Tekbite

Tekbite viewership: Female?

2009-04-12T15:03:00.000-07:00

So today I logged into YouTube and looked at the "insights" on the video posted a while back about Advertising Paradigms; and much to my astonishment we apparently have a user group of women who watched the video!
Surprising, but welcomed!

Textbook Hockey Stick Growth

2009-03-15T20:34:00.001-07:00

The wonderful part about the internet is how quickly information can spread. This viral experience is almost breath taking, especially when a service/website goes from flying under the radar to getting HUGE attention.
A perfect example of this feat is the site known as "FML" (f*** my life). It's a site that I have found entertaining for well over a month, and when showing people here in college I always get the reaction of "Why haven't I heard of this before???". Once fmylife.com setup their fan page on Facebook, they have received a tremendously positive feedback from users and experienced a true textbook version of hockey stick growth and with this should come a plethora of active users. In this case more users means more content, more appeal, and even more users. In the past 24 hours they have gone from 200k to 300k to nearly 350k fans and growing rapidly. If only ALL web based startups could see this kind of growth we might not be in our current recession!

http://www.fmylife.com
http://www.facebook.com/pages/FML/55821604168?ref=nf

Google's Personal Turk?

2009-02-05T15:06:00.000-08:00

Google has the known muscle in the cpc territory as being an industry leader, and has helped define the new market economy for websites. This has also provided for viable business models centered around free content which has produced the websites, blogs, and videos that we all know and love.
So where has Google been lacking in the online advertising industry? Graphical Advertising.
Google knows that cpm advertising will be the golden handle for big businesses in the future and is trying to develop a more defined sense of the sector. So how do you target your advertising towards a new audience and learn about customer behavior? Why not just ask them!
Google has recently started asking for visitor input at sites like Arstechnica as to whether or not they have seen an ad from their larger name clients. In the case illustrated below, Google asks whether you have seen a particular GMC advertisement and if you have not it runs a dual ad space motion advertisement. If you select "yes and I don't like it" it will then prompt you for what product is being advertised, or "I don't know".
This is in essence Google's private mechanical Turk (amazon product) to give metrics to their advertisers and develop further insight into their cpm platform.

YouTube Goes Long

2008-11-24T21:32:00.000-08:00

YouTube has recently formatted all of its video's into wide screen (granting side bars for 4:3 aspect videos... aka most videos) when viewed on YouTube's site. With the flurry of recent changes to the YouTube overall goals this change is not a huge surprise, however the timing of it is.

The recent cooperation with MGM for delivering full length films obviously pits itself against primary competitor Hulu, MGM has stated that we can expected for hits such as the Bond franchise to steer clear of these sites while DVD sales are still doing well.

In short, this basically means that we can expect to be offered poop on a platter (C list films) until the model of digital distribution no longer poses a real "threat" to physical media and that the advertising revenue is there to support such delivery.
However in my own personal opinion, delivering hit movies on YouTube at their "high quality" setting, but not HD and offering affiliate based links to purchasing their physical media through the major sources could prove as an amazing way of natural promotion for already hit titles.

New Live Brand: Kumo?

2008-11-24T19:49:00.000-08:00

Microsoft loves online services. So much so that it just can't seem to figure out what the hell to call any of them! This with be the second rebranding experience that users will have to endure of rumors hold true of them renaming their Live Search as "Kumo".
While marketers for ages have used the trick of "rebranding" to help shake past stigma about a particular product/service or to reignite interest amongst users through a retro appeal, this Kumo rename just feels to groundless.

Let's take a look at the landscape for Microsoft right now. Vista = terrible rap, so I get why they are calling the next iteration Windows 7 when, in all reality, it is more like Vista 2nd Edition. However changing the brand of their search engine just doesn't seem like it would have the effectiveness that Microsoft is looking to use in order to break the market share stagnation that has overshadowed them. The real key to their success, especially if they are choosing to rebrand is not simply just a new name. It really needs to be the whole new product that a separate brand name leads you to assume.

They need to fix their results to react to users who are used to working with Google, so that when you use terms more suited for the Google brain, it makes for an easy transition of users to the new services.

The second major thing to drive market share is to upgrade the level of standardization and ease of use to their Live! Search Cash Back program that users have when setting up a free Hotmail account. This model of rewarding users for choosing particular retailers for a product is the sugar for our new advertising kool-aid. Once this can become a mindless task for users to save money by going through certain routines, you then have clients instead of just visitors.

The Open Source IPTV?

2008-11-18T12:16:00.001-08:00

With heavyweights like Hulu slugging it out for online advertising dollars in the joint venture between NBC and Fox the quest for the ultimate consumer video portal is still on.
A lot of noise noise been made about the open source interface known as
Boxee which offers a mashup of all the big names (sans drm options) as well as local media including NAS support and nearly every codec under the sun. They are offering invite based rollouts each monday; however with the pent up demand for their product the wait list is gasping for air. So if you are looking for a clean interface on your mac, pc, Linux box or Apple TV head on over to Boxee to give it a whirl.

Boxee

Why Purely Digital Content is Stammering Around

2008-11-17T15:26:00.000-08:00

If anybody plans on succeeding as a content provider with increasing customer demands, they are going to have to offer centralized content storage with a Sync between all the devices in that customers portfolio with varying qualities to match each offering. This would not only give the customer what they want (without the need to break the DRM that exists on much of today's most desirable content) but it would also help keep that customer for life in regards to buying your hardware if it links with your content management system better than anybody else. (a la Apple thus far)

What is seriously lacking, and why nobody has really taken off in the digital download space (HD video especially)is that consumers don't really have a central store to keep their content and be able to access it across all of their devices in a resolution that is fitting for each one.

For example, as a consumer I should be able to purchase a media "license" as to which I decided the highest quality variable when purchased (influenced by price) and should be able to stream the highest quality to my HDTV, a standard res to my desktop/laptop environment, as well as a lower resolution to my mobile/ipod device.

I should be able to select what types of media are physically on each device, as well as at least have the option of streaming content when I am on my own local network, if not stream my media over the web through something like Mobile Me. A great application of this would be if I am on a business trip and I would like to watch some fresh content that has downloaded to my home media server, I should be able to stream that via a web interface of some kind on my laptop given it has a fast enough connection.
This digital ownership of licenses would give way for license upgrades that would make for a much lower total cost of ownership for consumers and speed adoption rates when higher and higher quality options present themselves.

As it is right now, a customer who bought a new title on DVD for $20, the DVD player for $100 is now faced with the next medium of Blu-ray with media fetching $35, and players going for well over $200.

Imagine if you were able to consolidate this cost into a media server/Time Capsule type device and then manage your digital content lifestyle from one jumping point. Something like Time Capsule really presents itself as a candidate as if offer Draft N wireless (fast enough for higher resolution media), connected to the internet, and has expandable storage through high capacity external hard drives.

The problem here really lies with no content owner (Sony pictures etc.) wanting to give up control over their licensing rights and letting any single provider develop such a solution to completely deliver on customer needs. While Apple does dance around a Monopoly with their iTunes/iPod ecosystem, the reality is that it has WORKED for consumers, and that is why it has done so well. It is something reliable, and they have offered legal ways to upgrade your audio for those who purchased media through them before the higher fidelity was available, instead of forcing a straight rebuy for all of their customer base.

This type of solution is the ultimate successor to the physical medium (vhs, dvd, bluray...) and is what will ultimately be necessary in the coming age of digital downloads. If you have any additional thoughts, please feel free to voice them in the comments as I love hearing feedback from all of you!

Advertising Paradigm Video

2008-10-31T11:49:00.000-07:00

Windows Live! Mail Receives a Facelift

2008-10-30T15:25:00.000-07:00

Some users are reporting an updated interface for their hotmail accounts which Microsoft touts as not only being cleaner, but providing up to a 70% quicker experience for those still using Redmond's free offering (as opposed to GMail). This parallels the move for more cloud services offered my Microsoft as they appear to capitalize on strategic business units (SBU's)to actually innovate and justify each product offering they have.
Combine this with their Windows Azure, upcoming Windows 7 and its tight integration with web services and Microsoft might actually have a fighting chance to regain the slippage in market share that they have recently endured in both platform and in the search space.

Mobile Me: 50% Off!

2008-10-29T22:51:00.000-07:00

Love it or hate it, it's hard to argue with a good deal (in comparison anyways). Right now through Amazon (although shipped by a 3rd party) you can pick up a 1 year subscription to Mobile Me for only $49.99, while some of you may be yawning right now this indicates a significant discount over retail, and even bests the price Apple offers when bundled with a new Mac (usually $69.99 bundle price, $99.99 retail)

Check it out below if you are interested in picking up the real deal (assuming you are on the trial period) or are just looking to renew as I am your current account!

Mobile Me on the cheap!

Affiliate Dream Tool?

2008-10-22T13:41:00.001-07:00

Google's seemingly random additions to their GMail offering have blessed us with a new feature that will be useful for techs and affiliates alike, as well as any help desk type situation. Their "canned responses" bring to the table something that is kind of a duh! feature.
It offers the ability to paste in common responses which will be excellent for help desk activities that come across the same and/or similar issues for their client base. Affiliate marketers will probably be the ones in practice who use this feature the most seeing as you can have automated responses based on keywords etc. So this basically offers a clean auto responder that will be hugely effective when you direct users to put specific titles in the e-mail headline.
I personally find the most amusing point of this feature is how polarized it appears when compared to the GMail goggles that are supposed to make it harder for people to send out those canned responses and/or late night drunken confession :)

Advertising Paradigm?

2008-10-19T14:39:00.000-07:00

With the current housing bubble imploding, and an overall recession (depression?) just getting warmed up within the United States, where it most certainly will not end regardless of how far away you are! It is interesting to see how advertising dollars are being spent by firms to create sales, and promote themselves.
And with any recession across the globe, a tighter money supply leads to innovation or a shift in how items are purchased. With this particular recession coming after huge surges of money spent in the online advertising sector, I think the virtual dollars are going to be spent much more diligently and go through a paradigm shift towards results driven (affiliate) advertising, and steer away from being so dependent on CPC advertising that requires small businesses to understand their metrics and see if the time, money, and effort was well spent of if it is actually costing them money.

There will always be a place for impression based advertising, but as rates have recently fallen through the floor (due in part to small business conservation), we are seeing that this impression strategy not only has lower value than previously conceived, but in fact it's value is really only for large scale companies who want to be that name you think of every time you go shopping such as Coca-Cola, or Pepsi.
This shift is also going to greatly decreased the cost of video advertising as the current model which relies on television primarily is so untargeted and untraceable that is really does not make feasible sense for most businesses to take part in. Companies like Spotrunner are trying to lower the overall barrier to entry, but those types of services will only be complementary services to videos online which will only pay out based upon conversions. This will leave the payouts for each program to be optimized but the publisher of the original content to target visitors for higher revenue, which is completely justified in advance based on a percentage of sale.

These metrics will help foil fraudulent content producers who are artificially driving up click prices, and make a nice pile while generating no real value for their respective advertisers. Companies like Google and Yahoo have technologies in place to help combat this type of fraud, but they are far from perfect and represent a large overhead cost to their business model. Whereas conversion payouts make much more sense as it would no longer be feasible for any publisher to take advantage of this inefficiency.

Google Reaching Deep for Cashflow

2008-10-19T14:22:00.000-07:00

It seems at though Google is taking the flak that is has been receiving recently to heart in regards to straying from their main revenue streams to be involved with their green initiatives, the moon footage competition etc. instead of building out the revenue streams from their primary products such as search, maps, and videos.
Well let's first take a look at YouTube. This is the video wonder child who absolutely dominates the online video segment for user generated videos, but has failed to really bring in serious enough cash to justify the 1.65 billion dollar purchase price that Google paid out for the asset. Recently, they have upped the asking price for home page sponsorships, and have linked in click-to-buy features where visitors can easily obtain legal downloads of music from iTunes and Amazon when viewing a music video online. This move greatly reinforces the paradigm shift that I expect to happen with online advertising which I will get deep into in a future post.

Google Maps: This product has some real untapped value when you consider geographically targeted advertising, not only to your particular location, but perhaps locations that are seeking out for a potential vacation. For instance if you were looking at the Italy on Google maps to see what areas might be a great area to stay, local hotels could offer an advertisement along the bottom touting what they offer over the other local competition. This type of geographical targeting just makes sense for this hugely popular and effective tool, that has broadened it's reach and solidified it's lead in the handheld market as well (a la iPhone, iPod touch, Android).

Search Advertising + Adsense
Google is looking to draw more revenue from each search made both on their search engine (see: Yahoo Monopoly) as well as their syndication network known as Adsense. The adsense program in particular is what will most likely be their focusing driver in future financial quarters as Google attempts to draw more revenue from domain assets not directly under their control. And while they have pretty strict policies about what kind of Adwords prices are asked based upon the percentage of web space that is taken up by advertisements, do not be surprised if their search engine gave a preference - if even small to those sites running their Adsense content which converts well.

Halloween

2008-10-10T20:45:00.000-07:00

While I normally hate forwards, this was just too true to pass up.....

Adroll vs. Rubicon

2008-10-09T11:09:00.001-07:00

In arena of monetizing leftover advertising space, there are a few advertising management opportunities that can result in a variety of experiences. First of all, anybody with an AdSense account can now use Google Ad manager for selling space at their higher rates, and letting AdSense fill any leftover inventory.

I think there is a better approach, and a few companies agree.

Adroll
What Adroll does is pretty unique. Adroll is an adspace management system that allows for you to insert code from whatever advertising network you are currently using (Yahoo Publisher network, Adsense, Adbrite etc.) and even ad multiple networks on a rotation. In-house ads are also options to add, however Adroll let's you pick between picking an eCPM for them to beat (a.k.a whatever you are making currently or above), OR you can allow them to maximize your advertising space through whatever networks they have running on your site.
They key here is that the targeting stems from having your domain joined under social groups, so that low traffic sites primarily can offer more value to larger buyers such as Hyatt etc. to run fluid campaigns across multiple domains without a ton of work.

The Rubicon Project
Rubicon takes a slightly different approach, and thinks that their advertising matching system is so efficient, that by analyzing your traffic based on time of day, geographic origins etc. that they will be able to maximize your current earnings - but they take a small fee for the privilege of doing business.
My experience has been that for lower traffic sites, you can make a lot more money through Adroll's system if you have target niche content compared to the page view whore mentality of sites such as Tom's Hardware which has lost a lot of respect in their respective fields.

Feel free to check out any of the offerings and see what fits your site's traffic the best and ultimately brings you the best value for your time and effort.

Adroll

The Rubicon Project

AdSense

CIO of Visa

2008-10-09T10:35:00.000-07:00

In one of my classes today I had the pleasure of hearing the CIO of Visa give a presentation, and as a former Coug he had some interesting things to say about how technology is creating a paradigm shift in how people conduct business across the globe. He spoke about the huge disparity of the number of Visa cards compared to the number of mobile phones in the world (3:1 in favor of mobile phones); and how they must be cognizant of those changes to how people want to interact with their services.

He spoke about the current American financial troubles, and how while it is troubling and effects a large portion of their customer base, he does not have such a bleak outlook on both their business, and the economy as a whole. He does mention that in today's market applicants are going to have to work harder for a job, but that the positions and cash flow is out there to sustain the educated masses of America.

On the Education note, he spoke of how when opening up positions, he never excludes non college graduates from the pool because he said, "While the general rule still holds true that college graduates are the cream of the American knowledge force, you should never limit your options by excluding those only with a High School degree".
He goes on to state, "One of the brightest and hardest working people I have on my team only graduate from high school. Not because he is lazy, but because he actually has a tremendous work ethic and would rather be in the field he loves than go to higher education - and I admire him for that".

These notes resound the sentiment of most College attendees that feel that College may not be giving them everything that they were hoping for, and in fact may just be "going through the motions" and why a degree is holding less and less weight unless it is of higher value such as an MBA. There are quite a few affluent people who have not attended college. Take a look at the author of ShoeMoney.com who has built a very strong business based on affiliate marketing, and has fleshed out the niche market by blogging about ways to develop your online income. He struggled with school because of the format in which it was presented. And, like myself and many others, found that the non relevant courses to his interest were not only boring but useless to his profession. His latest post about the value within College actually goes on about how only the classes in Marketing and Business tended to have content that stuck with him.

The principles of Marketing have not really changed in the last 100 years ever since business started asking customers what they wanted, and tailoring their products/services to meet unique customer demands. If you can fulfill that simple objective, your business has a much higher chance at success.
Feel free to read more about the particular Shoe Money post here. He has a lot of interesting articles and his blog even republishes Tech Crunch stories that fit into his particular niche.

Behind the Scenes: Race to Cloud Computing

2008-10-09T09:08:00.000-07:00

It is a well known fact that Microsoft rules the world when it comes to desktop clients running their Operating System, and that as trendy as Apple is right now they just are not mustering the kind of market share that a lot of investors would like to see them at.
Meanwhile Google is dominating the online search category (the most profitable online category to date based on the percentage of online ad dollars spent there). Google more or less "meddles" with projects which seem in a continuous Beta state (i.e. GMail).
So what is all of this fuss over "cloud computing" anyway? Well the root behind the idea is actually quite old; with the initial cousin being main frames with clients who used cycles of the mainframe to complete tasks. With the advancement of the internet and increasing bandwidth to all of our computing devices such as desktop, laptop, ultra-mobile devices; companies are more and more interested in bringing services to customers based on the same mainframe model, but sent over the internet instead of a local network.
So what does this mean for the players in the field? Apple is taking the tack of offering a solid hardware/software solution for local needs, and attempting to drive a subscription service for their Mobile Me service which connects all of your devices, most of your files, but most importantly your digital thumb print (e-mail, calendar, and address book).
Google's approach is to be able to offer these services for free through a still viable business model by showing relevant advertising from their enormous ad inventory that is commanding some of the highest eCPM (revenue per thousand impressions) in the industry. This feature has allowed for Google to play with new offerings while still offering a hose of cash flow to sustain their habits.
So what is Microsoft going to do about could computing? It is a technology that is gaining traction extremely quickly and has the potential to allow for a new dominance in the market as our internet connections get faster and faster. Microsoft however has the advantage of sitting on a huge amount of cold hard cash, which they can throw at their Live services to develop decent competing services. The catch? Microsoft just does not have the advertising inventory to fund these projects in lieu of their Windows/Office combination. So how are they hoping to fund this? At the end of the day there are going to be bills that Strategic Business Units will have to account for. Microsoft will either be forced to charge a subscription like Apple, develop their advertising inventory if they can't get their CPA (cost per action) advertising technology up to speed.
Microsoft is hoping to create a competitive advantage in the advertising space by not offering just lower click rates, by offering the ability to track the flow of traffic over the internet to see when customers actually buy your products. By streamlining a CPA advertising model, they would be able to tout a real eCPM that costs less for advertisers, and only charge them when they have a sale which pays out for everybody. This is the type of advertising we will all eventually be at, it is just a matter of how long it is going to take for not only Microsoft, but all other online advertising companies to implement for their customer base.

Ask Begins their Focus on Women

2008-09-15T10:51:00.000-07:00

A while back Ask.com announced their shift in focus from being a primarily search oriented business to focusing on questions that women specifically have as (they believe) it is a vastly underserved market. Their marketing strategy is now visible on various news sites and focuses on a younger demographic from what the advertisements point to.
How this will pan out for their core business has yet to be seen, but creating a strong advertiser following that focuses on young women could help create their own niche ad-network among the often cluttered internet. Niche markets appear to be the future of advertising and business models as the "one size fits all" is certainly providing a lesser experience overall for the customer in today's market.

New Touch: New Business?

2008-09-09T15:17:00.000-07:00

The second coming of the iPod touch is pretty significant for Apple's core business due to two primary reasons.
#1: Price Point
Apple has brought the entry price of the iPod touch down near the magical $200 price point which is the "trigger price" in consumer electronics. The iPod was really just a novelty until the iPod mini was introduced at the $199 price point, at which a majority of users could justify spending their hard earned money on essentially a toy. The design has also been greatly improved with physical buttons for volume control in addition to a built in speaker (great for sharing those lovely YouTube videos with your buddies at work)

#2: Software Features
Consolidating to the 2.1 firmware and allowing for Mic input (also available on the new nano) for "voice recordings" will easily lend themselves to VoIP applications to be used over a wifi network, conferencing with buddies, or communication for games/software that might have an interactive part to them. This really bypasses the need for Application support through the dock connector which is what most users wanted to do with that extended functionality anyways: add a mic.

Also, with the back to school promotion that Apple ran this year, they really boosted the installation base of devices capable of utilizing the App store, which is just going to further generate revenue for their "third leg" of their business as well as add continual value in the minds of the consumers with the products without actually really giving them anything else for free.

4th Generation iPod Nano's

2008-09-09T15:06:00.000-07:00

With Apple's new offering for its best selling (price point) music player hits the scene returning to its "tall" roots and getting a large splash of color. The previous generation received a lot of flak for being "squashed" and having "dull coloring". Anytime the magical sub $200 price point is under fire, you can be sure Apple will be quick to react in order to reinvigorate their largest cash cow business.
The new features from a technology standpoint include the Accelerometer found in the iPod touch as well as iPhone's to rotate the screen between landscape and portrait modes.
A nifty "shake to shuffle" feature has been implemented as well for these particular models. One plus with the 4th generation is also that all colors are available for both 8gb and 16gb capacities; $149 and $199 respectively.

What kind of content are you looking to read?

2008-09-09T15:03:00.000-07:00

I realize it has been an age since I have posted something onto this blog, but that is partly due to the fact that I don't know what you the readers are looking to find! If you know a topic you would like me to cover and/or explain just let me know in the comments!

Mobile Me: Small Business Exchange Alternative

2008-06-10T11:02:00.000-07:00

Apple's new Mobile Me service which is a replacement for the current .Mac offering is taking a different approach than just personal use. While the photo galleries etc. are great features for home users I believe that the real proof within the pudding lies in the idea of push services brough to smaller scale and becoming more affordable for small and medium business to get features such as what Microsoft Exchange offers without paying up for their own exchange server, license and IT overhead.

[Techcrunch solely sees the consumer uses for Mobile Me: here]

Mobile Me is more about instant collaboration between people and devices. The push e-mail will keep you up to date in your phone and multiple computers that you authorize, including Windows which is a big step in the right direction for a small business charge. The photo's and file storage while appearing domestic could also suit the needs of a small business environment. Think about it, what if you as a small business owner had an employee who needed to go choose particular patterns for some new product you are producing with cloth, and while she is there, she can snap a few pictures with her iphone and add them to a web gallery where you can look over them at your convenience without needing large attacthments, and more easily sharable with a group of people rather than attaching to an entire distribution list.
By creating sandbox type work places for pictures, files, and e-mail Apple is starting to culminate a very attractive offering for small businesses running both OS X and Windows. With the addition of their security measures (password protected sharable content) and ease of use/integration (iPhone, Outlook, Mail, iCal etc.)Apple is allowing for a lower bottom line of potential users, quicker decision making, and opening up the possibility for business owners to consider Mac a viable alternative in their workplaces.

Voodoo Envy 133

2008-06-10T10:52:00.000-07:00

Today Voodoo annoucned their competition to the Macbook Air as taunted by the cake cutting incident and snarky remarks by a few HP employees. The Voodoo Envy 133 is certainly something to Envy and should also keep Lenovo with their X300 worried about some serious competition as this lappy is not aimed at the gaming market but instead the sleek ultraportable market.
Coolest feature? An instant on enviroment via Voodoo IOS for e-mail, web and skype without boothing into Windows!

Specs:
.7" Thick
3.37 Pounds
13.3" LED Display
1280x800 Resolution
Removable Battery
1x USB, 1x USB/eSATA combo
External Optical
1.8ghz Core 2 Duo
GMA X3100
SSD and HD options
Vista

Starts at a humbling $2,099

3G iPhone: The Nex Hit or Miss?

2008-06-10T10:38:00.000-07:00

With Apple's announcement well known all across the web, some users got exactly what they were looking for in this new iteration of the iconic iPhone from Apple. However, some people were still left with a bad taste in their mouth over such things as an unimproved camera (2mp!) let alone no ability to video chat as had been rumored on sites such as macrumors.com.
So I guess the real question remains; Does the 3G iPhone have enough new features to make you drink the Kool-Aid?

Streaming Media App: My Orb

2008-05-23T11:14:00.000-07:00

Yesterday I wrote an article about a great budget Home Theater PC which can also serve as nice media server for other devices within your network. However for most people there is a need to have an even more simplistic way of pushing around media via streaming and being able to access all of that media while on trips with someone else's computer would be a gigantic plus.
Well a few years ago a little app came out called My Orb which has since developed itself into quite a nifty program that allows you to access more than just media now. Including documents and other files of interest. The access is secure to only you unless you would like to share something in particular with a friend which is easily done through e-mailing them a special access to exactly what you permit them to access.
If you have a Jailbroken iPhone this setup would also be of interest to you as it allows you to pull all of that content right into your hand so the limitation of storage becomes a small factor when out and about and trying to view/listen to media.
The installation is pretty easy and I think most users, even if you don't have a htpc will find it useful for creating an avenue of access to their media stores, catch is though; Windows only program, sorry OS X!

My Orb

[Picture via Ian Dixon]