An Ignoble Experiment

eBook: TV Everywhere Gets Personal

Facebook (NASDAQ:FB) introduced Home, an alternative homescreen for Android smartphones that promises users more immediate and efficient access to applications and social media, deeply integrating the social networking platform into the mobile user experience. HTC announced its "First" phone would have Home preloaded, and the phone will be sold through AT&T.

HTC First phone, with Facebook Home.

"We're going to turn your Android phone into a great, simple, social device," said Facebook co-founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg, explaining the company set out to flip the script on the traditional mobile user experience paradigm, designing around people first and then focusing on app-enabled interactions, instead of vice versa.

According to Zuckerberg, Facebook Home, available for download April 12, is a "family of apps that becomes the home of your phone." All content and apps within Home are available when users launch their Android device: "There are no swipes or gestures--everything is already loaded on your phone while your device is sleeping," Zuckerberg said. "All the interactions are really smooth and natural. We wanted this to feel like system software, instead of just an app you run."

Key Home features include Cover Feed, essentially a home page presenting apps and media. "As soon as you turn on your phone, you see a visually-rich News Feed that automatically slides from story to story," explained Facebook Product Designer Adam Mosseri. Home also includes Notifications and Chat Heads, which offers similar functionality to the social network's standalone Facebook Messenger app. "Chat Heads work with both your Facebook messages and your SMS," Zuckerberg said.

Users can download Facebook Home by clicking an "Install" button integrated into the latest version of Facebook or Facebook Messenger for Android. Home will not launch on Android tablets, although Facebook promised to expand to those devices in the coming months.

Facebook Home will also arrive preloaded on the new HTC First smartphone, available from carriers including AT&T Mobility (NYSE:T), launching April 12 for $99. Facebook also will support a partner program, confirming commitments from companies including Samsung Electronics, Qualcomm (NASDAQ:QCOM), Sony Mobile Communications, Huawei, Alcatel One Touch and Orange. However, it's unclear exactly what level of support Samsung, Huawei and other smartphone makers will provide to the effort.

While Facebook is first rolling out Home to Android, citing the openness of the Google (NASDAQ:GOOG) platform, the firm did not specify when or if it will extend the concept to rival operating systems like Apple's (NASDAQ:AAPL) iOS. When pressed on the topic by Wired, Zuckerberg said "We have a pretty good partnership with Apple, but they want to own the whole experience themselves," adding that "a lot of people love iPhones--I love mine, and I would like to be able to deliver Facebook Home there as well."

Facebook has no intention of building its own smartphone or operating system. "We don't want to build a phone or operating system that only some people will be able to use," Zuckerberg said. "We want to build the best experience for every person on every phone."

Informa Telecoms and Media Principal Analyst Malik Saadi doubts Facebook will ever go all-in with its own device. "Facebook is not yet ready for the mobile hardware game, but it needs to come up with a reference implementation to show its hardware partners how the next-generation mobile Facebook (which will be equipped with Graph Search Engine capabilities) should be deeply integrated with mobile hardware," Saadi said. "The risks are high for Facebook if it was to launch its own smartphone--and the risks could outweigh any benefits that it would gain."

But Facebook also must establish a stronger foothold within the mobile ecosystem said Analysys Mason Principal Analysts Ronan de Renesse and Stephen Sale, who argue the social network needs to be more "native" to nurture consumer engagement, noting that two-thirds of daily smartphone usage corresponds to pre-installed applications. Home tackles that challenge head-on.

"Although some new smartphone models come preloaded with the Facebook app, it is also important that the Facebook application is tailored for specific popular smartphone models to guarantee a superior quality of experience," de Renesse and Sale state. "Facebook could increase its app engagement (i.e. daily usage per user of the app) six-fold if it were to become the default communication platform for telephony, messaging and email."

For more:
- see this Facebook post
- see this Wired article

Read more about: Mobile Social Networking, Android
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FierceCable discusses the latest technologies TV networks and content owners use to drive increased ratings and revenue from various video devices. Download for free today.

2. Report: Apple close to sealing iRadio streaming music deals

By Jason Ankeny

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3. ComScore: Android's U.S. market share tumbles, iOS narrows gap

Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL) is close to signing streaming music licensing agreements with two major record labels, CNet reports.

Citing sources familiar with the negotiations, the report states Apple could complete agreements with Warner Music and Universal Music within the next week. While the so-called "iRadio" service would offer label partners roughly half the per-stream rate they generate from dedicated digital music platforms like Pandora, Apple is promising new revenue channels to make up the difference, including integration with its iTunes digital media storefront as well as a cut of new audio advertisements Apple plans to roll out in association with the service.

Apple, Warner and Universal are still hammering out ad revenue sharing, with the labels pressing for as much as 35 percent to 45 percent in exchange for consenting to a smaller share of per-stream profits. "The only thing concrete in the contract is the per-play rate," said a source familiar with the terms. "If you end up having no ad revenue, that's still zero. And we won't know what the buying habits will be. Will people streaming still take the time to buy from iTunes?"

Sources say iRadio will closely evoke Pandora in terms of functionality, eschewing on-demand listening in favor of programming content based on users' favorite artists, songs and genres. Apple also will add unique features like the ability to jump back to the beginning of a track. Like Pandora, Apple will offer the service via multiple mobile operating systems as well as the desktop.

Insiders caution that neither label deal has been finalized and could still fall apart. Apple must also sign iRadio agreements with Sony Music and music publishing organizations to offer consumers a catalog experience on par with rival services. Even so, Apple is telling partners it plans to launch iRadio this summer, rolling out the platform in the U.S. as well as key international markets like the U.K., France, Germany, Australia and Japan.

An Apple spokesperson declined to comment.

Rumors of Apple's impending entrance into the streaming music segment have swirled for months. The Wall Street Journal and The New York Times first reported on an Apple streaming radio service last fall--last month, Reuters reported that Apple CEO Tim Cook and Senior Vice President of Internet Software and Services Eddy Cue had met with Beats Electronics CEO and co-founder Jimmy Iovine to explore a potential partnership involving the audio technology firm's forthcoming Daisy streaming service. Rivals Google (NASDAQ:GOOG) and Amazon (NASDAQ:AMZN) are reportedly exploring streaming music efforts as well.

Subscription-based and free Internet radio services like Pandora and Spotify accounted for 23 percent of average weekly music listening time among U.S. consumers between the ages of 13 and 35 during the fourth quarter of 2012, up from 17 percent in the year-ago period, thanks to increasing mobile engagement, according to a NPD Group report issued earlier this week.

For more:
- read this CNet article

Read more about: Universal Music Group, Mobile Music
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By Jason Ankeny

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4. AT&T boosts LG Optimus G to Android 4.1 Jelly Bean, adds Isis support

Apple's (NASDAQ:AAPL) iOS narrowed Android's U.S. smartphone market share lead during the three-month period between December 2012 and February 2013, digital research firm comScore reports.

Click here to see the changes in smartphone OS market shares since 2009.

iOS controlled 38.9 percent of the U.S. smartphone market in February, up 3.9 percentage points over December, comScore notes. Google (NASDAQ:GOOG)-backed Android slipped from 53.7 percent in the final weeks of 2012 to 51.7 percent in February; Samsung Electronics will release its newest flagship smartphone, the Galaxy S4, in the coming weeks, which should help Android regain its footing moving forward.

BlackBerry (NASDAQ:BBRY) declined from 7.3 percent U.S. market share in December to 5.4 percent in February. The manufacturer unveiled its overhauled BlackBerry 10 operating system in late January; the Z10, its first smartphone running the new OS, did not go on sale to American subscribers until late last month.

Microsoft's (NASDAQ:MSFT) Windows Phone experienced modest gains, growing from 3.0 percent U.S. market share in December to 3.2 percent in February. Symbian remained flat at 0.5 percent.

As of February, 133.7 million U.S. subscribers own smartphones, corresponding to 57 percent mobile market penetration. Apple leads all smartphone manufacturers at 38.9 percent, up from 35 percent in December, trailed by Samsung at 21.3 percent, up 1 percentage point. HTC follows at 9.3 percent, down from 11 percent three months earlier.

For more:
- read this release

Read more about: HTC, Windows Phone
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By Jason Ankeny

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5. Electronic Arts ditches premium model for free-to-play mobile games in 2013

AT&T Mobility (NYSE:T) is rolling out Google's (NASDAQ:GOOG) Android 4.1 Jelly Bean mobile operating system update to the LG Optimus G smartphone. Subscribers may upgrade the device over-the-air by pulling down the notification panel, selecting Settings> General> About Phone> Software Update> Update Now and following the prompts.

LG Optimus G

In addition to core Android 4.1 features like the Project Butter UI engine, a revamped homescreen and Google Now, which includes personalized information such as local weather and traffic, the AT&T update simplifies the user experience via expandable/collapsible notifications, enhanced notification options, a new Tasks app to sync activities in Outlook and a data usage calculator.

The Android Jelly Bean update also makes the Optimus G compatible with Isis, the Near Field Communications-based mobile commerce network AT&T launched last year in partnership with Verizon Wireless (NYSE:VZ) and T-Mobile USA. Optimus G owners may begin making contactless purchases at participating retailers after going to any AT&T store in the Austin, Texas and Salt Lake City trial markets to obtain the required Isis SIM card and downloading the Isis app from the Google Play digital storefront.

According to Google's Android Developers dashboard, Android Jelly Bean 4.1 currently powers 23 percent of all devices worldwide, up from 14.9 percent a month ago. The spike follows Google revising its approach to measuring Android operating system version adoption, collecting data from each Android device that visits Google Play instead of tracking devices checking in on its servers.

For more:
- read this AT&T Consumer Blog post

Read more about: AT&T, LG Electronics
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By Jason Ankeny

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