Archive for December, 2011

Just like the party on Times Square, the Rose Parade is an essential part of how we celebrate the beginning of a new year. The Tournament of Roses Parade, which is how it’s officially called, has been happening in early January for more than 120 years. Each year, dozens of floats built entirely out of flowers and other organic material parade down Colorado Avenue in Pasadena, California.

This year, things are going to be a little different though: Not only is the parade happening on January 2nd instead of New Year’s day due to parade rules that don’t allow it to happen on a Sunday; Occupy protesters are planing to use the parade to broadcast their demands to a world-wide audience. There are plans for a human float that will follow the official parade, and protesters will also position themselves along the parade route.

Both the official parade and the surrounding protests will be streamed live online:

• Local TV network KTLA will broadcast the entire event online starting at 8am PT.
• Occupy live streamer Spencer Mills a.k.a OakFoSho will be live streaming from the Occupy the Rose Parade protests. The schedule for this stream is still a little unclear, but your best bet is to check his Twitter feed.

And in case you’re wondering who Spencer Mills is – we interviewed him a few months ago:

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There were reports of widespread outages of Twitter’s main Web site Saturday, with speculation centering on the problems stemming from a flood of New Year’s greetings.

We asked Twitter for comment and will update as soon as we hear back. “Our engineers have identified the issue and Twitter is now almost fully recovered,” Twitter spokesperson Carolyn Penner said in an email at 4:30 p.m. ET Saturday.

By 2:50 p.m. ET, MSNBC was reporting that the site was “slowly coming back online” and there seemed to be few problems with accessing the site and posting messages by 4:15 p.m. ET. The only official indication from Twitter that something was amiss came Saturday morning, when the company posted “Users may currently be experiencing some site issues; our engineers are working on resolving this issue” on its status microblog.

If the site goes down again — particularly as you hope to send out your New Year’s tweets as the calendar turns in your part of the world — try using an app or the mobile site. Some users reported success posting messages using clients like HootSuite, TweetCaster and Twitter’s own TweetDeck during the earlier outage.

Email. It’s quickly becoming the bane of our existence, even though it’s the biggest social network in the world. Yes, even bigger than Facebook. More people use email than they do any other service on the web, and if mis-managed, it can keep you awake at night.

If I had a buck for every person who complains about how many unread emails that they have, I’d be a billionaire. Why is email so hard to manage? For geeks, it’s because we sign up to every damn service known to man, creating more and more junk in our inboxes. For everyone else, it’s because they are busy paying attention to other things, like their actual lives. Yes, I know, it’s different for everyone, but the problem is the same.

What should we do about it? Mark them all as unread before we start 2012. Here are three reasons why:

1. If you haven’t read them already…

Who are you fooling? If you haven’t read the 3,000 emails in your inbox, you’re never going to read them. Do yourself a favor and spend an hour on setting up filters to get junk out of your inbox, then mark everything as read.

When I talk to people about that, they say “What if there’s a recruiter email in there?” or something similar. Quite honestly, if you haven’t returned an email to a recruiter in under a week, they’re no longer recruiting you. Same goes for someone trying to send business your way, or offer you a speaking gig.

2. Stress

Most people need something to stress out about. First world problems, right? How many times do you hear someone complaining about how many emails they have in their inbox? Quite a few, I’m sure. Your response shouldn’t be to coddle the person, tell them to simply mark everything as read. The more emails that stack up, the more stressed we get.

When you notice an email chain starting to get longer and longer, cut it off and try having a conversation with the people in another format. If they’re co-workers, have a meeting. If they’re friends, pick up the phone. I know, crazy right?

Cut down on the excessive email and it won’t pile up. Less stress means better performance. Focus on things that really need your full attention.

3. Behind the numbers

Spend an hour and dig into the email that is behind those huge numbers. They’re mostly worthless, I promise. No matter what email service you use, there are features to filter out messages from certain companies or ones that match certain subjects. Create the filters, learn about what’s junking up your inbox, and then mark them all as unread. Never look back.

Moving forward, just tackle email as it comes in and take action right away. If you see a notification from a music service you tried a year ago, filter it out immediately and move on. You’re not going to miss anything, and there are no prizes for having the most unread emails in your inbox.

We should use the Internet, not let the Internet use us. Do yourself a favor in 2012 and by any means necessary, cut down your stress level. There’s no reason to take a bunch of baggage from 2011 into the new year, so give yourself the gift of an inbox with a big fat goose egg.

Be careful during your New Year’s celebrations folks, and for goodness sakes, don’t read email or text while you drive.

“No matter how you slice the data,” Vivek Wadhwa said on Twitter, “the exponential growth in Social Media is no more. Just gradual growth now.”

Wadhwa is an astute observer of long-term technology trends and is likely correct within a particular understanding of the situation. For one thing, I can’t help but imagine raw user numbers still have a long, long way to go in many parts of the world just beginning to come online.

Even within the US and the rest of the West though, such conclusions require an assumption that the key metric is number of new users in total. “Instead of raw user growth,” Eldon argues on Techcrunch, “the numbers to watch going forward will be around engagement.”

What might that look like? I’d like to present two possibilities for major continued growth in social media.

Afterwords, Vivek Wadhwa’s response.

The Instrumentation of Everyday Life

One way to understand engagement with social networks is not just time on site, but data provided as input. Mark Zuckerberg sees it this way, he argues that the amount of information people share doubles every year.

Facebook’s Open Graph API allows all kinds of websites to push user activity into their Facebook newsfeeds. The roll-out of Open Graph, widely referred to as Frictionless Sharing, has just barely begun. It’s already super controversial. I believe it has been implemented in a way that puts the whole kitten caboodle at risk, unfortunately.

Have you noticed how much more prominent music has become in Facebook since the introduction of the Open Graph on Spotify, Rdio and other services? Now imagine that rolling out to everything you do online. It’s already begun to enter into news reading and video viewing. Facebook is sure to do it better the next time around when they roll it out to shopping again, after the Beacom debacle several years ago.

Meals eaten? Hours of sleep slept? Distances traveled? TV shows and books watched? There are many more parts of our lives that can be wired up to Facebook or other social networks.

The instrumentation of everyday life may sound frightening to many people, but so did posting photos of yourself online or using a debit card (at all) just a few years ago.

If it’s done well, with privacy protections, security, user education, informed consent and delighted users – then this type of engagement with social media could represent a huge and desirable period of growth in the industry.

“Just as location-based applications became a ‘feature’ rather than the ‘big thing,’ social media will live on and become an integral part of what we do,” Wadha writes. “But the party’s over for investors and start-ups in this space. The big growth is behind us. Revenues from social media have not lived up to the promises, and the vast majority of those thousands of start-ups are either dying or on the ropes. It’s time to jump on the next bandwagon, folks.”

Given the huge growth of data input that is likely just around the corner, it makes no sense to me that investors and start-ups don’t have plenty of room to make money in social still.

The Web of Things

Connected devices, many of which you might not even consider connecting to the Web today, are expected to facilitate fundamental changes in human life over the next few years.

Hans Vestberg, CEO of Ericsson, predicts that the world’s nearly 5 billion mobile phone subscribers today will be surpassed by 50 billion connected non-phone devices in 10 years.

What are all those devices going to do? Wireless industry analyst Chetan Sharma says they will be connected to entirely new forms of electronics and will disrupt entire industries like consumer packaged goods. Imagine cereal boxes that detected when you were about to run out of cereal and automatically ordered more from the cereal maker. Maybe that cuts out retail altogether.

What does this have to do with social media? Quite simply, what do you think people will be doing while they ride in the driverless car that picked them up at home to take them to work? They’ll be Facebooking and Tweeting, of course.

What will happen after your 50th automatic re-supply of Cap’n’ Crunch? You’ll win a Super Fan badge on your social media profile, I’m sure.

Blippy, the social network that publishes every debit card transaction you perform out into your social network of fellow exhibitionist friends may never take the world by fire. But Mint.com’s aggregate financial data and benchmarking is much more likely to. Real-time data bout local spending sounds like social media to me.

Social media in the age of instrumentation and connected devices may be more about aggregate social activity than about the long voice blogging and Tweeting.

The intersection of people, machines and passively monitored objects (the cheapest input of all!) all combine to form an entirely new world of opportunity.

That may be the biggest opportunity yet.

As Mark Roberti, founding editor of the publication RFID Journal, wrote this Spring:

“This change – enabling computers to see and understand what is happening in the real world – is enormous. Most people have yet to grasp it, seeing RFID as a more expensive alternative to bar codes. They don’t comprehend that when computers can automatically collect information regarding what is happening in the world, new insights and business strategies then become possible. And the companies that leverage these capabilities most effectively will be the big winners in the century ahead.”

Cloud-scale information gathering regarding what is happening in the world we live in, leading to entirely new insights and business strategies. That sounds like social media to me.

I expect that this kind of information is going to make the number of photos we all pro-actively upload to Facebook look like a drop in the ocean. Let’s hope this vision of the future gets built in a way that’s equitable and pro-freedom. Those are key concerns here at the early morning, just after the dawn, of social media.

Wadhwa’s reply

I was fortunate enough to catch Vivek Wadhwa on Twitter last night and sent him this post before publication. This was his response.

“I don’t disagree with you. But I maintain that this segment will lose its sizzle–just like eCommerce did in the early days of the Internet. We overhyped this, invested in too many of the same startups, and portrayed this as a destination rather than a means. Facebook and to a lesser extent, Twitter will become platforms from which other, deeper, services are built. But gone are the days of the silly me too social media startups–the Twitter and Facebook clones.

“Look at ‘location based services’–the insane hype that TechCrunch created around this. This has just become a feature that we take for granted and build other meaningful applications on. Social media will go the same way. It will persist and grow, but in depth and value rather than just numbers and hype.

“I expect the excitement and hype in 2012 to be in the social game companies, newfangled B2B technology plays, and cloud computing. These will be the next bubble. Soon after, we’ll see the Big Data bubble. All of this is good because it spurs investment and innovation. That’s the beauty of Silicon Valley–it moves from one fad to another as if nothing ever happened.”

Apps are, at the end of the day, very personal pieces of software. And your favorite mobile app isn’t mine. So we decided to poll the staff here at GigaOM to see what apps changed our lives in 2011. It could be apps that just launched this year, or it could be programs that really came of age or matured greatly through updates. Or it could just be an app we missed before.

Some are very familiar but others may be new to you, but all have played a big part in our lives this year. Take a look and then tell us your favorite app in the comments.

Colleen Taylor: Hipmunk for Android

Android typically takes a backseat to iOS when it comes to getting slick apps. That’s why it’s so refreshing that Hipmunk, the travel search engine, put real time and effort into making its Android app just as awesome as its web and iOS offerings. Shopping for plane tickets in general can be a real headache, and doing it on a mobile device is usually impossible. But I’ve priced out and purchased plane tickets with this app, and it’s a pleasure to use.

Darrell Etherington: Path for iPhone

Path is great because it’s a beautiful-looking tool for people who might not share a lot of content, but like to keep on top of what their friends are doing without feeling overwhelmed. It feels like Facebook did before apps, games and the need to monetize made it a noisy, privacy nightmare. Path’s relatively pristine environment probably can’t last, but for now, that’s what makes it great.

Erica Ogg: Hotel Tonight for iPhone

This is the best if you’re regularly passing through cities on short notice. It does what it says: finds you a hotel for tonight only. But they don’t bombard you with options. Hotel Tonight helpfully curates the lodging choices for you: there’s usually just a couple to pick from among the categories basic, hip and luxury. They have relationships with the hotels so using it is a snap. I used this to locate the best local hotel deals night-to-night when we were between apartments in our new city. And it’s especially helpful if you want to make a last-minute trip to pricey cities like New York, Chicago and Los Angeles.

Kevin C. Tofel: WiFi File Transfer for Android

This free app is a must have for transferring files from an Android device to any other device on the same Wi-Fi network. Works as a small web server on your Android and shows up as a nicely formatted file directory on other devices: great for shooting files, photos, or videos off of Android device instead of e-mailing them. For $1.40, the Pro version allows you to add files to the phone or tablet.
Kevin C. Tofel: TED Air for Android

I didn’t find this app until late in the year, but I try to hit it daily now for a new TED talks. It’s great for mobile use because you can download the videos while on a home Wi-Fi connection and view it later on the phone and not use up any mobile broadband.

Mathew Ingram: Instagram for iPhone

I started using Instagram mostly because it gave me an easy way to upload photos from my iPhone to a bunch of different services at once, including Flickr — where I archive photos — and Twitter and Facebook, where I share them with others. Other apps from Flickr, Facebook and Twitter make it easy to share with that specific network, but don’t make it easy to distribute them to multiple places at once. I liked Instagram’s filters, but that isn’t what kept me using the service — what kept me coming back was the social aspects, the ability to see and comment on friends’ photos and have them see and comment on mine. This is something Flickr should have owned, but it failed to capitalize on it and Instagram swooped in and seized the market.

Kevin Fitchard: Paprika for iPad, iPhone and Mac

Though this iPad recipe management app has been around more than a year, Paprika made the service infinitely more useful with the launch of its Mac version this year. The iPad’s big screen but compact size is great for propping on the kitchen counter, but if you’re like me, you would rather research and annotate your recipes on a computer. The iPhone app completes the triumverate, allowing you to ship shopping lists directly to your phone. You have to pay for all of these apps separately of course, and there’s no Android support. Paprika also does have some limitations on the recipes it can import, but no more than any of the other recipe saving apps on the market, and of those its definitely the most streamlined.

Ryan Kim: Foursquare for iPhone

This is an app that’s been around for a while, but this year, it got a lot more useful for me. The specials have been greatly improved including new deals with American Express. And features like Explore have been a big help in finding recommendations for new places to try out. I’m also becoming heavily dependent on Foursquare Tips in the past year to know what to order in new restaurants. The updated list feature is turning Foursquare data into a lasting resource you can share with others. I never got into the race for Mayorships and even the point standings among my friends really don’t mean much to me. But all the new features and updates really make the app powerful for me in ways that wasn’t the case before.

Om Malik: Camera+ for iPhone

Camera+ is the only app I use to take photos just as iPhone is the only camera I use to take photos. It is an app that can turn rank amateurs into photo-artists. Add filters and effects and you have photo magic in the form of an app.

Katie Fehrenbacher: PowerMax for Android

This has made my old school HTC Incredible not suck so much battery power. It used to be that I couldn’t keep the phone running for a whole day before I installed. But I’m ditching the HTC for an iPhone in the New Year, so I won’t need PowerMax in 2012 anymore.

Janko Roettgers: Google+ for Android

The Google+ app for Android rocks, if only for one reason: Automatic media uploading. I’ve shared many more photos since I’ve installed this on my phone, simply because sharing something you’ve already uploaded is incredibly easy.

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Image: Getty Images / Justin Sullivan

He has every reason to be thrilled. But he’s not killing Google.

Henry Blodget

For the past couple of years, one meme has grown ever louder:

Facebook is killing Google.

Facebook is taking over the Internet, this story goes. Facebook now has ~800 million global users, half of whom log in every day. Facebook now accounts for something like a third of all pageviews in the U.S.  Google is miles behind in social, despite the huge numbers for Google +. Facebook consumes an astonishing percentage of time spent online. And so on.

And most importantly for the Facebook-is-killing-Google meme:

Facebook (and Twitter) are now the means by which many people share content online.

And all of that is true.

But none of it means that Facebook is killing Google.

To get a quick reality check on whether Facebook is killing Google, all you need to do is glance at these two numbers:

• $40 Billion
• $4 Billion

What are those two numbers?

Those are the approximate revenue numbers for 2011 for Google and Facebook respectively.

Google’s 2011 revenue will be about $40 billion, Facebook’s will be about $4 billion. Google, in other words, is 10-times Facebook’s size.

But, but, but, you say…

Google is still 10-times Facebook’s size because Facebook is just in the early stages of generating revenue. When Facebook gets its revenue engines really cranking, it will blow past Google in no time.

No, it won’t. Not unless it figures out a way to insert itself between consumers who want to buy specific products and companies that make and sell those specific products, the way Google has.

If Facebook builds a products and services search engine, for example, and somehow captures a huge amount of Google’s global search share then, yes, Facebook will in fact be “killing” Google.

Until then, all the “time spent” and “pageviews” and “users” metrics are pretty much irrelevant.

Why?

Because as the current revenue levels for both companies are demonstrating, search is a vastly better advertising product than social networking.

Vastly better.

So much better, in fact, that, when it comes to head-to-head business competition, the two companies aren’t yet even in the same league.

And why is search such a better business than social networking?

Because search is the best advertising product in the history of the world.

Social networking, meanwhile, is a relatively lousy advertising product (relatively).

Search is taking over the world. Click for more

The reason the search business has swallowed such a huge percentage of global ad spending in only a decade is that it is advertising space that can capture the consumer’s attention at the exact moment that the consumer is looking for something to buy.

When you search for a product, you are telling the world you are interested in that product. And there is no better and more efficient time for those who make and sell that product to try to get your attention than at the moment you announce that you are interested in it.

That is why search spending has gone through the roof.

And what about social networking?

In contrast to search, social networking advertising is like hanging signs on the walls of a house during a party and sending sales reps to mingle with the crowd.

Yes, you can target which parties you pay to hang your signs on the walls of.

Yes, you can make those signs appealing to those at the party.

But the fact remains that the people at the party, who are sharing stories and photos and news and gossip, are not at the party because they want to buy something.

They’re at the party because they want to socialize.

And any time you do more than passively hang in the background at the party, they will likely be annoyed by your intrusion. And, annoyed or not, when they do notice your ads, their reaction will most likely be, “Cool–if I ever decide to buy a car/boat/stereo/meal/flowers/bull-whip, maybe I’ll look at that kind.” Then they’ll go right back to their party.

Yes, Facebook has a great business. Yes, Facebook is rapidly becoming the place where the whole world hangs out and socializes online. Yes, “online” will soon become synonymous with “everywhere,” meaning that Facebook is rapidly becoming the place where the whole world hangs out.

And by commanding that much of the world’s attention, Facebook can’t help but build a humongous and profitable business.

But advertising “where people hang out” is still fundamentally different and less valuable than advertising “to people who are looking to buy your product when they are looking to buy it,” which is what Google does.

And that’s why Google’s revenue is 10-times Facebook’s revenue, despite their both having similar enormous global reach.

Google’s revenue grew much faster than Facebook’s, even with a smaller Internet.

But, but, but, you say. I used to get all my content from Google. Now I get it all from Facebook and Twitter. How can it be that that this won’t kill Google?

Listen carefully to what you’ve just said and you’ll find that you answered your own question.

People do now find more of their “content” via Facebook and Twitter than they do from Google, at least relative to a few years ago.

But Google doesn’t make its money from “content.”

Google makes its money from commerce.

And people do NOT get most of their commerce content from Facebook and Twitter.

When you want to buy something, where do you start?

Facebook?

No.

You start at Google or, increasingly, Amazon. Or, if you’re a regular customer of a store that you know will have the product, you might start there.

You might ask for recommendations about what to buy from your friends at Facebook and Twitter. But when it comes to actually researching and buying it, you’re likely going to start with a search. And that search is where the real money is going to be made.

Is Facebook going to build a huge, profitable business that will change the world?

You bet it will. It’s already doing exactly that.

Is Facebook killing Google?

No way. At least not yet.

For Facebook to kill Google, Facebook needs to find a way to insert itself between a consumer looking to buy a product and the folks who buy and make that product. Or, via “credits” or another payment mechanism, it needs to find a way to take a healthy piece of every transaction.

And right now, Facebook is nowhere near that point.

Right now, Facebook is just a gigantic global party with sales reps wandering around and advertisements on the walls.

And that business, no matter how big it gets, is still in a different league than Google’s.

SEE ALSO: Here’s Everything We Know About The Facebook IPO

Image: Flickr / NASA Goddard Photo and Video

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Italians Don’t Care About The Internet

How do you get around the government potentially censoring the Internet?

Launch a bunch of satellites and start your own Internet.

Yes, seriously. That’s what a bunch of hackers are planning on doing, the BBC reports. They outlined their schemes at the Chaos Communication Congress in Berlin.

The project’s organizers, who intend to build a “Hackerspace Global Grid,” also plan on building ground stations to track and communicate with those satellites, according to the report. Here are the highlights:

Hobbyists have already put a few small satellites into orbit – usually only for brief periods of time – but tracking the devices has proved difficult for low-budget projects.

The hacker activist Nick Farr first put out calls for people to contribute to the project in August. He said that the increasing threat of internet censorship had motivated the project.

“The first goal is an uncensorable internet in space. Let’s take the internet out of the control of terrestrial entities,” Mr Farr said.

He cited the proposed Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) in the United States as an example of the kind of threat facing online freedom. If passed, the act would allow for some sites to be blocked on copyright grounds.

Image: Flickr / g l u b

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Jonathan “Jony” Ive, Apple’s chief design guru, was awarded knighthood in the United Kingdom in the New Year Honours list, the BBC reports.

Ive can now call himself Knight Commander of the British Empire.

Ive had a special relationship with former Apple CEO Steve Jobs, who passed away earlier this year. He also has a lot of privileges within Apple, making the company’s design chief guy practically untouchable, Jobs’ biography written by Walter Isaacson revealed earlier this year.

Those privileges weren’t limited to lunches and regular visits at the end of the day. Ive holds a private design studio on the ground floor of Apple’s campus shielded by tinted windows and a heavy locked door. Not even high-level Apple employees are allowed into Ive’s office.

We’ve heard many stories that camera phones are changing the world, they’ve long overtaken standalone shooters on Flickr, for example, but in Japan it seems that the rise of the camera phone has seen an increase in complaints on voyeurism.

A report from Mercury News states that, according to Japan’s National Police Agency, 1,741 cases of illicit photography were reported in the country last year, that a 1.6-fold increase on the number reported five years ago, and a series of apps are being blamed for the rise.

One third of the incidents are reportedly from photo taken by smartphones, according to a police spokesperson, who suspects that the grown of silent camera apps — which remove the shutter sound that plays when a photo is taken — has given wannabe voyeurs an ideal way to grab sneaky shots.

Indeed, one particular app appears to be geared towards allowing pictures to be taken discreetly, as the article explains:

The latest applications include “upgraded versions” that enable people to silently take photos while an email or website is displayed on the phone’s screen to provide cover for the surreptitious picture-taking.

An information security expert from Keio University, professor Keiji Takeda, believes that the situation must be addressed:

There are limits to legally regulating smartphones whose settings can easily be changed. From a corporate ethics viewpoint, we shouldn’t ignore the fact that they’re being misused for crimes. We need to consider guidelines for screening and putting apps on the market.

It is worth pointing out the uniqueness of Japanese culture before people go away thinking that all smartphone wielding Japanese are snapping illicit pictures. On the subway, for example, respect for fellow citizens is such that talking on a phone is largely a taboo, you may see a couple of people take quick calls and using their hands to cover their ‘crime’. Yet, in the midst of this, men read comics or magazine containing ‘less suitable content’ which is ok to show in public.

While Japanese social norms are one thing, candid and voyeuristic photos are a complete breach and privacy and this is clearly an issue in the country.

Japanese manufacturers claim that the silent camera option is not the issue, and that it is the way that people use it which is the real problem. However, clearly an app which helps take secret photos is encouraging the problem. It seems likely than action may be taken over specific apps, as an outright ban on using camera silently would be ludicrous, not to mention near impossible to impose.

Of course, most of us genuinely have a need for a silenced camera, how else would I be able to snap photos of the sardine-tin commute to work without looking like a tourist?

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Be the consumer-focused innovator

By Dan Hesse, CEO, Sprint (As told to Kevin Fitchard).

Dan Hesse has been the CEO of Sprint since 2007 and is probably most recognizable as the star of many of Sprint’s TV commercials. For the last year, Hesse has made it a personal crusade to fight against the merger of ATT and T-Mobile, a deal he believes would have irrevocably crushed competition in the wireless and stifled innovation. ATT-Mo may now be dead, but Hesse still faces the challenge of leading his company in a market dominated by two giants, ATT and Verizon.

This year, ATT’s attempted acquisition of T-Mobile set off all sorts of alarms, and it made me realize just how tenuous the competitive situation in the U.S. wireless industry is.

People have used the term “Big Four” to describe the industry’s top players, because there is a big difference in size between number four (T-Mobile) and number five (MetroPCS and the other Tier II regional providers). But I think an even a larger difference in size exists between ATT in the number two slot and us at number three, so I’ve always viewed it as the “Big Two.”
The Big Two, Verizon Wireless and ATT, have been getting larger for many years through organic growth and acquisitions. For example, Verizon bought Alltel, and ATT bought Centennial and Dobson. And ATT is buying spectrum from Qualcomm and Verizon is purchasing spectrum from the cable companies. There has been a gradual creep towards becoming a duopoly.

I think people recognize now that most innovation has been coming from Sprint and T-Mobile. T-Mobile was the first to launch Android handsets, followed quickly by Sprint, and Sprint was the first to launch nationwide 4G. These threats are what drove the market to be competitive. Verizon and ATT weren’t responding so much to each other, as they were responding to Sprint and T-Mobile.

The attempted acquisition was a wake-up call that got us to step back and look at what’s been happening over the last several years. I believe that in the long run, the industry will be healthier for it.

In 2012, Sprint’s number one priority will be to modernize the network, a huge project we call “Network Vision.” When I took this job at the end of 2007, we had the iDEN network as well as the CDMA network. With Network Vision, we have the opportunity to go down to one network architecture—single platform with multi-modal base stations—which will support CDMA as well as LTE. It’s a huge investment, but we believe it will give us unrivaled network capability.

We also plan to build out LTE 4G as part of Network Vision. Later in the year, our partner Clearwire plans to put LTE 4G, in addition to WiMAX 4G, in its network. We will be building out more 4G on the Sprint network and we’ll also be improving the capabilities of our 3G network, because we will be putting capability on lower spectrum frequencies, installing new and better equipment with better dB performance that will improve performance. 2012 will be the year that our network will improve noticeably.

In all other areas, our strategy and priorities are going to stay exactly the same for the fifth year in a row because it’s worked.

We’re going to focus on the customer experience, the brand, and continuing to generate cash.
Every operations team meeting begins with customer satisfaction and churn. In 2011, we rose to the top spot in terms of overall customer satisfaction in the American Customer Satisfaction Index. We’re the most improved U.S. company in customer satisfaction across all 47 industries that they study. If you just go back two years, Sprint was consistently dead last in customer satisfaction in every ranking, and now we’re consistently first or close to first.

There are a lot of accomplishments to feel good about this past year. In terms of total net addition of customers, Sprint is the fastest growing brand out of the major wireless post-paid brands in the U.S. In every quarter this year, we added at least one million total net adds across all the categories, post-paid, pre-paid, wholesale. We got the iPhone, we solidified our position with Clearwire, and we raised capital in a tough environment. And on the ATT/T-Mobile front, our message was heard. I believe the tide will continue to turn in the consumer’s favor in 2012.

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