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Posts By Karen Webster
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21.4KRetailWalmart, Amazon And Retail’s Reinvention
The Boston Red Sox and The New York Yankees are the most celebrated rivalry in sports history. It all began in 1919,...
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15.3KEMVThe Great August EMV Pile On
The whole world started piling on EMV last week. Media reported its confusing and clunky experience at the POS and wondered why...
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21.2KMobile PaymentsWhat Mobile Payments Can Learn From Debit Cards (Circa 1995)
We’ve been trying to ignite mobile payments now for more than a decade and we’ve barely moved the needle. Karen Webster says...
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33.5KPayments InnovationVisa/PayPal And The Future Of Payments
There’s no doubt that the announcement of the Visa/PayPal partnership shook the payments world more than a little bit last Thursday. Over...
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24.9KPayments InnovationWho’ll Be The ‘Netflix’ Of Payments?
Most people describe Netflix’s success as anticipating the shift from physical to digital media consumption. Karen Webster says that would be overlooking...
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16.9KMobile CommerceThe Coming Clash Of The Commerce Titans
There’s a battle brewing in commerce, Karen Webster says. One that’s driven by the fear of being boxed into the whims of...
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Karen’s Two Cents – Week of 7/4
Friday, July 8, 2016: Thought to provoke on this Friday. Is messaging the new browser? I just talked to a clever innovator...
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57.2KMobile PaymentsApple Pay’s Tough Twenty Months
In the mood for a little role play today? Your head of product walks into your office with his end of quarter...
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32.2KMobile PaymentsPayments’ Innovation Half-Year Progress Report
At the start of the year, I wrote a piece that outlined six trends that I suggested would set the agenda for...
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16.6KAppleWhat Apple Didn’t Tell You Last Week
This piece will give you important insight that hasn’t been covered about Apple’s developer announcement last week. So, keep reading. I promise...
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17.2KAmazonThe Rumble In Big Retail’s Jungle
The world lost “The Greatest of All Time,” boxer Muhammad Ali, over the weekend due to complications associated with his 32-year battle with...
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18.6KInnovationThe Curse Of The (Startup) Cool Kids
‘Tis the season for … caps and gowns! Nearly three and a half million kids will graduate from high school this year...
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23.0KMobile PaymentsWhy It Pays To Be Thick In Mobile Payments
Starbucks and Dunkin’ have cracked it. Walmart Pay seems to have all of the ingredients to do it, too. Facebook and Messenger...
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17.9KRetailRetail’s 12-Step Program To Commerce Redemption
“We’re frankly scratching our heads.” That’s Macy’s CFO last week explaining – or perhaps not – the root cause of their rather...
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22.5KAppleHow Apple Can Reverse Their Revenue Curse
Not many companies can lay claim to losing as much value in 12 months as the entire market cap of the world’s largest...
- Apple
Why Apple Won’t Give Us Real Numbers
If last week wasn’t a wake-up call that there’s something amiss in Cupertino, I don’t know what is. I’m not talking about the...
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20.2KRegulationUber’s Tipping Point
Has Uber reached its tipping point? Or, more appropriately, is it tipping the future upon which Uber’s business might hinge? At the...
- Amazon
The Future Of Payments Is In The Voice
“Open Sesame” was the magical phrase that a poor mythical woodcutter named Ali Baba uttered to open the door of a secret...
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17.6KCFPBWhy Regulators’ War On Fees Will Kill Consumers
Free. What can be better than free? “Free” is so alluring that songwriters have created a boatload of songs about the concept....
- Mobile Commerce
Chatbots And The Future Of Facebook Messenger
Until about a couple of weeks ago, bots were mostly thought of as the last four letters of a word that began...
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21.6KPayment MethodsThe ‘Uber Of Nothing’ Is Coming
Payment’s Next Big Thing: The “Uber Of Nothing” ”I’m about to sneeze. May I have a Kleenex, please?” “I have a headache....
- Merchant Innovation
Why Contextual Commerce Is The Next Big Thing
In January of this year, I wrote a piece in which I said there were six things that would shape the direction...
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27.0KFaster PaymentsThe Fastest Path To Faster Payments In The US
The path to faster payments in the U.S. doesn’t have to be paved with a 500+ person task force analyzing what the...
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65.4KNFCUK’s Lessons For US Mobile Payments Adoption
Consumers and retailers in the U.S. apparently just aren’t getting it. The latest stats coming out of the U.K. show that one...
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34.2KPayments InnovationSleepless In Payments
The world is increasingly sleep deprived. Nearly 70 percent of adults in the U.S., 75 percent in the U.K. and nearly a third...
- Payment Methods
How Payments Will Save Retail
I, Shopper, take thee, Online Retailer, to be my faithful partner in commerce. To have and to hold from this day forward...
- Mobile Commerce
If Mobile Is ‘Everything,’ Why Haven’t We Seen More Progress?
“Mobile is everything.” That’s the theme of this year’s Mobile World Congress. The conference organizers make a great point. Mobile is everything...
- Marketplace Lending Platform
Is The Tide Going Out On Marketplace Lending?
Warren Buffett is a lot more than just a mega-billionaire and one of the world’s most revered investors. He’s a philanthropist. He’s...
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11.7KeCommerceCensus Calls For Retraction – Webster Calls For Independent Audit
“I’m from the government and I’m here to tell you that you’re wrong.” That was sort of the email that I got...
- Innovation
Innovation’s Trivial Pursuits
What passes today as innovation is really pretty trivial. That’s the view of Robert Gordon, noted macroeconomist and Stanley G. Harris...
- Payment Methods
Could Apple Be The Next Amex, Or Could Amex Be The Next Apple?
We all watched yesterday as two of the NFL’s crown jewels battled it out for a chance at Super Bowl 50. Manning...
- eCommerce
Massive Online Retail Data Error Uncovered
It’s common knowledge that Kodak’s demise came at the hands of digital. But few know the whole story of why that happened....
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24.2KAmazonIs Alexa The Savior or Slayer Of Merchants?
“Defender of man.” That’s the meaning of a girl’s name that, until recently, wasn’t all that popular or even very familiar. But...
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78.2KMobile CommerceThe Six Things That Will Define Payments In 2016
There are lots of things that will influence the actions of the players within the vast and dynamic ecosystem in 2016. But...
- Payment Methods
Five From ’15: The 2016 Payments Pacesetters
There are four more days until we say “bye-bye” to 2015 and “hello” to a whole new year. As part of that...
- 20.2KKaren Webster
The Race For Faster Payments Rails
Usain Bolt is the fastest human on earth, but cheetahs are three times faster. Does that make cheetahs better than a 6-time...
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9.6KKaren WebsterThe Rest Of The Payments 2015 By The Letter: S Through Z
A was for Apple Pay, B was for bitcoin and C was for cross-border. OK, maybe you saw those ones coming, but...
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10.4KKaren WebsterPayments 2015 By The Letter: L Through R
Narrowing an entire year of payments activity into a 26-item list may sound like quite the feat. And with one for every...
- Payment Methods
The A, B, Cs Of Payments 2015
Well, here we are – just a few short weeks before 2015 is one for the history books. What a year it’s...
- Karen Webster
Payments Disruption By Any Other Name
HBS Professor Clay Christensen published an article last week that said Uber isn’t a disruptive innovation - even though 100 out of...
- Karen Webster
Issuers To Apple Pay: Just Say No!
Odysseus was a pretty clever fellow. For those who might need a crash course in ancient Greek history, Odysseus was the mythical king...
- Karen Webster
The Great Facebook SMB Conversion Challenge
Facebook went all in on SMBs last week during its earnings call – citing a number of things that they are doing...
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15.2KKaren WebsterThrough The Mobile Payments Looking Glass
“Curiouser and Curiouser” might have first been spoken by Alice in Wonderland after she tumbled down the rabbit hole, but it seems...
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16.0KKaren WebsterMobile Payments’ Great Big Leap
There’s a perfect storm brewing in payments – one that’s intensifying because of the shift to EMV. And one that could accelerate...
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11.2KHmmmThe Dangers Of Groupthink
Was med-tech startup, Theranos, following in the footsteps of Uber and simply embarking on “permissionless” innovation? Or is its current firestorm the...
- Hmmm
Does The CFPB Really Help Consumers?
The law of unintended consequences is alive and well in Washington, D.C. and in particular, inside the agency formed to advocate for...
- Karen Webster
The Blockchain: ‘Just Like the Internet,’ Except That It’s Not
The Blockchain: “It’s just like the Internet.” And so starts every conversation by the devoted to explain why bitcoin and the blockchain...
- International
The Incredible Mobile Payments Myth
MPD CEO Karen Webster says that everything that you’ve heard over the last several years about how successful mobile payments are at...
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6.7KControversialWill Ad Blockers Drive Mobile Commerce Innovation?
- Karen Webster
Will Apple Own The Payments Customer?
It’s September 14, 2022, eight years after the first Apple Pay network and issuer deals were signed. Does Apple own the payments’...
