mTrends - mobile media lifestyle trends - m-trends.org

I know how mTrends looks great on a PSP and on a Nokia N800; I haven’t seen my blog however on the iPhone, but I suppose it looks ok - the iPhone features Safari, the most advanced web browser ever on a portable device.

UPDATE => Kelly sended me some shots of mTrends on the iPhone, looks pretty cool, I cannot see from the screenshots if all my sidebar widgets work and if the feed subscription functionality works automatically in the mobile Safari browser… Anyway thanks, Kelly!

Since it’s going to take a while before everyone is able to buy an iPhone, and before device manufacture competitors catch up with Apple, browsing the Mobile Web stays somehow a non-standardised fragmented experience for most people. I have been writing about this confusion before, now it was kind of weird reading this ’strikethrough’ story from Scobleizer on how the iPhone gets confused with the mobile version of the Google Reader. Note that the Safari browser shows the desktop web pages - the ‘real’ internet, as most people know it; Robert just got confused with the different - mobile web - URL’s to browse to.

Now both ways to acces the internet will most probably have to live next to eachother on mobile devices since no real solution is in sight to converge the mobile web as ‘one real web’. There’s the ‘full’ browsing experience possible on the high-end devices like the iPhone, PSP’s and for example the Nokia N800 and then there are the ‘adaptive’ browsers that will adapt at it’s best the existing web page to your phone, like Nokia S60, Openwave and Opera browsers and others like Google Mobile transcoding normal web pages so they fit the mobile screen.

But what about the Mobile Web users?

To my view there are 4 different types of mobile web users to distinguish (some with a combined use), people who:

1. want to read their favourite feeds (through mobile browser or standalone applications)
2. browse websites and pages (using Nokia, Opera Mini or Safari browser on the mobile)
3. search from within a browser using Google Mobile, Yahoo! oneSearch, …
4. use standalone apps/tools to connect to people or communities like Jaiku, Twitter, Fring, Google Mobile Maps, etc…

Currently I use 1 and 4 the most, since browsing the web on the mobile is simply still too annoying and slow and searching on my phone not context relevant for me as it is now; I read feeds and use standalone apps to connect to people and find locations, that’s it. With the coming of more and more webapps, RSS tools and communities going mobile the coming months - YouTube, MySpace, Facebook, Netvibes, and alikes - some of them already there - the ways to get to those apps will become even more diverse, not to mention about how to handle correctly Mobile SEO.

For a simplified any (txt) feed ‘works on any device’ solution there’s still the real pre-cursor of the Mobile Web, Winksite. David Harper writes in this Love the Mobile Web post, how Winksite makes it easy to publish mobile Internet sites and build simple mobile connections via mobile phones:

“Winksite is the first standards compliant mobile Website builder that also includes RSS-driven content deployment and mobile-tuned community features such as forum, chat, and polls. This approach delivers fresh content, fast-loading screens, and universally accessible community features to you and your audience. The Winksite service is a free and fully hosted solution. No software install on your phone is necessary to view a Winksite powered mobile site. Learn more about how it works.”

I’ve had mTrends on Winksite since a while now just because my blog was always accesible on most phones, now for anyone who wants his internet blog or pages to be displayed correctly and available on ANY phone, I think Winksite is still the best option. Check below how MobileOK my Winksite blog is using the dotMobi’s MobiReady Report generator.

BTW: great tool! I like the way it displays information on pricing and speed of different networks to acces your mobile web pages.

To close this post, I would like to add this paragraph from Dave’s post on The mobile Web is not just for phones anymore:

“Gamers and their WiFi connected version of the Internet have been largely ignored by Mobile & Web 2.0 publishing and community platforms. We’re changing that. Whatever you choose to build at Winksite will now be served up optimized and fully functioning to the Sony PSP browser and Nintendo DS Lite Opera browser over WiFi connections. With the DS-Lite in mind we provide a fast loading and readable version while in overview mode. The PSP is delivered a version that eliminates the horizontal scrolling (and reduces the vertical scrolling) required to read posts and chat with your friends.”

Right attitude, Dave. Keep going!

What about you? I’m interested in your experiences and opinions

.mobi, Analysis, browser, browsing, convergence, dotmobi, iphone, mobile 2.0, Mobile Apps, Mobile Blog, Mobile Games, Mobile RSS, Mobile Search, mobile seo, mobile video, mobile web, mobile20, mobileok, mobileweb, n800, nokia, opera, QR codes, safari, scobleizer, SEO, usability, w3c, web 2.0, winkiste

With the iPhone comes the 1st iPhoneDevCamp, which is being held at Adobe’s San Francisco office July 6-8. Totally Mobile 2.0, this is a free event, and features presentations, development projects, and demos.

If you are planning to attend in-person, please visit the iPhoneDevCampAttendees page and add your name and contact info.

For the others interested, there’s already a Flickr group for this event.

adobe, Announcements, apple, barcamp, devcamp, Developers, developers camp, iphone, iphonedevcamp, mobile 2.0, mobile web, mobile2, mobile20

Following the response and feedback I got on the “Understanding Mobile 2.0” article I wrote at Read/WriteWeb a couple of weeks ago, I created a wiki space to start categorizing the so-called Mobile 2.0 companies.

You can acces the directory at mobile2companies.com.

I decided to use a wiki tool, called Wepaint, so companies can add their own information and keep it updated. You just need to sign-up to add your Mobile 2.0 company info page, you can add images, slideshows, video’s, and RSS feeds as well, and tag your page(s).

Companies can use the tool to keep the web community updated with latest news, elevator pitches, presentations of new products/services, etc. You can browse the wiki by category, by keywords, subscribe to the wiki feeds on new pages added or updated, comments and news, a lot of other stuff out there yet to discover.

The directory is far from complete, I just gave it an initial injection and added some companies I know to start with, so the best thing to do is add your page if you don’t find your company in there and update your page if you don’t like what I added, it’s a wiki, you know

Kudos to Carlo for helping me with the introduction texts.

Contact me if you would like to contribute to this project, to become a writer/moderator, to help develop the wiki, and for any suggestion and comments. I hope these pages will be usefull for the entire mobile value chain, spread the word!

2.0., 3G, advertising, Announcements, audio, Bluetooth, cameraphone, cell phone, community, companies, company, device, Directory, image recognition, imaging, innovation, lbs, m trends.org, marketing, messaging, mobile, mobile 2.0, Mobile Advertising, Mobile Apps, Mobile Blog, Mobile Content, Mobile Culture, Mobile Events, Mobile Lifestyle, mobile marketing, mobile music, Mobile OS, Mobile RSS, Mobile Search, mobile video, mobile web, Mobile Web Server, mobile20, mobilize, Moblog, mososo, mtrends, Music, next generation, NFC, office, Operators, podcasts, Proximity Marketing, QR codes, qrcodes, Read/WriteWeb, search, social media, social software, start ups, startups, Trends, Ubiquitous Devices, ubiquitous marketing, video, voice, voip, w3c, we media, web 2.0, wi fi, Wimax

Here some impressions from the excellent Under The Radar: Mobility Conference from November 16 in Mountain View, CA. Debbie Landa and her team are doing an incredible good job creating this type of events bringing together various types of quality (!) value chain players in mobility. Just seeing the number of VC’s around per square meter shows that mobility is definately on the radar in Silicon Valley. You can view some of my UTR pictures here as a Flickr set.

The number of company pitches one could view in a day was pretty impressive: 32 companies, divided in 8 tracks in 2 rooms; The 2-track system however made me skip some presentations I would have loved to see too. Anyway, on the overal side, this was a very smoothly organised event and a chance to meet loads of new people in the industry, mainly focused Silicon Valley. It was very interesting for me to get a better notice of the US mobile market and understand better between the differences US and European markets.

The overal tone of the conference was all about web 2.0 going mobile, there has been numerous blogposts and discussions lately on the topic… Daniel Appelquist has one of my preferred mobile 2.0 definitions so far:

Mobile 2.0 is not “the Future.” it is services that already exist all around us. These services are maturing at an amazing rate and what they are doing is effectively knitting together Web 2.0 with the mobile platform to create something new: a new class of services that leverage mobility but are as easy to use and ubiquitous as the Web is today. These services point the way forward for the mobile data industry.

I started with the first session on VIDEO with ComVu, Juice Wireless presenting JuiceCaster, Nexage and Veeker; a very potential set of companies. My favourites are ComVu because I can stream (imagine a good flat rate deal somewhere of course) and geotag automatically, and JuiceCaster has it’s community building stuff together. I can’t really remember about Nexage, neither can I found notes back and the Veek Video Peek from Veeker just doesn’t sound right.

Then I went off to the other room to see Omar Hamoui, CEO of AdMob (excerpt here below); everytime I hit their homepage, I’m always impressed by the number of incoming live ad requests coming in, and they are not fake - as some suggested inside the Microsoft building… Correct me if I’m wrong.

In this ADVERTISING/MARKETING track Greystripe won the audience award for it’s great presentation and idea - inserting ads into mobile game downloads, ok but that’s too American for me, I just don’t believe a cell phone is not a TV and in the long run kids will just skip the ad whenever avaiable or possible.

Meanwhile I missed the session on MEDIA SHARING and SharpCast who won the audience award here. SharpCast is doing what everybody else forgot to do well between the desktop and the mobile: it’s all about syncing your life! I also missed the transactions track but you can view winner Mobo’s pitch here below by CEO Noah Glass himself:

During lunch I catched up with Scott Rafer from MyBlogLog and Dave Harper. Dave (here below) presented in the next MOBILIZE session his WinkSite project. Moderator Rafe Needleman from CNET made a very true review of that session. You can read Dave’s presentation here, don’t forget to check their pitch!

Meanwhile in the other track Loopt was winning the overall audience choice. Loopt is doing what Plazes (and some others) are doing for a while now yet, somehow Loopt chooses resolutely mobile and seems to have spend a lot of time on usability and user experience, stuff not the least to be underestimated on the mobile phone. I’ll check the new stuff Felix will show us next monday for an definitive update on MoSoSo.

In the IMAGING track Daem Interactive was to me way ahead of the others but I may sound too subjective here The key in the image recognition technology sector will be how fast the companies presented can go to market with the right solution. Japan is leading innovation and ideas in this area but the companies in this track at UTR showed some very mature technology and solid business ideas behind.

In the Galileo room, TalkPlus was showing what voice 2.0 is all about and convinced judges and audience with it. Get a grimp of it yourself here in demo and interview I did the day after with TalkPlus CEO Jeffrey D. Black.

Jeffrey explains the voice 2.0 concept (left) and demonstrates a SIP Call

Jeffrey D. Black, CEO TalkPlus explains TalkPlus

My list of companies to watch has been growing quite fast now, here below the ones I recently added - check back in a year or so and let me know what happened with these companies

ComVu
JuiceCaster
Loopt
Plusmo
WinkSite
Mobo
Sharpcast
TalkPlus

You can view all the Under The Radar: Mobility judges and audience winners here.

Note: all video shooting done with a Nokia N93, thanks to vpod.tv for hosting - actually you should check their portal, Rodrigo is currently live reporting from Nokia World in Amsterdam.

And as an extra for the incrowd fans: hear Peter Vesterbacka (Some Bazaar) explain his “to found 100 companies in a year” pitch. Way to go, Peter!

2.0, admob, Analysis, ComVu, daem, GreyStripe, image recognition, innovation, juicecaster, juicewirless, Loopt, m trends.tv, mobile 2.0, Mobile Advertising, Mobile Apps, Mobile Events, Mobile Lifestyle, mobile marketing, Mobile RSS, Mobile Search, mobile video, mobile20, mobility, Moblog, Mobo, mtrends, n91, n93, nokia, Nokia N91, Nokia N93, Operators, Plusmo, Predictions, ScanR, Sharpcast, silicon valley, social media, spanish startups, startups, TalkPlus, Trends, Under The Radar, utr, vc, veeker, web 2.0, web20, winksite

People get ready, the mobile 2.0 train is definately on the rails now…

Mike Rowehl and Vodafone’s Daniel Appelquist (both involved in their local MobileMonday chapters) are organising a Mobile 2.0 event (just before the web 2.0 event) in San Francisco on November 6.

Though I am using heavily (and have been writing on) mobile (web) 2.0- associated apps and mobile podcasting, I haven’t used the term ‘mobile2.0′ a lot since I believe accessing the web from a mobile is part of web2.0 core = platform connected to any device, anytime, anywhere - however the real power of the mobile phone lies in the fact that the mobile has an incredible high penetration rate nearly everywhere - and is growing tremendously in area’s where it hasn’t reach it’s full penetration yet - and yet it’s going to be THE primary device that people will use to connect to web 2.0 services (or whatever we’re going to name it in a couple of years).

Many are probably seeing the potential but few (Ajit, Carlo, Charlie, Kelly, Oliver, Russell, and a few others…) have been writing insightfull ‘food for thought’ on this subject. So, I’m am glad the subject is finally hitting the event floors for real discussion with mobile value chain companies and players.

A great list of speakers will attend the mobile2.0 event, great job and initiative Mike and Dan! Personally, I would add some operators in the mix, that’s the real discussion I’m waiting for… Meanwhile walking the mobile walk - apart from using your 3G data card flat rate for mobile browsing, is still costing pocket loads of money for the enthusiast end-users.

For mobile2.0 to become a mobile user-driven media, and for mobile users to start accessing these web 2.0 services from their cell phones, they’re going to need flat rates from their operator or carrier. Here’s a taste of what it’s like accessing web 2.0 services on a mobile now… too bad my operator makes or breaks the connection (and charges per connection made) every time I…

• Check or send email from my mobile
• Check a (mobile) web page(s)
• Subscribe or update feed(s)
• Download or update a client application
• Upload a picture to Shozu, Flickr, YouTube or other services
• Subscribe, update or download a podcast
• Connect to consult my interactive Visual Radio service
• Trying out new mobile services

please fill-in accordingly if you use more services yourself…

… With the current operator offerings being unserved for mobile2.0 users like me (at least in Europe), I started to bypass the operator network wherever I can, what about you?

3G, Analysis, Announcements, mobile 2.0, Mobile Lifestyle, Mobile RSS, mobile web, mobile2.0, mobile20, Operators, podcasts, social media, usability, we media, web 2.0, wi fi