Comments on: Mobile Frustrations

By: Adam Riggs

Adam Riggs — Thu, 20 Sep 2007 18:33:09 +0000

I think you are making option B out to be much harder than it is. Assuming you are a somewhat decent developer (which you would have to be to have any success with any application) you would write your code in J2ME since it has the largest global market share.

Then you hook up with any number of vendors (Bango, iLoop etc.) that can help you with the distribution of your app to phones. They handle the carrier connectivity/billing and take a chunk of your revenue (granted its a big chunk, but hey its not easy stuff to do).

Sure then you have to market your application, but you’d have to do the same with an SMS app or a WAP site. If you use a website to market your app, people can find you through the web, register from their PC and the site can deliver the app over the air.

In the end it’s not that hard. It reaches a very large portion of the handsets and should your app be successful, porting the application from J2ME to BREW, while not trivial, can be done and there are people that will do it for you.

By: Nikolaj Nyholm

Nikolaj Nyholm — Sat, 15 Sep 2007 20:40:14 +0000

> (or pay Opera to do it for them).

Andrew,

The real opportunity is in with Opera (which I’ve been trying to tell them this for the past two years).
A few basic hooks from Opera Mini into the address book, calendar, sms, file system (ie. photos, videos, music, cache), camera, and bluetooth, coupled with a ‘mobile AJAX’ (akin to the widgets they have for Opera Mobile, but loadable on any page).

Being listed on the Oslo exchange, they hardly qualify for any VCs investment criteria but it’s definitely one of the big opportunities to leverage the 2.5 billion handset market.

By: Andrew Parker

Andrew Parker — Wed, 12 Sep 2007 15:56:34 +0000

@Nate yea, I think this market with expand with iPod Touch, but it’s still a bit limited. I wonder if other phones will start rolling their own full Safari-like browsers (or pay Opera to do it for them).

@Harry That’s certainly an option, but it’s a gated approach that put you on a treadmill. I’m hoping to find a hockey stick growth chart in here somewhere, and I’m not sure this solution will get you there.

@Xenon GPS has been “coming” since I started using cell phones in the mid-90s. Can’t wait for it to arrive, but I’m not holding my breath. Where is GPS on the iPhone?

By: Xenon

Xenon — Wed, 12 Sep 2007 14:11:48 +0000

in 18months 80% of europes mobile devices will have a GPS-Receiver which enables especially all budget-owning marketing-spenders a whole new world of targeting customers (local based services).

After there´s money…systems will follow

By: Harry S.

Harry S. — Wed, 12 Sep 2007 11:36:53 +0000

In my opinion, option E is to build an application for a group specific customers and to collect find some devices which have all the needed features or specifications. For your group of customers, you make a list of the supported devices and if there are new devices, you have to test, if your application runs to add it to the list.

I know, the topic was about the mass-market, my advice deals with a differentation-approach ;)
But i think it could be the E-option!

By: Nate Westheimer

Nate Westheimer — Wed, 12 Sep 2007 05:35:08 +0000

Option E really is the iPhone solution.

The Safari-as-the-SDK deal really was a big deal because it opened this option E, which is having a rich internet application on your phone. More functionality than WAP but less ability for the carriers to interfere.

Of course the penetration of the iPhone is still very shallow, but I think that’s the direction things need to go in. Disempower those carriers with technology!

Here are my archives on the matter:
http://innonate.com/category/mobile/