So with that background, I’ve been keeping an eye on what Symbian’s been up to, including its recent announcement that it had completed open-sourcing its code. That’s a big achievement, especially doing so four months ahead of schedule. But going open source in and of itself doesn’t solve any of the problems or threats facing Symbian at this point, and again, in and of itself won’t help take down the roadblocks to developers that have sprouted up in the OS over the last several years.

But what the move to open source does mean is that there’s an opportunity for the community to help rectify that (if they’re so inclined). A case in point is the Social Media Framework for the Symbian^4 release, proposed by a company called Sasken. Rafe over at All About Symbian has a great rundown of the SMF and some video about it. Basically, the SMF acts as a middleman between applications on a device and social networks. It interacts with social networking services on one side through service-specific plug-ins, then makes their information available to any application on through the use of generic, built-in APIs.

So, in practice, the SMF would have a plug-in for, say, Facebook, which would link it with, say a contacts API and image-sharing API in the SMF. The SMF server then becomes a single point of contact for applications, and the data it’s pulled in from the social networks are accessed by applications through a common interface. In layman’s terms, it’s sort of like your cable set-top box: instead of having to go out and get separate connections to CNN, ESPN, Disney Channel and so on, then connecting them to your TV, you just connect the box to the TV, and it then makes all the channels available.

That’s a great strategy for Symbian to take, and one which could let it build a strong advantage over some other platforms. Given Apple’s penchant for control, it’s very difficult to see it building such openness and interoperability into its platform; given Google’s myriad services, and its constant attempts to usurp other social networks, it’s hard to see such functionality making its way into Android. So a platform like Symbian (or Palm), that’s not attached to social-networking services via a corporate parent, can really seize this space and take real advantage of its ability to be the best middleman between social networks and devices, hopefully leading to the best integration for users, and the ability for developers to easily create the most compelling social applications.

“Ah, but what about Ovi?” I hear you asking. Nokia obviously gets the importance of integrating social services into handsets, even if the services it integrates aren’t necessarily the best ones. This middleman strategy I’ve highlighted would dictate that the platform provider doesn’t play favorites, and then hopefully the handset vendor would go along with it. If not, they’ve undermined it, and reincarnated the walled garden. Which, really, is more of the same, and not a way for success going forward.

It seems likely that Symbian will live on in Nokia’s mid-range devices where its strengths as an OS running under constrained resources will be useful — and this is where the standard Nokia scale line gets trotted out: “Well, Nokia has 40% market share, and that sort of scale makes it really attractive to developers just on sheer size, etc etc etc. They’ll flock to it”.

Only that hasn’t exactly worked out, has it? Refer to Mike Rowehl’s excellent rant on the subject:

There’s an interesting discussion floating around that a fanatical devotion to iPhone is blinding mobile developers to larger potential markets. And I’m amazed. Really, just freaking flabbergasted, that the conversation could even be taking place. How can anyone seriously say “well, you’re ignoring all those potential millions of handsets out there running Symbian” and keep a straight face? … Stop lying to yourselves, and definitely stop lying to us. Is the Nokia store supposed to challenge Apple? Or Microsoft supposed to? Or RIM? You know what folks, you had your chances. If you want to impress me, if you want me to start developing for your platforms again, get your houses in order. Once things change, once you get your stores developed, released, and proven as a good commercial channels to end users – then we can talk again. Until then we’re all just going to keep laughing at you and developing for iPhone.

Sure, there’s a big potential market there, but the means by which developers are supposed to access it have been a mess, for any number of reasons, such as a poor development environment and poor sales and distribution channels (which is probably being generous to the Ovi store). And that doesn’t even get to the relatively horrific download and install experience Symbian offers compared to other platforms.

So I’m left wondering why any developers who aren’t already working on Symbian products would bother now. In two years, the OS won’t appear on Nokia’s “high-end” devices — ie its most expensive and fully featured devices, which you’d imagine would attract the sort of users who, you know, would be most into buying apps — which doesn’t seem like much of a vote of confidence in the platform. The scale argument has been proven untrue when the path to market and development environment remains so unattractive; it’s also undermined when Nokia itself fragments its devices among multiple platforms. And, in any case, it’s not clear exactly what market Symbian will have in a couple of years’ time, because of Nokia’s choices, but also because of Symbian’s declining market share in the face of increased competition.

A couple of things (at a minimum) need to happen for Nokia to sort this out:
- It needs to elucidate a clear platform strategy so developers (and the rest of the market) aren’t taking cues from comments by marketing staff at user meetups or leaks written up in FT Deutschland.
- Fix the Ovi Store.

If you want to take a screen shot of your iPhone, press down the Home button and then click the top button. The screen sort of flashes and then the shot is stored in the Camera Roll in the Photos menu.

Nice!

Courtesy of MacWorld

Certainly the story is good for a chuckle, but there’s more to it than that: if Japan is a bellwether for mobile, what’s in store for the rest of the world as mobile data traffic continues to grow? New technologies like LTE are often seen as a savior, wringing more throughput out of available spectrum, but some say that those gains will simply be offset by increased usage.

There’s growing talk about the unsustainability of flat-rate data plans, and that eventually operators will have to shift back to usage-based pricing. That seems like the easiest solution, but also the one most likely to undo all the gains the industry has made in getting people to use mobile data. It’s undeniable that flat-rate plans have played a key role in sparking the growth of mobile data services; it similarly seems undeniable that taking two steps back and trying to charge users per KB or MB would not just stifle that growth, but knock the leg out from under the table.

So it’s time to come up with some other solutions — in particular, new ways to deliver mobile content. Certain content could be downloaded during off hours, such as “streaming” radio like Pandora or Last.FM. If those services are building a stream based on a user’s preferences, it doesn’t necessarily need to be streamed; it could be put together and downloaded overnight, then stored locally on the device and ready for playback the next day. This could even be done at home over a femtocell, cutting the mobile network out completely.

Another obstable: the lack of seamless mobile/Wi-Fi switching in most devices. This is another area that the iPhone’s gotten right, while other vendors have — for some unknown reason — twiddled their thumbs. Perhaps old operator objections to Wi-Fi in handsets had something to do with it; but now, if anything, they’ll be happy to offload the traffic from their networks.

These are just a couple of quick thoughts that I came up. What are some other ideas? It’s important to remember that none of these will (or should seek to) completely cut out the mobile network or the ability to use it to access live data. But what can be done to offload non-time-sensitive content, or use other available networks, to free up capacity for that live traffic?

For example, you can look at the screen widths of devices in the database and find which are the most common, or find the number of devices that support a certain audio codec or particular J2ME JSR. Check out the link above for more details and a video that goes into some more depth about the capabilities.

This info’s free, too — all you need is to register a free developer account with DeviceAtlas. This is a great starting place to inform your mobile and mobile web development, helping you to navigate the fragmentation of devices and specs. It can also be combined with other sources of free data, like AdMob’s monthly metrics reports to get a good idea of the capabilities of devices people are using to surf the mobile web. Then, of course, once you’re up and running, you use some analytics on your site to sharpen your focus even more.

Fragmentation remains a hugely annoying problem for mobile developers, but it’s great to see more and more free data and services emerging to help mitigate the problem, even if it’s just a little bit.

– One of the cooler apps I’ve seen in a while is the new beta version of Remote Professional for S60 from Mobileways.de, creator of one of the best and most complete Symbian apps I’ve used, WirelessIRC + Twitter. Remote Professional lets you view and control your handset from your PC, and the new version makes it possible to do so over the web. You simply connect your handset to the internet, then you can view its screen and control it through your web browser (you can also control it over Bluetooth or a USB connection).

Yeah, it’s totally geeky, but it’s also really cool. One addition that Mobileways’ Jan Ole Suhr has added since the first beta version is a feature called the Switchboard. Remote Pro users can connect their handset to the Switchboard, then people can log in to it and view or control the device over the web. Nifty stuff, and Jan Ole is working on some interesting applications of the Switchboard, so stay tuned for more news.

All these new features are still in private beta, but if you’d like to get in on the action, you can email Jan Ole at suhr at mobileways dot de, and tell him MobHappy sent you.

– Another one of my favorite mobile apps, and one that I’ve been using for many years, is WorldMate. It provides all sorts of useful information for travelers, like weather, currency rates, world time and flight info. A new version has just been released for BlackBerry and Windows Mobile devices, called WorldMate Live, with a UI update and some new features, such as the ability to easily create itineraries by emailing in flight and hotel confirmations. The itineraries then get synced to the WorldMate app on your device.

If you travel, you should check out WorldMate, particularly now that the basic version is free. If you want to update to the Gold edition, which adds a lot of flight schedule data and alerts, you can get 25% by using the discount code “specialwml”.

– Skyfire, a new browser for Windows Mobile and Symbian that can handle the “full” web, has opened up its public beta and released a new version for WM devices. Skyfire can do Ajax, Flash, and several types of video, and does it pretty quickly. It’s definitely worth checking out if you’ve got a compatible device.

– I got an email a while back from the creators of KeyToss, a customizable mobile portal. Old hat, I thought, but I actually dig KeyToss quite a bit. The idea is pretty simple and old hat — think My Yahoo or iGoogle for your handset — but KeyToss does a nice job of implementing it, and has some cool features of its own, like the ability to access 50+ search tools, and file-transfer functionality. Definitely worth a look from your smartphone.

– Finally, the folks at FlyingBird sent over their Money Manager application, and its depth is staggering. So many features — budgeting, forecasting, expense tracking. I have to admit that I’ve never been the best money manager, so much of this functionality is lost on me. But if you spend a lot of time mobile and have the need or desire to stay on top of your finances, you could do a lot worse than to try this application.

If you’re just getting started in mobile development, or if you’re looking to connect with new partners and tools, be sure to check it out.

The biggest problem is that people confuse location with context. Location is just a part of the context of each individual user. If I’m near a Starbucks, am I just passing by, or am I going to get a coffee? If I’m at an airport, am I travelling, or am I picking up a friend? My location doesn’t indicate my personal context. To beat up the Starbucks example, yet again, maybe it’s 115 here in Las Vegas when I go by a Starbucks, hardly the time I’d like to have a nice hot cup of coffee — but maybe an iced tea would be good. But maybe I don’t like tea or coffee, or simply hate Starbucks. Anyhow, the idea is that there’s more defining me and my state of mind, my preferences, and my desires than my location. Just the simple fact that I’m near a Starbucks (especially given how many locations they have) doesn’t share any meaningful information about me.

So in light of the continued interest in LBS (not to mention the Starbucks scenario), it’s worth asking, would you rather have a location-based service, or a context-aware one? There are some interesting thoughts on context awareness from an industrial design perspective at Speedbird (via Small Surfaces).

Meanwhile, Google today announced the availability of location information from its Gears Geolocation API on some mobile devices, which some services are already using.

In some cases, such as mapping, there isn’t a great need for context-awareness instead of location, but in many LBS instances, being sensitive to context is much more important than simply location. Are there any good examples of context-sensitive services out there? And, of course, sensing context makes determining location look downright simple. How can developers and service providers best build context-sensitive apps and services?

Update: Check out Helen Keegan’s similar thoughts from last month. And, of course, ping her if you need help in this area as she’s the expert!

One thing that caught my eye is the Plaza widget technology it announced. On the face of it, Plaza is YAMWP — yet another mobile widget platform. But this is one that definitely bears watching for several reasons, but one of them being Qualcomm wants operators involved. That’s likely to cause some kickback right away, because for many people, operators have a reverse Midas touch. But it’s important to remember that they still play a huge role as gatekeepers to the mass market, and their support of one widget platform over another, and the ability to give it a prominent place on the devices they sell, give them a lot of power as kingmakers.

Plaza is not a BREW-specific solution, it’ll be available across multiple platforms, and the QIS exec I talked to about it went to lengths to stress that Plaza and BREW are separate, but complementary technologies. That said, it’s easy to see how some of the lessons and strengths of BREW could be rolled into Plaza and strengthen it. For instance, BREW offers a pretty solid end-to-end application discovery and download solution. It’s completely closed, yes, but it’s probably about the closest thing out there to the iPhone App Store (which, of course, is closed too).

The BREW marketplace is really good at monetization, especially from the operator perspective. So it’s easy to see how Qualcomm could put some similar stuff into Plaza, and create this widget environment that operators would love, charging users for each widget and all the content coming through them. But, they don’t want to. They get that for widgets to take off, they can’t work that way. They see the monetization for the operator coming indirectly, and forsee the widgets themselves being free to download. That said, if an operator wanted to offer their own widgets as gateways to pay services alongside the Plaza gallery of free widgets, that’s an option. But Qualcomm sees Plaza as primarily being a tool for operators to improve the user experience, increase takeup of data services, and reduce churn.

I think the parts of BREW that Qualcomm hopes will most show through in Plaza are the relative ease of the developer experience and its appeal to operators. By embracing operators and making them part of the value chain, Qualcomm can steal a lead over other mobile widget platforms.

Though almost every discussion at the MobileBeat conference in Sunnyvale, Calif., on Thursday centered around the iPhone, venture capitalists told mobile entrepreneurs to broaden their focus and build applications for all phones. Still, all anyone wanted to talk about was the Apple App Store, from which users have downloaded 30 million applications for the iPhone this month.

Startups should “intelligently hedge their bets across multiple platforms,” advised Richard Wong of Accel Partners. His firm has invested in mobile games and application site GetJar, “the store for the other 3 billion phones that aren’t iPhones,” as Mr. Wong put it.

Interesting stuff. VCs (one of whom created an iPhone-specific fund) reminding Valley developers to think outside the iPhone — hard to argue with that on a market share or geographic basis. But the ease of development for the iPhone is pretty alluring for many of these guys, so the CEO of Loopt suggests they first develop for the iPhone and use it as a proving ground, then go to other platforms. Sounds like a decent idea, but it seems to have a few pitfalls, too. The controlled channel of the App Store doesn’t really replicate the distribution experience in the rest of the market, and the demographics of the iPhone user base may not accurately represent the wider mobile market, particularly if you’re trying to target users in countries where the iPhone’s unavailable. Also, what if you want an app to do things that aren’t possible with iPhone apps?

But, there are still good takeaways here for platform providers, device vendors and operators: make development easier, and make app discovery and download simple and rewarding. More thoughts on the former from Symbian VP David Wood, more on the latter from yours truly.