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The iPhone obsession

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Re: The iPhone obsession

#71

Post by pyre »

pyre wrote: post #62
awolf wrote: post #28

"First, so what? No, let me rephrase that: So fucking what? Since when does web development mean leaving 50% of your mobile users out in the cold? Since when is “I only support browsers with a large market share” a valid argument? (Answer: since we have an iPhone up our ass.)" A device has more than 3x its market-share in traffic-share and we are supposed to ignore that? That doesn't seem realistic. This gap between…

He also makes these points: * Those usage numbers (50% of mobile browser traffic) could be a US-only statistic * People on other browsers might not browse the web as much because not enough effort is made to making web content usable on those browsers. Viewing your argument alongside the second point poses a possible chicken-and-the-egg problem. No one is using other mobile browsers because the experience sucks, but…

I guess I can bolster this with the usage scenarios that are probably happening:

People get their phone and try to use the mobile browser, but the experience sucks so they give up (or only use it whne they really need to get some info from the web).

Developers look at the usage statistics, see that no one is using the other browsers and proudly declare that the people whole own phones with those other browsers don't want to access the information that they are presenting to the world, so therefore there is no point in targeting them as an audience.

The problem is that this is the wrong conclusion to make. Just because people aren't accessing your content in a certain way does not mean that they don't want to.

Re: The iPhone obsession

#73

Post by ZeroGravitas »

Are people actually designing for Webkit mobile? I thought the big breakthrough with Mobile Safari was that basically every website on the web just works.

Okay I have to turn the phone sideways to read Hacker News comfortably, but apart from that it generally just works. Mobile enhanced sites are nice but if we had to rely on them then we wouldn't be getting any mobile web at all.

If the other phones can't render that non-iPhone optimised sites then they've got bigger problems than not being able to see the iPhone version, because only some vanishingly tiny percentage of the web is available in that format.

(I believe Opera's command of the market on lower end phones was partly due to very smart reformatting of standard webpages (done both server- and client-side.)

Re: The iPhone obsession

#74

Post by GeneralMaximus »

rimantas wrote: post #47
pieter wrote: post #11

Lots of mobile browsers have iPhone in their UA strings to work around browser detects that obsessed web developers have set up. Do all traffic market share reporters work around that problem? Most probably do, but we can’t be sure. Which browsers do that?

This quote does not make much sense at all. Looks like ppk is so blinded by iPhone hate that he did not even bother to find out how these thing work. iPhone was the first mobile phone which made ordinary web usable on mobile device for me—and that's for sites without no optimization whatsoever. On the other hand most of optimization which makes web experience even more enjoyable on iPhone can be very simple (as simpl…

> iPhone was the first mobile phone which made ordinary web usable on mobile device for me ...

... while the rest of us did fine with Opera Mini on whatever "dumb phone" we owned. Try out Opera on one of Nokia's high-end Symbian phones one day (the N95 comes to mind). You'll be pleasantly surprised :)

Re: The iPhone obsession

#75

Post by GeneralMaximus »

mrduncan wrote: post #45

For instance, SMS only really took off with the Obama campaign, while the rest of the world became addicted to it years ago. Anyone happen to have stats to support that, I find it very hard to believe based on (admittedly anecdotal) evidence.

I can only tell you that SMS is big in India. And when I say "big", I mean so mind-bogglingly, utterly huge that you're going to have to grow an extra brain just to imagine the sheer volume of SMSs Indians send each day.

Re: The iPhone obsession

#77

Post by tjogin »

mrduncan wrote: post #45

For instance, SMS only really took off with the Obama campaign, while the rest of the world became addicted to it years ago. Anyone happen to have stats to support that, I find it very hard to believe based on (admittedly anecdotal) evidence.

SMS:ing is bigger than (mobile) phone calls in Sweden, especially among young people — all they do is text each other, back and forth, even when calling might be cheaper. It's been this way for years.

Key reasons: receiving an SMS is free (I believe this to be true of most countries except the US).

Sending SMS as well as making calls is much much cheaper.

SMS are usually delivered the moment they are sent.

Re: The iPhone obsession

#78

Post by mhw »

anotherperson wrote: post #35

Here’s the thing: developing for the iPhone means that you are developing for any browser that supports web standards. Why bend over backwards for browsers on phones with archaic web browsing capabilities. If anything, it will force vendors to get with the HTML5 and CSS3 programs.

And of course, once the vendors get with the HTML5 and CSS3 programs they'll release new firmware packages including the new version of the browsers for all the old devices that have archaic browsers, and then your users will all go and download the new firmware and install it on their phone, and, bingo, you don't need to worry about supporting the archaic browsers.

You're obviously new in town, so I'll point out the two flaws in your reasoning:

1) The vendors won't ship updated firmware for all the old devices they've already shipped to market. There are just too many different combinations of devices and firmware versions (each network typically gets a custom firmware build to include their links and logos), so the cost would be huge.

2) Even if they did ship updated firmware, most users won't bother installing it.

The mobile market just isn't like the desktop market - what you're effectively saying is that people can't use your web application until they upgrade to a new phone.

Re: The iPhone obsession

#80

Post by al_james »

When you spend money developing a mobile app, you have to future proof it so that keeps up with the apps/sites of similar functionality, otherwise people will end going to your competitors (obviously that statement depends on your service, but its certainly the case in my sector). People with smartphones wont want to use a site that is so stripped down it would work well on a crappy handset.

We are sitting on the edge of a large explosion of smartphone devices and (potentially) users (with lots of Android handsets coming out this year). In the UK you can now get a Android powered device for £20 / month with a free handset. If you want a smartphone (and therefore probably interested in using the web), you will be able to afford one this year (at least in Europe!). This is going to be huge.

The iPhone is the standard they all will judge themselves against, and therefore the iPhone is the benchmark device.

I would suspect that the 50% smartphone / 50% other phone traffic statistic will be way higher towards smartphones in 12 months time.

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