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There are thousands of physical payment instruments, and most of us only use a handful.  Individually according to context.  There may eventually be just as many e/m/wallets, and we will use the one or two that do a good job of (securely) aggregating those payment instruments with other features such as which to offer up to accrue the best loyalty points and targeted offers.  Enabling a payment transaction itself (via NFC, QR or whatever) is not enough.   When the APIs are there to do these things, the compelling wallets and usage will follow.

Isn't this simply a solution which helps address the rising cost of transportation.  Who wants to load an Oyster card with hundreds of pounds of credit to use it for just part of a week, and then be stuck with a residual balance you never cash in.  Using a NFC enabled credit card means you get the bill shock at the end of the month instead when you come to settle.

Yes, great post.  A 'man cannot live by payments alone' blog.

Operators on the other hand, did very nicely out of 1st gen content mobile payments (pSMS).  But that's declining.  Their issue is getting into the App payment chain with Direct Carrier Billing, as an alternative to paying with credit cards.  That's revenue which is completely bypassing them todate, and still comes with a healthy margin for managing the billing relationship.  In short, there's still profit in Digital Goods, including MP3.