Going Mobile - Melding my thoughts with @loulouk and @theverytiger
Isn’t it funny when two posts appear in your RSS Reader from two (I think?) unconnected people from different sectors, but both talking about the same subject. Well that happened this week as both Honey and Louise chose to blog about use of and access to content via the Mobile Web
Mobile access to websites and use of Smartphones continues to rise at a phenomenal rate. In workshops I delivered last year I used quotes such as “”By 2013, mobile phones will overtake PCs as the most common Web access device worldwide”. (Gartner Key Predictions for IT Organisations and Users in 2010). However in India it is about to happen with 49% of users accessing the Internet via this route and according to Opera an increase of 308% in page views by users of their Opera Mobile browser in the last 12 months. In the UK figures show that 22% of mobile Internet users now infrequently or never use a fixed desktop computer (On Device Research - December 2010) and that Opera recorded a 74% growth in usage.
So as Honey says here - when developing a website one of the first questions you should ask is “will it work on a mobile?” and from Louise, that although apps have their place, it can often be better to have a well written adaptive mobile friendly version of your website rather than a custom built app.
(Added later - A very useful white paper written by Squiz about designing web sites for mobile access)
Finally, I was shopping for a new smartphone last week (on-line of course!) and in conversation with the salesperson(s) from “T-VodaO2range”, I was told “no-one asks about Texts or Minutes any more, all they want to know is how many MB is the data allowance”.
Sign of the times!
