Address book as mobile Web's digital identity

OK, I have an idea. Unifying data behind your address/phone book name or nick name as a mobile URI and registered as an internet service.

People are in need to connect on the internet when on the go. Mobile phones do have these days more access to the Web.
But if they don't '''surf'' web pages ( limited usability ) they look for specific information , but one of the more compeling reasons to do this would be to search for information about people they know or might know ( socializing )

What if we think about address book in your mobile phone as your unique mobile URI ( uniform resource identifier ).

Could you as a mobile subscriber register ( to your operator or to some third party ) your address book name or nick name so that every mobile phone can search ( via phone's phone book ) and access your digital presence ( digital stuff ) which could be stored in a ''digital box'' ( as a type of mobile hosting service ) somewhere on the server ?

Your mobile pocket filled with stuff like Facebook or MySpace profile homepage .
Zipiko is an interesting model for connecting and communicating with others, and mobile URI would be of great help to those type of services.
Yes, do most people know where's browser on the phone at all ?
What if one of those ''internet browsers'' is in your phone book ?

Now, think about your phone as a tool for exchange . You can use your address book for this as well. Just send your photos or movies to someone from your A-book.
Yes, operators, bandwith and updating data from mobile phone is an issue , but looks interesting to me.

I am sure somebody already thought about this paradigm. Maybe Nokia's Ovi portal could be doing something with such an idea. Remember Nokia's Mobile Web Server project, but a bit different model.

Look how japanese used phone book in 2007.

Poll: Other than address book information, what sort of data have you exchanged with other people? (Sample size=mobile phone address book users, multiple answer)

Own phone number, mail address 44.1%
Photos and movies 35.0%
Downloaded pictures 8.0%
Deco mail animated emoticon 7.5%
Music data 6.9%
Schedule data 2.0%
Games 1.6%
Work-related data 1.1%
Other 0.9%
Nothing in particular 39.9%
No answer 0.5%

Even though I was in a camp for .mobi domain introduction, I wish to see this type of mobile URI funcionality implemented in the future.

Twitter back

Persona non grata

Have U heard about Twitter personalities ?
Be a ''girl'' and go read it :-D
Andrew Grill knows everything about your inner twitter hehe

Open Handset Alliance brought to you by Google

The down of innovation in mobile eco-system ?

The goal is open software stack for ''magic'' phone ( any phone ) . Build it as you like, but keep it open to all. Google made alliance and tries to bring it alive.
The strategy that worked when internet was young. But will it work in the mobile bussines ?

Android will deliver a complete set of software for mobile devices: an operating system, middleware and key mobile applications. On November 12, we will release an early look at the Android Software Development Kit (SDK) to allow developers to build rich mobile applications.

Well, what's then with LiMo initiative ? Some thinks it's here to stay as well.
Here's a short summary and notes of Google conference call ( source: Gizmodo )

Live: Google's gPhone Open Handset Alliance Conference Call

9:52: Call done. Archive below.

9:50: USA Today asks about gphone name again. Coming? Another way to think about the gphone, says Andy, is that there will be 1,000s of Google phones, some you like, some you don't.

9:46: NYTimes asks what kinds of agreements will be in place between carriers and google on ads, and will they have to share ad revenue with carriers? And will this phone change business models in the phone industry? Google answers: Sharing is likely. Our strategy is to share. Android allows it, but doesn't require it. If anything, it provides additional opportunity.

9:44: Sasha asks if its possible to create completely locked down phones. It is, apparently, but Google says that you can do that, according to the license, such a device wouldn't be able to run many apps and would be much less powerful and competitive.

9:43: So if you don't like the phone you get from your carrier, if it's android, you're free to switch it up? Google: "that's an answer for the carriers."

9:39: How will this phone compete with development communities of other OSes, and will yet another platform fragment the dev community. The difference, Andy says, that this one is open. And it's open source. Eric says that because of this, even competitors might both pick it up, if the platform is good enough.

9:39: Eric says he could picture using iPhone in one hand and Android in the other. Strange.

9:33: Chicago Tribune asks what the diff is between the Gmail apps on phones now, and the android ones. Eric answers that the gphone, with a real browser, won't need customized programs and websites, so it'll be easy for devs to support the phone by supporting any desktop browser. Android will be the first to do this broadscale.

9:29: Someone asks, were Microsoft, RIM, and Apple to join the alliance, and what did they say? The question is being dodged but he says the alliance is open and if people want to join they can.

9:29 Financial Times asks if a real gPhone is coming. Eric says that we're not announcing, but if we were to, this would be the platform for it.

9:27: WSJ asks about Google's web applications and ads will work with the new platform. Andy responds that Google's flexible ad platform should be fine, esp since one part of Android is a very robust HTML browser. But you won't see an ad driven browser on this phone for some time.

9:24: BBC is on. They're asking if HTC is going to use Android exclusively. Peter Chou says that they're going to be using all OSes equally. Moto says that this is important to accelerate their development, but they do have some commitments from other OS devs.

9:23: The Q&A is starting.

9:21 Sergei Brin: Sergei is talking about how linux helped him start Google, and now he hopes that they can use open source to develop great handsets. Today's mobile devices were more powerful than the servers he was using 10 years ago, so he's excited.

9:19: VP of China Mobile, biggest carrier in the world. An open mobile platform will accelerate China's smartphone adoption, he believes.

9:16: Ed Zander, CEO of Motorola is on the phone. Says nothing about handset development.

9:13 Paul Jacobs, CEO of Qualcomm, is speaking. He's chatting about 3G. Qualcomm has been working on Android for the last year, committing significant resources. They've been working on the 7000 chipsets for ideal multimedia functionality. They're upcoming snapdragon chipset will do better data throughput, 3d, GPS, and mobile TV at better power consumption.

9:11: Peter Chou, CEO of HTC Corp is speaking. He believes that the point of a mobile phone OS is to provide quick access to the content and functionality of a mobile phone. Android can do this, he believes. We plan to release the first mobile phone in the second half of 2008 with others to follow. "Windows Mobile Sucks!" Just kidding, he didn't say that.

9:08: René Obermann, CEO of Deutsche Telekom, parent company of T-Mobile, is speaking. Squishy quotes but no new data...our current plans include the launch of an android handset in 2008 in the EU and US with heavy wireless and web2.0 capabilities.

9:07: Eric is saying that users want better features. And that you couldn't do this with one company. That's why they've started the alliance of 34 companies.
Access to less expensive phones with more services and better UIs. Elliot Speaking.

9:06: We want to start a mobile phone platform that includes new services and features we couldn't imagine today. First mobile phone platform stack, including OS, apps, etc. Most liberal open source license, too. It's important to say that this isn't an announcement of the Googlephone. It's the announcement of a platform for lots of phones.

9:05 Started. Eric Schmidt is here and speaking.

Steve Jobs doesn't understand mobility

OK, today ( 28.06.2007. ) I wrote follow up ( scroll down this post )

The first real iPhone reviews are in from a few influencers.

Walt Mossberg - Great, but not so great.
David Pogues- Great, but not so great.

Well, Steve, WiFi is NOT ubiquitous.
EDGE is not enough for browsing.
GPS is not inside iPhone.
Video camera ( ! ) is not inside iPhone.
$ 599 is too expensive.
iTunes won't work directly from a phone.
E-mail is not SMS. SMS is not email.
Removable battery , please

You better get those super-extra gMaps and 3D gEarth or image-processing capabilities on board or else...Eric will leave you ;)

Steve Jobs and the crew of ''mobile experts'' around him should relocate in Europe or Japan for a few months to understand mobility.
It's not that I had too many expectations ( well, in terms of UI it is a game-changer ).
I am currenly using mass mobile phone ( am not techie ) and I can record my videos, and much more here in Croatia.

OK, UI is superb. But everything is dejavu from previus releases.
For $ 599 I can get much better phone, and I won't worry much about UI.

Come to Croatia.

We are waiting for the 2nd iPhone generation and Europe's sale.

FOLLOW UP:

According to real user usage, data and app services should be in this order:

A 6 (six) Core:
In order of importance

1. Voice
2. SMS ( not so much in US )
3. Photo Camera & multimedia
4. Search ( info & news, people, places, maps )
5. Apps
6. E-mail

Services and apps tailored on those basic promises will be successful.

iPhone partly missed those realites and try to bypass some of them ( Wi-Fi instead 3G, email instead of SMS ( mobile phone is 1-to-1 medium - personal ) , not enough camera-centric ( or will be ? ), Maps as a proxy for ''search'', and apps not installed but used on the web ). Kind of too much PC-centric and not mobile-centric ( or is it just me ? )

According to what we know before public release.

Super Google Maps and image-recognition magic could could force me to change my thoughts :))

Google's secret feature inside iPhone ?

A magic carpet for the iPhone ? Google.

Google Phone project doesn't exist per se ( hardware ), the concept might be special software arrangment inside iPhone based on Google Maps & gLocal & gEarth API suite.

Location- aware web & mobile service/browser/app/code ( call it whatever you like ) that will serve as a glue between physical and virtual locations ( via object hyperlinking, sort of, call it information nuggets, placemarks etc. ) .
Suddenly, iPhone user could be having a '' cloud '' and exchange information with the surrounding ( other people, places etc. ).

Google will call your phone to connect you to the business you are searching ( just one example ).

I was doing much research lately about iPhone and possible Google phone so I looked into every possible scenario and found this one as the most appealing to all parties, including end users.

Something was missing all the time. We hear a lot of yelling like ''mobile, mobile, mobile'', then ''maps, maps, maps ''. Well, Google Maps. My maps, my local placemark, review, news...Google free call !

Why would I buy ( I'm in Croatia right now, so I won't ) a handset that costs $ 599 only to make calls, use multimedia etc. ?
Well, I've come to realise it might be worth the price ( I am on defensive and yet unconvinced when talkning about battery, Edge instead of 3G, GPS , and if it is about niche product which it is for start).

There's got to be something that will make Google go not just inside iPhone but to other mass phones on the market. It will NOT change the world solely with iPhone, but it will challenge the current thinking and the way we used to think about mobile.

Suddenly, we will be aware of another informational element ( geobrowsing, information geo layer ) and the wholy new way of making locally accessable information for the mobile phone ( can't say much more about the tech implementation it will be used- GPS probably not available from day 1., user will be asked to provide default location ).

Google will do just fine with extremelly targeted and personal ads. No need to elaborate that. Click-to-call.
Searches will be tailored to location, history of searches in that location , daytime, personal preferences and the results won't be the same for everybody.

But more important, Google will do the CALL for you when you search local businessess and will call you FOR FREE , unless you provide Google mobile number.

Google Phone Company , sort of ;)

Sort of informational / wireless cloud around our heads and authoring tools in our hands ( some authoring widgets for making user-generated content fo the location- annotation if you like ).

These are all ideas floating around a decade , in one or another form, but Apple and Google partnership could be real execution of these ideas.

And as I already said in my previous articles, if Apple succeeds in making the 'widget' the standard app delivery service for cell phone usage, then they can succeed in delivering the first mass-market entirely web-based computing platform and Google could get opportunity to for ''inovative'' software delivery ( the trend is there ).

Maybe my thought are only wild speculations and wishful thinking, but we will know everything on the 29th when iPhone ships ;)

Annotation of the Earth could become reality and sort of ''augmented reality'' perceived on the phone.
''The Google globe'' if you like and you are good to go if you are not privacy advocate ;)

All of this could lead to new way of using, organising and creating information, and Google will surely try to make sense out of this content bits and make a buck.

Here are my other articles about the similar subject during my research:

Google widgets for iPhone ?
Google Mobile Gadget ?
Mobile Web Tablet ( see the end of the article )

Nokia mobile web server

User- generated mobile phone content for your friends and family that doesn't have to be uploaded. It's shared, instant and contextual ! Oh, and it will drain your battery ;)

Juha Pusa, a Nokia man, demonstrated at MobileCamp event in New York for the first time Nokia's Mobile Web Server.
It's the concept of serving web pages directly from a mobile phone connected to the network.

It's a 6 years ahead of thinking for Nokia, IMHO.
The key is access to information such as location, pictures and phone numbers which will enable a new breed of applications to be created. Access from any browser.

But do we need to access all those information using browser ? Is that unnecessary complication while at the same time there is some sort of web service with mobile ''leg'' accesseable from a phone ?

The plan is that every mobile web server will be provided with global URL.
So, I can only imagine a mobile website it will change by its owner and it will be meaningful as the content that is shared may depend upon the current location and context.

If every mobile phone or even every smartphone initially, is equipped with a webserver then very quickly many websites will reside on mobile phones. That is bound to have some impact not only on how mobile phones are perceived but also on how the web evolves.

Mobile Web Server, also known as Raccoon, consists of a port of the Apache web server to the S60 smartphone platform.

It's a very exciting Nokia brave world.
Very interesting to follow up on their actions about mobile web server and it's ''computing'' strategy for the future business.

I can imagine as well this sort of thing; Every mobile phone user is likely to have forgotten his phone at home at some time or another. With a mobile web server on the phone it is easy to browse to it remotely and check, for instance, whether someone has called or sent an SMS, and even answer SMSs.
Cool ;))

All of this is, IMHO , relevant for personal communication and information sharing for small groups not for one-to-many broadcasting.

Web Balkanisation

The Web is split up

Stephen Wellman from InformationWeek was among the crowd in the auditorium during Google presentation about mobile applications and service and quotes Google user experience designer Leland Rechis who said:

''Rechis said, bluntly, that the mobile Web is balkanized, "The Pangaea of the Web is gone." And don't expect this to change anytime soon, either. Thanks to carrier portals and off portal applications, there is no one mobile standard to develop for.''

Read, Google thinks there's a two-tier Web and it won't be reversed fact.
I realised this one year ago when they labeled their search as ''Web'' and ''Mobile Web''.
Tim Berners Lee is strongly against this view but it's a simple truth.

Paul Golding even thinks we can't call it ''Mobile Web'' either. Maybe we should wait DoCoMo to define it :))

Follow up:
What term Pangaea means

VoiceIndigo preloaded podcasts support

Audio- centric mobile service

Samsung UpStage will be the first mobile phone by the global handset maker preloaded with podcasting software provided by VoiceIndigo with its catalogue service and advertising solution.

The service will be free for the consumer ( but not for Sprint ).
This solution is enabled for Sprint users in USA.

The trouble I have with those sort of services is web-based management of the subscription service.
It must me managable from the very same device from which you are occasionally listen audio content.

Latest edition of MobileMedia here in Croatia showed on the main page Beyonce Knowles holding dual-faced Samsung UpStage ( SPH-M620 ) phone. It's clearly phone for mobile entertainment.

VoiceIndigo podcasting app is only one feature but of equal importance just like Bluetooth or 1,3 Mpx camera.

Low 3G capacity utilisation

Not dumb, but empty pipe

It’ll take a long time for the telecom ''pipes'' to be filled.
Short on incentives for a mass market.

Croatia ready for 3rd party mobile services

The point of saturation.

Puls, a croatian market research agency, presented findings 2 months ago about croatian mobile habits and use.
I almost forgot about these findings.

They conducted interviews with croatian households ( n= 1.000 people, time frame- January 2007., people over 14 years old, national representative sample ).



Key findings:

- Penetration : 101 % ,

- Usage: 37 % photography, 25 % games, 21 % mp3, 16 % video clips, 13 % radio, 12 % content dowloading, 7 % web browsing, 7 % mobile e-mail

- Males and under 25 years old are using more actively multimedia, music, games and web browsing

For example, T-Mobile Croatia has ARPU of € 27 ( In Germany it has about 21 € ).
Tele2 has the biggest subsciber growth. Vipnet provides videocalling, HSDPA network with 7,2 downlink ( HSPU upgrade ) and is actively making inroads in fixed-mobile convergence with its VIP Homebox service.