The Changing Face of Mobile Experience and Opportunities for Developers and Designers
by Robert Hall, 1 Mar 2009

Robert pushes the Flash Platform in unique directions. He is currently an independent contractor focusing on utilizing Flash with Flash Media Server for online video delivery, as well as leveraging Flash in interactive exhibits and kiosks for experiential destinations, such as museums, interpretive centers and other venues.

Robert also presents and speaks regularly about Flash in his role as the manager of the Philadelphia Flash Platform Adobe User Group - www.pfpaug.org as well as assisting with the local Philadelphia Flex User Group - phflex.org

Visit him online at www.impossibilities.com

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Over the last several years the mobile handset and smartphone industry has undergone a dramatic change in the overall user experience. New innovations in touch screens allowing multi-user input, denser, sharper screens at smaller sizes, faster smaller CPU's, new battery technology, new device capabilities and the melding of features that used to require several devices, into one - have all been contributing factors.

One of the best examples of a device that embodies all of these catalysts for change is of course Apples iPhone, originally released in June of 2007. It has proven to be quite a force in the mobile industry with Apple going from 0 percent marketshare to 28 percent marketshare in the US for smartphones and with the international launch of the iPhone 3G in July 2008, worldwide it accounts for over 6.6 percent of all smartphones.

The iPhone provides a wonderful user experience via its elegant and simple interface made only better through its use of multi-touch input. With all its networking capabilities, 3G, Edge, WiFI, GPS, and the applications it comes with such as full email and the great Safari web browser, mapping, GPS, a camera, and all the functionality of an iPod, plus all the applications which can be installed via the Apple App Store, its not too surprising why it has really taken off.

At the Mobile World Conference in Barcelona Spain just a week ago, (the largest mobile device centric conference/exhibit in the world) Apple did not even have an official presence. However according to many attendees there wasn't a single new device that wasn't instantly compared to the iPhone on a number of levels. All you have to do is browse the web for articles on the Mobile World Conference, and take a look at what other manufacturers are offering, and its plain to see there is quite a rush to either emulate or surpasses the end user experience that the iPhone delivers. Some such as the Chinese company Meizu have taken to emulating everything from the form factor, to the interface, at such a level that it might as well be a knockoff with a fake Apple logo on it, sitting in a vendor cart on Canal Street in New York City with all the other hawkers of counterfeit goods.

On the more up and up is Palms potential rebirth with its Palm Pre and its new operating system the Palm WebOS which combines many of the best elements of the iPhone such as multi-touch input, but also includes a slide out keyboard. The experience in terms of the user interface design is also very unique and looks to one up the iPhone by allowing developers to leverage existing skill sets that a typical web developer might have, to build Palm Pre apps for its Palm App Catalog in JavaScript with its Mojo framework available here: http://developer.palm.com.

Currently if you want to build an application for the Apple App Store, you need to learn Objective-C, Cocoa and Xcode - the language, framework and development environment, and toolset required to build iPhone apps available here: http://developer.apple.com. Both environments will certainly be easier to pickup for a developer who has experience in JavaScript and building websites and OOP (Object Oriented Programming) techniques, but the Palm Pre WebOS was designed to make things even more applicable. Sure, the iPhone can certainly support web-based apps, and that was initially the only way for third party developers to get their apps on the phone. Now however, the Apple App Store and native iPhone apps are sure fire hits with many apps doing hundreds of thousands of dollars or more in business since launching.

Pangea Software a long time Apple game developer was able to rake in $5 million in revenue in 2008 thanks to the launch of several of their popular titles through the Apple app store. According to Pangea's Brian Greenstone, in only the first four and a half months their iPhone apps have generated more income than retail sales of all of Pangea's apps for the Mac for the past 21 years combined. Success stories like this have led to tens of thousands of apps from third party developers becoming available in less than 6 months from the launch.

So the elegant and refined user experience that the iPhone offers, combined with amazing success stories and the possibility to have a success of your own, makes for quite a compelling case to quit your day job and write mobile device applications all day. If you're not a huge Apple fan, there is no shortage of choices either.

Beyond Palm and its App Catalog, there is also Google's Android mobile platform which has an App Store, even venerable mobile giant Nokia has an app store for its Symbian OS platform used on all of its smartphones. Blackberry, who many a corporate honcho including our new President Obama can't live without, has a new touch screen device out, as well as its own Application Center. Motorola, who once held the lead with its Razr line, and now playing catch-up behind everyone else, has devices running on multiple operating systems, such as Microsoft Windows Mobile, which also has plans to launch an app store called Skybox very soon.

The demand for these applications is real. I personally have already worked on a team to deliver an iPhone application for one of my clients. The application, Concert Vault, launched on November 4th as a free application, and has seen a tremendous number of downloads. The best part of the experience in working on this application, was finding so many other local like-minded individuals with the skill sets, interest and desire to work on mobile applications, particularly for the iPhone.

At the last Philly Cocoaheads meeting, a local group dedicated to Apple Cocoa/Xcode development, there were close to 30 individuals who showed up. This is a huge increase over the course of only a handful of meetings to promote the group since its inception late last year when the group formed and its initial meeting with maybe 8-10 individuals in attendance. At every meeting, the iPhone SDK is always a topic of discussion. Seeing the interest and demand from a variety of individuals in a local setting, really further drives home the sheer popularity and interest in this platform.

Given this huge interest and availability of platforms and choices, and despite the recession and current economy, there are numerous opportunities and outlets for monetizing mobile application development. Pick your favorite platform, head to Amazon and buy a book on developing for that platform, hunker down and create your masterpiece, pray for its approval to pass inspection and get submitted to the app store of your choice, and then wait for the cash to roll in.

Obviously this in idealistic scenario and maybe not very realistic if you have never programmed anything in your life before, but consider that there are billions of mobile devices shipped every year, clearly surpassing the number of desktop computers and laptops shipped. As mobile devices evolve to become even more powerful and capable, approaching near parity with their desktop brethren, it might not be such a bad idea to add a bit of mobile device development to your toolkit. The toolsets and SDK's are improving as well, making for quite a compelling reason to invest.

For designers, there are plenty of opportunities as well - taking a companies brand and extending it to the mobile channel in a seamless and consistent manner provides plenty of work. It's a rarity that a hardcore programmer, who can make all your functionality work flawlessly without bugs, would also embody all the skills that makes a great graphic designer.

Sure there are folks out there who combine both left and right brain hemispheres to deliver the goods in both areas, but its far from the norm and leaves plenty of room for competition for designers, as well as great opportunities for the two camps to huddle together in front of white boards and do battle with erasable markers as they map out their next success story.

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