DISQUS

jamescoops · 1 year ago

cheap data!

the one place outside of Asia where there's been a real breakout, mass market social network is South Africa - Mxit.

no surprise that its dirt cheap there to use GPRS - ~ $0.10 per MB.

paulsweeney · 1 year ago

This may sound a bit stupid, but one of the things they might need is a reason to exist ! I use jaiku and plazes, and have been contributing to both for over a year. I access via my mobile to "broadcast" where I am, and what I might be thinking about. But is there any real benefit to being mobile, or location aware (at the moment?). In the "early user echo chamber" there is some value in knowing things quickly, thus the amount of journos on the sites. Facebook on mobile (blackberry) does roughly the same thing by broadcasting my "status update".

Mark Curtis · 1 year ago

Hi - I run Flirtomatic. A couple of comments:
1. yes we are wap/xhtml NOT java: we ditched that in 2005 before launch
2. address book cannot be accessed from a browser on any phone that I know of...possibly on the iPhone (we'll know shortly). The APIs are there for java apps but I'd rather eat my hat than launch a java app.
3. zero marginal cost distribution: yes very web 2.0 but this is not the web and the two key elements of viral are not in place viz a) free messaging (email is free, sms not) and b) access to the address book (see above). Expect businesses to grow through clever marketing but viral mobile is ley to be cracked
4. spot on re the independence from operators: it is the right philosophy BUT their portals still control the majority of mobile internet traffic
Get it right....and the users are out there...we had 51,000 unique mobile users in December consuming 118m pages.....

nic · 1 year ago

Thanks guys.

Paul - the point of mobile social networking is to stay in touch with people better - just like online socnets - but with a mobile twist. Status updates are part of that - but being able to quickly share media as you see/capture it is another example.

Mark - interesting comment and great to see you getting so much traffic. Java apps are attractive because of what they offer, including address book integration, but they are painful too. I think cracking that zero marginal cost of distribution problem is going to be the key here.

Ronan HIggins · 1 year ago

Bringing "vastly superior functionality" to the 160x120 pixel phone screen with WAP pages is no easy task. Web-based sites get to enjoy usability features such as ajax that can't be done with WAP.

The "independent guys" (exclusively mobile social networks) have to bring something to the table that simply can't be done or is less important on the web.

Top of the list would be location. But not just "here's where I am" pinpointing.

Location tied into the very essence of what makes social graphs compelling environments to participate and invest time in.

In contrast to Flirtomatic's WAP strategy we've decided to invest the resources in J2ME apps to bring some of the Web 2.0 ajax user experience to the phone. It is expensive and consumers have been averse to installing applications on phones to-date, but Google seems to be paving the way for a change with Google Maps for Mobile.