The whole crew takes the last podcast of 2009 to review the major events that rocked the web and tech landscape and also makes predictions for the new decade of 2010. This is probably our longest episode over an hour long and also a rare one which was done in the afternoon today.
Review of the Year 2009 in the Asia Web and Technology Landscape: The Rise of Asia Social Networks (QQ) with virtual currency and goods and also the mobile web economy beginning with the emergence of location based mobile social networking apps: FourSquare and Gowalla in Asia. Of course, we reveal how often our podcast has been downloaded.
Predictions Ahead for 2010 in the Asia Web and Technology Landscape: Netbooks, Cloud Computing, Broadband Infrastructure in Asia and how it might lead to a new era of content production for podcasts and videocasts in Asia. Short notes on venture capital in 2010 and whether we will see more companies getting next stage funding.
Just a note regarding Blackberry in Indonesia. It took off because RIM worked with the telco operators to bundle handset with data plan, which creates costs that are far more affordable. This is a common practice with RIM, but was unusual in Indonesia (unlike in, say, Singapore where phones are normally subsidized with plans). Together with the popularity of Facebook and Twitter, mobile internet access suddenly became in demand. When iPhone came, it's only available via Telkomsel (i.e. monopoly, just like SingTel before) and they offered it at a much higher price bundle than Blackberry -- that's why iPhone has not been able to make a dent in Indonesia so far.
My view, there will be a backlash to the popularity of Blackberry. Phones are a social status now and the coolness factor of Blackberry is so diluted now in Indonesia. There are cheap knock offs from China, etc. I think people will soon look for the iPhone and it's up to Telkomsel whether they will welcome the demand with open arms (i.e. make iPhone more cost-competitive).