Privacy
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Posted by: Viki ZabalaAugust 3, 2012
Following months of rumors, a date has reportedly been set for the launch of the iPhone 5. In other welcome news, two industry reports chart the significant growth of mobile ad spending and app revenues. Meanwhile, Android developers received word of important policy changes for the Google Play app store.
Apple will announce its iPhone 5 Wednesday, Sept. 12, with the device hitting stores Friday, Sept. 21, according to new reports. According to a Mashable piece, the launch will be made via a special announcement and will also include a new iPod Nano and possibly the iPad Mini. As CNET reports, Apple expects to produce 20 million iPhone 5 units in the September quarter alone. And J.P. Morgan predicts Apple meeting – or exceeding – the current sales estimates of 39.5 million for Q4 2012 and 37.8 million for Q1 2013.
According to a new report from eMarketer, global mobile ad spending is projected to hit $6.4 billion in 2012. Driven by strong growth in the U.S., mobile ad spending will increase about 62 percent this year, putting the U.S. market ahead of Japan for the first time. The research estimates the U.S. mobile ad industry will balloon 96.6 percent to $2.3 billion in 2012. Mashable shares a chart that depicts mobile ad spending worldwide (by region and country) from 2011-2016.
Revenues generated by iOS and Android apps are forecast for healthy growth, says Mobile Marketer. New data from Flurry Analytics projects app revenues to grow 60 percent to $8.7 billion, with advertising as the fastest growing revenue category. According to Flurry’s data, iOS and Android apps tallied a total of $5.4 billion in 2011 from premium sales, in-app purchases and advertising sales. Interestingly, in 2010, the top 25 ranked titles on iOS and Android generated 28 percent of revenue from premium sales and in-app purchases, but this year, they are expected produce only 15 percent of revenue. “What’s most surprising is that that mid and long tails are getting fatter not skinnier,” said Peter Farago, vice president of marketing at Flurry Analytics. “More apps are making more money.”
This week, Google Play delivered a letter to its tens of thousands of Android developers, informing them that it is making numerous changes to tighten its policies. Changes included naming apps, app icons, payments, privacy, spam and advertising. “All in all, this is a pretty strong list of ways that Google can now use to better control what kind of apps appear in the store, and perhaps attempt to raise the quality in the process,” writes Ingrid Lunden in her TechCrunch piece. Developers of new apps will be required to meet the new policy changes immediately, while apps that violate the new rules will have 30 days to comply or risk app store ejection. You can read Google Play’s full letter here.
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Posted by: Viki ZabalaJuly 13, 2012
The Future of Privacy Forum released an encouraging new study this week indicating that app developers are becoming more privacy savvy on both Google and Apple operating systems. And as the Apple App Store celebrates its birthday week, an industry expert compares the App Store’s first four years to the early commercial Web. In international mobile news, breaking reports show that China has pre-empted Apple’s upcoming iPhone 5 launch.
The New York Times is reporting on a new study from the Future of Privacy Forum, released this week. According to the study, 61.3 percent of app developers have privacy policies in place, detailing what data is collected and how it is used. The study revealed that the number of free apps with a privacy policy on iOS grew significantly from 40 percent to 84 percent between September 2011 and June 2012, while those for Google's Android operating system increased from 70 percent to 76 percent during that same period. The think tank also urged app developers to provide “enhanced notice” if apps collect information users might not expect and to give users control about what they share. AdWeek has more on the study.
“When Apple debuted its App Store four years ago, even the most bullish analysts and enthusiastic fanboys could not have fathomed how iOS apps would so quickly change our lives,” writesAppolicious’ managing editor, Brad Spirrison, in a contributed Huffington Post column. In this piece, he examines the parallels between what the Apple App Store has done for mobile media consumption and what Netscape’s browser-based Internet did for the commercial Web in the mid-90s. He continues on to say that today, between iOS, Android and Windows, there are nearly 1.5 million apps available for download, each competing fiercely for users. This underscores the continued discoverability challenges mobile app developers face as the app stores continue to grow exponentially each year.
And as speculation and anticipation continues to mount around the upcoming iPhone 5 launch, opportunistic sellers in China are already accepting pre-orders for the new model, reports Fox Business. These pre-orders come with mock-up pictures and “guesstimate” technical specifications, though Apple has remained tight-lipped, not revealing any specifications, details or pricing to the public. According to the current rumor mill, the new model will have a bigger screen than previous models, and the phone's voice recognition software, Siri, will have more powerful functions.
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