By definition, an android is an automation in the form of a human being but for smart developers Android could be an automation in the form of cash if they focus on location.
Mobile display advertising in its current infancy is worth $200 million a year according to M:Metrics but by 2011 the global mobile advertising market is predicted to be worth over $19 billion.
The bulk of those billions of dollars will result from location-based ads as Diana LaGattuta, head of global marketing at Nokia Interactive, claimed mobile click-through rates fluctuate from 2 percent to 20 percent, with a consistently higher click-through rate than standard Web ads, sometimes up to eight times higher.
Google‘s view of this is expressed by their spokesman Gareth Evans, “I think it’s fair to say there are still some perceptions in the industry that mobile advertising is hard to do. This is something Google is trying to change by evangelizing the mobile space and helping advertisers develop integrated mobile campaigns that make full use of the platform.”
Thus Android is the means Google is evangelizing the mobile space to capture this predictably vast monetary advertising stream.
Gareth continues to say “By opening up mobile devices to all developers we believe we can drive greater innovation, and faster innovation, for the benefit of mobile users everywhere. Put simply, our hope is that the next big application will actually be built for mobiles, not PCs.”
As Google dominated the search space Adwords and Adsense allowed them to monetize it and mutually benefit webmasters hosting those ads so by dominating the mobile space it will monetize Google Maps and then mutually benefit those developers creating location apps and mobile sites.
Cole Brodman, CTO and chief innovation officer for T-Mobile. “Simply, what’s been lacking in mobile is a compelling set of apps and content that take advantage of those broadband networks. The U.S. over-consumes everything. We lead in mobile usage and home Internet penetration. But the mobile Internet is at a dismal 16 percent in the U.S., because there really haven’t been that many compelling experiences for people to lean into.”
Nokia‘s CEO even echoed last week what I stated here that America will leapfrog Europe in mobile technology as in the 1990s Europe was the center of mobility when the focus was on texting and making calls, but Silicon Valley’s Internet and PC heritage is starting to give the U.S. the edge.
It is my opinion that it will be an Android developer that fills this need and will be greatly compensated in both money and prestige.
Which developer and what application do you think it will be?
