“Helio, a small mobile carrier that sells to younger users with features designed for MySpace and YouTube, was charging a $5.99 monthly fee for a YouTube application,” writes Nathan Weinberg, recapping the situation.

“Helio’s application, while powerful and allowing you to upload and watch YouTube videos, still came off as overpriced when YouTube started working with Apple TV and the iPhone, and released its own mobile site, and worse so when Helio actually tried to block access to YouTube’s mobile site so they could keep charging their customers,” he continues.

There’s also the upcoming YouTube phone to consider.

But, whether it saw the error of its ways or just made a smart business decision, Helio corrected its course.  Gizmodo even carries a picture of a note from “Customer Care,” and the many comments that follow prove Helio is back in users’ good graces.

In related news, Helio is apparently still in its investors’ good graces, as well.  Reuters reports that the company will receive $100 million apiece from SK Telecom and EarthLink, and “SK expects Helio to become profitable in 2009.”

Whether it does or doesn’t, in the short term, it’s easy to forget that ideas for innovation may come from elsewhere. The Helio from Samsung is one of those kinds of products.

The interface and look of the phone is not necessarily unique. Yet built into the phone are a range of smart features, from integrated support for MySpace Mobile, to full screen landscape video viewing. The feature that I found most interesting, however, was the built in GPS.

A core feature of this GPS service is something they have called the “Buddy Beacon” – a way of broadcasting your location to friends so you can find one another at any time.

This idea of the beacon is a powerful concept with many other applications. Rather than most maps which rely on street addresses and turn by turn directions, the beacon can be a marker of location that offers a visual way for someone to find you … or find a location. It’s a portable homing device.

What if retail stores could use this beacon concept for marketing?

The idea of “Beaconvertising” simply refers to the idea of broadcasting your location to customers in a way that helps them find you in the real world.

Now think about all the situations where as a consumer all you need is the closest location of something. The closest place to buy diapers – the closest place to rent a movie – the closest place to fix a flat tire … the list is endless.

These are purchase decisions made largely based on location – yet there are still only rudimentary ways to get this information on mobile devices.

I should also point out that Beaconvertising is not just for the future – Business 2.0 reports in this month’s issue about a few advertisers and campaigns, including an effort from Saturn to help customers locate their nearest dealership – that are finding ways to use Google Earth and MSN’s competing services to drive users to their physical locations.

Jeff Goodby notes in the article that he believes “every retail chain will eventually do this.” As GPS phones become more common – the range of uses will continue to grow as well. Keep your eye out for Beaconvertising through GPS – it just may become the next killer app (and opportunity for marketing) on the mobile phone. Take that, iPhone.

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Rohit Bhargava is the Vice President for Interactive Marketing with Ogilvy Public Relations Worldwide.

http://rohitbhargava.typepad.com

The media shift is more noticeable in the 18 – 24 age group: between reading articles, visiting MySpace, and checking out video clips, around four in 10 students spend at least 10 hours a week online, according to a study released this week by Experience.

By contrast, just 17 percent said they watch TV more than 10 hours a week, and a mere 1 percent spend 10 hours a week reading magazines or newspapers.

Reaching this group means being online and mobile. Offer content they can subscribe to via feeds and see/listen/read it on a mobile device.

Seen the new Helio? Now college kids can stay connected 24/7 while on the go.

Time to rethink that content strategy.

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Sally is the author of Website Content Strategy blog: Information about the shifts in media consumption and the use of
technology in marketing and PR so business can stay in touch with
their rapidly moving audiences.

You get Helio, a new youth-oriented cell phone service that wisely has formed an exclusive partnership with MySpace. A customized, WAP-based MySpace client comes on each Helio handset. It not only makes it easy to read MySpace blogs on the go, but also to write to them.

The Wall Street Journal (via the Kansas City Star) sees this as a big trend. They note that Facebook’s mobile services will be available to students at more than 2,000 universities by the end of this month and high school users by early May.

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Steve Rubel is a PR strategist with nearly 16 years of public relations, marketing, journalism and communications experience. He currently serves as a Senior Vice President with Edelman, the largest independent global PR firm.

He authors the Micro Persuasion weblog, which tracks how blogs and participatory journalism are changing the public relations practice.