"Your Name" <your.name@isp.com> wrote in message
news:your.name-3108101423580001@203-109-166-240.dial.dyn.ihug.co.nz...
> In article <sBVeo.34645$6o7.14749@newsfe21.iad>, "Todd Allcock"
> <elecconnec@AnoOspamL.com> wrote:
>
>> "Your Name" <your.name@isp.com> wrote in message
>> news:i5h6gh$s8i$1@lust.ihug.co.nz...
>> >
>> > "Todd Allcock" <elecconnec@AnoOspamL.com> wrote in message
>> > news:ArQeo.8196$sL7.4825@newsfe15.iad...
>> >> At 29 Aug 2010 10:14:21 -0500 Jolly Roger wrote:
>> >>
> <snip>
>>
>> > That's why specific mobile versions of websites were created. They
>> > didn't
>> > really become popular because browsing on such hopeless devices was too
>> > tedious and annoying ...
>>
>> Actually they were popular BECAUSE browsing "real" websites on such
>> devices
>> was too tedious and annoying. And far too data intensive when 30-40kpbs
>> GPRS was considered a "high speed" mobile connection. So, most popular
>> commercial websites had mobile versions long before the iPhone was a
>> gleam
>> in Steve's eye. I used to bookmark my favorite mobile sites and visit
>> them
>> on my PC because they are quicker, less ad-filled, and get right to the
>> point without, as JF says, "the fluff and flowers." These days many
>> websites have figured that trick out and force-direct desktop browsers to
>> their real site to insure we get the ad impressions.
>>
>>
>> > until the iPhone arrived and showed how to do it properly.
>>
>> Nice revisionist history. Actually the iPhone promised us "the real web"
>> and sort of delivered. However, since using any browser, regardless of
>> how
>> well it renders, is tedious on a 3 or 4" screen, many websites started
>> offering iPhone-specific pages, giving us the delicious irony that
>> despite
>> the "real web" browser, the iPhone is often viewing the same or similar
>> mobile-formatted pages that those "tedious" other smartphones and most
>> dumbphones are viewing. The BBC webpage referenced in this thread is but
>> one example.
>
> Nope. Web browsing on a mobile device (excluding laptop computers of
> course) was unpopular because it was slow and the user interfaces were
> tedious and difficult to use on such small screens ... not to mention the
> cost of the device and the mobile data connection, but that hasn't really
> changed!
What has changed is that mobile websites have become richer with more
capable devices and faster networks, and that more people can now
comfortably view "real" websites instead of mobile-formatted sites on mobile
devices.
> The iPhone (and iPad) together with the upgrades to 3G networks have made
> it much simpler and much more popular. The iPhone brought mobile web
> browsing to the general public, and it is still the mostly widely used
> device for the task by a huge margin. The March 2010 numbers for the UK
> have the iPhone at 70.2% of mobile web users. Every other mobile company
> has since been rushing around trying to make a clone.
Still quoting AdMob stats? AdMob includes ads served up within iPhone and
Android _apps_ as "mobile data usage" which heavily skews the data towards
iOS and now Android. Even AdMob admits its data is useful only for trend
analysis, and not hard market share or usage statistics.
http://metrics.admob.com/2009/10/pla...cs-in-context/
While certainly much more popular today, mobile browsing has been around for
quite some time, and has been used by quite a few people even before the
iPhone and its iPhoney successors. If it were as unpopular as you seem to
think, why were there literally thousands of mobile sites in existence
pre-iPhone? Because web developers had nothing better to do?