Fifteen years ago, AOL was actually kind of cool. It provided email, shopping, entertainment, and chat applications through a slow internet connection to millions of people. But over time, the popularity waned as people realized they’re better off bypassing AOL for the actual world wide web.
To me, this seems quite similar to the state of the mobile industry, including the iPhone today.
1. It’s slow.
2. The carrier acts as a gatekeeper to content and applications.
3. One of the most popular buttons is for the web, rather than the applications the provider thinks are important.
History seems to be repeating itself on the mobile Internet.
Based on Apple’s recent approaches to application approval, I get the impression that the transition from AOL-style gatekeeper to web surfing device will be faster than in the past. If Apple denies their users access to content they want on their phones, they’ll simply use their phones to find similar content on the web. Apple will train people away from the App Store.
As I look at the buzz over the soon to launch App Store for the iPhone, I have to wonder: Why is their so much buzz for building clients applications for a 3G phone?
Here’s my theory: While the development platform for building client applications for the iPhone has taken what’s possible in mobile software to a new level, there has also been a significant evolution in what can be done on the mobile web. The latter cuts into the value of the former.
Sketching it out, here is the trend I see:
Back in the day, people would pay quite a bit for really rudimentary software. But that was the only way to expand the functionality of their devices. However, as the web became easier to access due to a combination of better mobile browsers, more mobile friendly websites, and faster mobile bandwidth, the need for client applications has become less and less.
People are no longer standing in line at the grocery store playing Soduku on their phones. They’re checking headlines in their Google Reader mobile or iPhone edition, or CNN, or any number of things more valuable than the previously mindless distractions they paid to download and install.
Clearly, there are things that can be done in a client application that dwarf what can be done using a mobile browser, but is it enough to reverse the trend toward mobile web browsing? I doubt it.
A panel at the National Conference for Media Reform discussed how cell phones can be used for community and issues organizing efforts.
Mobile Has Reach
Cell phones not just preferred form of communication but primary form for millions of users. They are quickly being adopted at the expense of land lines, and are proving to be more effective than email in reaching certain groups.
One panelist, Monifa Akinwole Bandele, polled the audience, asking, “Who here has ever deleted an email without reading it?” This was nearly unanimous. She then followed up with, “Who here has deleted a text message without reading it?” which received exactly the opposite response. Maybe it’s because it’s newer technology, or because the time commitment involved in reading an SMS is less. Either way, people read what you send to their phones.
SMS has also proven to be a powerful communications tool when dealing with groups who don’t own computers such as minority populations including Latinos who have some of the highest mobile adoption rates in the United States.
According to Becky Bond from CREDO Mobile, the USA mobile-only (no land line) population projected to reach 30% by the fall election. Outside the United States, mobile phone access often dwarfs lane line access. For example, 97% of Tanzanians have access to a cell phone by either owning one or through access to a shared one in their community where no land lines exist.
With that in mind, SMS has become a popular communications tool for fast, easy, and cheap messaging - especially when compared to email, direct mail, or door knocking by non-profits or political organizations.
Mobile Challenges
However, using cell phones / SMS for organizing may be at risk. Carriers aren’t necessarily fans of seeing their networks used for political organizing. For example, Verizon Wireless refused to allow NARAL, a Pro-Choice organization to send opt-in SMS messages through their network until media pressure forced them to change their policy. Outside the United States, some government owned mobile networks have been shut down during elections. As Jed Alpert, CEO of Mobile Commons, explained, “We’re much further from net neutrality in mobile than on the web today.”
Twitter?
A few audience members asked about whether Twitter would be a good choice for text based organizing. The panel, some of whom work in the mobile industry was mixed on this, however, knowledgeable audience members seemed to think it would be a valuable platform for nearly free messaging. Of course, it doesn’t offer some of the statistics you’d receive through direct messaging, or the control you’d receive from parsing your own mobile database in order to target appropriate demographics.
What is the ultimate video blogging device? Ben reviews two of his almost-favorites from Nokia at their CES booth.
We heard a rumor on the floor of the CES show that LG didn’t want people taking pictures of this concept for a watch phone. In our opinion, anything sitting in a display case in the middle of a trade show that’s visible to the eye is visible to a camera as well.
This is not a shipping product. According to the staff member from LG who spoke with us under condition of anonymity, this is simply a concept that they’re testing.
The people we saw viewing the product (but not taking pictures) seemed to have the a consistent reaction to this. They thought it was cool and would consider buying it.
Based on the form factor, it would probably need to have voice activated dialing and Bluetooth support to be really valuable. I can’t imagine many people would want to talk to their wrists.
We heard a rumor on the floor of the CES show that LG didn’t want people taking pictures of this concept for a watch phone. In our opinion, anything sitting in a display case in the middle of a trade show that’s visible to the eye is visible to a camera as well.
This is not a shipping product. According to the staff member from LG who spoke with us under condition of anonymity, this is simply a concept that they’re testing.
The people we saw viewing the product (but not taking pictures) seemed to have the a consistent reaction to this. They thought it was cool and would consider buying it.
Based on the form factor, it would probably need to have voice activated dialing and Bluetooth support to be really valuable. I can’t imagine many people would want to talk to their wrists.
Fredric Dannen, author of Hit Men: Power Brokers and Fast Money Inside the Music Business participated in a quorum on the Freakonomics blog looking at the music industry. While laying out his take on the industry, he made the argument that convenience wins out over fidelity:
Whats the Future of the Music Industry? A Freakonomics Quorum
My epiphany, if you want to call it that, was simply this: consumers of recorded music will always embrace the format that provides the greatest convenience. No other factor — certainly not high fidelity — will move consumers substantially to change their listening and buying habits. The single exception to this rule was the introduction of two-channel stereo in the late fifties.
That’s a brilliant point. People want their music, and they want it in easy to consume formats. Tapes are easier to consume than records. MP3s are easier still since you can put thousands of them on a relatively indestructible Nano.
As I’ve thought about this concept, it’s become clear to me that convenience wins out over fidelity many other markets as well. Here are a few that come to mind:
1. Cell Phones - sound quality sucks compared to land lines, but I haven’t had a land line for 7 years. The quality goes down another step when you add a BlueTooth headset, but that doesn’t seem to be slowing down people who live off audio communications.
2. Fast Food - the food sucks compared to what you could make yourself. But that doesn’t stop people from eating a ridiculous number of meals in their cars.
3. BitTorrent - it’s easier to steal music, movies, and TV shows than buy them today.
4. CraigsList - it’s easier to post ads and search for ads on Craigslist than most every newspaper’s classifieds site. And it has RSS so you can create persistent searches for your RSS reader.
5. Travel - it is more convenient to run a search for a flight to Vegas on Expedia than it is to talk to an agent to has to describe to you what she’s seeing on her screen.
What would you add to the list?
David Kirkpatrick from FORTUNE magazine hosted an interesting forum last week
called iMeme where big thinkers in we technology got together to talk about
future trends.
Preceding the now completed event, Kirkpatrick threw a set of questions out to
invitees about current tech trends, which
led
to some interesting commentary.
Here are a few highlights:
Companies
1) For you personally, what technology has taken the most unexpected turn in
your lifetime?
I never thought search technology would turn itself into the bridge to all
content, connecting all passion and interest and securing such a scalable
business model, and it has become the darling of the investment community.
When I was at Sina, we already had search, but we failed to capture this
opportunity.
Many businesses still don’t realize this. How can a site say it understands
search without having things as common as subscribable persistent searches using
email or RSS? High quality search and subscriptions turns the web into a
customized content delivery system of interesting things.
Officer, Motorola, Inc.
1) For you personally, what technology has taken the most unexpected turn in
your lifetime?
For me personally, the technology that has taken the most unexpected turn in
my lifetime is what I refer to as “the device formerly known as the cell
phone.” I still remember many predictions that by 2000 there would only be
about a million cell phone users. Boy, were they ever wrong!
Today there are about 2.9 billion mobile device users, i.e., roughly half
the planet uses this technology for so much more than a phone call. Today
people call people, not places!
Absolutely. When I was growing up way back in the 80’s and early 90’s, my family
had no cell phones and one land line shared by four people! Because of this,
there was some competition for the phone, but more importantly, my parents got
to know my friends by occasionally answering the phone. And my friend’s parents
got to know me when I was calling for their sons or daughters. Now, there are
times where I hardly know a friend’s spouse since I’m calling a person rather
than a phone sitting in someone’s house.
We haven’t gotten there yet, but we’ll likely reach a day when everyone’s
assigned a cell phone number at birth that will stick with them throughout their
lifetime. And a domain.
Center for Internet and Society, Harvard Law School
2) What, for you, has been the most surprising infectious idea of the past
year?
Paris Hilton. I just don’t get it.
Sadly, I think he’s right.
As we’ve reported before, some airports in the United States including the
Minneapolis / St. Paul Airport are
installing
power charging units from companies like Smarte Carte so they can charge
travelers to power up their mobile devices. I find this ridiculous since ports
should be in the business of promoting business, and enabling easy
communications via easily accessible mobile power is one way to do this.
So imagine my surprise when I found a completely different mobile charging
business model at the Zagreb airport in Croatia: ad supported by a carrier.
Below is a T-Mobile Powerstation attached to the wall of the international
departures lounge. When not drinking one last cup of cappuccino or smoking one
last cigarette, travelers can top off the batteries in their mobile devices. And
it’s free! Free? Yes, free. And it works for most major cell phones - T-Mobile
or not - from Nokia, Sony Ericsson, and Samsung.
T-Mobile seems to own the Croatian market based on my time walking the streets
of Zagreb and Dubrovnik. Dominating the advertising in the airport is a smart
move since it gives newly arriving guests the impression, like I have, that’s
it’s T-Mobile territory, putting all competitors - in this case, companies
including Vodaphone and Orange - in a position of first removing my market
dominance impressions T-Mobile has established upon arrival.
What a great tip: “Please be considerate to other people . . .”
I’d love to see this type of thing catch on in the United States. American
wireless carriers should jump on this relatively cheap form of service based
advertising. And airports should welcome the installation of power stations like
this, while perhaps charging an access fee in excess of what Smarte Carte shares with
airports from their SmarteCharge Rapid Charger stations.
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