The Middle Man in Wireless Content

Derek Kurton, formally in charge of strategizing and building Disney’s wireless efforts, has posted an interesting article about the way carriers deal with mobile content in the US: It’s too bad the US hasn’t seen the adoption of the democratic Asian model, where carriers put up just about all content available, and let the customers decide which is bad, which is good, and which belongs at the top of the decks. This model has worked wonders in Japan and Korea, and would work even better when joined by new emerging solutions in custom UIs, search, segmentation and discovery.

Another comment that caught our eye was: If you’re a carrier, you may disagree with me, but just lurk in the halls at any CTIA or Developer conference (hide your badge) and listen to what the developer community is saying about you behind your back: they hate working with you.

Clearly this kind of friction is not in the best interest of any player, not too mention the consumer, in the value chain. — Eds.