Vic demo @ MWC 09: The browser is the platform

I will post more on my thoughts on the Mobile World Congress, but I did want to share this video of Vic Gundotra's demo of Google Maps on the Palm Pre...



Google has been talking for a long time of the browser as the platform... Wekbit + HTML 5 plus millions of iPhones, Android, Pres (and yes eventually Nokia's) make this statement a reality.

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• HTML 5 and Gmail (q-ontech.blogspot.com)
• HTML5 Enabled Gmail: What Does it Mean (mashable.com)
• Google Maps on Palm Pre; Gmail on iPhone (ajaxian.com)
• Google demos offline Gmail for iPhone, Android at MWC (engadget.com)

Google Adwords supports iPhone and Android

Today Google's mobile team announced the ability for all of our Adwords advertisers to target their desktop ads to high-end (Android and iPhone) devices.

There is a lot of speculation about how many advertisers Adwords has. The point, however, is that what is arguably the front end for the broadest online advertising platform now enables all of its advertisers to deliver appropriate ads (and deliver associated ROI).

I believe that one of the primary issues with mobile advertising has been the challenge of educating broad-based advertisers about how to discover the medium, create appropriate ads for the medium and track said ads' performance. That all goes away... Think about the implication of 10+ million iphones with Google ads and 30x the search usage of a typical device across many, many advertisers...

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• Mobile Advertising Set To Go Big This Year?

iPhone surpasses Windows Mobile

Endgadget reports that iPhone has surpassed Windows Mobile sales.

Back in May, 2007 Ballmer stated "the future of the mobile handset business will primarily depend on software influence rather than hardware."

Android, RIM, Nokia open sourcing Symbian...I am not sure the world of dollars-a-pop mobile OSs supports Ballmers assessment.

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Mobile advertising piece in Venturebeat

Venturebeat put together an interesting post on mobile advertising and the effects of the downturn.
Their point is that the iPhone is driving growth (as Admob, Google and other have touted publicly), and that advertisers are transitioning from "testing" the medium to actually planning spend against it.

Having interacted with dozens of agencies and advertisers over the past year, I continue to feel that mobile is seen as "experimental" for now, but with everyone eyeing iPhone, Android and other "true-web" phones to see how quickly they get a significant install base.

If you can have 100 million devices that leverage the technology (banner ads, tracking, analytics, targetting) of the web AND provide location based targetting and a deep personal attachment for users, then we have a compelling medium.

As always, I am very bullish on mobile and I am glad to see others begin to agree.

Mobile browser test

If you have heard anything from Google on mobile over the past year, it has probably centered on the importance of the browser (and unlimited data plans) in driving true mobile internet adoption.

Gizmodo just did a great test on the major Smartphone browsers side by side. In summary, the iPhone gets a not-undexpected A- with the Android G1 coming in second with a B+. Nokia rounds out the Webkit browsers with a B-. I was surprised by his B-/C+ for the BB Bold (no way!) but highly supportive of the big fat F for pocket Internet Explorer.

G1 launches, the Market business model, and hour-long lines in SF

I don't think Andy Rubin and team had this in mind when they chose the date, but the T-Mobile G1 launch yesterday coincided with my birthday (wohoo!)

And so the day is finally here: The first Android device is out in the wild (aparently some folks who pre-ordered got it 2 days early). I have pasted some reviews at the bottom of the post.

Apparently the scene at the SF T-Mobile store was electric as people waited in line and had entertainment in tow.

In parallel news, Google announced the commercial model for the Market... fully open, Google gets none of the revenue, and the users vote for the best apps with their thumbs!

Review of the G1.
Gizmodo
Engadget
TechCrunch
Giga Om
Washington Post
Mossberg in the Wall Street Journal

Android now Open Source

Android is now open sourced as promised...

This is huge. The concept of an end to end mobile OS stack, run time engine, Webkit browser, etc ALL open sourced.

For those not in the industry, what this means is that hopefully the Android effort and investments will enable handset makers to leapfrog into a best-of-breed high end mobile OS FOR FREE (as compared to paying Nokia or Microsoft on a per-license basis). Lets hope that savings is reinvested into innovation on top of the platform.

A video outlining the launch of the Open Source code is below:

Mobclix and iPhone apps

I came across Mobclix a month ago. They had just succesfuly presented at TechCrunch50 and were selected as finalists for Seedcamp as well

A good idea with brilliant timing, their service enables data analytics for iPhone (and eventually other platforms) applications.

Given that Apple provides such limited information to developers (and the industry in general) their dashboards are like gold. Borrowing from Admob's playbook they are becoming *the* source for insight into Apple apps.

9to5mac has a post on Mobclix as well outlinging the distribution of apps by category:

• Games: 1,027 (31.4%)
• Utilities: 476 (13.5%)
• Entertainment: 407 (12.4%)
• Productivity: 240 (7.3%)
• Education: 213 (6.5%)
• Books: 202 (6.2%)
• Reference: 191 (5.8%)
• Travel: 184 (5.6%)
• Healthcare + Fitness: 176 (5.4%)
• Lifestyle: 158 (4.8%)

I think these guys might be onto something... its no longer enough to know the install base of Symbian vs WinMo vs J2ME enabled handsets... its about the use that each platform will drive.

Hands on with the TMobile G1

I finally got to play with the final UI of the TMobile G1 Android device over the last few days and I must admit I was impressed. Understand that my comment carries some Google bias, but more importantly strong skepticism having launched v1 mobile OSs before (ahem Motorola MPx200) and my recent frustration with the iPhone.

Here are some of the things I like the most:

Search: A lot of the features that we have implemented on the web including suggest and history make typing queries A LOT easier (the keyboard also helps. Video of the search features below:





The Android Market: Easy to browse, easy to find cool apps based on feedback, and a large number of FREE apps!

CUT AND PASTE!!! (enough said)

Android G1 launched

Wow, the day is finally here. The worst-kept secret in the mobilesphere became true and T-Mobile, Google and HTC announced the first Android phone, the G1.

Walt Mossberg had already posted some initial thoughts on the G1.

Huge Kudos to Andy and the rest of the Android team who started with a big vision to use an OS as a way to make mobile handsets more open and more web-friendly. Several years and a lot of work later, the G1 is the first incarnation of these efforts.

The first device will be available in the US for $179 starting in October with a planned launch in the UK in November and the rest of Europe soon after.