Moving websites to mobile phones

The web by its very nature tends to make information available globally and accessible from any location as long as there is a form of data carrier to move information from the servers to the clients/computers.

The web has been very useful and in fact has single handedly changed the way governments, corporations and media houses push information to the general public.

The web has turned the masses who used to be mere consumers of information to owners, part owners and publishers of information. The web has indeed handed over much power to the masses and has fundamentally changed the dynamics of information creation and dissemination.

Websites are set up to serve very many purposes ranging from news, sports, games to ecommerce and e-learning where students and teachers now engage themselves in ways that were never thought possible a couple of years back.

Majority of people access websites using desktop pcs and laptops, some use PDAs and smart phones while others still benefit from one form of interaction or the other using basic mobile phones even if for just SMS.

Globally, it is estimated that for every pc in use you have more than 15 mobile phones. This means that we actually have more mobile phones than pcs (whether desktops or laptops).

In Nigeria, due to the unreliable telephone infrastructure that has led to massive explosion of mobile handsets even in the remotest parts of Nigeria (that's a bit far fetched anyway unless the GSM operators are now deploying masts every where).

With more than 40 million mobile phones (and counting) in use in Nigeria it would not be out of place to believe that the ratio of pcs to mobile phones may be something like 1 pc : 1000 mobile phones.

Due to the power problems many cannot use their desktop pcs as they would want to and there is a limit to how long laptop users can work running on batteries.

But aren't mobile phones small computers on their own? You have a chip even though with less powerful processors, operating system, some form of storage system, mobile browsers, call capability etc.

It is much easier to charge a mobile phone than it is to provide power to desktop pcs or laptops where power is unreliable as one can quickly ask his/her neighbor to allow for charging of mobile phones whereas you cannot carry your desktop pcs from one place to the other just to use them.

What this means is that a great majority of Nigerians already have the ultimate tool that information can be pushed to or tool they can use to access information that is on the web anytime, any day.

So, can we really push websites to the mobile phones? Yes, we can.

In spite of the limitations of the mobile phones as regards browsing the web there exist in this particular terrain opportunities that may never be rivaled in human history as the mobile phone is not only personal, convenient to carry about but also a means of accessing or receiving information anytime, any where apart from the regular voice capabilities.

All that is required to develop and deploy truly mobile applications is a clear understanding of the underlying principles, best practices and very clear understanding of the limitations of the mobile phones and ways to ameliorate these limitations as the limitations themselves have very workable workarounds.

Everybody wins with the truly mobile web

Mobile phone owner - Instant access to information any time, any where without any need for a regular desktop pc, laptop or even internet subscription. All that is required is a gprs capable phone and this feature is pretty common these days especially when phone makers are already integrating 3G and EDGE. It is also extremely very cheap. You can browse a complete website for less than N3.00

Content providers - Opportunity to showcase products or services to an audience that can really access the information even when there are no regular pcs or internet access for example in the villages where you may not find cyber cafes.

Network providers - Additional income from gprs based connections as more and more people would now have to access relevant information using their mobile phones and with the very low cost when compared to other alternatives people will use mobile phones as a first port of call when looking for information online and this really translates into increased revenue.

What next?

Website owners, web developers, business men and women, professionals, government agencies etc should begin to imagine ways the mobile web can help in their respective areas.

The opportunities are many. Consider the following

People being able to stay in the villages and armed with a mobile phone and scratch cards they are able to check their JAMB results without even leaving their homes and spending less than N3.00 or N4.00 to do so. Compare this to the usual practice of traveling to the city where they can have access to cyber cafes just to check results that could actually be checked on their mobile phones. This reduces the risks involved in traveling such as accidents and robbery attacks.

Road Safety Officials or Policemen being able to get information from a driver simply by using the drivers' licence number to query a database and within a few seconds or minutes all relevant information is retrieved and traffic offences and fines can be added to the driver's record by officials with the relevant access rights.

Users in places where internet access is not common being able to spend say N10.00 per day to get access to all the relevant news from one or more sources using just their handsets.

Real estate agents, lawyers, doctors, sales people or engineers that may be outside the main office being able to retrieve relevant data using their mobile phones which ultimately will increase productivity and reduce cost of transportation and communications that would have been incurred if they had to go back to their offices or make calls before they can get access to the same information.

Banks being able to provide all relevant information about what they do on their mobile web and allowing people to access the information at their own convenience rather than depending on marketers that are always under pressure to meet targets to promote their services or offerings.

Restaurants, boutiques, bookshops, computer stores being able to provide information to any gprs capable phone around.

Just in case you think this is all theory I have successfully created mobile versions of all my major websites and you can visit all the pages of any of the websites including reading full text articles on your mobile phone without spending up to N6.00 (if you are reading full text articles) or N2.00 (if you are not reading any articles).

So, it is not just a case of "It can be done", rather it is a case of "It is already being used".

See you on the truly mobile side of life, are you coming along?