The 2017 tech year-in-review

The year is about to come to an end and I wanted to jot down a few thoughts about some of the events that I have found most significant in the tech and startup spaces over the last 12 months.

(1) Amazon goes brick and mortar

 If there is one major corporate transaction that I would highlight that would be Amazon's $14bn purchase of Whole Foods. We are all well aware of Amazon's clout and how much many of us rely on it for buying and selling stuff. This acquisition is a game changer and, even more importantly, it seems like it is not going to be the last of its kind, as in recent weeks there have been multiple rumors, in particular around French leader Carrefour, about Amazon acquiring in Europe.


As NYU Stern's professor Scott Galloway usually says, Amazon is slashing value out of traditional retailers and is likely to become the first $1tn company in the world.  Interestingly, he also points out how Amazon is a threat for competition and advocates for antitrust action that could easily to breaking the company up in different pieces.

Even in such a scenario, Amazon is a global "darling". Case in point: the beauty pageant / auction launched by Amazon among American cities for the purpose of erecting its second American HQ. An astonishing 238 proposals have been received. Game on.

(2) The crypto hype
As blockchain technology evolves, 2017 will be remembered as the year when cryptocurrencies became a new hot thing in tech. I would not dare say the became mainstream but it is obvious that when your mother asks you what bitcoin is and how she can invest in it, there is something going on. I already blogged about this some months ago.

The main cryptocurrencies (in particular bitcoin and ethereum) have had dramatic price increases (chart below; source: Coinbase), which has led to lots of market debate as to whether we are in a new bubble or if, on the other hand, bitcoin is for instance the new refuge replacing gold. There are arguments and interest of all kinds. From Jamie Dimon's - JPMorgan Chase's CEO - calling people "stupid" for buying bitcoin to the CME Group's launch of bitcoin futures a few weeks ago.

But this crypto frenzy has gone past bitcoin and ethereum. ICO is the acronym of the year and funds raised through this mechanism have exceeded $3bn. We have seen a proliferation of new ethereum-based tokens relying, in many cases, in dubious business models.

I took the time this year to learn a bit about all these topics and decided to invest (ie. gamble) some money in various cryptocurrencies to give this thing a shot. It did not go badly, although I am kind of expecting a short term correction and have therefore cashed in for the most part. In any case, in spite of diverse theories, I'd argue nobody has a real clue about how to value these new assets and how things are going to go down the road.

(3) The Uber crash

Uber has been for years the darling among startups and venture capital investors. Aggressive growth all over the world, increasing valuation round after round, huge losses relying on future market domination...and all of this relying on a "bro-kind-of culture" of work hard play hard.

In 2017 the foundations of Uber became under substantial scrutiny as a result of a very unfortunate  sexual harassment scandal which, rather than an isolated event, proved to be part of the company's culture itself. The whole thing led to CEO Travis Kalanick's resignation and to significant user backlash...and planted the seed for the #MeToo movement - which Time magazine has fairly acknowledged as "person of the year" - that exploded with the whole Harvey Weinstein "plot" .

I am very curious to see how Uber recovers under new CEO Dara Khosrowshahi after having moved into such a slippery slope. Corporate culture matters and now that culture-related scandals are reportedly bringing valuation down, executives will most likely pay more attention to it.

(4) Disney threatens Netflix

Star Wars: Episode VIII premiered in L.A. on December 9 and just a few days later in Europe. But this was not the only surprise that The Walt Disney Company had for us before the year end. On December 14 it was announced that Disney would be acquiring 21st Century Fox film and tv studios for $66bn (including debt) which, among others includes the FX and National Geographic networks, a large additional stake in Hulu and valuable franchises such as Alien and Avatar, or TV shows such as "How I met your mother". A massive move that I expect will change the playing field very significantly in the coming years.

I have thought for a long time that entertainment consumption has changed forever and that TV as we have known it is doomed. Disney has understood this and in the last year they have amassed a ton of content on top of their traditional stuff, including Marvel, the Star Wars franchise. Now it is this bold move.

In the last months there have been rumors about Netflix being a target for Disney. However, this may no longer be the case. After deciding to pull content from Netflix, all points in the direction of launching its own service, either from scratch or on the back of Hulu. If you add sports content (i.e. ESPN) to the mix, we do have a new streaming battle ahead. Watch out Netflix, Amazon.

(5) The advent of fake news

2017 has been the year when fake news have become a major threat globally. It all started at the time of the US presidential election in late 2016. As it has been proven, Russia played a a central part in creating fake news that substantially contributed to changing public perception and generating opinion in favor or Trump. Upon becoming president, Trump started a PR war accusing CNN and others of being fake news. Several examples of this unacceptable activity followed for instance with the French election and, more recently, with the pathetic allegations against Spain's democracy fabricated by the Catalonian pro-independence block (and the likes of Russia and Venezuela) supporters) in their crazy and illegal pursue of independence.

Fake news are a 21st century weapon aimed at bringing down the foundations of democracy as we know it. And it is in this instance that technology companies - in particular Facebook and Google given their size and business models - have a huge responsibility to prevent, or at the very least minimize, fake news from happening. They have the budget, the resources and, increasingly, the technology (e.g AI) to address this. I am hoping that they honor their duty.

It's been an interesting year. I am sure 2018 is going to be a ride, which I am going to have to follow even closer. More to come soon.

Happy holidays!

Gmail's Priority Inbox

I have just installed Priority Inbox, Gmail's new feature that allows you to have an inbox separate from the actual "Inbox" where you store those emails that you find most important. I have just used it for a couple of hours but it definitely works for me.

I used to conduct this prioritization on Gmail by adding stars to emails but they were not so intuitive and and easy to find as they are with Priority Inbox. When I am working on my desktop-based email program I try to keep in my inbox only those emails that require additional attention or follow up. Now Priority Inbox does this for me.

The new feature is supposed to be able to classify your emails as priority or non-priority and to improve such classification as the user confirms or modifies the status that Gmail gives to each received email.


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Google vs Facebook on social...again

Last February I wrote a couple of posts about how Google and Facebook were somehow challenging each other: Google was making a move into social with Buzz and Facebook was planning on creating @facebook email accounts. I did not expect much success of either and, five months later none of the initiatives has crystalized.

Now seems like Google is striking back with a social initiative, named Google Me. Apparently, according to Techrunch, it was Kevin Rose, Digg's CEO, who first mention this on his Twitter. A lot of comments have been made about this and Google is reportedly giving top priority to this venture. This is not Google's first move on "pure" social networks, since it already owns Orkut, which is very popular in very important markets such as Brazil.

I understand it if Google is worried about the Facebook effect. More and more people spend more and more time on Facebook (and on other social networks) and that means less time searching on Google and, in turn, fewer ad impressions and clicks on Google.  Btw, some sources are claiming that FB's 2009 turnover was around $800m, more than doubling that of FY 2008...impressive.

I have to admit that I am curious to see the new thing that Google will be offering. That said, I am doubtful about whether I will be signing up. If it is to offer the same thing Facebook does, what is the point? And at the end of the day I will only sign up if my friends do so. Or maybe someone will be coming up with an app that will sync FB and Google Me... but then again, what's the point if the offering is the same?

Wait and see...

The iPhone 4 effect

By now it is of public domain that the iPhone 4 is out and that it is being a massive success. I have read reports highlighting that Apple may have sold 1.5 million plus devices on the first day, which would turn the iPhone4's opening the most successful in Apple's history so far.

I have read some preliminary reviews and pretty much everyone agrees on how cool the device is and on the fact that it is the best cellphone out there in the market for the time being.

The good news for Spain is that Telefonica will not enjoy distribution exclusivity (along the lines of AT&T's in the US) any more. Apparently, both Orange (France Telecom's mobile subsidiary) and Vodafone (my carrier) will be distributing it too. Leaving aside the very important competition-related issues (i.e more creativity and competitiveness around mobile data plans), this means that I will have access to an iPhone 4 without changing carriers. I have to admit that I am quite happy with Vodafone's service after 20 months (well, if I do not include the shitty Storm... but that was my fault) and I am not planning on switching.

Though the iPhone 4 is really cool, I would lie if I did not say that the shadow of Android is quite large. Over time, there are more and more voices claiming that Apple's closed environment - as opposed to Android's openness - is a bummer and gives Apple to much power. There are sleek Android devices out there and there will be more coming too. At the end of the day, it seems like I will be more and more dependent on both Apple and Google. Isn't it a bit scary?

Anyway, it won't be until mid-July that the iPhone 4 will land in Spain. I am really looking forward to the carriers' marketing campaigns...

Privacy is in fashion

Internet users' privacy has always been a concern. That is obvious and reasonable. It must not be allowed that companies do whatever they want with the data they might gather. Over the past couple of weeks, significant outcry has raised against two giants such as Google and Facebook.

Google has faced trouble in countries such as Ireland and Germany. Apparently, Google gathered data from unencrypted wifi  networks while getting info for location-based products from its Street View cars. The Irish authorities have forced Google to delete all the collected data and Google has met that demands quickly and has confirmed through a public statement .

On the other hand, Facebook has experienced the last of its many incidents concerning the use of its users' private information. I am quite an avid Facebook user and I must admit that I have never paid super detailed attention to my Facebook privacy controls beyond the people I share pics and information with. The other day, after reading about Mark Zuckerberg explanations (how many so far!!) on the Washington Post I went to my Facebook's settings and they are a mess and hard to understand. Zuckerberg acknowledges that, though people are willing to share information (but with the people they want to, not necessarily with third parties, I'd say!!!!!), they want simpler privacy controls and claims that Facebook has heard such feedback from users and that some changes will be introduced shortly. Well, this sounds to me like the same old story. It is the "n-time" that Zuckerberg goes out there to apologize/explain their treatment of users' data. C'mon guys, enough, just do what you have to do (i.e. all settings should be "private" and "opt-in" by default) at once. I understand that Facebook might need such information to monetize its audience through third parties but this is not the right way to do it.

These have been to of latest stories about privacy. Rest assured it they won't be the last.

iAd: Apple entra en la batalla de la publicidad en el movil

Hace unos dias Apple presento su nuevo sistema operativo para el iPhone, el denominado IPhone OS4, que incluye diversas mejoras como la posiblidad de multi-task (utilizar varias aplicaciones a la vez) o la de organizar las distintas aplicaciones en carpetas. Pero lo que mas me llamo la atencion fue la presentacion de iAd, una nueva plataforma que permitira incluir publicidad de calidad (video, etc.) en las aplicaciones creadas por los desarrolladores. Un incentivo mas para desarrollar mas y mejores aplicaciones para el ecosistema iPhone.

Pero mas alla de todo esto, lo importante es que Apple se mete de lleno en la pelea por los dolares y los euros derivados de la publicidad, algo que al dia de hoy es practicamente un territorio propiedad de Google.

La perspectiva es en todo caso diferente. Mientras Google concentra su publicidad (y por tanto los ingresos) en las busquedas, Steve Jobs se centra en el uso por los usuarios de las aplicaciones. Tiene sentido. Atacar a Google en un ambito como el de las busquedas en el que es el lider destacadisimo probablemente sea una batalla abocada al fracaso (que se lo digan a Microsoft y Yahoo). Por otro lado, la popularidad de la App Store y de sus aplicaciones para el iPhone las convierten en un activo por explotar.

Os adjunto el link a la pagina de Apple donde podeis ver el keynote de Jobs sobre diversas cuestiones (iAd comienza hacia el minuto 44 del video y, por cierto, las cifras que maneja sobre la base del uso actual de aplicaciones y del numero de iPhones vendidos - 1.000 millones de anuncios al dia - son bastante impresionantes. Indicar igualmente que Apple planea entregar a los developers el 60% de los ingresos derivados de la publicidad).

En un momento en que se empieza a intuir cada vez mas la lucha por convertirse en el sistema operativo de referencia (yo apuesto sobre todo por iPhone y Android y en menor medida RIM, Windows y Symbian, en este orden), los ingresos derivados de las aplicaciones para moviles no hacen esa lucha sino mas interesante todavia.

Google Buzz

I wrote about Google's new tool yesterday without actually knowing that it was being released today!! So Google Buzz it is.

I have just tested it a little bit - such option appears automatically when you log on your Gmail account - and so far I have to stick with what I said yesterday. Plus the only idea of getting started with picking friends to follow and so forth from my list of contacts is just tiring...

I am giving it a go with 10 people I'm following and will see what happens. There has been a lot of buzz (easy joke) today about this. As usual, Techcrunch gives us some good insights about potential pros and cons.

Google vs Facebook

I have just read today that Facebook is working on creating @facebook.com email -the so-called Project Titan- accounts and Google is considering setting up status updates on Gmail so you can see what your friends are up to. Interesting.

Gmail is a pretty good email service, offering lots of capacity and quite user-friendly. I still miss the typical folder structure because I am one of those who hates having a lot of stuff in his inbox and with Gmail that is exactly what happens. The labels that you can now attach to each emails somewhat replace such feature but to a lesser extent. Overall I am happy with Gmail and given that I have been using it for so long, I find it hard to think about changing overnight to Facebook mail or to any other. The only idea of replacing all my signing in details in every single site in which I am active or the transition process until everyone is aware that you have a new email account are big deterrents.

On the other hand, the move by Google to offer status updates to Gmail users is quite curious. At this point I do not really see myself using it. My audience is different on Gmail, Twitter and Facebook. As of today I make a difference between fun (Facebook) and work (Twitter-Linkedin) and that is why I to not have updates in sync. Audiences differ and I do not necessarily want one audience being aware of some issues and vice versa. My Gmail contacts at this point include people from both audiences so it would be hard for me to filter. The fact that people are spending so much time on Facebook might be a little worrisome for Google and the status update move might work in that direction.