Rich Miner, Group Manager of mobile platforms at Google presented this morning. His presentation was titled, "Changing the mobile industry, one device at a time." The content of his presentation was largely focused on Android, and not the TMobile G1. Rich first set the stage of why an open platform, Android, was long overdue in the mobile market. Using a lot of his mobile related startup experience (prior to joining Google) to drive his argument, Rich argued that openness of mobile platforms is the primary catalyst for the tipping point of the mobile revolution. 5 years ago, it was nearly impossible for a startup developer to get their app onto a mobile phone. The operators were simply too monolithic and closeminded to streamline the process. Paraphrasing Rich with regard to mobile operators, it takes 100 people to agree on something, but only 1 to say no and slow the whole thing to a halt. Another anecdote he mentioned was related to a push to talk service he was trying to get off the ground. The service was being developed on the Windows Mobile platform. His team actually found a bug in the Windows Mobile code. Upon approaching Microsoft to fix the bug, Microsoft indicated it would take 18 months to complete. Wow that is a long time. They must not be using the agile development methodology.
After describing why closed platforms have stifled innovation in the mobile market (something I absolutely agree with), Rich continued on to give all the reasons why Android fixes these problems.
Couple other gems from the presentation:
"Google sees 50 times the searches on an iPhone than any other platform."
When the first versions of Google Maps Mobile (written in Java) were developed, and Google was trying to convince the operators to ship the app with the devices, Google experienced a lot of grief and resistance. The operators indicated that even if the users loved the app, they suspected there were unspoken motives for Google wanting to distribute the app. In some cases, operators disabled the underlying service for Google Maps Mobile, so even if the user was able to install it themselves, it was unusable.
Thursday, October 23, 2008
Full featured browsers on mobile browers - end of .mobi?
An absolute them from Mobile Internet World is there will only continue to be a heavy market penetration of full featured browsers on mobile devices. Consumers know how powerful their desktop browsers are, and they want nothing less on their mobile device.
This presents the question, is it even worth pursuing development of .mobi sites now? How long will they continue to be around? I think the answer is yes, it is absolutely worthwhile to have a presence in the .mobi space. For the next couple years, the majority of mobile Internet users will be using these scaled down browsers. While users do want the full desktop experience from their mobile device, it won't be for a couple years until the desktop experience on mobile has a majority share in the market. Until then, people need a site that is usable on their Motorola RAZR.
When I refer to .mobi sites, I'm basically referring to websites that are designed specifically for the lightweight mobile browsers of today, like the one you'd find on a BlackBerry.
This presents the question, is it even worth pursuing development of .mobi sites now? How long will they continue to be around? I think the answer is yes, it is absolutely worthwhile to have a presence in the .mobi space. For the next couple years, the majority of mobile Internet users will be using these scaled down browsers. While users do want the full desktop experience from their mobile device, it won't be for a couple years until the desktop experience on mobile has a majority share in the market. Until then, people need a site that is usable on their Motorola RAZR.
When I refer to .mobi sites, I'm basically referring to websites that are designed specifically for the lightweight mobile browsers of today, like the one you'd find on a BlackBerry.
Wednesday, October 22, 2008
Mobile Internet World - Day 2 - Afternoon
Mobile Internet World day 2 is just about to wrap up. Regarding the second half of the day, I heard from a bunch of speakers. I'll only capture the highlights.
First, I heard from Erik de Kroon of Vodafone. Vodafone is another network operator prevalent outside the US. There were two important points that I took from Erik's presentation: The main differences between the PC and mobile device with regard to distributing mobile content are that the entry point is very important (users don't want to type long urls on their mobile device), the business models are different, and finally there is limited reach on the mobile platforms due to the large fragmentation in the market. The other important point from Erik's presentation, is the large amount of work that Vodafone is putting into developing a widget platform for their mobile devices. It didn't sound like this platform would be open to developers for third party apps, but merely an easy way for Vodafone to distribute apps.
Next, we heard from Tony Lewis, VP of Open Development at Verizon Wireless. Right off the bat, Tony's first slide was a "safe harbor" slide. I had never seen one of these, but he passed it off as something everyone in the audience had seen. There was a bunch of small font text on the slide, but I think the gist of it was, don't repeat what you're about to hear. I'll keep this part brief, and restricted to info that is already public. One cool thing Tony mentioned, is that Verizon has these mobile cell towers that they can drive to areas with poor coverage. Also, Verizon Wireless really does have people driving around testing service (can you hear me now?). Tony also described the Verizon Wireless Open Development program. I'll let you go to the site to read about it, but OMG YET ANOTHER OPERATOR COPYING APPLE'S IPHONE DEVELOPMENT SITE!!!! It's so funny how fast these companies mimic eachother. It's a site with documentation and a community for developers writing apps for Verizon devices. Ok, enough on Verizon.
Next up, Marcelo Vieira, General Manager of OMAP at Texas Instruments. The guys from the hardware companies (like Intel and TI) have the coolest toys. Similar to the Intel Atom processor, TI has release a processor for mobile devices. As an example of its power, he was demo'd a photo album app on a mobile device (using the processor) that was easily and very quickly flipping through 8 megapixel photos! It was definitely impressive. Here's an interesting stat Marcelo mentioned:
In 2004, 15% of the handsets shipped were smartphones
In 2012, 35% of handsets shipped will be smartphones
So what's a smartphone? This question has been posed to be many times, and I don't think I ever gave an answer as accurate or succinct as Marcelo's. A smartphone is a handset with a high-level operating system. This makes a lot of sense. Just think of the functionality offered on RAZRs, and then functionality on a phone with, say, Windows Mobile. There's a huge difference. It's not just the QUERTY keyboard, but the nature of the software. Smartphones weren't the only mobile device that Marcelo talked about. There's an exciting new class of devices coming onto the mobile market, mobile internet devices (MIDs). Characteristics of MIDs include: boots up in seconds (not minutes), can go a full day's charge with a full day's use, impressive service, and uncompromised browsing. These are like mini laptops, not quite a laptop, but certainly more functional than a smartphone (with regard to Internet browsing). Finally, the coolest device that Marcelo discussed (but no demo :() is called the DLP Pico. It's a tiny projector that may be integrated or included with smartphones! Google it to check out the product page.
Next, I heard an okay presentation on near field communication. The topic of the presentation was attractive, "Mobile Transactions." Instead of meaning software based transactions, like mobile banking, it was much more focused around near field communication as a technique to use your cell phone like a credit card. Interesting, but not really up my alley.
After the presentation on near field communication, I attended a presentation on securing SMS messaging. SMS messaging (or simply text messaging) is extremely unreliable and insecure. Additionally, unlike email, SMS messages that are sent and received cannot be monitored for compliance purposes. Even with these limitations, data indicates that there will be 2.3 trillion messages sent in 2008. Obviousily, these are at the consumer level, not enterprise. Regarding the enterprise, a company called CellTrust has come up with a solution to secure SMS. Besides needing to subscribe to their service, a thin client is required to be installed on the consumers phone! That seems like a huge barrier of entry to me. Maybe within the enterprise and its devices that are managed by the company, one could easily roll out the software to their phones. This seems to be way too much of an inconvenience for a company to expect their clients and consumers to install an app on their phone, merely to receieve secure messages. I certainly wouldn't. Messages just aren't that important to me.
Next I heard a panel discussion on WiFi in the enterprise. Couple of interesting points here. It was suggested that any new WiFi rollouts in the enterprise should, without a doubt, include hardware to support 802.11n. There was also some interesting discussion around fixed mobile convergence. I'm still a little unclear on what fixed mobile convergence is. At the highest level, it's basically a way to integrate your mobile device and your other communication devices, such as your desk phone, and work voice mail. Advancements in wifi and related software will eventually enable this. It was the common consensus on the panel that 4G/WiMax will not replace WiFi, but they will instead complement eachother. WiFi is so cheap these days that there's no reason every electronic chip should come with an integrated radio to allow for connectivity.
The last panel of the day discussed mobile enterprise applications. This was slightly a disappointment. The CIO of Providence (yes the town in Rhode Island) monopolized the time by telling the audience how he set up a complicated network for his police force. While interesting, not really the type of information I was looking for. There were a few worthwhile points that came out of the discussion. Drivers for enterprise mobile applications need to come from a balance of the business and IT, not solely from either. The panelist from Yankee Group confirmed some of my thoughts, that college grads entering the workforce will make choices of where to work based on the company's enterprise mobile direction. Meaning, companies without a strong mobile direction will lose the best job candidates.
There's the highlights from this afternoon. I've probably skimmed over some of the details, but I do have some notes that go a little further below the surface. I'm not trying to go that deep on this post.
First, I heard from Erik de Kroon of Vodafone. Vodafone is another network operator prevalent outside the US. There were two important points that I took from Erik's presentation: The main differences between the PC and mobile device with regard to distributing mobile content are that the entry point is very important (users don't want to type long urls on their mobile device), the business models are different, and finally there is limited reach on the mobile platforms due to the large fragmentation in the market. The other important point from Erik's presentation, is the large amount of work that Vodafone is putting into developing a widget platform for their mobile devices. It didn't sound like this platform would be open to developers for third party apps, but merely an easy way for Vodafone to distribute apps.
Next, we heard from Tony Lewis, VP of Open Development at Verizon Wireless. Right off the bat, Tony's first slide was a "safe harbor" slide. I had never seen one of these, but he passed it off as something everyone in the audience had seen. There was a bunch of small font text on the slide, but I think the gist of it was, don't repeat what you're about to hear. I'll keep this part brief, and restricted to info that is already public. One cool thing Tony mentioned, is that Verizon has these mobile cell towers that they can drive to areas with poor coverage. Also, Verizon Wireless really does have people driving around testing service (can you hear me now?). Tony also described the Verizon Wireless Open Development program. I'll let you go to the site to read about it, but OMG YET ANOTHER OPERATOR COPYING APPLE'S IPHONE DEVELOPMENT SITE!!!! It's so funny how fast these companies mimic eachother. It's a site with documentation and a community for developers writing apps for Verizon devices. Ok, enough on Verizon.
Next up, Marcelo Vieira, General Manager of OMAP at Texas Instruments. The guys from the hardware companies (like Intel and TI) have the coolest toys. Similar to the Intel Atom processor, TI has release a processor for mobile devices. As an example of its power, he was demo'd a photo album app on a mobile device (using the processor) that was easily and very quickly flipping through 8 megapixel photos! It was definitely impressive. Here's an interesting stat Marcelo mentioned:
In 2004, 15% of the handsets shipped were smartphones
In 2012, 35% of handsets shipped will be smartphones
So what's a smartphone? This question has been posed to be many times, and I don't think I ever gave an answer as accurate or succinct as Marcelo's. A smartphone is a handset with a high-level operating system. This makes a lot of sense. Just think of the functionality offered on RAZRs, and then functionality on a phone with, say, Windows Mobile. There's a huge difference. It's not just the QUERTY keyboard, but the nature of the software. Smartphones weren't the only mobile device that Marcelo talked about. There's an exciting new class of devices coming onto the mobile market, mobile internet devices (MIDs). Characteristics of MIDs include: boots up in seconds (not minutes), can go a full day's charge with a full day's use, impressive service, and uncompromised browsing. These are like mini laptops, not quite a laptop, but certainly more functional than a smartphone (with regard to Internet browsing). Finally, the coolest device that Marcelo discussed (but no demo :() is called the DLP Pico. It's a tiny projector that may be integrated or included with smartphones! Google it to check out the product page.
Next, I heard an okay presentation on near field communication. The topic of the presentation was attractive, "Mobile Transactions." Instead of meaning software based transactions, like mobile banking, it was much more focused around near field communication as a technique to use your cell phone like a credit card. Interesting, but not really up my alley.
After the presentation on near field communication, I attended a presentation on securing SMS messaging. SMS messaging (or simply text messaging) is extremely unreliable and insecure. Additionally, unlike email, SMS messages that are sent and received cannot be monitored for compliance purposes. Even with these limitations, data indicates that there will be 2.3 trillion messages sent in 2008. Obviousily, these are at the consumer level, not enterprise. Regarding the enterprise, a company called CellTrust has come up with a solution to secure SMS. Besides needing to subscribe to their service, a thin client is required to be installed on the consumers phone! That seems like a huge barrier of entry to me. Maybe within the enterprise and its devices that are managed by the company, one could easily roll out the software to their phones. This seems to be way too much of an inconvenience for a company to expect their clients and consumers to install an app on their phone, merely to receieve secure messages. I certainly wouldn't. Messages just aren't that important to me.
Next I heard a panel discussion on WiFi in the enterprise. Couple of interesting points here. It was suggested that any new WiFi rollouts in the enterprise should, without a doubt, include hardware to support 802.11n. There was also some interesting discussion around fixed mobile convergence. I'm still a little unclear on what fixed mobile convergence is. At the highest level, it's basically a way to integrate your mobile device and your other communication devices, such as your desk phone, and work voice mail. Advancements in wifi and related software will eventually enable this. It was the common consensus on the panel that 4G/WiMax will not replace WiFi, but they will instead complement eachother. WiFi is so cheap these days that there's no reason every electronic chip should come with an integrated radio to allow for connectivity.
The last panel of the day discussed mobile enterprise applications. This was slightly a disappointment. The CIO of Providence (yes the town in Rhode Island) monopolized the time by telling the audience how he set up a complicated network for his police force. While interesting, not really the type of information I was looking for. There were a few worthwhile points that came out of the discussion. Drivers for enterprise mobile applications need to come from a balance of the business and IT, not solely from either. The panelist from Yankee Group confirmed some of my thoughts, that college grads entering the workforce will make choices of where to work based on the company's enterprise mobile direction. Meaning, companies without a strong mobile direction will lose the best job candidates.
There's the highlights from this afternoon. I've probably skimmed over some of the details, but I do have some notes that go a little further below the surface. I'm not trying to go that deep on this post.
Mobile Internet World - Day 2 - Morning
The morning presentations just concluded. We heard from three people:
Emily Green, the CEO of Yankee Group
Russ McGuire, Vice President of Strategy at Sprint
Anand Chandrasekher, Senior Vice President of the Ultra Mobility Group at Intel
Emily's presentation was interesting, themed around what the Yankee Group calls Unleashing the Anywhere Network. The Anywhere Network is really a concept defined as a common platform, bandwidth, intelligence, seemlessness, and ubiquity. There are a few issues with mobility today that are holding us back from realizing this innovation, including: network limitations, device limitations, pricing problems, spectrum, and mobile operators. Even with these issues preventing huge jumps in mobile innovation, flat rate data plans have unleashed huge appetites for more mobile services! In contrast, despite these large increases in mobile demand, mobile revenues are in long term decline. Weird. Continuing on a theme started yesterday, Emily says that the mobile browser is the field to nourish to easily address the fragmented market. Mobile popularity is having a huge impact on the enterprise. Workers want connectivity. In fact, workers say that their personal technology experience is better than what they have at work. Additionally, 20% of employees say they would be more productive at work if their technology experience matched that of which they have at home!
Next up, Russ McGuire, Vice President of Strategy at Sprint. His presentation was a lot of marketing of why Sprint is so great. I'm not sure they're as good as he presented, but they do have two great innovations: dominating the click to talk market, and also the first wide spread wimax solutions in Baltimore (and Boston soon to come). It's funny to hear execs from non AT&T operators talk about the iPhone. I definitely feel a sense of jealousy that they missed the boat. He briefly talked about how successful the iPhone has been, and then mention some aspects of how Sprint has innovated to excel their products beyond the iPhone. Russ did mention an interesting point about a customer fear. Customers have a concern around unintentionally subscribing to a pay service when using advanced funcitonality on their mobile device. They are worried that clicking a link will accidently subscribe them to a service for which they'll be committed to paying for something, even though they were just "trying something out." I find this definitely to be true, especially when I had my Verizon Wireless RAZR. Maybe part of this was the poor interface. It was not clear at all when I'd be charged for clicking a VCast link, or testing out a game.
Finally, Anand Chandrasekher, Senior Vice President of the Ultra Mobility Group at Intel made a presentation. He called 2008, the year of mobility. According to Forrester Research, 1 out of 2 mobile internet users prefer full internet pages on their mobile device, not a mobile version. Consumers are aware of the experience they can get on their computer, and aren't happy that their handheld doesn't provide that. Anand introduced Intel's Atom processor, released earlier this year. It will continue to allow for next generation mobile devices. Atom powered devices will have computing power comparable to laptops circa 2004. He had some devices on hand, they were somewhere between smartphones and laptops. I think he called them, mobile internet devices (which he later clarified, not expected to cannibalize laptops or smartphones). He showed two Intel vision videos which I embedded from YouTube in earlier posts. Closing his presentation, he brought up a picture of the Carpentier vs Dempsey boxing match in 1921. Anand posed the question to the audience, "Does anyone know why this event was revolutionary?" Answer: it was the first sporting event to be broadcasted over live radio. This was really when radio transitioned from a medium for news and information, to a medium for entertainment. The following year, sales of radios doubled, and the year following that, they doubled again. Anand compared this with what he expects will happen with mobile behavior and usage.
Emily Green, the CEO of Yankee Group
Russ McGuire, Vice President of Strategy at Sprint
Anand Chandrasekher, Senior Vice President of the Ultra Mobility Group at Intel
Emily's presentation was interesting, themed around what the Yankee Group calls Unleashing the Anywhere Network. The Anywhere Network is really a concept defined as a common platform, bandwidth, intelligence, seemlessness, and ubiquity. There are a few issues with mobility today that are holding us back from realizing this innovation, including: network limitations, device limitations, pricing problems, spectrum, and mobile operators. Even with these issues preventing huge jumps in mobile innovation, flat rate data plans have unleashed huge appetites for more mobile services! In contrast, despite these large increases in mobile demand, mobile revenues are in long term decline. Weird. Continuing on a theme started yesterday, Emily says that the mobile browser is the field to nourish to easily address the fragmented market. Mobile popularity is having a huge impact on the enterprise. Workers want connectivity. In fact, workers say that their personal technology experience is better than what they have at work. Additionally, 20% of employees say they would be more productive at work if their technology experience matched that of which they have at home!
Next up, Russ McGuire, Vice President of Strategy at Sprint. His presentation was a lot of marketing of why Sprint is so great. I'm not sure they're as good as he presented, but they do have two great innovations: dominating the click to talk market, and also the first wide spread wimax solutions in Baltimore (and Boston soon to come). It's funny to hear execs from non AT&T operators talk about the iPhone. I definitely feel a sense of jealousy that they missed the boat. He briefly talked about how successful the iPhone has been, and then mention some aspects of how Sprint has innovated to excel their products beyond the iPhone. Russ did mention an interesting point about a customer fear. Customers have a concern around unintentionally subscribing to a pay service when using advanced funcitonality on their mobile device. They are worried that clicking a link will accidently subscribe them to a service for which they'll be committed to paying for something, even though they were just "trying something out." I find this definitely to be true, especially when I had my Verizon Wireless RAZR. Maybe part of this was the poor interface. It was not clear at all when I'd be charged for clicking a VCast link, or testing out a game.
Finally, Anand Chandrasekher, Senior Vice President of the Ultra Mobility Group at Intel made a presentation. He called 2008, the year of mobility. According to Forrester Research, 1 out of 2 mobile internet users prefer full internet pages on their mobile device, not a mobile version. Consumers are aware of the experience they can get on their computer, and aren't happy that their handheld doesn't provide that. Anand introduced Intel's Atom processor, released earlier this year. It will continue to allow for next generation mobile devices. Atom powered devices will have computing power comparable to laptops circa 2004. He had some devices on hand, they were somewhere between smartphones and laptops. I think he called them, mobile internet devices (which he later clarified, not expected to cannibalize laptops or smartphones). He showed two Intel vision videos which I embedded from YouTube in earlier posts. Closing his presentation, he brought up a picture of the Carpentier vs Dempsey boxing match in 1921. Anand posed the question to the audience, "Does anyone know why this event was revolutionary?" Answer: it was the first sporting event to be broadcasted over live radio. This was really when radio transitioned from a medium for news and information, to a medium for entertainment. The following year, sales of radios doubled, and the year following that, they doubled again. Anand compared this with what he expects will happen with mobile behavior and usage.
Another Intel Vision video showing off the potential power of the Atom processor
WOW, this is SO Enterprise 2.0!
Intel's Ultra Mobile Concept Video
Anand Chandrasekher of Intel just showed this vision video of their Ultra Mobile technology:
The Weather Channel's Mobile Site
Good morning, day 2 of Mobile Internet World is about to start. Have you seen The Weather Channel's mobile site? The Weather Channel owns www.weather.com and thus their mobile site is http://weather.mobi
I heard from one of their employees yesterday that they're mobile website actually gets more hits than their desktop website! The kicker was that many of these hits are actually coming from desktop browsers! They suspect that people are prefer the mobile site because there is so little fluff there. The users only want the weather forecast, and that's what the mobile site provides.
I heard from one of their employees yesterday that they're mobile website actually gets more hits than their desktop website! The kicker was that many of these hits are actually coming from desktop browsers! They suspect that people are prefer the mobile site because there is so little fluff there. The users only want the weather forecast, and that's what the mobile site provides.
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