Jérôme over at Smoothplanet answers the question: Why doing a mobile version ?

I just add my five cents. Making your site mobile with a mobile CSS or using a mobile RSS reader can on first sight do the job, but you quickly get stuck when you use it daily. The UI of a cellphone "is" something completely different and you have to use it everyday to really get to know the differences - i guess most people who asked the above question don't do this that often. The screen for example is not only smaller and 90 degrees flipped, it's also much more difficult to scroll and to type. You also need to give the user constantly extended backlink possibilities. This sounds obvious and still you never will accomplish this by using the mentioned "quick and dirty" techniques.

Today we are also still stuck in the high data rate time and from a design point of view it's not that bad after all. So you really want to know before starting a download how long it takes or how much it will cost you. You also want to know if you are going on another mobilized site or if you will probably find yourself on a high data, not at all optimized old school website which will shut down your mobile altogether.

I also don't think that the transition to the "all mobile" will happen for all of us tomorrow. Still I believe that it will happen, but it will be an even more chaotic and hybrid mobile world with an eclectic variety of use cases we cannot even imagine today. And interestingly the "all mobile" will happen first at places where the desktop computer never got a hold.

In this regard, Russell's post is also interesting:
Negroponte Vs. Gates: They’re Both Right

Pointing Based Solutions for Mobile Phones

With Mapion Local Search, users can now walk down the street anywhere in Japan and point at over 700,000 objects such as buildings, shops, restaurants, banks, historical sites and instantly retrieve information on what they are looking at or find what they are looking for just by pointing their phone. Just like one uses a mouse to click on an object on a computer screen and retrieve information, now users can Click on the Real World® using their mobile phone.

Mapion Local Search combines Mapion’s POI (Point of Interest) information on objects all over Japan (including map data) with GeoVector’s pointing based technology and spatial search engine to give Japanese users the world’s first personal local search. According to Takehiko Murata, President of CyberMap Japan “Mapion Japan is always searching for pioneering technologies to improve our user experience and incorporating GeoVector’s technology allows us to give users an experience available nowhere else in the world and an advantage over our competitors.”

See some demos here.

Via Sascha Schmidt

In Future shock awaits mobile firms Mark Heath, research director at Sound Partners and author of a report into 3G futures for consultants Analysys, speaks about the reluctance for operators to offer flat rate pricing, which is in my opinion too, the necessary step to make the mobile internet a reality for all:

In some respects the current pricing systems are designed to help manage the relatively limited data carrying capacities of 2G and 2.5G networks.

But on 3G networks there is, relatively speaking, so much bandwidth available for data that it makes no sense to use a scarcity-based pricing system.

In fact, said Mark Heaththe early days of the net show that flat rate pricing systems, in which users pay a set fee every month to get at as much data as they want, are the best way to encourage customers to do more.

Operators tend to underestimate what's going on with the PSP or the iPod: these are the current mobile tools where people get mobility with relatively small investment and no additional data expenses. Once a lot of people get accustomed to that it will be impossible to ask for the high rates which are currently offered by operators.

So there is a lot of truth, when the article closes:

If the operators get their strategies wrong, there is no doubt that they will be the ones paying.

I just read the following in the the mobile designer:

When developing a web-based application or portal screen, designers should target one or two devices and create an optimal experience for that specific screen size and browser. Information regarding target audience usage of specific device types should be gathered if available.

At Kaywa we also tried to to it like that in early 2004 - we had 4 main target phones then - but this didn't work out. There are so many devices out there and every day brings up a bunch of new ones, you will utterly fail when you focus on just two phones - with the sole exception that you only design for BlackBerry's.

As an advice I would say, a mobile designer has to work tightly with its mobile tech staff to get some good results. On the net it may be possible to have a division of labor, in the current mobile market this is just impossible.

The Personal Internet Will Subsume Mobile Internet Assumptions, Says Shosteck Group

Shosteck analysts say that operators must accept that the premium for mobility is significantly lower than they believe it is today even though few alternatives will compete on a like for like basis with mobile networks for many years, if at all. The mobility premium is not yet dead, but it will come under increasingly heavy attack. It will come under attack in both the voice and data worlds.

“The development of the Personal Internet or the mobilization and un-tethering of the Internet will require a fundamental shift in attitudes of operators and in the technologies used to deliver services,” commented Mr. Darnbrough. “Significant changes will be required in the mobile network to enable the development of the service and business models that we envisage will be the framework of the Personal Internet.

The already mentioned Economist article about "Disquiet about Vodafone" points in the same direction.

Via Amy

I started to write about the article in last weeks Economist about "Disquiet about Vodafone" (which I will later probably), but then I started reading more about the Carnival of the Mobilists. Ajit lately indirectly brought me to it and I saw that Nicolas was also taking part at the 3GSM mobilists gathering.
(I am still not sure if I can make it to Barcelona - right now I am fighting a cold.)

Anyway, I think the idea of the Carnival is a great one and a truly bloggerlike one too (reminds me of last year's Menu for Hope).



The Carnival of the Mobilists

For the blog reader it exposes you to the very best posts of the previous week, all written about mobile and gathered together in a central place. You can read the summary on the host’s site and click on any story that catches your eye. Each week, it’ll be hosted at a different site, so you can read the Carnival post and explore many other mobile blogs you may not be familiar with.

10th February Xellular Identity
17th February - No Carnival - Mobilists are all at 3GSM
24th February TBC
3rd March - Textually!!!