What's Up with PayPal Mobile - and with Mobile Payments Generally?
Curiously, over the weekend the second most popular article on Payments News was one written way back in late March of 2006 as the official launch of PayPal Mobile was nearing. The article, titled "PayPal in the Air! - A Look At PayPal Mobile", was written before PayPal's official launch of the mobile payments service - that happened a few weeks later on April 6, 2006. That was just over two years ago.
We haven't sensed a lot of interest or activity in PayPal Mobile recently - so we were somewhat surprised at the surge in readership this particular article was receiving. Our last article about PayPal Mobile was the launch of PayPal Mobile Checkout last July!
Maybe something's happening with mobile payments that we're just not yet aware of? Maybe its time for us to update the Facebook poll on PayPal Mobile that we did last June? Or?
What do you think? Send us an email with your thoughts! Especially if you've been using PayPal Mobile or another mobile payments service!
By the way, the most popular article this weekend on Payments News was the one from Friday morning about the Frontier Airlines bankruptcy filing resulting from First Data's reported change in its reserve policy for Frontier.
Do you think the launch of Amazon's TextBuyIt mobile shopping system could be spurring interest in other forms of mobile payment/mobile shopping? The ability to compare brick and mortar prices with Amazon prices via cell phone and pay for products with one's Amazon account seems like a recipe for one-stop shopping that that could spur a lot of interest in mobile payments.
Posted by: Deborah Block-Schwenk | April 15, 2008 at 11:59 AM
Early adopters take a lot of arrows. Amazon purchased paybytext (as I recall). Many issues remain. time will play out for next few years. Actual prediction of what will come is anyone's guess and my guess is we will see many slivers of markets emerge. The carriers want their pound, and Retailers want it all, and handset carriers and software driving them want a slice.
Recall when Motorola wrote off $ 7 billion on Iridium. Probably a timing issue. Security is a major issue. Digital photography was announced in 1984 and PMA with fanfare. It tool 16 years plus before it emerged mainstream.
Posted by: Thomas Cannon | April 21, 2008 at 01:26 PM