The mobile phone browser is the most popular mobile phone application used on smart phones and it’s only going to get bigger. Most of the general population are likely to have been glitz by Apples “there’s an app for that” commercials but in reality users surf the internet 2x as much more then using applications according to a Nielsen survey. By accessing the open internet there no need to have “an app for that” so long as the mobile browser is capable enough to render sites with speed and utilise the latest web technologies.
There are several reasons why the mobile browser and hence, web applications will prevail over native applications. Currently mobile operating systems are severely fragmented. To give you a bit of an idea we have iOS from Apple, Android from Google, WebOS from HP/Palm, Bada from Samsung, Symbian from Nokia, Blackberry OS, MeeGo, Maemo, Linux and now also Windows Phone 7!
Try asking a developer to create a native application that works across all phones. Most will give you a dumbfounded look, others will tell you your crazy, but some will pursued you to go completely mobile web. The web is the common platform that all phone operating systems and browsers are united under.
So it’s not surprising to see some big market players making big moves into this area: Sprint Nextel the third largest carrier in the USA will introduced a new browser based mobile applications service promising developers the tools to create web applications and value added services which span across the different operating systems and device form factors. Expected to be released in the first half of 2011 it’s a system which will be composed of open APIs giving developers the ability to quickly build web applications that leverage location, content adaptation, security and analytics. The solution is also touted to include a range of monetisation models like targeted advertising and content conversion services.
A further development which is no surprise given these guys have been creating widget based content for years is the introduction of Widgetbox Mobile. It’s the same team behind ClickTurn ads. Widgetbox mobile aims to help businesses build mobile web apps in minutes. After using their solution I have to admit it’s very slick and easy to use. It’s basically a DIY platform which allows you to build HTML5 based web applications which work on the iPhone and Android platforms (Blackberry support is apparently on the road map). You can use images, icons, skins, social media buttons, splash pages, slide shows and polls. As you build the application you get a preview window so you can always see how it’s eventually going to turn out. It’s a little pricy in my opinion at $25-$100 per app, per month, likely pricing most small businesses out.
The space of mobile web app v native apps is clearly polarised, and as the old saying goes we could take about it until the cows come home and so I’ll leave it to Jason Alderman (@justsomeguy) and Matthias Shapiro to rap battle it out. Thanks to 0m4r for discovering this vid.
