Tag Archives: iphone

Mobile access should not be an afterthought

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I’m a heavy user of mobile devices including an iPhone 4 and a first generation iPad. I am also a very heavy consumer of news and information. Most of that consumption these days is via one of these mobile devices. So a long overdue realization really hit me, finally, this morning as I sat on my couch, trying to pore through as much news coverage of the huge, multiple tragedies in Japan as I could. Why on earth should articles, media, and other online information content still be created for the desktop PC browser first, and mobile devices as a distant afterthought?

I know, I know. There are many good reasons why this is the case. but frankly, I don’t care. As a mobile device user, I am fed up with the poor user experience I am forced into when consuming information that is not created with mobile devices in mind. I think that content creators and providers should by now think FIRST about making their content friendly for mobile devices and THEN for desktop PC browsers, not the other way around.

Every recent technology trend or study about adoption of mobile vs. desktop devices supports this. Mobile devices, broadly defined, are the present as well as the future. We need a sea change NOW in terms of content creator/publisher thinking! It is crazy, from a user perspective, that we are building and distributing content, still, based upon what is quickly becoming the tip of the iceberg.

I’ve experimented with lots and lots of different methods that try to ameliorate this situation: apps like FlipBoard, Zite, Google’s Mobilizer service, Readability, and many others. Each one is clever, inventive, and useful, but each has its limitations and doesn’t present a complete solution. I believe that the real answer lies in building for mobile first and primarily. Only then will the user experience improve.

Like many others, I am quite used to dealing with a poor user experience when trying to consume information, news, etc. on my mobile devices. But increasingly I ask myself, why should I have to put up with it?

The mobile future

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One thing that having an iPhone and and iPad has taught me is that the future is mobile. Lots of recent studies and news items point in this direction.

I’ve been spending time thinking about this as part of a goal at my work. What I’ve read and seen show that our library services have to at least account for mobile access, if not focus primarily on that means of access instead of, say, access via a regular website or portal. This might seem like common sense and it is. But unfortunately we are far from where we should be in terms of being able to serve up valuable content in an easy-to-use mobile format to our users. I’ve learned that especially in our line of work — healthcare — there are quite a few applications and sites that are optimized for mobile, but there are also many others, especially those that are expensive to buy and serve up, that are either unfriendly to mobile altogether, or the provider expects us to pay a separate license for a mobile-friendly version. This is ridiculous.

Another hindrance is the fact that my company currently only supports mobile devices that are extremely limited in their functionality (Blackberries). This is changing but not quickly enough. This past week, for example, I was very happy to hear that a large part of our staff in international markets might begin using iPads. But the fact remains that it is hard to build a mobile strategy for content delivery based on devices that have limited functionality. This is complicated also because not every device functions the same way. We in the library do not have the luxury of limitless resources to devote to support for multiple mobile platforms in addition to all of the other work we do. We know that if we serve up mobile content, it has to be done in a compelling and user-friendly way, otherwise our users won’t bother to come back to us. To do this will take a lot of work.

Then there is the problem of getting our foot in the door with the people in our corporate IT group who support mobile devices to ensure that our content is made available on supported devices.

Another twist that I have a lot of personal interest in is the possibility for corporations to support or allow the use of personal mobile devices for business. For example, as I mentioned already, I have an iPhone as well as an iPad. I use these devices (especially the iPhone) for business use but it is my personal device and I am quite limited in what I have access to. Mainly I use the web version of our corporate email system to keep track of emails and calendar.  Although recognizing the risks and challenges for companies like mine, especially when they exist in a heavily regulated and risk-averse business like healthcare, I think support for personal mobile devices should be seriously considered.

Goodbye, Flickr

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I’ve been saying “goodbye” — figuratively speaking, of course — to a lot of things I’ve used in the past.  For instance, I recently said “goodbye” to using Firefox in favor of Google Chrome.  Now I am saying goodbye to Flickr, a service I’ve used for many years.

Instead of Flickr, I plan to use Google’s Picasa Web Albums (PWA) for uploading and sharing my photos from now on (in addition to sharing them here on this blog.)  The reason for this switch is simple:  Google recently dropped the storage prices to ridiculously low levels.  I’m able to pay $5 per year for 20 Gb of storage.  Compare that to paying nearly $25 per year for Flickr.  I realize that with Flickr, storage at the Pro account level is unlimited, but 20 Gb of storage on Google is way more than enough for all of my online photo albums.

I also realize that Flickr will remain a favorite of photography cognoscenti, and that my switch to PWA won’t hurt Flickr in any way. But there are several other reasons I made the switch besides the cost factor.  Since it was first released, I have used Google’s free desktop photo application, Picasa.  It is head and shoulders above just about every other similar software application out there, particularly with the latest release.  I’ve tried a lot of other similar applications, including iPhoto, and I’ve decided that Picasa is the best for my needs.  There is tight integration between Picasa and PWA, so this tilts the balance in favor of switching to PWA in my mind.  In comparison, Flickr has all kinds of third-party plugins for uploading and downloading files and other stuff, and I’ve tried them all.  Picasa is way ahead in this area and Flickr is at a significant disadvantage.

Also, because Picasa is available on Windows and Mac, I am able to interact with my photos no matter what computer I am using.  This is critical.  I can download photos from my cameras onto any of the computers I use, load them into Picasa, and then sync with PWA.  I can then download them or sync them from PWA to Picasa on any other computer.  I can do all this on my iPhone as well (for this, I use Pixelpipe).

Picasa Web Albums lacks many of the nice features that Flickr has, I’ll admit.  For example, PWA only recently began to track number of views for each photo, as well as number of times a photo is “favorited.”  This was built into Flickr and is much better executed.  In PWA, for example, I can’t see a summary of this data. Instead I am only able to see it on an individual photo by photo basis.  However, over the years I have become a bit frustrated with Flickr’s overall capabilities as well.  Google’s Picasa has excellent face recognition, for instance.  Flickr does not.  Flickr’s overall interface is bland and somewhat stagnant (my opinion).  Picasa Web Albums features much better geolocation capabilities.  PWA also has tight integration with Google Contacts and Flickr doesn’t have anything to compare to this.

I’ve actually used both services for years.  The only substantive thing holding me back from making the switch was the cost of storage on PWA.  Now that it is set at a reasonable price, the decision was a no-brainer.  (And did I mention that the extra storage I purchased for PWA can be used for all kinds of other stuff, not just for photos?)

Moon Shot with iPhone

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Below is a recent photo of the moon taken with my iPhone camera. I’m not sure if it is as good as I think it is, having only viewed it on my iPhone. The point is that sometimes, even in low light conditions, I can get a surprisingly decent photo from the iPhone’s camera.

I’ve started to use the iPhone’s camera a lot more lately despite its significant limitations. Why? Because it is very convenient; it is almost always available to me. This is about the only thing I think is subpar on the iPhone, and I wish it was better.