emconsteroids

Nowadays, everybody has understood the power of the Internet. Most people also under stand the convenience and the power of mobile. So needless to say that it is clear that the internet on a mobile device is even more powerful.

However currently there are a few things which have to be sorted out until the Mobile Internet will unleash its full potential.

1. Battery life of the devices has to be better
2. The speed of the download has to improve
3. The screens have to become bigger
4. The input devices need to be more effective
5. Manufacturers and software suppliers need to agree on and stick to standards

In the meantime, there are three different approaches which are being taken in order to get the internet on the mobile devices.:

1.) UK Mobile Operator Vodafone has launched the much discussed Internet on your Mobile campaign in 2007. The idea was that any HTML based website will be re-rendered for mobile devices via a Vodafone Proxy Server. Google took a similar approach: Any site which you search in the Google Mobile search will be re-rendered via a Google Proxy. The advantage of this system is all existing internet content will be available on mobile device immediately. In theory. We’re not discussing how it looks and how well it works. There is no control over design, functionality and anything related to the aesthetics of the page.

2.) Nokia, Apple and some other device manufacturers have taken the approach of getting browsers as we know them on mobile devices. The idea is that you can then use the mobile device to access any internet site as if it was on a computer. This also works only in a very limited way. The screen size for example is a major issue as well as the input devices (no mouse, no QWERTY keyboard). Also are most internet sites completely unaware of context such as location, the handset’s capabilities or connection speed.

3.) The third approach is the approach mobile specific agencies and technology providers are taking. In the long term, this solution is the only sustainable way of marrying up mobile devices and Internet. Mobile internet pages should be created and designed specifically for the devices which are being used to access them. This starts with the detection of the device, the rendering and access to the device’s features such as telephone calling, messaging via click, location, billing, small screen optimized user interface or even making use of Bluetooth or the built in camera. There is no question that the Web as we know it an the Mobile Internet will converge. One day, the stationery computer in the office will just be one of many devices with which you can access a (web-)site. If you want to deliver top quality Mobile Internet at the moment, you need a device database of around 1800 devices and you have to render the page according to those devices. The stationery computer could just be the 1801st device. But until that time comes, we have to keep making mobile sites better and better. Until the borders between them and the web as we know it are completely blurred out. The iPhone with its Web Apps has certainly led in this direction and continued with native Apps even though the latter will never be working cross device in the same way a (web-mobile-converged) Internet page would.

What media does to us. And everyone around us.

Today, I was helping my sister to sell her Recycled Magic Wallets at Brick Lane Market (Back Yard Market).

On one of the stalls, an Italian fellow was selling cheap chinese imported sun glasses for £5 a pair. He was the “odd man out” in the market as everyone else was selling hand made stuff. Yet it seems that his stall seemed to be one of the most popular ones. It was the perfect prove that the price was what makes people buy stuff. Everyone liked the idea of my sister’s Recycled Magic Wallets, yet hardly anyone appreciated the work which was needed to produce them. Let alone pay for it. It’s sad but a hard fact. Cheap stuff from China still sells better quantities than good hand made local craftsmanship. And better quantities gives more profit. And more profit gives more incentive.

You can see more pictures of Recycled Magic Wallets on Flickr.

NOTE: My sister still sold a couple of wallets. Not everyone was just looking at the price. There are people who appreciate ideas, innovation and hard work.

The Metropolitan Police in London has released a Google Maps Mashup under http://maps.met.police.uk displaying the distribution of London crime rates.

The maps show the amount of incidents (in some occasions even vandalism and graffitis) per 1000 inhabitants and in certain locations, the map can be zoomed all the way down to street level. The maps will be updated on monthly basis.

The idea is to roll this service out for all England and Wales by the end of the year.

The question is now, what impact do such maps have on the local house prices. Does my rent drop if I put a graffiti up on the other side of the street? Who knows…

I don’t exactly know but the AJAX Technology has become hugely popular amongst the so called Web 2.0 sites.

I think there is a big misconception going on here! Just because it’s possible and it works, it doesn’t necessarily make sense. In fact, in most of the cases, AJAX doesn’t make sense at all.

I believe that AJAX has become an absolute necessity on sites such as YouTube where you want to browse through the some of the site functionalities without interrupting the video playing. Let’s say you’re watching or listening to the Canon, you might want to browse through the comments at the same time without interrupting the video. This is where AJAX is the only possibility to do this effectively.

For anything else, AJAX is just an useless frill with no real benefit. In fact AJAX causes more problems than it solves:

• Search engines would not find contents
• Deep-Linking is not possible
• Some browsers still cause problems
• Most mobile devices don’t support AJAX
• The back button don’t work properly
• Accessibility is limited
• Analysis of user behavior is more difficult
• In-transparency in terms of SSL protocol usage

It may have some good sides such as:

• Enabling complex user interactivity (including drag & drop etc.)
• Reducing server load by modularizing the queries
• More client-side logic

However most of the time these features are not even used and the disadvantages outnumber the benefits by far. Or would you not agree?

Have you had this before? There is this great prize to win on this ridiculously difficult crossword puzzle, but in order to get your holiday on the Maldives, you still need another couple of words to fill out?

For all you crossword puzzle freaks out there, I have just deployed a quick crossword puzzle solver application. Check it out it’s absolutely free and not even sponsored by advertising!

This is the most expensive iPhone app I’ve found so far. And check what happened! It’s crazy