Monty's Gaming and Wireless Outlook - Issue 191

What a wacky world we live in. Not content with marketing the hell out of Lost, the hopelessly overrated TV show of abandoned pretty people in rags, Disney has now taken publishing past post-modern and back again.

The company has just released Bad Timing by 'Guy Troop', a book that only existed as a manuscript-prop in the aforesaid Lost. Cue marketing machine, cue concocted three-pardigm story, cue publication, cue no royalties to writer who doesn't exist, cue egregious product that provides swill to the masses.

Bitter? You betya. I spent 12 years preparing to write a book, 12 months writing it on a voyage from Australia to Sri Lanka to India to Pakistan to Nepal to Canada to California and another 12 years trying to get it published. Still no joy and stuck here writing another pathetic newsletter to make myself feel better. Pass me the absinthe.

Bad news, bad news, bad news in much the same way as this week has been for the mobile industry. Orange is laying off 2,000 people in the UK, Vodafone Global is in the process of being decimated and a report from M:Metrics this week announced that the mobile games market was stagnating and in danger of stalling completely.

Even last week's industry drinks in London wasn't its usual buoyant self. People's jobs seem as safe as a footballer's metatarsal and everybody's either moving on or being pushed out or thinking of moving on before they're pushed out (or have been pushed out before they've moved on, but you get my drift).

But it's not really that bad, it's just a classic case of readjustment as capitalism tugs, teases and yanks its elements into submission. The operator-centric nature of mobile entertainment is changing as other channels become more important to those who are creating it. That's all that's happening. It. Will. All. Come. Out. In. The. Wash.

What's more, mobile game company Gameloft last week announced mobile game downloads were 116% up on last year, and EA's acquistion of Jamdat saw mobile game revenues soar by 233%. If that's stagnant, then lead me to the local village pond.

All mobile games need is a huge dose of marketing from everybody in the ecosystem so mobile users are informed about all the content they're missing out on. Perhaps we could all learn from Disney about how to do this, but mobile games are real, not invented, so maybe they wouldn't be much use at all.