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Why reinvent the Web for mobile phones? by Eran Wyler, CEO with InfoGin The WWW2006 conference saw industry leaders pushing for developments into specially created Web-like content for the world's two billion mobile devices "with researchers and companies keen to replicate the success of the original Web" (BBC online). Meanwhile brands rushed to register dotMobi domain names after the initiative declared it was down to individual Web sites to deliver content in a mobile-ready format. The dotMobi organisation, sponsored by mobile operators, claims that "dotMobi will revolutionise the use of the Internet on mobile devices... dotMobi is designed to guide mobile users to made-for-mobile Internet content and services that can be accessed with confidence." Dotmobi actually tries to address the need for more content on mobile devices but it doesn’t give a solution for the Content Providers community. They will still need to redesign and rewrite their content in WAP (2.0) and/or i-mode and/or new standards. Instead of having a new - suffix (.mobi) - today’s technologies can address it by simply identifying a mobile device that tries to access a website, directing it to the mobile version automatically, so the user will type the same URL they are familiar with while being on the move.Why reinvent the Web when Internet users are happy with the Web sites and services that already exist? Although WAP and i-mode exist, most of the Internet content including the top sites either don’t have a mobile version, do not work on mobile devices, or the results are very poor. And what about the multi-technology gaps that exist between mobile device manufacturers? Are we going back to a low common dominator concept or will all relevant players start to develop systems according to the same specifications? (I am sure that the answers are obvious). So did we miss something? Yes, it is the time and effort a content provider must put into the project in order to have a mobile version and that issue is not addressed by the dotMobi initiative. The other issue remaining is the end-user habits and experience. Even if a content provider will write a mobile version, it will be different and will not include all the original web site offerings. The level of expectation from the end users' perspective is not the same, it could even be perceived as a different site – a site the user is not familiar with. The dotMobi concept is all about giving the end user a list of certified working sites available for mobile phones and standards behind the domain name, but what is the difference from the WAP 2.0 or i-mode standards? As I see it, users want the full web and dotMobi won’t be able to deliver it without heavy efforts from all sides (including the content providers). Therefore the issue should be solved from a different direction – for example, solutions which automatically adapt the original site to the mobile device’s physical and functional capabilities. This solution must provide the best content presentation and ease of use for even the smallest device. We need to provide users with what that they are really looking for – the World Wide Web! |
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