Digital first' should really be 'tablets first'

With tablet and smartphone shipments already eclipsing PCs, publishers should start adopting a mobile-first attitude if they're to position themselves competitively.

True forward-thinkers will be thinking about whether their strategy should be 'smartphone first' or 'tablet first'. I'm backing the latter.

The fourth quarter of last year

While it has already been established that smartphones began outselling PCs from the fourth quarter of last year, it's clear that publishers should advance their strategy beyond the fixed screen.

However, I'd expect tablets to become the dominant form factor for digital media consumption previously long. Technology by iSuppli indicates annual shipments will hit 202m by 2015. VoIP (Voice over Internet Protocol) apps, just as Skype, running on tablets will before long be able to perform as then as any 'normal' phone. Hence, I'm backing them to overtake smartphones for usage.

As an aside, I expect Apple to continue its dominance of this segment for some time to come, in spite of stiff competition from Android-based devices and in the long run those running the Windows Phone OS. Finally, innovation by ComScore conducted in Q1 2011 indicated iPads aren't just popular with iPhone owners. Nokia owners accounted for over a quarter of people who owned an iPad, barely 1% behind iPhone owners.