Samsung Set To Launch App Store

Samsung Electronics announced today it will launch a new app store for its smartphone users on September 14.

The app store will open in the U.K., France and Italy, with more than 30 countries including Germany and Spain to follow. Initially the store will be focused on users of Omnia and I8910 HD devices and later expand to other models.

Users will be able to browse a variety of applications including games, references, social networking, e-books and health related tools.

The app store is available in English, French and Italian and supports credit card and phone billing through the mobile store. Additional languages, devices and features will be added throughout the year.

More than 300 applications will be available at launch, and Samsung said it expects to grow to over 2,000 by the end of 2009. Gameloft, Electronic Arts, Handmark, TAITO, Paragon SW, Capcom, Com2us, Prompt, Pearson Longman, Bokan Tech and Diotek are among the providers of applications to the store.

"With the launch of the Application Store, Samsung will increase mobile phone sales and add value for its mobile customers through the availability of carefully selected applications," said Ho Soo Lee, Executive Vice President of Samsung's Media Solution Center.

"The Application Store will expand the service channel, not only on handheld devices but also on PCs through the launch of new PC software. The software will allow customers to download applications and manage them on a PC to maximize service usability."

Could Hulu Potentially Harm Quality TV Shows?

There’s just one problem with the chart below:

If correct, cable companies are likely losing millions of subscribers that are instead getting their TV fix from online sources, such as Hulu. The problem? Online TV watching doesn’t generate anywhere near the revenue of cable programming.

If we all switch to watching TV via Hula et al, what happens to the quality of the programming? If we continue down this path, we’d better figure out a way to make online video ads successful–and fast–or we may see the end of quality shows such as LOST and House.

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Scoble: Twitter Probably Worth $5 Billion To $10 Billion

Estimates of Twitter's value have varied wildly.  David Letterman, for example, famously implied that it's worthless.  Facebook tried to acquire it for $500 million.  And now Robert Scoble's presented a new - and very large - estimate, putting Twitter's value at five to ten billion dollars.

In March, a joke story about premium Twitter accounts (organized into Sparrow, Dove, Owl, and Eagle tiers, if you remember) kidded that Twitter's value is about equal to the GDP of Canada.  If Scoble's right, Twitter's not worth that much, but it might be neck-and-neck with Moldova, Haiti, and Mozambique.

So why the big numbers?  Scoble wrote, "Twitter is underhyped.  I'm now convinced that Twitter has locked up a whole raft of businesses."

He argued that low engagement scores and the prevalence of spam won't impact its appeal to companies, either.

As for Twitter's competition with Facebook, Scoble pointed out problems with tracking references to businesses on Facebook and continued, "Twitter is winning.  Is winning big."

Anyway, Twitter is supposed to make some attempts at monetization in the near future, so we might get to see how accurate Scoble's five to ten billion dollar estimate proves.

Walmart Brings Other Retailers on Board for Online Sales

Over the years, Walmart has been widely criticized in some circles for essentially stamping out small businesses across America with its ever-expanding presence. There have even been documentaries made about this. But that's about the offline world right?

Walmart has now introduced "The Walmart Marketplace," a new online initiative, in which it bolsters its inventory by partnering with other online retailers with large inventories themselves.

Walmart Marketplace sells items in categories like Home, Baby, Apparel, Toys, and Sporting Goods, by allowing customers to buy goods from the other retailers through Walmart's secure checkout process. The retailers themselves actually manage and support the orders, including shipping and handling, customer service, and exchanges/returns.

"We've added nearly one million new items to our online assortment with the introduction of Walmart Marketplace, making it even easier for customers to find more of what they want when shopping Walmart.com," says Kerry Cooper, Walmart.com's chief marketing officer. "Working with select retailers, known for their strong customer service and large online assortments of new merchandise, gives our customer more reasons to choose Walmart.com when shopping online."

It is unclear what kind of money Walmart is making from the deals with these retailers. The company says they are handpicking the retailers based on "strong customer service track records and large assortments of quality brands and products."

While Walmart says it will continue to grow the Walmart Marketplace program with additional retailers over the next year, it doesn't sound like it's going to be a place where small businesses in general will be able to find many opportunities to participate like with some other affiliate programs.

According to Compete, Walmart.com got over thirty-two and a half million unique visitors in July.

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