Opinionated comments on mobile phone industry news

As there's a Web 2.0 there has to be a Mobile Web 2.0 right? At least that's what many think, so I of course need to provide some mind-numbingly ingenious views on this topic as well.

First off, I don't think so much in terms of the traditional Web, that to me means "services accessed via web browsers", as a mobile phone has many other means to communicate and present information. Therefor let's start with removing the "Web" part, so we have Mobile 2.0.

Of course media and analysts are all over these kinds of terms, as they seem to explain a lot, but they only mean what they contain, and what they will contain is based on what becomes used, not what's being standardized or what's the "best" (fastest, least code, most hard to pronounce) technical solution.

Hence, below I try to focus on things I believe will become used a lot in the era of Mobile 2.0. A rough thought-umbrella for Mobile 2.0 is "When information services became broadly used on mobile phones". Everything before this has been experimentation and very often misdirected and consumer-ignoring such.

Mobile phone: voice device --> also information and multimedia device
Applications: embedded --> downloaded or bundled (games, messaging, utility etc)
Applications: standards-based --> market-driven (and often tied to services)
Idle screen: wallpaper --> information access
Browsing: WAP --> Normal/Full Web
Messaging: SMS --> IM, Email
Messaging: no use of MMS --> MMS for media sharing
Messaging: no IM --> full access to popular Internet services
Camera: for wallpaper --> for media sharing
Operator: service provider --> transparent bit-pipe
Operator: walled garden / operator portals --> access to the full Internet
Payments: SMS (phone bill) --> Online (phone bill and account)
Payments: whatever --> non-paid service registration (membership) and pay-as-you-go or monthly flatrate
Phones: new phones for new services --> use installed base for new services (see Applications above)
Location: not used --> used for maps, directions, local information
Subscriptions: per-minute/megabyte --> flatrate

Also, of course the user-generated and widget-related aspects of Web 2.0 will move to mobile phones, and requires no new technology and no new phones. It's already all there. You already see it in the shape of ShoZu, mojungle etc.

In my previous posts Web 2.0 on overdrive and Has OMA lost its mojo, it's painfully clear the traditional telecom model of going through a multi-year process to standardize new phone features has to go. Nokia's Wibree effort shows that even the players themselves are fed up with over-specified misdirected solutions, and instead go for what's useful now (and not years from now). 3's adoption of a Java client for MSN points in the same direction, etc.

Update: For a possibility to prove me completely wrong you can visit the Mobile 2.0 conference in San Francisco. The conference is inexpensive ($45), but stay away from the hotel's special conference (read: extra expensive) rate.

Update 20061008: Comments on the as yet rudimentary definition of Mobile (Web) 2.0 at Wikipedia:

a) Harnessing collective intelligence through restricted devices i.e. a two way flow where people carrying devices become reporters rather than mere consumers

Could also be said like: Web (2.0) services accessible via mobile phones, making use of the additional functionality of mobile phones, like multimedia recording, always-on, real push etc. The collective intelligence bit I consider arguable. There's no so stupid a thing as a crowd. Also, we need to be careful about saying mobile phones are restricted. Mobile phones are actually much better at multimedia recording than PCs. A device's capabilities is not just reflected by the UI.

b) Driven by the web backbone – but not necessarily based on the web protocols end to end

There's no such thing as a "web backbone", only the Internet. If you don't even use web protocols (read: HTTP) then you are clearly on the pure Internet. Not that it matters. The key thing is to make useful services.

c) Use of the PC as a local cache/configuration mechanism where the service will be selected and configured

Seen worldwide, many more people have their own mobile phone than a PC, and even more so when we talk younger people, so it's obvious that configuration should be possible via the phone as well. Also, it's only temporary that we have to use a PC as a download/cache device, due to the huge difference in traffic costs between broadband and mobile networks, but that will have to change.