Opinion: Cell phone users in the U.S. love texting and gaming. But why isn't video popular?Is mobile content about to make a major comeback?
You old-timers out there (those of you who weren't crushing beer cans on your forehead back in 2000) may remember the first time mobile Web content made a big splash back in the late '90s. Back then the first cell phones with WAP access were released to great fanfare and analysts predicted billions of dollars in revenue to phone companies and anyone savvy enough to jump on board. NTTDoCoMo (Japan's telecom) had some amazing successes with its iMode service, and 3G apps were starting to gain traction in Europe, but the U.S. market failed to materialize. Americans weren't ready for mobile content.
Why? For one thing, the hype never matched the delivery: Consumers were promised the Web on their cell phones and were then forced to experience "the Web" as four or five lines of text instead of the multimedia extravaganza they were used to on their computers. Content was generally lacking, interfaces cumbersome, and most carriers did a poor job of supporting those customers interested in mobile data. There was probably a fair amount of dot-com-y hubris too, but that's a bit harder to quantify.
Cell phone Web access may not have taken off in the U.S., but other mobile data services have. By 2003, over 14 billion text messages were sent per month in the U.S., a number that's continued to climb. Blackberries have become nearly ubiquitous (and indispensable) for many of us. Mobile gaming revenues are expected to hit nearly $2 billion in the next few years.
These growth figures have sparked renewed interest in mobile content. AOL recently launched a new mobile search feature and Google has announced its Google Mobile service and the incredible Google SMS service, which lets you Google using the texting capabilities of your cell phone.
We'll come back to Google in a moment, but it's obvious that there's renewed interest amongst consumers. Developers are beginning to play with creative new ideas for wireless functionality that moves beyond transferring data, especially in realm of gaming. Nintendo's DS system comes a wireless chat function right out of the box and Sony's PSP handheld gaming system includes Wi-Fi connectivity, a built-in browser, and wireless multiplayer capabilities. A new game from Planet Moon Studios called Infected actually allows users to "infect" other players with a "virus" representing their own character when they win, a "virus" that can be transmitted to other players. Users can even track the global spread of their "virus" on the Infected Web site.
On the other hand, many older media companies are starting to look at mobile technology as a way to deliver older content such as television—an idea that surely creates great joy in corporate boardrooms. Unfortunately, according to some recent research people don't want it, at least not on their cell phones. Instat found that only 1 in 8 mobile users wanted video on their handsets, and Parks Associates found that a mere 12 to 13 percent of consumers want television functions on their handhelds.
Why are services like texting and gaming popular when video isn't? Why does some mobile content click with consumers and others are met with yawns? To answer that question perhaps it's worth a look at Google's SMS service.
First off, the brilliance of Google's service is that it utilizes text messaging (SMS) as its base. This means that searching is as simple as sending a text message, something that millions of users are already used to. In addition, texting is a low-impact network activity and is available on nearly every cell phone being sold today. It doesn't require color or fancy screens or high-end features that aren't available to all users.
Best of all, it does one thing and does it beautifully. You can search for weather, driving directions, answers to questions, word definitions, movie showtimes, and product prices…all the kind of stuff you might need to know when on the go. It doesn't require a complicated syntax, doesn't require any complicated menus, and delivers answers quickly as text messages. In short, it just works.
The lesson to take from Google's effort and the new reports out on mobile video are simple: If you're starting to think about jumping on the new mobile boom, think about the medium itself. What are the characteristics of someone in a mobile situation that are different than someone sitting in front of a computer? What kinds of services do people actually need versus what you think is "cool?" What are the limitations of the technology and how can you embrace those limitations rather than stretch them beyond all recognition? Doing it right can mean extending your Web presence into mobile ubiquity. Doing it wrong means being irrelevant and ignored. Which do you want?
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