Open Thread: Have You Started Mobile Browsing?
May 30th, 2007 (2:40pm) Anne Zelenka 20 Comments
Mobile phones are not ideal for surfing the web and yet they have their advantages. They’re portable and cheap plus most of us carry them with us all the time. Might we be looking towards a world where lightweight devices with small screens provide our default connection to the web?
A study commissioned by T-Mobile found that mobile phones provide employees with the ability to connect to the world outside their cubicle even when management restricts access to social networking, web-based email, and other non-work-related websites. Here’s where a mobile phone’s portability comes in most handy — 15% of those surveyed even confessed to mobile browsing in the bathroom.
In response to the T-Mobile study, Jeremy Wagstaff suggests that mobile browsing is the future:
History will find it weird, not that we connect to the Web on the john with a device once designed to make phone calls, but that for 15 years we had to do that via a big hunk of metal, plastic and wires sitting in the middle of what used to be a big open space called a desk.
Do you surf the web on your mobile phone? What sites do you visit from your tiny screen? Do you foresee a day when you will do most of your surfing on a phone rather than a PC?
20 Comments Post your own comment
JT says: May 30th, 2007 3:33pm
I surf on my phone everyday. I use it to read my rss feeds when I’m not at my computer. Most of the time I’m browsing wap.howardforums.com, m.wordpress.com, m.flickr.com, m.twitter.com, mobile.starbucks.com, and engadget.com which when using a mobile browser Engadget automatically formats the page for a phone screen.
Mobile Browsing « Ramblings of a Geek says: May 30th, 2007 4:09pm
[...] 30th, 2007 There’s an interesting post at Web Worker Daily about browsing on your mobile phone and a recent T-Mobile study in the UK. [...]
OnWebStartups.com Admin says: May 30th, 2007 4:18pm
I regularly check my gmail and my google calendar on my mobile phone, and both work great. I highly recommend google calendar since it’s new mobile interface is very easy and quick to use.
Blog: On Web Startups
Pete says: May 30th, 2007 6:25pm
I use my phone for the local water temp and surf report (surfline.com), accessing my to do list on the web (m.rememberthemilk.com), google reader for RSS feeds (www.google.com/reader/m/view) and checking my netflix queue (web.netflix.com).
Kelly says: May 30th, 2007 6:51pm
I used to use Newsgator for my Treo, then bought a Nokia N*80 with the fancy web browser in it. I love the way it works, and it makes reading websites on the go much better. Still, my biggest qualm is connection speeds. Slow loading feeds etc. can make the experience a pain sometimes.
Deepak says: May 30th, 2007 9:47pm
Quite a bit actually. Heavy use of my feed reader (Google reader). Also use Twitter, Facebook, Newsvine, and Google calendar.
Laura says: May 30th, 2007 10:00pm
I do e-mail (hotmail and gmail), gcalendar, and occasional Cingular provided news. This all started in class (college), when I was bored.
Louis says: May 30th, 2007 10:05pm
I read the New York Times on my phone almost every morning. Their last redesign has made the site a lot easier to browse. And of course, gmail.
kenneth says: May 30th, 2007 11:03pm
I only really use it to check Nextbus.com in SF and once in a blue moon to check cellartracker.com
Archaeogeek says: May 31st, 2007 1:48am
Same as pretty much everyone else- Google, with my IGoogle (yuck) page set up as my mobile home page. The new google calendar is pretty cool, but I still think the mobile version of the reader needs more work. Mowser (mowser.com) is good for formatting any page into a mobile-friendly version, and http://wikipedia.7val.com/ provides a good mobile interface to wikipedia.
Jeff VC says: May 31st, 2007 2:30am
Funny this thread should appear now. I just got a new phone last week. A few years ago I tried mobile browsing and pretty much gave up on it, except for checking BBC (http://www.bbc.co.uk/mobile/index.shtml) and slashdot (http://slashdot.org/palm/) on the train. It was too much of a chore and there was really nothing out there.
Now, in addition to Google Mail, Calendar and Reader, I’ve discovered that flickr (http://m.flickr.com/) and facebook (http://m.facebook.com/) have excellent mobile sites, though I wish I could favorite photos from the flickr interface. Upcoming (http://m.upcoming.yahoo.com/) has also introduced a mobile site recently, but I haven’t used it yet. It’s pretty safe to say that I’m addicted!
Pablo Apanasionek says: May 31st, 2007 6:19am
I guess the development of more capable mobile browsers as Opera Mobile has favored the mobile approach of the Web. Factory browsers about 2 or 3 years ago sucked at displaying a web page correctly. I currently use GMail, GCal and GReader, plus checking the availability of some sites I run. And the Wiki in those cases you can’t get any longer without getting answers.
Rob Witham says: May 31st, 2007 6:22am
I browse the Web quite often from my mobile phone. I use the Opera Mini browser as opposed to the less-than-wonderful OpenWave browser that ships with my Cingular mobile though. OpenWave’s browser is far too limited whereas Opera Mini functions much like any PC browser you are accustomed to.
I read RSS feeds, news, and google for anything that strikes my interest when I am bored. I also use Google’s mobile search quite a bit to locate area businesses when I need to find something.
I agree that mobile browsing will continue to increase in popularity in the future. I suspect handhelds and smart phones will represent an increasing market share in the next few years.
John Flinchbaugh says: May 31st, 2007 7:03am
I’ve used my phone for a while to hit my bank’s mobile site, Sometimes RSS (but not as much anymore). Most the time I use Opera Mini or some other connected app (JaikuMidlet). Jaiku usually gives me the ability to catch up on people in those spare moments. I’ll ofter review some of my recent del.icio.us links as well. I’m starting to use Opera Mini’s RSS support more.
Warren says: May 31st, 2007 12:39pm
WIth a Pocket PC mobile device (touch screen, Windows Mobile OS), it’s much easier to browse the web. And I do so quite often. I can imagine it will only get better and easier.
Yomi Adegboye says: June 1st, 2007 9:00pm
I have been browsing on my phones for upwards of 3 years now. What I do - visit my favourite blogs and forums, register domain names, setup and manage web hosting accounts, make purchases online, run online banking transactions, manage email, run my blog - almost everything I am able to do on a PC browser.
The plus is that with a mobile device, I am able to do them all almost anuwhere, anytime. I am posting this in bed on my Nokia E61, for example.
I agree: mobile browsing is the future, especially as more powerful, user-friendly devices and browsers show up.
pandacube says: June 13th, 2007 5:24am
I usually check my gmail from mobile while Im away from my PC. And a few RSS feed as well.
Mobile Browsing « Ramblings of a Geek says: July 28th, 2007 8:27pm
[...] treo, web worker, cell phone, wap, palm, cellular, mobile. trackback There’s an interesting post at Web Worker Daily about browsing on your mobile phone and a recent T-Mobile study in the UK. [...]
Ramblings of a Geek » Mobile Browsing says: August 31st, 2007 11:06pm
[...] an interesting post at Web Worker Daily about browsing on your mobile phone and a recent T-Mobile study in the UK. [...]
frank says: September 4th, 2007 8:23am
@jeff vc - some of the major players are coming along fairly well, but five sites does not an internet make… the restrictive (and time consuming) nature of phone browsing make it uncomfortable and inconvenient. i personally only ever use it in near emergencies
@pandacure - checking email on your phone is fine, but writing an email? at least text messages are, of necessity brief and abbreviated…
personally i have a that provides the same diversity as i expect from my laptop with the mobility i get from my phone - perfect….