Attending were bloggers Kip Kniskern, Molly Holzschlag, Jesse Warden, Jonathan Snook, Keith Peters, Erik Natzke, Julie Lerman and Rob Howard. The highlights of this media roundtable were playing with the new Surface Table and dropping science with Bill Gates. I asked Bill if he had one of the Tables in his living room, thinking if anyone did, he would. However, he did not, noting there were only seven in existence at this time. The two people present who did not have iPhones were in awe of the Surface. The rest of us were suitably impressed - but I guess you only get one shot at the “wow factor” of your first interaction with a responsive, gesture-based interface.

Last year, I asked Bill what he wanted for Christmas and also what he thought of the OLPC ($100 laptop) initiative. This time, I asked him to describe the next phase of his life and how being a father has affected the legacy he would like to leave behind. Here’s what he had to say.

Anyway, in terms of having kids is not — it’s not an easy thing to describe how that affects you. I mean, authors I suppose try and do that, or various creative forums. It’s a very exciting thing. My daughter happens to go to a Tablet PC school, so she knows more about Tablet PC than I do. I get her homework, her graded homework every day, I see what she got wrong at dinner, I can know whether we have to discuss scientific notation or whatever it is, and she’s just so much more — for her it’s so natural to use the pen and just be reading everything online. They got rid of the textbooks, and it’s a phenomenal thing. And this year it’s all based on OneNote where they use the collaborative synching of OneNote where they’re updating their thing, and the teacher sees it.

Anyway, that’s a pretty phenomenal thing. The thing I asked for Christmas last year, those Teach12.com DVDs, the sad fact is that in their science area I now have all of their lectures. These things are brilliant. If you weren’t here to hear me enthused about that, these are not — they’re kind of pricy, but these are brilliant science lectures. If you want to learn about — if you want to understand how semiconductors work, get the lecture called “Physics in your Everyday Life” and watch it. He will explain to you, better than I’ve ever seen explained, because I’ve always tried to explain to people how semiconductors work. If you want to know about geology, just get the geology course. If you want to know biology, you want to know string theory, you want to know anything, they’ve gone and found the very best lecturers in the world and they’re fantastic. The problem is I’ve seen them all now. I’m going to go back and re-watch maybe about half of them, because they’re that fun and interesting.

Some of them — my daughter is 11, my son is 8 — some of them are good enough I’ll get to watch with my kids and go through and see if they’re ready for them. So, I might have to think of something new. I’ve told them they should go get more lectures. There are some areas that they don’t cover very well. They don’t cover chemistry as well as they should. There’s actually nothing that’s really good on chemistry out there.

Anyway, I’m 50-some-years old, so I guess there’s a lot of different changes. July 1 will be as much of a demarcation for me as there’s been for a long time, just because I was 17 when I was writing the BASIC full time, so I’ve worked full time for Microsoft since then, and so that will be the first time that I don’t work full time for Microsoft. So, it will be an interesting change. I’ll still work at Microsoft, I’ll come in one day a week, and there will be various projects that I work on. I get to take my kids to school, but after July 1 I’ll get to pick them up, too. I’ve never gotten to do that.

During the conversation, Bill spoke about Microsoft’s new projects, RoundTable and the Surface, and how they effect change in the industry. Specifically he talked about natural interaction techniques as well as content and collaboration across multiple media devices. He started to get into 3D and Second Life (which he evidently feels is “First Life” in his world).

There’s a lot in terms of the interaction style, where if you have to interact with the keyboard and mouse, there’s just a lot of things that aren’t simple. You have a lot of companies trying to make breakthroughs on that. For us really an iconic thing is something like Microsoft Surface where you just take information, take how you interact with a map when you have a keyboard and a mouse, and then take when you have Surface where you can zoom in, pan around, try out different things. Take how you would sit down with a friend and look over some photos. Your computer is set up so that it’s not that easy for multiple people to sit there, not that easy for multiple people to navigate around, it’s just not a shared experience; whereas having the tabletop type environment with the natural interface makes that very simple.

We actually have a product that’s not a consumer product, so it’s not as visible as a lot of consumer things, that are called RoundTable, that show some of the potential on this, where you take and you have just digital cameras and digital audio pickups, and so if somebody is remote but wants to have a meeting, a virtual meeting with a group of people, they get to see all the participants, and it automatically directs the meeting in terms of knowing who’s talking, telling them who’s talking, showing that in the main display, but still showing the 360-degree view of everybody in that room.Our view is that these natural interaction techniques are very complementary to each other; that is touch screens, surface touch, touch whiteboard, pen type interfaces, which you’ve seen on the tablet, natural 3D input, which you see on things like the Nintendo Wii at this point, but you’ll see very broadly as a standard input peripheral over time, not just for videogames but for PCs as well, and that’s one of those push/pull things where the Web is not 3D today, but that’s partly because the peripherals aren’t there, and the peripherals aren’t there partly because the Web is not 3D. Well, why isn’t it 3D? Well, there’s been at least five startups a year that have said now we’re going to make the Web 3D, and then they go and fail. The tools, the performance, the richness, the environments. You know, (First Life ?) has gotten some degree of critical mass in terms of what they do, but still people won’t think, okay, I go to a bookstore on the Web, it’s going to be a 3D experience; I go to a site to navigate what my house is going to look like, that’s a 3D experience, but that will change. We and many others are investing super heavily in the input devices, the runtimes.

The conversation went well, however I cannot help but wonder how long it will take before consumers truly get a taste of the new Surface Table and if, by then, the wow factor will dim to a murmur. Here are my thoughts on the new Surface after playing with it in-person and seeing the demos by the team:

It’s more impressive in person than I had anticipated. It’s more than a $10,000 version of the iPhone, that’s for sure. The level of interaction and subtle attention to detail has not been lost on the device, it is truly fun and evokes a group response. That is the primary difference between the Surface and the iPhone (besides size and cost of course.) The iPhone is a decidedly personal device, while the Surface is a collaborative experience. The folks at Microsoft demo’d the table and much like the video suggests, there are many commercial applications for the device — you can imagine using one at a high-end restaurant or lounge in a fancy hotel. The size, cost and customization of the Table means it is not consumer-oriented or priced. The goal was to create a truly ‘natural’ interface that acts and responds in a way that is intuitive and playful.

Another difference between the iPhone and the Surface is the ability to sense other objects and directly interact with them using a form of 2D tag (note the round buttons with dots in the image below - these are currently the ‘identifiers’ where in the future we can imagine using RFID tags or some form of QR code that is ubiquitous). The tags allow you to take a photo (as in the photo of the group above) and automatically download them to the table surface by placing the camera on the table. In seconds. It also allows you to place objects like your mobile phone on the table, and sync or compare it instantly to another device (for in-store use).

The Surface team has done an impressive job, that’s for sure. But the timing of the release of such a product is unfortunately quite a ways behind the other ‘groundbreaking’ interfaces such as the iPhone. If released last year, more attention might have been given to the unique nature of the interface. But now, this level of interaction is becoming mainstream, and the innovation will only continue to grow.This week at Macworld, Steve Jobs announced the new MacBook Air as the ‘thinnest laptop in the world’ with a rather limited gesture-based trackpad and a built-in (non-removable) battery. This device — long awaited and much anticipated — is the beginning of a new era of ‘ultra mobile personal computing’ (UMPC) that wirelessly merges (and converges) multiple devices, networks, content in a way that works seamlessly with the way we live.

• What is the future of the mobile web - with full browser access from mobile devices in the future replacing ‘mobile-specific’ web sites?
• How are transcoded web pages working (or not working) in the current system?
• What will be the norm - browser-based content or installed apps? 
• What will future ‘standard’ ad units look like? 
• How will Google’s entry into the market affect mobile advertising?
• What is the experience of the U.S. vs. Europe vs. Emerging Markets?
• What is the value proposition of mobile advertising to the end user? 
• How will the Blyk model (free minutes for paid advertising) work?
• What is the carrier reaction and/or dependency to the mobile web?

The group used these questions as starting points for a larger discussion which I will try and summarize below. The bottom line is, we’re just at the beginning of a new era of mobile and integrated/convergent media consumption.  The topic of mobile advertising has been discussion worthy lately, especially since the announcement made by Google last week that they are officially entering the mobile space. In an insightful post dated June 2th (pre-iPhone, pre-Google announcement), visionary Alan Moore discusses mobile as the 7th mass media in a post titled: “What do, Cyworld, the iPhone, blyk, Admob, MyNuMo, Artists first, Moblog UK have in common? They are all part of the 7th Mass Media: Mobile,” with some comments (paraphrased by Howard Rheingold in this Smart Mobs post):

Moving to the advertising sector, Alan thinks that the new mobile platform is the ground for far greater developments comparing to the traditional ad business of the classic media, due to the nature and expansion of the mobile technology that make the advertising messages more personal, thus more meaningful. This adds a new dimension to the viral and mouth-to-mouth marketing strategies, making them faster, more focused on appropriate customer audiences, and this way perhaps less expensive.

From our session, several themes rose to the top of our discussion:

 1. Death of the Mobile Web and rise of the ‘Middle Web’: Fully rendered browser experiences and style sheet driven mobile sites are quickly becoming the norm. It was agreed that a new format of merged/converged web sites is rising and we coined it the ‘Middle Web.” The debate continues whether moving into .mobi or m.site.com formats for specific mobile content will be relevant in the future. Certainly there will always be room for targeted mobile content and services which merit custom microsites and separate URLs. However moving between the sites (cross-linking) along with access to transcoded web pages and web-based apps the ad model starts to fall apart. We see a larger gap created between commotization and specialization when it comes to ‘big’ web sites versus mobile-specific sites. 

2. The iPhone Effect: It was agreed that the emergence of the iPhone has sped up the mobile eco-system 10x through usability and physical design. It has also largely cracked the mobile web issue by offering an easy to view, easy to browse solution. The U.S.  has the ability to set the pace of innovation through both devices and content, accellerated because of the iPhone. Also discussed (briefly) was the fact that the full-featured phone is no longer limited to the enterprise audience. The iPhone gives ‘smartphone’ feature access to the general consumer, which finally gives rise to an entirely new level of content and services targeted to the masses.

3. Text Based Mobile Ads Enable Browsing: Through observation of user behavior, it appears that many mobile users click on text-based advertising as a means of cross-linking or browsing on a mobile device. Especially when the content is appropriately targeted, it seems the text linking replaces the ‘next’ button for bored mobile browsing. This might account for the extremely high click-through rates companies like Ad Mob and Greystripe are experiencing — not just a novelty, but content that enables continued mobile browsing.

4. Apps/Games versus Mobile Web: These two experiences on mobile devices are very different. Apps/Games are a bigger barrier to entry, but a better experience overall. The value exhange of ‘free’ for paid advertising is a double ‘opt-in’ for promotions and subscriptions. The ability to focus advertising and know the target audience’s needs and behaviors is high. Moving forward, the user experience and consumer adoption of web-based applications and flash games will decide the future, especially as the capabilities of the mobile web continue to evolve.

5. Is Mobile Advertising a Novelty? Two questions arise —  is the current success of mobile advertising  novelty-based  and has it reached a plateau? Within the current mobile eco-system, mobile advertising seems to be flourishing. The click-through rates are extremely high, especially in countries where the mobile web is the web (i.e. South Africa and India).  However when contrasted with regular web-based or traditional advertising spending, the monetization is not quite there.  Funding for mobile advertising seems to be other mobile content and services, and works within a targeted and specific user base. Outside of the mobile eco-system, the future of mobile advertising seems questionable, especially in growth markets such as the Americas and Western Europe.  For emerging markets such as China, India and South Africa — the promise of a larger mass market accessing mobile content and services continues to grow.

From a comment on Alan Moore’s blog post, a reader states, “Until either mobile can offer advertising real estate on a scale to match TV and print (and scale is not measured solely in number of devices), or the model for buying, selling and measuring advertising changes radically, mobile is not ready for prime-time.” More of this reader’s comments can be found on his blog: Brands, Digital Media and Me.

So - Where is the Future of Mobile? During our discussion, Raj Singh stated “The U.S. is the future of mobile.” Supporting this statement was the fact that the U.S. dollar wins overall (even though it is at a low point currently) and the monetary strength of the U.S. has influence over carriers. The walls are being torn down as Google ‘opens up’ and innovation paves the way into the future. Innovation is seeing as a ‘push’ rather than a ‘pull’ in various cultures and economic situations.

This was quickly counteracted by Mike Rowehl who stated “India and S. Africa is the future of mobile.” Developing countries such as India and S. Africa are jumping past traditional web-based and other consumption methods straight to mobile devices. However the infrastructure is still not in place and the user base is still too far behind to set the immediate trends. Fragmentation from both carriers and operators along with global convergence is not happening due to differences in culture, establishment of true 3G networks, etc.

As a wrap up, the group was resolved that in a contained mobile eco-system, mobile advertising works. But moving into traditional outlets and more general consumer advertising, it falls apart. Although mobile media is quickly moving into mainstream, there is still a wide gulf between the mobile and traditional media outlets for consumption of content and advertising. It’s surprising how traditional advertising and media is still tentative about the web - not to mention the mobile web with a mere fraction of a % of overall budget targeted to the internet as a whole. In the end, it was agreed that the future of mobile was dependent on community and communication — with the final success factor determined by the simplicity and utility of the user experience overall.

1. There is definitely money here - Whether it be traditional WAP text ads or even SMS ads, there is money that I am making and the eCPMs have been good. With self-service WAP ads, I’ve been getting between $1-$6 and with sponsored ads, I’ve seen ad sales upwards of $15. That being said, there was definitely some initial promises of CPMs in the $30-40 etc range; however, I think this as a % of the inventory has definitely scaled down to less than 5% - the majority of the inventory is under $10.

2. The MMA must be furiously working with all the different kinds of ad units being proposed. I haven’t been able to test all of them but I’ve noticed some general themes. I haven’t seen an improvement in click-thrus with banners over text. In addition, I don’t think the ad-providers have sorted all their bugs yet since I still, on occasion, see incorrect banner sizes being displayed on different phones. I haven’t yet tried interstital ads from Mophap, it’s not a standard mobile ad unit but it’s an interesting concept. I did try click-to-call ads, but that failed pretty miserably, I’m thinking that’s only interesting in the context of local search but I’m not sure what kind of C2C ad would be relevant on a ringtone WAP site? I also haven’t tried any in-voice ads, such as those from VoodooVox but I hear it is doing fairly well although we still have to wait and see if 1800Free411 can be profitable - maybe they already are. I know MyWaves was running mobile video ads - my gut tells me this wouldn’t work because the user experience would be pretty bad. I have found in-game advertising to work with Greystripe but the CPMs being extremely low - you have to be really high-volume to make a killing here.

3. Ad load time is extra important on mobile. Because mobile ads are usually server-sided queries (versus Javascript), your WAP page doesn’t load until you’ve received your ads. My buddy Allen Day with TinyTube wrote an interesting post where he analyzed the response time of a number of different ad networks - see the data for yourself. If it takes a second to request an ad, that means, it’s an extra second on each WAP page load which is a huge user experience issue on a rather slow experience to begin with. Do note, there are some ad providers which display the ad as a URL such as Mophap and thus are not subject to the ad-load time issues.

4. There has been a lot of talk recently about how Google Mobile Adsense will eat everyone’s lunch. One interesting thing to note, initially described by Omar at Admob, is that Google is passing through web advertisements to mobile. Basically, this means if you are a web advertiser, your ad may run on Google Mobile as long as Google can successfully tanscode your page. This is both disruptive but interesting. It’s disruptive to existing ad providers because it immediately gives Google an enormous ad network with high-paying CPMs; it is interesting because it’s taking a long-tail view of mobile where the mobile web browsing experience will converge with the web experience. Knowing this, I’ve still seen very mixed eCPM numbers from Google Mobile Adsense, some weeks, the numbers have been great, but other weeks, my other ad partners are outperforming by a big margin - I’m not sure why the variance. I also haven’t really seen random ads displayed on my WAP site via Google Mobile Adsense either - it still seems to be mobile targeted ads rather than the entire ad network as they initially announced - maybe, they changed their tune. In any case, Russell Beattie pointed out an interesting find, where Google may be giving you prioritized WAP page indexing if you use them for Adsense; that would be extremely clever and arguably anti-compeatitve. Remember the WAP index is pretty small compared to the web, you might be on the first page of results against the search word ringtone!

5. The mobile ad industry is definitely maturing although you could argue it just begun :) I’m seeing folks carve themselves out as sponsored ad providers such as Millennial Media or Quattro, self-service ad networks such as Admob, carrier ad enablers like Enpocket or Rythm New Media, in-game advertisers such as Greystripe or Hovr, SMS ad providers such as 4Info or Movoxx, in-application ad providers such as Amobee etc. etc. - everyone is finding there niche!

I’m looking forward to seeing how this all converges and plays-out over the next year. And let’s also see how Blyk, the ad-supported MVNO turns out!

Raj

• Let’s make it compelling
• Make it easy to fail
• Mobile doesn’t always equal a phone
• Personalize - know who I am and my rights
• Remove the screen and think about creating value
• You can’t have too many Apples - at least that is what my doctor tells me…

(Patrick McVeigh) Wireless has been around for a long time. What is new in the wireless business is enabling the white collar worker with wireless technology. The company that really started this is RIM - they started PUSH email and generated a good experience. If you are a grey collar worker you either need to learn the device or you are out of a job. The bottom line if you look at the next generation of wireless experience you have to keep the user experience in mind. Using things like Web Kit and the Nokia browser we’re making progress. Back to the PALM example, 12,000 employees had palm devices before the CEO even noticed it. How do we get these web-based tools up and running and mobilize them quickly and easily?

(Russ Daniels) We’re very early in the stage of mobility. It’s roughly like 1995 with the Internet. People had started to understand how to communicate but they didn’t figure out how to make any industry changing paradigms beyond communication. The barrier to innovation is how hard it is for people to understand how to make money. The point I’m trying to make is are we willing to give half of our $11 billion dollars away? How can we create a way for others to share in this value chain without giving it away?

(Tony) If you constrain people they are motivated to be even more creative.

(Patrick) There are barriers everywhere. Not from all business models - the API’s are all different. It takes 3.5 years to create a new smartphone OS. It is a highly fragmented industry - the browser is probably the best bet for this to change.

(Russ Daniels) One end is the consumer, the other end is the person providing the service. One of the things we can learn from other experience is the migration of value to other areas of value. Other enterprises that have shareholders and large companies making plays that want to preserve the values they have - as well as determining what disruptive technologies they have - Google is one of these companies.

(Tony) Do you think you are competing with Google?

(Jean Marc Frangos) I think the Google move is built out of frustration. We cannot all share in this fragmented market. In lieu of the Apple way - which is to build it from the OS on up to ensure end user integration - Google is focused on capturing the market in a different way.

(Patrick) We’ve seen the value that can be created by focusing specifically on a segment of the market and focusing on that market. There are two challenges - the capital costs of being a network operator (not everyone can be a low-cost player). The MVNO model has not yet revealed a stellar success model. Until this all works its way out it’s hard to break it down in the way you have asked. If you are going to be a low-cost player, you need to differentiate in different ways. You need to have different strategies.

(Tony) Given the convergence with WiFi and WiMax - (didn’t get the whole question here)

(Jean Marc) I think to be clear - the ideal situation is to invite developers and 3rd parties to out platform. We’ve opened up our API’s - BK.com is an entry portal into the messaging and capabilities platform we are opening up to 3rd party developers. We are trying to create enough interest - in order for it to be developed in a meaningful way you need to open up your SDK and open up security and authentication modules and allow everyone to access it.

(Tony) You are talking about the web. mobile is about the location, personalization and the analysis of who you are doing these things with. How can you play in mobile without access to your customer’s data?

(Jean Marc) We are (BK Telecom) considered to be an MVNO and we do have access to our customer’s data.

(Tony) Are you hearing anything that is truly mobile 2.0 and high value?

(Russ) I’m one of 8 CTO’s at HP. I’m not aligned with a specific business unit but across several. I’m looking at this not from the web perspective, but the ability for digital content and capabililties to extend into human experiences. Mobile plays a role in this - it’s difficult to derive value without understanding the broader perspective. I think there are opportunities everywhere.

(Tony) Are people going to pay?

(Patrick) It has to be extremely relevant. If you look at the PC industry and Microsoft’s dominance - it makes complete sense if you look at it in reverse. If you look at the PC industry in the last 70’s you saw the PC’s and the Apple docs. We didn’t know what the “killer app” was and someone wrote “Visicalc” and the industry was born - they became spreadsheet machines. Out of the failures come the sucesses. It is too hard in this industry for people to fail because it costs too much. The least common demoninator seems to be the next generation of mobile browsers. Our current projection is late ‘09 there will be a lot more memory and persistance (users want instant reaction; they don’t want to wait for the system to react) this will give us the right platform to fail faster and innovate quicker.

(Jean Marc) The response time is hampering the mobile user experience. People want instant response. Even if there is a 1/2 second delay it affects the mobile experience. Soon we’ll all have WiFi and we need to think about which way we are going. Are we going thinner clients or thicker clients? What will we need to do to make the interaction just like it is on the PC?

(Russ McGuire) You’re saing it’s all about the browser and how to make it work. It’s just like saying how are we going to take the Internet and make it work with spreadsheets? What we want to see is new things that are possible. Mobile technology is much more personal than desktops - location is the easy one. There is a variety of information available - we know how the devices are being used, the nature of the telephone calls - as long as we can gain insight without invading privacy we can get somewhere.

(Patrick) If you look at user stickiness for video the usage is a magnitude larger. Mobile is a personal device, not a family device. The first order is to make these things compelling and friendly. Steve Jobs has done one thing right - usability is the major enabler.

(Russ Daniels) Mobile isn’t just about the phone. I feel when I am in my hotel room I am using ‘mobile’ and there is an aspect of a phone which is all about the ability to connect and communicate. Whatever user experience I choose to communicate with is a pretty atractive proposition to me. We should be thinking about mobililty more broadly than just as a handset.

(Tony) In closing, what do you want people to come up and talk to you about?

BT - If you have something that is multi-bandwidth, wireless, cellular and fixed IP is worth talking about. WiFi applications is something we’re very interested in talking about. BT.com/developerchallenge

SoonR - has buit a platform for people on the go to access their data very very easily. It is a platform - we have a set of open API’s and our go-to-market strategy is to partner with operators - we want to integrate our solutions and offer our users more value.

HP - we have a very software-centric mentality. The interesting question is when you think about the end to end experience that causes someone to spend money - what are the opportunities to do this? If you have something that addresses the human experience, please come and talk to me.

Sprint - we’ve created value on top of our mobile platform. I’ve recently published a book called the Power of Mobility? How do we open these up without destroying the value we’ve created in the industry? The next wave is WiMax - and we have the opportunity to start from scratch and we’re excited about this.

All in all a very interesting ‘fireside chat’ and a look at how these companies are viewing the mobile space, the opportunity and direction. It reminds me of my conversation with Malcolm McClaren (former manager of the Sex Pistols) who said at a conference he and I spoke at last year, “BE A BRILLIANT FAILURE.”

Enter Google.

In an article by the NY Times today, the “Gphone” is rumored to hit the streets in 2008. Unlike Apple, Google is not expected to release an actual phone, but instead has developed an open-source software solution. According to the article:

In short, Google is not creating a gadget to rival the iPhone, but rather creating software that will be an alternative to Windows Mobile from Microsoft and other operating systems, which are built into phones sold by many manufacturers. And unlike Microsoft, Google is not expected to charge phone makers a licensing fee for the software.

“The essential point is that Google’s strategy is to lead the creation of an open-source competitor to Windows Mobile,” said one industry executive, who did not want his name used because his company has had contacts with Google. “They will put it in the open-source world and take the economics out of the Windows Mobile business.”

As the iPhone closes its doors to hacker/developers (for now) google paves the way for a new wave of Linux-based open source software and browsing as an alternative to Windows Mobile. Mobile web-based advertising, still in its infancy in the U.S. will be given a boost and Google-based services and software will find a new home.

How will the GPhone gather momentum and market share? Here is my GPhone wishlist.

• Operate on devices accessing high-speed 3G network allowing for a positive browsing experience.
• Leverage GPS device ability to locate and track via Google Maps instantly and accurately.
• Integrate SKYPE or VOIP services for cheap and easy phone calls and overseas calls.
• Integrate a universal IM application.
• Partner with Facebook to allow for integrated systems and one-touch mail and messaging.
• Create a ‘smart’ search that not only brings up results but also maps it, gives you the number to call and allows you to automatically save it into your address book.
• Allow open-source mobile widget creation that will also run seamlessly on desktops — allowing for a true ubiquitous cross-device experience.
• Operate on both fancy thin high cost HTC devices and also lower cost, accessible and cheap (or free!) devices that are advertising subsidized.

Ideally, the GPhone would utilize integrated search and advertising to subsidize the partial cost of mobile web browing. At least mobile web viewing (especially in Europe where 3G costs are so high) could be partially or fully subsidized due to advertising and search revenue. Is this possible? Who knows. The cost of accessing carrier-driven 3G networks is so high, and the lack of flat rates outside of the U.S. have caused a backlash in mobile web viewing. According to M-Metrics at the beginning of the year, 8% of cell phone users have ever searched the web via cell phones in the U.K., and a little over 10 million have tried it out at least once in the U.S. as opposed to 15% currently in South Korea.

Who knows what the next wave of mobile phone frenzy will be. It would be nice to have an open source contender.

Life has changed considerably since I last tried to post (my last post was interrupted by the birth of our little girl) and two months later I am (somewhat) refreshed and ready to absorb myself into the mobile world once again. I was on bed rest when the iPhone was released, using it during the birth process to track contractions, and when they were five minutes apart, Twitter the birth itself. Since that time, the iPhone is now honored as the most successful consumer product release in history. ‘Successful’ if you subtract the frustration surrounding AT&T’s customer service and bizarre billing practices.

As many have already stated, the iPhone has proven not to be just another release – it is a phenomenon. Reviewers have said “breathtaking,” “breaking new ground,” and just plain “cool.” I feel the device cannot be compared on a feature-by-feature basis against other mobile devices in its category because the category stands alone. In a recent usability comparison Does the iPhone Match the Hype? between the iPhone, the Nokia N95 and the HTC Touch; the iPhone wins hands down which is no surprise. Although many can and will continue to compare the iPhone to other mobile handsets or smartphone devices, it would be a mistake to review it based on features or even on standard use case scenarios. It’s the experience overall – the feeling of ‘wow’ and the knowledge that the device and the experience is just going to get better over time. Something we’ve come to expect from Apple with their ‘don’t look back’ attitude. This flagship release is just the beginning of something big – we all feel it. And Apple has only begun to scratch the surface of what is possible with persona media and communication devices. It’s named the iPhone, but it might very well be called the iConnect or the iDevice. For now, it’s MiPhone.

What I feel is more of an ‘apples to apples’ comparison is a niche we’ve been fascinated with for years, but still has yet to become mainstream. t’s the ultra mobile personal computer (UMPC) category with Microsoft (Origami), Sony (Vaio) and Samsung (Q1P) leading the way. Independent companies have created devices I have been coveting for years - including the design dream OQO and the more engineering-centric Pepper Pad. These portable personal computers tout the word ‘convergence’ however the iPhone and Apple’s media platform along with iTunes and YouTube integration truly match the vision Jobs’ has had all along.

But why has this ‘ultra mobile’ category not grown into a major consumer play? Price, form factor, utility all factor in. At $1299, the OQO is more than double the iPhone’s original selling price. With the UMPC category, we have yet to see a truely convergent ultra mobile device that meets our lifestyle needs by traveling in our pocket, allowing us to access our primary communication tools, and interact seamlessly with our desktop / laptop computers. Intel has introduced a new category called the MID (Mobile Internet Device):

For highly mobile people who want engaging, rich Internet experiences while on the go, Intel®-powered Mobile Internet Devices (MIDs) and Ultra Mobile PCs (UMPCs) offer the freedom and flexibility to communicate with others, enjoy digital media, and access information anytime, anywhere - all using a small, ultra-mobile device.

Sounds a bit like the iPhone to me. The success of the gesture-based touch screen interface is almost so fluid and easy to use it goes unnoticed. Even a 1-year old baby can use it. Since its release, many individuals formerly tethered to their laptops have admitted being able to switch to the iPhone for email and browsing when traveling. In many ways, the iPhone is the first ‘ultra mobile’ consumer device to give us a taste of tomorrow we can use today.

This year, 7-7-07 means iPhone DevCamp. Many are trying to decide what to do on that momentous day, I think weddings have been booked years in advance (because 6-6-06 was a bit scary) and babies are hoping to be born. It’s also a working, collaborative, free weekend session (starts in the evening of July 6th, all day on the 7th and ends the afternoon of the 8th) where a number of iPhone-ready web applications and web sites will be launched publicly.

(From the site) Attendees will include web designers, developers, testers, and iPhone owners, all working together over the weekend to improve the web experience for iPhone. Development projects will include both solo and team efforts. While some attendees will wish to work solo during the event, we encourage attendees to team up, based on expertise, to work in ad-hoc project development teams. All attendees should be prepared to work on a development project during the event. You do not need to own an iPhone to attend (although, a large number of iPhones at the event will make the development and testing process much easier).

Attendees will be able to:

• Create new web applications for iPhone.
• Optimize existing web applications for iPhone.
• Migrate Dashboard Widgets to web-based widgets for iPhone.
• Test and optimize web sites for iPhone.

If you would like to attend, submit your name and contact info on the site. Organizers are still looking for sponsors, presenters and remote hosts so check the site out and sign up today!

Well, last week was all about Apple and WWDC07. This year I actually got to participate in a session that kicked off the content and media track at the conference with Garrett Murray from Blue Flavor. I represented the enterprise and large legacy system team mentality while Garrett was more of the cowboy coder and indie developer guy. The session was called “Iterative Cocoa and Web Application Design” which covered topics having to do with agile processes merging with best practices in User Centered Design (UCD) and although I know very little about Cocoa itself, the session went (from what I hear) very well. Thank god for Garrett’s participation.

But what is more significant is the movement towards the web as THE platform for the iPhone. As many of you already know, during the Steve keynote (which was my first ‘in person’ keynote, and the longest I’ve ever stood in line for a non-theatrical event in my life) it was announced:

(from Roughly Drafted) “Finally, Jobs presented how third party iPhone apps will be delivered: as AJAX web apps in the iPhone’s Safari browser. These “web 2.0” apps will have access to the iPhone’s dialing, maps, contacts, and use the same scrolling and touch features, such as the two finger pinch zoom.

As anticipated in “An iPhone SDK? Predictions for WWDC 2007!,” Apple announced third party support for the iPhone would not involve an SDK, but rather be based entirely in Safari, using web based applications that can both use AJAX style updating and take advantage of iPhone features and native interface ideas.

Widgets are just a bit of HTML and JavaScript, essentially a mini web page. While some widgets can launch other applications or tie into more sophisticated functions, the majority of what they do is fantastically easy to port to other platforms, particularly ones that already run Safari’s WebKit, as the iPhone does.

Jobs says the web is a “very modern way to build applications,” citing Google and Salesforce.com as examples of companies based entirely on web platforms. This will offer more than just simple Dashboard Widgets; Safari provides a full custom development platform.”

Daniel Eran Dilger’s post on the history of the browser is worth taking a look. He states: “A related but commonly unasked question is: why has web browser software—a fairly simple and mundane concept in the tech world—been at the center of one of the largest and most well known vendor wars? The short answer, of course, is that the simple web browser is really a critically important key that unlocks a phenomenal amount of power in both consumer and Enterprise markets.

Today, Chris Messina twittered from a session about iPhone web development at Supernova Open. He comments “wow, so much resistance to the iPhone’s lack of SDK.” People are noticing the lack of J2ME, flash and Java support. Steve is offering the WEB as the new development platform and the new wave of web-based applications and thin-client solutions are about to emerge. Will it stick? Will developers adhere to these new rules as ‘best practice’ or will it be a one-off run? The big question is will the desktop movement to browser based applications and 2.0 technologies migrate to the mobile phone and will the industry open to the change (the key term being ‘open.’)

 Last week it was announced that Europe’s largest mobile industry show will change its name and branding from 3GSM World Congress to the Mobile World Congress starting with the annual February 2008 show in Barcelona. Concurrently, the 3GSM World Congress Asia will be renamed Mobile Asia Congress.  From the press release it states:

<blockquote> “Both the GSMA and the Congresses are focused on helping operators use the potent platform provided by today’s highly-capable and extensive mobile networks to better serve the many needs and desires of this industry’s almost 3 billion customers,” said Rob Conway, CEO of the GSMA, which owns both the Barcelona and Macau events. “Attracting visitors from the information technology, entertainment and financial services industries, as well as the mobile industry, the Congresses provide forums for the cross-pollination of services, ideas and business models.”</blockquote>

And of course some comments from the industry-at-large:

<blockquote>(From the Register) The 3GSM World Congress has renamed itself the Mobile World Show, hoping to attract a more sexy media crowd than the middle-aged telecoms executives who usually frequent the place.</blockquote>

So what does this mean? It feels like a label change to tie the two events together, and to get away from the acronym 3GSM which is not known in all countries and is a bit technical and limiting. Will the change in branding and possible repositioning change the attendees and content of the show? I look forward to seeing how the event shapes up in the next several months.

The question ‘are we in another bubble?’ comes up in a meeting I have at Bucks diner, which is a central meeting point between Silicon Valley and the City, five minutes off the 280 highway at Woodside. Bucks is a haven midst the world technology — unglamorous, lacking wireless and filled with the kind of nostalgia and memorabilia normally reserved for a kitchy 50’s diner (which it is.) But it’s here that deals are made, discussions of tomorrow’s technology occur and the bubble that is in question begins to grow.

My meeting is with a man who is no stranger to innovation. The company he helped to create now sits as one of the top Internet ventures of all time. At this remote spot, we discuss the late 90’s — filled with MBA’s with business plans trying to replace brick and mortar with pixels, one IPO at a time. We reflect upon the frenzy that became the dot.com era was reflective of the excitement surrounding innovation – and the potential of the internet. We agree that today’s two-point-oh environment gets a bit more real. Instead of hype and a focus on the marketing of a concept, today’s ‘bubble’ has become reflective of the real products and services we integrate into our daily lives.

Now small teams are building and launching instead of pitching: taking the internet to a new level and helping us to navigate through the hype into an open system of answers to our daily needs and desires. Friendster has transitioned to MySpace. Dodgeball is migrating to Twitter. Convergence and ubiquity is finally becoming a reality as devices merge with desktops, kiosks, GPS interfaces and personal entertainment systems and ‘placelessness’ is the new catch phrase. Platforms such as Ruby on Rails and .Net enable another level of prototyping and launching to occur, where designers can create like developers and vice versa. A movement from browser to desktop widgets is continuing to flow and flourish - creating new spaces for innovation and beyond. Speaking of Twitter (which I currently have a like-it/annoyed with it relationship with) I’m reminded of my favorite quote of 2006, which is so right on:

“There are a lot of good ideas out there, but not all of them need to be a company.” - Evan Williams

People are craving simple, easy, no-fuss interfaces that work with the way we live. Web-to-mobile services continue to come onto the market at lightning pace. My new favorite ‘integrated’ service is Jott (not Jot, which was acquired by Google), which allows for online GTD-based task lists or automated transcribed mobile calls that land on the same GTD page. I’ve met with several start-ups these past months who are offering mobile services as an addendum to their web-based offerings. Many of our clients are building downloadable mobile applications which supplement their web-based services. Today’s bubble isn’t about the IPO with brands launching and begging to be funded based on a business plan. The bubble is growing based on proven web and mobile products, services and applications that work. Simple and clean. Yet getting to simplicity is not as easy as it looks. Most manufacturers and software companies are busy trying to add features that will help differentiate and customize the experience. These companies are so busy adding onto the feature set, they neglect the core functionality the product was based on in the first place.

If companies were focused on designing for their customers instead of their investors, they would seek to eliminate redundant (and often confusing) features. They would step back and gain clear insight into their customer’s lives and answer the question, ‘what does my customer need, what do they desire, and how will they incorporate this (said widget) into their daily lives? The rift between simplicity and complexity continues to grow and real people are divided as to their real needs, varying aptitudes and willingness to change. Companies that talk to their customers - iterating between launches with one-on-one usability testing and feedback have a better chance at answering the right questions. Rapid feedback cycles with core customers can be done within an agressive development and deployment schedule, if the team is on board and the management team understands the value. If they realized what they were sacrificing by not doing it - it would not be worth the risk.

There is some frenzy and excitement going on. A race if you will — with ubiquity at the core. We’re moving past the desktop, past the browser, onto new platforms and new experiences. There are similarities to the late 1990’s, with individual teams hunkering down into small rented spaces with Ikea furniture — brainstorming, energetic and burning the midnight oil. But rather than meeting at City Hall for a night with Elvis Costello (the hype that accompanied the dot.gone was rather over the top), people are meeting in communities online, sharing ideas and best practices, striving to create a real voice in a saturated marketplace. I look forward to seeing the continuing creativity of innovation, and seeing how long this bubble will last this time around.