business. It is that simple.

The "dongle" device plugs into your iPhone, iPad or Android mobile device to handle your credit card transactions. I have talked about the value of mobile payments for small business owners and with their recent news, they are continuing to show growth for a much simpler way to accept payments. In the most recent information, Square has doubled their clients in 6 months and that is showing just how popular they are becoming. The current estimates of the volume of transactions has them processing at $2 billion per year. That is a lot of money flowing through the Square clients and being processed.

While they take 2.75% of each transaction, the ability to set up your account quickly and the freedom of movement with their square device makes it well worth using. For your small business, it is the ease of use which brings value and is something new for most people to be seeing. At the moment, there is not a lot of competition in mobile credit card handling and Square has now positioned themselves as the leader in that area.

And with the recent growth, they are now starting to hire some formidable executives to round out their team. Their most recent addition is Sarah Friar from Salesforce to be the companies CFO. And there will be others in the next few months given the rapid growth they are seeing. As the economy continues to recovery, there will be more growth for mobile credit card handling.

You can head over to the Square website and take a look at what they offer.

QR Codes Being Used On Trucks For Payments

Expanding use of QR Codes for making payments for items

Things are continuing to evolve for QR Codes as their use migrates into other areas for usage beyond some of the original intent for QR Codes. The usage as a means of advertising and promoting a product are moving beyond that to now becoming mainstream to handle just about any other option one can think of. The idea of using a QR Code as a payment mechanism is not something which might come to mind, but that is exactly what has evolved from the funny looking square boxes.

We have seen increasing acceptance around the world, particularly in Asia where they embrace technology far faster than we do here in the US. But now, that acceptance of using QR Codes to purchase items and even have them delivered to your home is on the rise. One of those companies offering the ability to make your purchase via a QR Code is LevelUp.com who is providing services to mobile device users.

The process is fairly simple and requires that both the customer and the business owner to use the LevelUp services to complete the transaction. The process is pretty straight forward. You download the app to your Android or iOS mobile phone and then link a credit or debit card to it. You then can pay for purchases at mobile trucks by having them scan the QR Code which is displayed on your smart phone. You can even get notification when you are in the area of a food truck that accepts the QR Code payments.

In another example, Procter and Gamble (P&G) have created mobile trucks called "@PGMobile Trucks" where you can purchase products using QR Codes. This is a test project between Walmart and P&G to see how readily consumers are to accept purchasing products and having them shipped to your home from roving trucks in New York City. Each product item, which is shown on the outside of the truck, has QR Code associated with it. You can scan the QR Codes to collect the items you want to purchase and then check out. If you purchase at least $45 worth of products, there is no delivery charge to have them delivered to your home. Pretty good deal.

And there is even more. PayDragon is another company which is handling the food trucks in Los Angeles with the use of QR Codes. For those food trucks which sign up with PayDagon, they can offer their customers the ability to order their food by scanning a QR Code to make their selections. This lets them skip the lines to order and they can also pay for their food at the same time as placing the order. This moves them to the pick up window and bypasses the typical waits to place an order.

QR Code usage is catching on and numbers are starting to come out for demographics. In the 25 to 34 age group, they have the highest scanning rate using QR Codes. That age group is also the same one which is purchasing and using smart phones in a variety of ways, including QR Codes to make purchases. The growth for QR Codes is going to continue to grow and at the moment it is growing far faster than most people are aware of.

A Mobio study shows that QR codes usage is growing at an exponential rate with an over 4,500 percent increase in Quick Response code usage since December of 2011.

We expect to see these kinds of partnerships continue because of the huge profits which can be made by the companies which are accepting QR Codes as a method to make payments. The whole are of mobile wallet is going to be exploding this year and continuing into next year as business see the growing acceptance of people making purchases with their smart phones.

QR Codes Continuing Expansion To All Age Groups

Recent campaign targets game players with mobile devices

The primary purpose of QR Codes is to encourage people to scan the code and take them to a mobile web site where they are rewarded with something of value. That something could be useful information, a special price on a product, coupons, insider information about future products or even a game. In the case of the QR Code here, the person who scanned it in is taken a site where they are able to then download a game associated with the Madagascar 3 movie which came out last week.

This is something new because it is going after a younger audience which will be seeing the movie. The Dole QR Code site shows you a picture of what a mobile device would see and the ability to download a game which is targeting those who either have seen the movie or are likely to see the movie. Since people of younger ages are a growing segment of mobile devices, this make good sense to us QR Codes with a group which feels comfortable with scanning them and going to a mobile web site.

There is a growing use of QR Codes associated with the movie going public. Another one spotted is associated with Regal Cinemas where they have you like them on Facebook and you can enter your mobile phone number and they will send you a QR Code. When you show that QR Code at the concession stand, you will get a discount of some kind. The most recent one is for a $2 Zap Pack.

Last year, they were using QR Codes to show movie trailers exclusively to those who scanned the QR Codes on movie posters. This was going after a teenager/young adult market with what they were presenting in that situation. As you can see, there are various ways of utilizing QR Codes and what has been described here is focused on the movie industry.

The use of QR Codes associated with movies has been going on since at least 2009 and has been steadily increasing and studios find that they can target their markets much better than standard methods of advertising over the past 20 years. QR Codes and mobile devices are going to continue to grow in their usage mainly because of the interest being shown by the public.

Watch for QR Codes the next time you are out and looking at posters for movies. You may be surprised by what you see. Take the time to scan the QR Code with your smart phone and see what you get by doing so. You might just find something of real value for yourself.

Password Strategies Being Improved On Sites

To stay ahead of hackers, security strategies must continue to improve

We have been talking about making sure that you take responsibility for your passwords for online accounts because you are the last line of defense against hackers. It is important to make sure that you do not duplicate the same passwords across online accounts because if they get your password on one account, they now have an advantage to gain access to another online account. But, with all the recent news of sites being hacked and files of passwords being taken, it causes one to be concerned as to what is being done to protect our online information beyond your having a unique and complex password to protect your online information. So, what are the companies doing to protect my password further than they are currently doing?

With the recent hacking of LinkedIn and eHarmony, exactly what are sites doing to protect our passwords from being taken and then used against us? Fortunately, there are things which can be done in this effort by companies. There are probably a few sites out there which continue to store a password in clear text. That is where it is stored in a database which if you could see it, would look exactly like you type it in. That is the worst situation, but not to fear as reputable sites are way beyond that. Just about every site on the web today is employing some form of hashing.

The idea of hashing is to combine the password with some other value (hash value) and come up with a fixed length value which is stored in the database. When you log on, the password you entered is combined with the hash and then compared with what is in the database. If they match, you are given access. The hash value is stored in code and not accessible by hackers. If hackers are able to get to the hashed password, they are going to have to figure out the hash value to unlock the password value. This has worked great for years, but as computer equipment gets faster and the hackers learn new skills, this method needs to be enhanced to protect us further.

With secure SSL (HTTPS) logons, we stop hackers from grabbing things from the Internet and using them. So hackers have to resort to hacking, either your local device or the servers where the passwords are stored. One the changes to the password storage is the use of encryption to protect your password further. This is accomplished by applying a private key to the password and changing every value in the file based on the private key. There are a number of variations of this, but you have to have the key to unencrypt the password to then be able to begin the validation process of authentication.

With the recent hacking of LinkedIn, they are working on new strategies for protecting passwords for their users. This includes a new technology called Salted Passwords. This one looks to hold the most promise for web sites to protect passwords from being stolen and then used. If you can make a stolen password from a site's database virtually unusable, you have protected your site's users and that is key. Notice that I said "virtually". At this point in the world, there is nothing which is 100% guaranteed as being unbreakable. Just look at all the hacking being done to some of the security agencies around the world.

There are many ways in which passwords can be stored, with varying levels of security. Salted password hashing uses a non-reversible hashing algorithm with the inclusion of a randomised element to make it more difficult to obtain user passwords.

One of the things which makes the salted passwords harder to crack is that another separate entry is stored along with the password for the salt value. This means that hackers are going to have to figure out how to crack the password, however it is changed to unreadable characters, and crack the salt value, however that was set to unreadable characters. This makes it much harder for a password to be cracked, though not impossible.

For now, the "Salt Passwords" provide hope to make it much more difficult for hackers to figure out your password. Once a company identifies they have been hacked, the salt passwords could give them far more time to notify all their users to change their passwords and prevent hackers from gaining access to individual logons. We can hope that even more methods are determined and employed to further stop hackers from taking advantage of passwords taken in mass from websites. Technology has to continually work to stay one step ahead of hacking and stolen password files.

Ponzify - IPO Extraordinaire For This Century

Ponzify IPO is one you do not want to miss out on to make you a billionaire

After the Facebook IPO and how there were dreams of people making it big by getting in on the ground floor, we have stumbled upon Ponzify, the next IPO offering which should be coming soon. Given the profits which people made from the Google IPO, everyone is on the look out for the next big thing. And we have found it for you. This one is going to make millionaires out of everyone at the company and they have already filed their "Form S-1 Registration Statement Under The Securities Act of 1933", so we should be hearing more about this in the coming weeks where you can get in on this ground floor opportunity. Not everyone knows about this one yet.

Prospectus for Silicon Valley’s Next Hot Tech IPO, Where Nothing Could Possibly Go Wrong.

Have we gotten your attention? This one is a sure thing and is not going to be taking the same direction as the recent Facebook IPO which has been going in the reverse direction in terms of current value. This one is not going to have that happen and you can be assured of the future value which is going to skyrocket to new highs. They have a very unique product which they are promoting and will bring in lots of revenue to the company, employees and investors.

Overview
Ponzify is a solutions-oriented global technology leader that specializes in selling paper products.

If you are now interested in getting this action to participate in the IPO, you are going to miss out on this one. This is an outstanding parody which has been provided by Timothy McSweeney’s site regarding an article by John Flowers. And the interest that this one has generated points out just how many people are looking for the next big thing.

If you want to have an enjoyable read, you need to take a look at this one as it is very well written and has a lot of humorous points in it which will point out all the absurd things going on with IPO offers right now. Read this and it will bring a smile to your face.

Users love our product because it’s something free. Venture Capitalists love it because they can imagine themselves talking about it at T.E.D. or on Charlie Rose. Trust us: Once you invest in Ponzify, you’ll have a difficult time investing your money anywhere else ever again.

Humor and parody are good things to help us keep things in perspective. Take a read.

Lost Passwords This Week From Hackers

Posted passwords should cause everyone to be concerned about their security

This has not been one of the better weeks for password security. While the reports we are seeing are not the result of less than secure passwords by individuals, it should cause everyone to take a look at what they are doing. The most recent actions are the result of hackers who have been able to penetrate some very large online companies which one would think are secure from hackers getting in to steal information. There is nothing you as an individual can do in a situation like this to stop the actions which are happening. This is the responsibility of the online companies.

These are some big online companies which have been hit and the information is still being revealed as they determine the extend of the hacking activities. Some of the biggest were hit today as LinkedIn and eHarmony are reporting they were breached with people getting 6.5 and 1.5 million passwords which were grabbed and possibly emails addresses. The passwords were encrypted, but it may only be a matter of time before they are able to crack them. What's worse is the emails which potentially were taken as part of the hacking activities. There are numerous reports of Spam and phishing campaigns where others try and convince you to click on a link to update your password information. You never want to respond directly to an email like that. Log on to your account directly and not by clicking on a link in an email. You never know where you are going when you do that. We have even seen an evolving report where Last.fm, the online stream site has been hacked and they are trying to determine the extend of the damage.

Passwords are your final lock on your account and these recent breaches should have gotten your attention. Do not use the same password across multiple accounts. If you did that for LInkedIn and Last.fm, they can now gain access to both accounts, not just one. The locks you use must be different for each account or you are just giving them a master key that will unlock all of your accounts. That is very important that you do not duplicate passwords across online accounts as you are just asking for trouble if you do.

We have talked about your password protection and strategies my making them longer and more complex. Yes, that makes it much harder to remember, but do you want to expose all your information because they guessed an easy password? Your passwords are the lock to protect your information. Small and weak locks are easy to break.

With this information in the news, now is the time to rethink your password strategies to protect yourself. It is important that you understand things which you need to be doing. Changing your password more than one every few years is an important step. Having different passwords for each logon is another.

This is not the last time we will hear of hackers breaking into servers and stealing the personal information of those who have accounts. The best thing you can do is have a secure password and pay attention to what is going on in the world. As soon as I heard that hackers had taken encrypted password information from LinkedIn, I immediately changed my password. If you have a LinkedIn account and have not changed your password, STOP reading this and log on to your LinkedIn account and change your password. It is critical that you do so. This applies to any online account you have where there is a report of it being hacked and personal information compromised. You have to watch out for yourself as it could take days before they get around to reminding people to update their passwords because of a breach of security.

Having a lot of different passwords makes it very difficult to maintain and writing them down is just as bad as giving them to hackers. We have used a tool called RoboForm which is one of several very good tools to keep your passwords secure and where you do not have to remember them all. If you have a lot of online accounts, this is probably worth considering.

Samsung Figured Out How To Fix Android Fragmentation

Releasing the Galaxy S3 globally may solve the current fragmentation issue

The problems with Android Fragmentation seem to be an ongoing problem in the mobile device world which Apple has shown does not have to be an issue. Apple releases an iOS update to all their devices at the same time and they seem to roll out very quickly with the vast majority of phones being updated in about a month. Android has lacked the ability to be able to get things updated that quickly and recent information proves just how slow the process actually is. But, Samsung's current release of the Galaxy S3, may be leading the way to resolve all of those issues and become the standard for how to correct the long standing problem of Android Fragmentation.

In the past, the release of a new Samsung phone in the US went from carrier to carrier over a period of a few months to much longer. As a result, the carriers where pretty much in control of when an update to the Android OS actually got updated. As an example, the ICS update for the T-Mobile Galaxy S2 will start to roll out on Monday, but Android 4.0 for the Sprint Galaxy S2 Epic 4G Touch has no date for arrival on those devices. And this is just an example of what so many have been experiencing. Android Fragmentation is looming large with a 7.1% share for ICS as of June 1st. And yet the Galaxy Nexus was the first ICS phone launched last December, but here we are over 5 months later and the market share of ICS is far less than 10%. The slow roll out of a new Android OS is a big problem and creates frustration among Android phone owners.

Samsung may have discovered the solution by having all carriers in the US who are going to be carrying the Galaxy S3 have them in stock within weeks of each other. As you can see from the picture, there are 5 US wireless carriers who will be selling the Galaxy S3 and all of them will be selling it within a few weeks of each other. It is that kind of coordinated distribution which now gives Samsung some leverage to attempt to keep all the wireless carriers in check so that things do not get out of hand when it comes time to update the Android OS on the Galaxy S3 phones. Apple has certainly proven it can be done. Even Microsoft, who has come with their new OS late to the game, has demonstrated they can get an OS update completely rolled out in about a month. That is saying something and it definitely shows that it can be done. So, if Apple and Microsoft have demonstrated that it can be done, then it is a question of what needs to change.

And Samsung has made that determination by rolling out the Galaxy S3 worldwide in a matter of weeks. When the next ICS or even Jelly Bean OS update needs to be rolled out, they will be able to have it available for all the Galaxy S3 phones at the same time. That will put pressure on all the wireless carriers to get the OS update out to their customers in a timely manner instead of the way that it is being done today. While this is pure speculation on my part as to what might happen in the future, it does seem highly likely we will see a change in how Android updates get rolled out for the Samsung Galaxy S3. It is unknown whether this might translate to other manufacturers or phones.

If Apple and Microsoft are able to get OS updates out to their phones in a timely manner, do you think that Samsung is going to be able to alter the Android Fragmentation which we see today?

Mobile Browser Interest Heating Up

Mobile browsers accounting for larger share of web traffic

We all know, or should be aware, that mobile devices are growing and taking up more of the day to day usage in people's lives. One of the biggest usages is browsing the web which is not a surprise. That web browsing takes up traffic and performance is an important item in that process. And with the growing importance of mobile devices, it follows that there is growing competition among those who provide mobile browsers to get a larger share of the market. In the mobile world, things are far different than in the desktop world in terms of control. In the desktop world, Microsoft has control of the desktop, yet they have not been able to maintain control of the browsers being used on the desktop.

In the mobile world, getting a mobile browser installed on a mobile device before it is released for sale gives a company an edge in the browser being used. Recently, we have been hearing a lot about the Opera Mini browser in the news. This has been because of talk of Facebook purchasing Opera to be used with Facebook to move the company more into the mobile world. Depending on who is doing the reporting on mobile traffic, some have indicated increases in Opera Mini usage on mobile devices. But that is not the only one we are hearing about. In a recent report, Opera and Android are the 2 top browsers being reported.

While we have been hearing a lot about the Safari browser for mobile devices, it is because it is the default browser on the iPhone. Since the Opera Mini mobile browser is not directly tied to a device, itS future is far more robust. The Opera Mini for Android has been growing steadily and is now a big contender in the mobile world. But the Android Robot browser has the best future given the huge gains for the Android OS on the growing number of devices. It is very popular, especially given that it is the default browser on Android phones.

If you look around at measurements for the most popular mobile browser, you are going to find a variety of different results as to popularity. That is because of exactly what is being looked at, such as ad traffic to a particular ad provider. But the end result of all the numbers is that mobile traffic is heating up and competition among various browsers is heating up. There is much talk about Safari, Android Robot and Opera Mini right now. But what about Internet Explorer? Microsoft's Windows Phone OS is expected to grow this year because of Nokia phones being rolled out around the world. How much shifting is going to take place is unknown, but it is going to intensify.

In the mobile world, browser selection is important for performance and just how well things are being displayed in the small screens on smart phones. Exactly which one you like is a matter of personal preference. Given the rapid increase of smart phones, we expect to see much more interest in which mobile browser people are going to be using.

What mobile browser do you like the most?

Android 4.0 - Fragmentation Continues For ICS

Latest report show very small growth in ICS adoption at 7.1%

Google has posted the most recent numbers for Android on their Android Developer site and the numbers they are showing for Ice Cream Sandwich adoption leave something to be desired. As of June 1st, Android 4.0 has a share of 7.1% of all Android devices coming to the Google Play site which is a good indicator of usage. And it is those numbers which are showing very disappointing results for the expected rise in ICS adoption. It seems that Android Fragmentation is alive and well with no signs of going away anytime soon.

Over the past 3 months, we have been watching the numbers with an expectation that ICS would climb above the 10% mark with the June report. In the previous May report of 4.9% the growth back then seemed like things were beginning to make progress, growing from 2.9% to 4.9%. The growth from 4.9% in May to 7.1% in June may seem like it has seen some great increases in adoption. But if you realize that ICS was first presented with the Galaxy Nexus in December, things do not look so good.

Making things even worse is the fact that Android 2.3 has grown from 64.4% in May to 65% in June. If Android 4.0 adoptions where growing at a much faster rate, that percentage should have gone down, not up. With the slow growth for Android 4.0, it is starting to look like the most likely outcome is growth through attrition. As Android 2.3 phone owners replace those devices with Android 4.0, we will begin to see the numbers start to move up much faster. The problem with that possibility is that there are still large numbers of Android 2.3 devices on sale and that is going to continue for much of the year.

Given all that is being shown here, it is quite possible that finger pointing for the lack of adoption of ICS could pick up again. There is the path that ICS has to travel from Google, to manufacturers, to wireless carriers. Each stop takes time as they add their pieces to the puzzle in order to make it more of their own. Take the case of the Galaxy S2 and the ability to get Ice Cream Sandwich installed on that device. Here is the US, T-Mobile has announced it coming on June 11th and there is no word from AT&T or Sprint. It has rolled out in other countries, but not yet in the US. It seems that the roll out is moving at a snails pace and there are no signs of things changing very much in that direction.

Exactly when we can expect to see ICS take off and have at least a 25% market share is unknown. Whether attrition is the most likely method of growing ICS seems likely this year given what we are seeing. That is not the way this should be going because Jelly Bean in on the horizon and that will add to the fragmentation even further than it already is. Who is responsible for all of this is a moving target as Google says they have released it to manufacturers. Manufacturers have released it for various devices to wireless carriers. At some point, the length of time between Google releasing a version and the public getting it has to be radically shortened. Is that ever going to be possible?