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December 29, 2007
A developer's perspective on Google's Android SDK
very nice article. A developer's perspective on Google's Android SDK
Posted by ajit at 7:36 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
December 28, 2007
Open Mobile ecosystems: The disruptive potential of open systems and open source in the mobile environment
I am happy to announce a new book from futuretext: Open Mobile ecosystems: The disruptive potential of open systems and open source in the mobile environment
With Android, OpenSocial and other developments, I believe that open systems will dominate Mobile applications development. With a blog called OpenGardens - these developments were clearly of interest to me. Thus, when the opportunity arose to write a book with Anna Gatti and Mauro Del Rio (Founder and Chairman of Buongiorno) about this new mobile industry paradigm - it was an offer I could not refuse.
The book had a curious history ..
It all stated when I spoke at Stanford last year and I met Dr Adam Tolnay - who has since remained a great friend.
Adam introduced me to Anna and Mauro – who both wanted to write a 'truly visionary and radical book about the Mobile data industry'. We met in the lobby of the Fairmont in San Francisco earlier this year – and since then we have swapped ideas about this book.
This will be a strategic, visionary book focussed on the impact of Open systems on mobile devices – a new paradigm in mobile industry. It will cover the principles – for instance - Open systems, Open Gardens, Open source and Net neutrality followed by a discussion of it’s impact on the industry and a vision for the future.
Apart from me, the two other authors will be Anna Gatti and Mauro Del Rio. The book will also be incorporating strategic insights from Dr Andreas Constantinou Director of visionmobile .
I am pleased to have Andreas on board .. Andreas recently wrote Informa's report on Open Source in Mobile and we have both been blogging about Open systems and Android. I feel privileged to work with such great group of people in Anna, Mauro and Andreas.
Watch this space. Book due in March 2008
Ajit Jaokar - futuretext
Ajit Jaokar believes in a pragmatic but open Mobile Data industry – a vision which he fosters through his blog OpenGardens. The OpenGardensBlog was recently rated a top 20 wireless blog worldwide by readers of Fierce wireless. The OpenGardens blog is also syndicated on the W3C’s Mobile Web Initiative/ Planet Mobile.
Ajit's recent talks have included Keynote at O Reilly Web20 expo(April 2007), 3GSM – talk on Mobile Web 2.0, Keynote at Java One , European parliament - Brussels - (Electronic Internet Foundation), Stanford University’s Digital visions program , MIT Sloan and others
Media appearances include BBC – Newsnight, CNN money, The BBC digital planet , The Scoble show
Ajit moderates Oxford University’s Next generation mobile applications panel and also conducts a course on Web 2.0 and User generated content at Oxford University
He is currently doing a PhD on Identity and Reputation systems at UCL in London and his last book was Mobile Web 2.0
Anna Gatti
Anna Gatti is currently working at Google in Mountain View, California. Before joining Online Sales and Operations at Google, Anna was partner of myQube, the venture capital arm of Telecom Italia, focusing on innovation in fixed and mobile telecommunications. Previously, she was Senior Economist and Advisor at the World Health Organization where she led several international projects. From 1997 to 2001 she served as researcher and faculty at University
of California Berkeley (Berkeley, CA, USA), Stanford University (Stanford, CA, USA), Bocconi University (Milan, Italy), and the Business School Fundacao Getulio Vargas (San Paolo, Brazil). Anna Gatti is editor and author of several publications in organizational theory, innovation and knowledge transfer, and she has been invited to present papers to many conferences and seminars worldwide. She holds a degree in Business Administration and a Ph.D in Business Administration and Management from Bocconi University (Milan, Italy),
a post-doc in organizational behavior from Stanford University.
Mauro Del Rio is Founder and Chairman of Buongiorno
Mauro Del Rio is Founder and Chairman of Buongiorno S.p.A. Prior to founding Buongiorno in 1999, he had been Senior Strategy Manager at Andersen Consulting (now Accenture), specialising in consultancy for the most important financial institutions and Italian wireline and wireless telecommunication companies. Before joining Accenture, Mr Del Rio worked at Ote Telecomunicazioni - the Italian branch of Marconi Group - specialising in the research and development of the first experimentation of standard technology GSM in 1989. Mauro Del Rio began his professional career as a researcher in Cefriel/Politecnico University, where he gained a Master's Degree in IT in 1988.
Andreas Constantinou, Ph.D. | Research Director
Andreas Constantinou is Research Director at VisionMobile, a strategic market intelligence firm specialising in uncovering under-the-radar mobile markets. Andreas has eight years experience in research, development and strategy in wireless. He specialises in mobile handsets, mobile software market, device management, operator strategy and open source. Andreas has worked on several product and marketing strategy projects for clients including France Telecom, T-Mobile, OMTP, Red Bend, Abaxia, Scalado and Trolltech, and authored numerous research reports for analyst firms Informa, Ovum and ARCchart. He specialises in providing intelligence on the mobile vendor landscape, analysing market dynamics and identifying mobile industry trends. When not hoping on planes, Andreas spends his time between Athens and London.
Andreas is invited regularly at international telecoms conferences as a speaker and chairman. He serves at the board of advisors at The Astonishing Tribe (TAT), a Swedish UI technology company. He is also a monthly columnist for two telecoms print magazines, ‘InfoCom’ and ‘Mobile Telephony’. Andreas holds a Ph.D. in Image & Video Compression from the University of Bristol, UK.
Posted by ajit at 1:16 PM | Comments (2) | TrackBack
December 27, 2007
Benazir Bhutto killed
A sad day for democracy and freedom when the rule of the gun / bomb prevails
Benazir Bhutto killed
Posted by ajit at 6:00 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
December 26, 2007
Open source vs. Open Standards – complementing or competing?
I have been thinking of this idea for some time especially after the launch of Android/OHA - and a recent email from Curro Dominguez of Vodafone Betavine R and D who attended my IMS course at Oxford university prompted this blog.
I seek thoughts on this – and admittedly I may not have got everything right here. Note also that this article/blog is specific to the mobile domain – however similar principles may apply to the Web as well.
So .. Here we go ..
Interoperability and standards
In any consumer based service, we need interoperable standards for the market to blossom
There are three ways to do enable interoperability - the first is by a monopoly i.e.. A single standard controlled by one company(for instance Microsoft). The second is via open standards and standardization bodies and the third(which I find most interesting) is via open source
The open standards process is now well known. For instance, W3C is a standardization body and its process is outlined HERE
As with any standardization body, it comprises submissions, committees, consensus, working groups, draft proposals – so on and so forth.
The result is – all standards from any standardization body have three problems:
a) They are slow i.e. they take a long time to materialise
b) They are ‘standard’ i.e. they leave little room for differentiation
c) Even when there is some effort towards standardization/consensus, there is no guarantee that the market will not fragment(such as in the case of J2ME)
Besides this, there are other problems – for instance -
a) Some companies actually thrive on fragmentation(transcoding companies/testing companies etc) and on the flip side - there are business models built around standardization by standardization entities themselves (for example testing, compliance mark, certification, training etc)
b) IPR management is also an issue
c) Finally, many companies support standards retrospectively. This means they are ‘compliant’ but only later when it makes little difference anyway.
The result is a slow, imperfect process, which does not always work. However, the options are much worse .. Essentially a commercial monopoly
Open source
Can Open source offer a third way forward?
It appears to be a road which companies are increasingly taking – especially with Android/OHA.
Firstly, for the sake of this discussion, let us differentiate between Open standards, Open systems and Open source
We have already discussed Open standards above – i.e. standards which are consensus driven and created by a consortium of companies with some form of community/committee process
Open systems is a term where users are not restricted by any commercial or technological means i.e. no walled gardens. The meaning of ‘open’ in this case is dependent on context. Recently, facebook opened up it’s APIs to third parties. In that sense, facebook is ‘open’. However, within facebook itself, you cannot contact any user without an introduction(unlike in MySpace). So, in that case, facebook is ‘closed’. Hence the meaning that : open = users should not be restricted by any commercial or technological means – is generally valid
Which brings us to ‘Open source’. For once, the Wikipedia article on Open source is not very clear. Hence, I am using a very simple, concise viewpoint to explain this, rather emotive for some people, term
Open source software is managed and promoted through an organization called Open Source Initiative -which maintains an OSI definition and endorses a set of Open source licenses which comply with the OSI definition.
All this is simple enough. However, the term ‘Open source’ was created to distinguish from another term called ‘Free software’ coined by the free software foundation. .
The principal philosophical difference between the free software foundation and the open source movement lies in ‘what to do with derived works’ also called Copyleft . The free software foundation believes that derived works should also be covered by the same terms as the licence(copyleft). In other words, if you modify software under the FSF licence, then the derived work must also be released back into the community.
In contrast, depending on which license you adopt from the open source foundation, derived works need not be released back to the community(there is a secondary question of what constitutes a derived work – but we will leave that aside for the moment). Specifically, the Apache licence v 2.0 covered under Opensource is not copyleft. In other words, any derivatives need not be released back into the community (thereby preserving IP rights of the person modifying it).
There are philosophical debates about this (and one can argue that the copyleft principle is more viral – see wikipedia link on copyleft above)– but the counter argument is that – companies will want to preserve their modifications for commercial reasons and there will be no commercial incentives for people if you force them to also release any derived works.
Of course, none of the open source (and for that matter the free software) licenses mandate ‘commercially free’ i.e. you are free to charge people (or not) for the software and derivatives.
Open source and Interoperability
Open source conjures up images of pony tailed geeks writing Linux code .. but there is another class of contributors enabling the rise of open source.
Companies
Why would companies want to contribute code under open source?
To facilitate interoperability and to grow the market.
In addition, unlike standardization which is top down, complex and committee driven : Open source initiatives are grassroots, simple and needs based since they are often solutions to specific problems. This makes the whole process simple and quick with unviable initiatives cut down at the source.
The biggest proponent of Open source in recent times is Google – with Android. The Android user space software is released under Apache version 2.0.This provides a commercial incentive for companies to develop modifications in the application space. See this fantastic post on why Google chose the apache license over GPL v2 for a detailed discussion on this topic.
Of course we have to reiterate that open source is not always better than standardization and ultimately I expect that the two will coexist. But certainly, it is a space to watch.
Others have spotted the same trend.
For instance,
Readwerite web correctly (in my view) identifies open source as the most promising trend of 2008 but wrongly(again in my view) mixes the three terms Open source, Open systems and open standards(for example the Opera lawsuit is not about Open source – it is about open standards since Opera itself is not open source as I understand it)
Vodafone betavine
Finally, we come to the email from Curro Dominguez of Vodafone who works with Vodafone betavine
I have blogged about betavine before and people like Dan Appelquist and Stephen Wolak who work with it are very clued on guys - so I am watching betavine with interest
Hence, I was interested when Curro told me about MobileScript which is an ECMA script that allows developers to access device functionality (calls, messages) in a simple manner.
It's also one of the first projects to be released as Open Source (GPL v2)
See this YouTube video
As Vodafone are doing (correctly in my view), I see this to be an increasing trend – and it will be beneficial since companies will address specific problems, they will court developers, Android/OHA will provide legitimacy to the whole area and we will balance the objectives of fast development cycles, interoperability and with no monopolies
Also, I wish to acknowledge the thinking from Andreas of visionmobile which I have used to clarify some of my own questions in understanding Open source.
Any comments welcome
Posted by ajit at 10:59 PM | Comments (8) | TrackBack
December 25, 2007
Merry Christmas ..
Wish you all a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!
Image source: rbytes.net
Posted by ajit at 6:57 PM | Comments (2) | TrackBack
On device portals - SurfKitchen
Following my blog On device portals - ODP, Widgets and the Phonetop: The iPhone killer, Saviour of IMS and the future of mobile apps?, I had intended to explore the area of On device portals(ODPs) further – especially in the context of Widgets and IMS integration.
Hence, I met SurfKitchen CTO Dave Evans a couple of weeks ago to get his views on ODPs, Widgets and IMS.
The SurfKit Product Portfolio is a product suite of clients that provides mobile operators and service providers with a method to find, download and consume mobile data services. The Surfkitchen product is a service creation environment. It is an On Device Framework that integrates and calls other services. It has evolved from its initial concept into its current incarnation over the past few years.
The next generation of SurfKitchen technology allows application on the framework to act as a widget. The widgets could be developed by third parties. Which widgets run on the device depends on the subscriber selection and operators’ policy. In that sense, it could be a walled garden or not depending on what the operator chooses.
If the operator’s network supports IMS, The ODP would utilise the IMS as a service layer (For instance - Location service layer provide by IMS). It could also use IMS to perform tasks across all applications allowing IMS capabile widgets to be built using XML and Script . Hence, SurfKitchen's current positioning around IMS is - the SurfKitchen platform will only support IMS when operators implement IMS & the Protocol stacks become available in the devices.
The SurfKitchen platform is technology agnostic and supports Java, Symbian and Microsoft Windows 5.0 and it can be acquired using a range of methods that include Client native, Device Pre-Installation, Point of distribution, Memory Card, Bluetooth OTA, Infra-red OTA and OTA delivery
I was interested in ODPs because IMS clients are still not very prevalent and I don’t see them on roadmaps either from major handset manufacturers. Hence, an ODP could potentially perform some of the functions of an IMS client.
Are IMS clients useful? The answer to that question(as with everything in IMS) is ‘It depends’. Certainly as the network upgrades to an IP network, there is some value in the client being able to access the power on the server(i.e. the network). However, I have never believed in the hype driven, sweeping vision of IMS(especially when it extends to differential charging, bearer management etc). Hence, this approach may be a simpler way to take advantage of some features of IMS.
I shall continue to speak to more vendors to gain more insights into ODPs. Many thanks to Dave and his team for their feedback
A block diagram looks like this
Posted by ajit at 6:40 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
December 24, 2007
ecomm 2008 conference
The ecomm conference to be held in March is an interesting place considering people who I know like Lee S Dryburgh, Martin Geddes and Dean Bubley are speaking at it. More details as per their web site and the schedule is HERE
Please contact the conference for an early bird discount
Some more details as below
Democratization of Communications Innovation
eComm is the venue for those interested in the radical transformation of the trillion dollar telecommunications industry. It has already started down the path that the homebrew computer took three decades ago. Just as democratized computation gave birth to the computer industry, eComm is tracking, highlighting and promoting this new wave of democratization.
eComm brings out the visionaries, emergent technologies, real-world startups, cutting-edge academic projects, views from the incumbent telecom players; garage based hacks and stirs required policy debates to create the ultimate three-day conversation.
Voice Industry Stagnancy
Telcos still see themselves as masters of communications innovation and the guardians to the creation of new services. Yet 3G, FMC, IPTV, NGN and IMS services are failing in the market place. At the same time consumer attention drifts increasingly towards Internet based service offerings such as Facebook, MySpace, YouTube, SecondLife, World of Warcraft Etc. which are becoming increasingly voice enabled.
Yet within the Internet realms VoIP is still heralded as the communication revolution. But VoIP on it's own is nothing more than digital telephony and it will never be profitable. It has gained little consumer traction and can be announced as dead-on-arrival. SIP the VoIP signaling protocol even after a decade of development has had little consumer reach and the entire notion of a common signaling protocol is now under question.
Unprecedented Opportunities
eComm represents a way forwards out of this stagnancy. It is the meeting place for those interested in accelerating and profiting from the democratization of communications. It is for those who have woken up to the industry realities and who wish to race-ahead of the slumber.
A new communications landscape is ahead and the democratization of communications may hold greater opportunities than the democratization of computation which occurred three decades back. It is for this reason that eComm seeks to track, highlight and promote both the people and the technologies driving the democratization of communications innovation.
Emerging Communication Markets
Outside of advanced markets, eComm will also provide unique insight into the emerging communication markets, most notably the Chinese market.
Speakers
We have a fantastic speakers list: http://eCommMedia.com/speakers/ which is a space worth watching (we can't say anymore yet, but note the venue location for a clue).
500USD Discount
There are only 300 paid places available.
The early bird price is 300.00 USD off until January.
A special discount code has been setup for the first fifty registrants. Simply enter the code 'firstfifty' during online registration to receive a further 200USD off. Please distribute and let your colleagues know.
Venue
The conference will take place 12-14 March, 2008 at the Computer History Museum, Mountain View, California.
Learn More
Checkout the conference homepage and the About page.
If You Can't Attend
If you are unable to make the event, feel free to stay connected by:
* providing suggestions by emailing suggestions08@eCommMedia.com
* subscribing to the blog which will appear next week onsite
* subscribing to pre-conference interviews which will appear onsite in January
* editing the Wiki
* joining the Facebook group
Also feel free to share your thoughts or questions by hitting reply.
Register
To register or learn more please visit http://eCommMedia.com
Posted by ajit at 4:48 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
December 23, 2007
Excellent SDP/IMS white paper from Devoteam
Occasionally, you come across a white paper which is so good that you wonder if it was intended to be in the public domain in the first place!
I have been interested in the interplay between Web 2.0, IMS and SDP – not easy topics to tackle especially since these terms mean different things to different people and are at different levels of the stack. Further more, IMS and SDP are largely hyped by the vendor community complicating matters even more.
I spoke about these ideas at my course at Oxford University on Web 2.0, Mobile Web 2.0 and IMS.
Hence, I was very interested to read this white paper (it’s a pdf) by devoteam in France. This is very good stuff .. And written with a vendor neutral perspective which is rare in this space. You may find parts of it technical but it still is great even if you are non technical
(BTW – I have no commercial relationships with this company – I just found this white paper useful)
link below to SDP white paper
Posted by ajit at 10:37 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Speaking at the Mobile world congress (formerly 3GSM) in Barcelona 2008
A brief note .. more soon
I am speaking at the Mobile world congress (formerly 3GSM) on exploring the Myths and Realities of the Youth Demographic. The session is part of the "Mobile Society" conference stream and will take place during the first day of the conference agenda; Tuesday the 12th February from 1615 - 1735.
If you are there, we can meet(although when I spoke at 3GSM last year, it was not easy to coordinate since I was staying at a faraway hotel.)
Hopefully I will do better this time!
Posted by ajit at 5:08 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Google’s next big dream – cloud computing ..
Interesting article in business week re cloud computing and the efforts of Christophe Bisciglia at Google to promote cloud computing at Campus levels. I have been tracking cloud computing for a while and believe that it will underpin efforts to take the Web to the next level – especially if a whole new class of web applications become mainstream(cloud search for instance). Hence, my belief expressed some time ago that cloud computing fits in nicely with Mobile Ajax
The article has a quote which says that Compared to this(cloud computing), the Web is tiny. We will be laughing how small the Web is. I think that’s not an understatement - since the cloud has the potential to unite the web , the mobile web and the social web as well (and everything else that comes subsequently – for instance access to devices) – if we view the cloud as a server which acts as a repository / server to all clients.
More about this initiative here Christophe Bisciglia, cloud computing, campus technology and HERE
Posted by ajit at 11:24 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
December 18, 2007
Losing the social in social networking: 1000 songs on your iPod and you can't smell any of them ..
Last week, it was a privilege to be invited to address Professor Dr Andrea Back's class in the University of St Gallen. The broad subject was The real life experiences of a blogger – and the format was an informal chat hosted by Dr Back and her team.
As is my style, I stress both the technical/content aspects of a blog but also the social aspects of blogging i.e. the online world causes us to lose the humanity of a personal interaction and successful bloggers, in their own small unique way, manage to bridge this disconnect.
I first touched on this topic in the blog Blogging: Of Tom and Jerry and craving the friction of a human being ..
In my view, far too many people worry about making money, ROI, Google coverage etc (by the way, if you are interested in SEO, see SEO: How to use blogs for Search engine optimization and to improve your Google ranking/Alexa rating) and lose the social aspects of blogging. I have yet to see a blogger become successful who failed to take this factor into consideration.
After the talk, I spoke to Dr Back about why the social context is so important and how digitalization causes us to lose our sense of connection with the sensual i.e. we may have 1000 songs on our iPod but we cant smell any of them ..
By that, I mean .. in the older Vinyl records, you had a lot of context which accompanied the music. For starters, the record itself had a distinctive smell. The jacket(cover) was large and colourful. The vinyl had a distinct feel to it. When the song is on an iPod amongst a 1000 others, you cant ‘smell’ it i.e. it loses it’s context(and by the same token – some of it’s richness)(By the way, this example comes from the book Distraction)
The same principle applies in blogging .. make it too efficient, too logical, commercial, too left brained .. and you lose the ‘social’ in social networking/blogging ..
Dr Back and her team write a blog appropriately called Back on the future (currently in German) as a part of their Business20 program
Many thanks to the University of St Galen and Professor Dr Back for hosting me and I hope Dr Back's students and industry invitees enjoyed my talk
Posted by ajit at 11:05 PM | Comments (2) | TrackBack
December 14, 2007
Mobile browser plugins: The browser as a platform la facebook platforms ..
Note: I changed the subject because the blog is emphasising Mobile browser plugins - which was not obvious from the previous heading
I have talked about browser plugins before in context of offline browsing. However, the concept of plugins could be an interesting idea in itself – independent of its use in offline browsing.
If browser plugins take off , then the browser becomes a platform much like the facebook platform. The analogy is not accurate of course since browser extensions are software extensions whereas facebook applications are extensions of the platform itself – which includes the software and the data i.e. people
Having said that, the idea of extending a browser could have some interesting implications – especially taking the idea of open source into the equation
If we take the vibrancy (and the irritability!) of facebook applications and extend that to browser extensions, then the act of extending browsers via plugins can have both positive and negative implications – for instance ..
a) People can create their own extensions – ideally very easily. Much like facebook apps
b) These extensions should installable at any time and by anyone(i.e. not determined at POS)
c) It should be possible to tell others what plugins you are already running(i.e. capability exchange much like what we see at WURFL)
d) Irritating applications should be removable(much like some facebook apps!)
e) It should be possible to ‘send’ extensions to others(again like facebook apps)
f) There should be a minimum set or configuration to start off with
g) The whole ecosystem should be open sourced – so that it takes off faster.
h) The plug-in interface should be defined separating the interface from the implementation
i) Testing and certification should also be decentralised i.e. not controlled as a revenue model – else things wont take off fast because developers wont have any incentive to work with it commercially
I am aware that as I mentioned in my previous blog, the missing link is access to device APIs from the browser – and by extension the security implications of the same i.e. merely having the ability to add these plugins on mobile browsers may have limited usage if the plug-in itself can do little .. But it’s a good start? No?
Posted by ajit at 1:13 AM | Comments (2) | TrackBack
December 9, 2007
Oxford university courses: user generated content, web 2.0, IMS ..
Another reminder .. and also to say that you get a certificate from Oxford for attendance!
I am conducting my courses at Oxford university in December.
The urls and dates are as below
If you are interested, please register for them through the Oxford university site
Dec 13 User Generated Content and Web 2.0
Dec 14 Mobile Web 2.0 and IMS:
Posted by ajit at 9:26 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Mobile Ajax: The big picture ..
Many thanks for your comments on Mobile Ajax, Google Gears on mobile and Offline browsing
Over at forumoxford, I entered into a discussion about more clarifications about this blog
In my view, the big picture comprises of
a) Mobile RIA/Mobile Ajax
b) Offline browsing
c) Network / IMS integration
d) Device API integration
e) security + Identity
f) The ability to choose the best network connection(wifi,wimax etc) from the browser
g) payment
h) location
Then the picture is complete! We are getting there ..
Some of these issues are addressed in an older Opera platform DOM specification
Posted by ajit at 4:38 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Stanford University Program - Future of Indian Mobile Value Added Services (MVAS) Market
Chetan Sharma gives a great account of Stanford University Program - Future of Indian Mobile Value Added Services (MVAS) Market on his blog
It was an event I was invited to attend but it’s a pity I could not make it. My compliments to Prof Tom Kosnik and Graduate Student Mohit Gundecha for the success of this event. Mohit and Tom partnered with BDA India to create the event, the document, executive summary, and video. The team from BDA's India office was led by Kunal Bajaj and Girish Trivedi, and included Deepshika Garg, Rahul Gupta, and Smita Sharma.
To watch the event over internet:
To watch the event over Mobile phone:
They have released a free report called Why Mobile, Why India, Why now .. which you can access from the link
I am looking forward to collaborating with Prof Kosnik's team in future
Posted by ajit at 8:57 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Mobile Ajax, Google Gears on mobile and Offline browsing
After two big announcements from Google, i.e. OpenSocial and Open Handset Alliance/Android .. I believe that the third missing announcement is Google gears on mobile. Google gears on mobile devices would solve a key problem for the Mobile Web and I have blogged about it’s potential almost as soon as the announcement was made.
With Android, Google has not gone RIA (Rich Internet Applications) but for a large measure, the rest of the world has already gone RIA for mobile browsers. If you accept that technologies like Mobile Ajax are now becoming mainstream just within two years after my now well publicised blog about the same topic Mobile web 2.0: AJAX for mobile devices – why mobile AJAX will replace both J2ME and XHTML as the preferred platform for mobile applications development - Part two , then it is indeed time to address offline browsing in tandem with Mobile Ajax.
In a nutshell, Google Gears comprises of a local database, local processes and a web server – with the logic being written in Javascript. Hence, Gears potentially fits in well with Mobile Ajax and Gears also fits in well with Mobile Web Widgets(and by that I mean Widgets created using Web standards as opposed to Widsets and similar products)
The acceptance of common standards between the Web and the Mobile Web is a good thing and while Gears is not a ‘standard’ – it is open sourced – and it’s acceptance on the Web would definitely help to promote it on the Mobile Web. As far as I can see, the only other group/body addressing this problem is HTML5 and even those efforts appear to be mainly to be for the Web(and not the Mobile Web)
While I am a big fan of standards, W3C etc .. in this case, I think Google is leading the way. And if they do the same as they have done in case of Android(An alliance rather than ‘doing it Google’s way’) – then we have the potential of a truly interesting service.
The most logical way to implement Gears on browsers is through a plug-in such as the Netscape plug-in API followed by Mozilla, Opera and most major players(except Microsoft). I am a bit unsure about Mobile browser plugin standards(as opposed to Web browser plugin standards) but I hope to find out soon. Google may well opensource Gears on mobile just as it does on the Web creating a de-facto standard if one does not exist.
Soon, I see Mobile development to be dominated by two open source products: Google Gears and the OHA. And that is a good thing because it allows other players in the industry(including Operators, device manufacturers etc) to have a role.
For instance, If vendors like Nokia, Opera and others support Gears in their respective Rich Web browsers – then we have a good way to overcome the fragmentation issue that has ailed the industry from the outset . Furthermore, it is an alliance founded on the basis of Open source with each party playing to their respective strengths.
The one additional bit missing here is security .. as a study of Google Gears on the web demonstrates. The implementation of Google gears on the Web gives some clues of the issues involved and we can expect the same issues on Mobile devices(plus security and device APIs unique to mobile devices)
As per the Google gears architecture on the web, some of the issues involved include ..
a) The lack of a data layer: For instance, AJAX calls can originate from anywhere within the code without an interim data layer. This is fine for existing Ajax applications since the only source is the server. However, when we also have local storage, there are potentially two sources (the server and the local storage). Hence, a common data layer is needed(which currently does not exist)
b) Features available offline: Not all features may be optimal offline – for instance rapidly changing stock quotes are best accessed from the server than offline
c) Modality – Managing the transition process i.e. switching between online and offline modes(explicit or user driven)
d) Synchronization: explicit, in the background etc
And then there is security .. a major topic in itself. According to the Google Gears site
, Gears follows the same origin policy
and security at the file system level is enforced by the Operating system.
However, when it comes to Mobile devices, there is a lot more in relation to offline storage and security. For instance
• Can the browser access content from removable media?
• Can the browser read/write data from the terminal’s file system programmatically?
• What restrictions are placed on personal data(stored in the cache) for ex data types like SIM contact data, Phonebook contact data, Diary elements etc which are normally protected but can now be cached.
There have been other references to Mobile offline browsing – most notably from the Register and CEO
To conclude, sqlLite is part of Android. It is also a part of Gears. Google could easily use a similar architecture and experience gained from Android to solve the problem of persistence in Mobile Ajax applications. A problem whose resolution would help the industry and encourage the growth on Mobile Ajax/Rich Internet Applications on mobile devices.
Comments welcome as usual
update from Stefan at intomobile
Thanks Stefan!
>>>
Actually Nokia is already implementing something called the Web Runtime with their next edition of S60 that will allow devices to do what you just said: http://www.intomobile.com/2007/11/27/widgets-the-s60-web-run-time-what-is-it-and-how-can-i-use-it.html
Motorola, in their next version of Linux, is also working on a web runtime.
What you want requires platform level support, something that even the mighty google will have a hard time with unless they pull a Yahoo 2 Go and build a mobile application platform in which developers work.
Who knows, too early to tell, but I agree with your basic logic that Google Widgets + Open Social + Google Gears for Mobile makes the most sense. The key is the implementation.
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Posted by ajit at 12:46 AM | Comments (8) | TrackBack
December 3, 2007
Carnival of the mobilists: No 102 ..
Carnival of the mobilists: No 102 .. at Tarek's blog Symbiano-Tek
My post P2P may be Google’s biggest weakness and an Operator’s biggest asset won the best post :) which is nice!
Posted by ajit at 6:31 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Nokia: UGC to account for 25% of entertainment
Nokia: UGC to account for 25% of entertainment
Interesting study from Nokia .. I agree with this. It is an interesting trend(see highlighted portions). Nice to see Mr Selby in the news!
source: fiercewireless
Up to a quarter of the entertainment consumed by people in five
years time will have been created, edited and shared within their peer
circle rather than coming out of traditional media groups. This
phenomenon, dubbed 'Circular Entertainment', has been identified by
Nokia as a result of a global study into the future of entertainment.
The study, entitled 'A Glimpse of the Next Episode', carried out by
The Future Laboratory, interviewed trend-setting consumers from 17
countries about their digital behaviors and lifestyles signposting
emerging entertainment trends. Combining views from industry leading
figures with Nokia's own research from its 900 million consumers around
the world, Nokia has constructed a global picture of what it believes
entertainment will look like over the next five years.
"From our research we predict that up to a quarter of the
entertainment being consumed in five years will be what we call
'Circular'. The trends we are seeing show us that people will have a
genuine desire not only to create and share their own content, but also
to remix it, mash it up and pass it on within their peer groups - a
form of collaborative social media," said Mark Selby, Vice President,
Multimedia, Nokia.
Selby continues, "We think it will work something like this;
someone shares video footage they shot on their mobile device from a
night out with a friend, that friend takes that footage and adds an MP3
file - the soundtrack of the evening - then passes it to another
friend. That friend edits the footage by adding some photographs and
passes it on to another friend and so on. The content keeps circulating
between friends, who may or may not be geographically close, and
becomes part of the group's entertainment."
Tom Savigar, Trends Director at The Future Laboratory added,
"Consumers are increasingly demanding their entertainment be truly
immersive, engaging and collaborative. Whereas once the act of
watching, reading and hearing entertainment was passive, consumers now
and in the future will be active and unrestrained by the ubiquitous
nature of circular entertainment. Key to this evolution is consumers'
basic human desire to compare and contrast, create and communicate. We
believe the next episode promises to deliver the democracy politics can
only dream of."
Of the 9,000 consumers we surveyed:
- 23% buy movies in digital format
- 35% buy music on MP3 files
- 25% buy music on mobile devices
- 39% watch TV on the internet
- 23% watch TV on mobile devices
- 46% regularly use IM, 37% on a mobile device
- 29% regularly blog
- 28% regularly access social networking sites
- 22% connect using technologies such as Skype
- 17% take part in Multiplayer Online Role Playing Games
- 17% upload to the internet from a mobile device
As part of the research we have identified four key driving trends;
Immersive Living; Geek Culture; G Tech and Localism. These trends are
currently sitting on the edge, but as these trends become more
mainstream, they will have a collaborative, creative effect on the way
people consume entertainment and, we predict, will lead to the Circular
Entertainment phenomenon.
Immersive Living
Immersive Living is the rise of lifestyles which blur the reality
of being on and offline. Entertainment will no longer be segmented;
people can access and create it wherever they are.
Geek Culture
This triumph marks a shift as consumers become hungry for more
sophisticated entertainment. Geek Culture rises, consumers will want to
be recognized and rewarded - the boundaries between being commercial
and creative will blur.
G Tech
G Tech is an existing social force in Asia that will change the way
entertainment will look. Forget pink and sparkly, it is about the
feminization of technology that is currently underway. Entertainment
will be more collaborative, democratic, emotional and customized - all
of which are 'female' traits.
Localism
The report uncovered a locally-minded sprit emerging in
entertainment consumption and Localism will become a key theme of
future entertainment. Consumers will take pride in seeking out the
local and home-grown.
The extensive research identifies the trends, along with the
technologies, that will be pivotal in the next episode of
entertainment. In conclusion, the results of the survey lead Nokia to
believe in the next episode; entertainment will be circular.
Notes to Editors
The research took place between July and September 2007. 9,000
consumers, who are active users of technology and own a mobile device
[not restricted to Nokia] aged 16-35 were questioned. In addition 17
correspondents from the Future Laboratory's LifeSigns Network were
interviewed. LifeSigns network is a community of 3,000 'superconsumers'
thinkers, doers, creators and authors of culture. Interviews were also
conducted with 10 leaders in different areas of entertainment who
provided us with in-depth proven insights into this subject and what
lies ahead. Experts were chosen from the areas of radio, internet,
gaming, device developments, mobile telecoms, music, computing,
legislation and marketing.
About Nokia Nseries
Nokia Nseries is a range of high performance multimedia computers
that delivers unparalleled mobile multimedia experiences by combining
the latest technologies with stylish design and ease of use. With Nokia
Nseries products, consumers can use a single device to enjoy
entertainment, access information and to capture and share pictures and
videos, on the go. http://www.nseries.com
About Nokia
Nokia is the world leader in mobility, driving the transformation
and growth of the converging Internet and communications industries.
Nokia makes a wide range of mobile devices and provides people with
experiences in music, navigation, video, television, imaging, games and
business mobility through these devices. Nokia also provides equipment,
solutions and services for communications networks.
http://www.nokia.com
Posted by ajit at 5:58 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
December 2, 2007
P2P, Google, Seamless mobility ..
Many thanks for the great feedback on my article: P2P may be Google’s biggest weakness and an Operator’s biggest asset
I agree with Tope in the comments (and which was my point) i.e. we can't look at the future with the ecosystem of the present. P2P is highly disruptive and no one really knows(and I dont claim to make any predictions either) how users will use all this bandwith and connectivity in a P2P mode.
I am however a BIG believer in the power of grassroots and in the belief that empowered,connected individuals can drive grassroots change(much the same optimistic view I take for Africa and mobile technology - of which I am a big advocate) i.e. the more links you can create between people, the more the emergence of an ecosystem which will be truly vibrant - and whose ultimate form we cannot see based on the views of today .. Thanks all - appretiate the feedback
Posted by ajit at 9:38 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack