It’s perhaps too easy and fashionable to trash multilateral operator initiatives – to think they are doomed to failure from the word go. But their dismal track record supports such cynicism. And after attending Informa’s WAC Focus Day in Berlin a couple of weeks ago, one couldn’t help but leave the event with a pessimistic view of the prospects for the Wholesale Applications Community, or WAC for short.

When it comes to the relationship between the devices and content they offer Amazon and Apple are two very different companies. Apple’s App Store was created to act as a differentiating feature that is available only to their end users, in order to compel consumers to purchase Apple devices rather than those of their rivals. While for Amazon it is the reverse, their devices exist to encourage the growth of the market for the sale of the digital content that is available on their online store.

Software and middleware vendors HP and Oracle have been all over the app store bandwagon this week, both unveiling platforms designed to help service providers and operators get their own app store initiatives underway.

Telefónica’s global API program, BlueVia, has this week released a new billing API designed to cater to carrier billing functionality for app developers.

The hype and excitement generated by the advent of digital advertising a decade ago led to widespread speculation on the death of traditional media. But were those predictions very much exaggerated or just premature?

We are at the start of a new digital era. The next stage shouldn’t be called Web 3.0 as it’s not about the ‘web’ anymore. Mobility is the heart of this new era and people spend more time in apps than they do on the web. There are very deep layers of personalisation in mobile apps that can aggregate all the activity that you and your friends are involved in, this gives us functionality that can predict user behaviour.