Had an interesting conversation yesterday with Mark Levy, VP of Content at InfoSpace Mobile…(An aside: my first company visit since I moved to LA last week…and my first experience with LA transport…two change of buses and two long, meandering hours to get to the other end of Wilshire, in Santa Monica. I figured out something: the bus system in LA is not complicated; it is just sorry ass slow. By car, it would have taken about 35-45 minutes from where I live. I am rethinking my no-car bit…).
The InfoSpace Mobile unit is still in a bit of flux, after it recently bought out Moviso. That plus INSP’s own mobile offerings on the backend infrastructure side makes things a little tricky right now, when it come to company’s positioning…(It is easy to understand: Moviso on the front-end mobile content side, InfoSpace’s Modalyst is on the backend delivery and infrastructure side, but it needs to get more aggressive with that messaging…)

But then, it is one of the biggest players in the mobile content market in U.S….Levy claims that his company powers about 60-70 percent of the ringtones sold in U.S. right now. Of course, with a lot of ringtones sites springing up, some not so accountable, it is difficult to judge.
Levy agreed on the sense of deja-vu I’ve been having, and have been writing about on my sites lately, about the current mobile content (and Internet in general) market beginning to resemble the frenzy on late 90s. And he is not necessarily thrilled by it…these so-called comebacks are as dicey as the original plans, if you ask me.
Levy also pointed about something which I haven’t necessarily given my thought to: I asked him about why a company like his wouldn’t be a natural ally to an online music stores like say the new Napster. He says that the different pricing economics would make it a very difficult proposition to sell to consumers. On one side, these online music stores are having enough trouble trying to sell 99 cent songs. On the other hand, the tinny 6-second, badly reproduced ringtones are selling for $2.50 a pop. Try justifying that to a consumer on one platform…hence he believes it makes sense to keep the two platforms separate, until the industry figures out more rational synergies.
Note to myself: I need to start taking notes or taping these conversations, so that I have more meat�go back to being a journalist and try not to pose as an analyst too much…
Related:
– InfoSpace Acquires Moviso for $25 Million; Looking To Sell Payments Division
– Cingular Signs On Major Five For Mobile Music
– Mobile Music Report for Feb 2004
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