In the last couple of weeks, my colleague Alan Majer and I have had some interesting conversations with people like Sean Moss-Pultz (associated with open source mobile effort openmoko), Vincent John Vincent (president of machine vision company GestureTek), and other forward-looking thinkers about the future of mobile technologies.
Here’s a nice image of the open source OpenMoko phone (can’t wait to get my hands on one when they’re released):
I couldn’t help but contrast some of the terrific emerging technologies with the challenges faced by developers who’d like to take advantage of them. We seem to be reliving the mainframe to PC inflection point all over again, but this time it’s with mobile devices. Right now these devices are improving at a blistering pace – better cameras, more memory and more processing power. But they’re also staggeringly closed – several others we’ve spoken to have been dismayed by the difficulties of developing across different devices, development environments, and accessing the wireless network itself.
The problem doesn’t seem to be a technology one, but a business model issue… network providers are hindered by the fact that low-traffic services like SMS are enormously profitable. Pricing mobile access by the gigabyte throws all that juicy revenue out the window. Maybe that’s why there’s no “unlimited” wireless plans in Canada anymore (please tell me if I’m wrong, I’m still looking). Mobile providers are just taking the tried-and-true approach of charging customers based on the value of these services to customers – ringtones, email, SMS or voicemailbox… so why leave money on the table?
Problem is that control over the device/network/services that allow these types of high margin charges looks like the mainframe situation all over again. Powerful open handsets seem inevitable. Why focus on milkiing a handful of killer apps for mobiles when there’s thousands that haven’t even been invented yet? No one company (or mobile provider) can create them all alone.
But keeping revenue streams like SMS intact eliminates the incentives to make wireless networks and services better. Simply put, hundreds of dollars in wireless monthly charges make all the coolest stuff impractical. A few minutes worth of video from a stompbox (see interesting how to: bottom of the page on this link) would send your wireless bill through the roof in a hurry. Fortunately, more powerful handsets will give innovators more wriggle room. Wireless networks and processing power are substitues for one another… if the network is cheap, you can transmit a video stream or photo out for analysis or storage somewhere else, but if the network traffic is expensive, you do all the analysis and storage you can locally and then send a much smaller amount of data (maybe a data about the content, or smaller thumbnails) over the network. Smarter devices can even optimizing their access. They can decide what connections are worth waiting for: a wired connection on your desk, or a wifi network when it comes into range -potentially bypassing expensive wireless networks whenever practical. With affordable data plans, there’s few reasons why mobile innovators wouldn’t use the mobile network whenever they can – almost certainly increasing usage AND revenues/arpu. Mobile network providers ought to encourage pioneering users to develop the wireless applications and services of the future. Avoiding out-of-reach pricing plans will ensure those applications depend on the mobile phone networks instead of encouraging innovators to route around them.
Dirt cheap open wireless access will encourage long term innovation. Rapid innovation in new applications and services is the surest way to produce a steady flow of profitable wireless traffic now and in the future. Open mobile devices and affordable networks will help incubate those apps. Sure that might put a short-term dent in profitable services like SMS today, but in the long term it’ll cement the role of today’s wireless network providers in the post mobile-mainframe future.
