Comments on: Whether News Websites Finally ‘Get’ the Web or Not, it’s Time to Focus on Mobile

By: John Paul

John Paul — Thu, 14 Aug 2008 15:14:19 +0000

I think Jeff is right about the “mobile web” becoming more like full-sized Internet. However, in terms of site design and development, I think there will remain a need to do mobile design that is different from one’s desktop-based Web site.

After all, the screens are still smaller. More importantly, a lot of what goes into mobile Web design has to do with the context the user is in while using the site (which is quite different than desktop Web users). People simply use the Internet differently when they’re out and about with a mobile device vs. when they’re at their desk.

Also, I’m curious to hear if anybody has worked with Verve, and what their experience has been.

By: Adam

Adam — Wed, 30 Jul 2008 05:04:36 +0000

Your tip about creating a mobile stylesheet piqued my curiosity, so I visited this site on my iPhone — lo and behold, it displays the same regardless of device. The good news is that WordPress (in particular) has plugins that make it very easy to implement a mobile “edition.” As a new full-time user of both WP and the iPhone, I was happy to find this and reported as much in my recent post about useful plugins.

By: Shawn Smith

Shawn Smith — Tue, 29 Jul 2008 12:37:25 +0000

Thanks for the comment Jeff. I think you are right about full-on internet on U.S. phones. I think that’s where the U.S. will leapfrog Japan as far as mobile goes. I’m really excited for that and the possibilities are nearly limitless as far as emerging business models and new sources for revenue. Can’t wait to get my iphone :)

By: Jeff

Jeff — Tue, 29 Jul 2008 12:26:59 +0000

Shawn, good roundup.

The NYT’s new iPhone/iPod Touch app is a masterpiece, IMHO, and sets a new bar w/r/t UI and presentation from what users can expect from a mobile news platform. The missing piece from nearly every mobile news implementation I’ve seen is interactivity — most sites portion off their mobile news into lesser versions of the site, which negates a lot of the commenting and reader feedback available via the main news site. I see that becoming a greater focus for mobile in the next year or so.

Longer term, I don’t see news/media sites creating and maintaining two different codebases for their main site and a mobile offering. I think if there’s one lesson learned with the popularity of the iPhone, it’s that people want the full-on internet. I see devices (iPhone, Android, Nokia/Opera) and bandwidth (3G and beyond) catching up to laptops/desktops and being capable of browsing the full on internet without compromise — and in about 1-2 years out, the whole idea of a cut-down “mobile” site will seem as quaint as those cumbersome Flash intros every website convinced themselves they needed about a decade ago.

~Jeff