Here in Europe, mobile phone use is nearly ubiquitous, and even though WAP services are widely considered to be a failure thus far, there's still much optimism for the future of mobile Internet services. I found conference attendees who used their phones' SMS capabilities to send short text messages to each other while both of them were in the same conference session. It's an easy way to communicate, though it does cost the equivalent of about 20 cents US per message. I talked to several publishers who have SMS content services operating or in the planning stages. At 20 to 30 cents per message, a daily headline-alert SMS service could become quite profitable.
Online syndication takes off The idea of online content syndicates is heating up in Europe.
Not only have major U.S. players like iSyndicate and Screaming Media set up shop in Europe, but a wave of new European companies are copying their models. Several other companies operating in the same space weren't invited to the panel. I think the local-based companies will always have an edge, because they can target their sales forces on their geographic and language areas. There does seem to be intense interest in online syndication by European Web publishers. I ran two workshops on online content pricing, where we discussed syndication opportunities.