Mobile markets fall flat for many consumers
By John Borland
Staff Writer, CNET News.com
January 18, 2001, 4:00 a.m. PT
Consumers have a message for companies trying to figure out why the wireless Web
market has failed to take off in this country: It's the screen, stupid.
Only a year ago, companies were promising to
liberate the power of the Internet from the confines
of the desktop computer, bringing it to the nearest
pocket-sized cell phone. The gap between hype
and reality is hardly new to the high-tech world,
but one glaring question continues to dog this
multibillion-dollar industry: Why is the U.S. market
so tough when other countries are flocking to the
new technology in large numbers?
Part of the answer lies in a combination of industry
hype, consumer confusion and cultural differences
that change the way people use such technologies
from country to country. But the main reason,
analysts say, is the simple fact that products on
the U.S. market are more difficult to use.
"There was a whole range of things that need to be
changed," said Jakob Neilsen, an influential
Silicon Valley computer consultant, who
conducted a recent consumer survey that yielded
complaints about Web site content, network
connections, baffling navigation and other major
problems. "That leads to the conclusion that, by
the time all of these things have been fixed,
something else will be along to replace it."
Interestingly, a major reason for this technological lag may be the very thing that is often touted
as America's most powerful weapon in technology: competition.
In effect, the stampede of companies joining the wireless gold rush may have created a logjam
of competing services, products and other factors that has helped stall the overall progress of
the technology. The result has created difficult choices for wireless companies facing a
fragmented marketplace.
By contrast, domestically dominant companies such as Japan's NTT DoCoMo have been able
to forge tighter links between hardware, software and content companies. That's created an
environment that many industry insiders say makes it easier to develop software and services
for, and thus makes it easier for consumers to use. That's helped the Japanese market mature
more quickly, many say.
"There was a misconception that (mobile Internet technology) would emerge from the womb as
an adult," says Sprint PCS Chief Operating Officer Charles Levine, stung as many wireless
executives are today by criticisms like Neilsen's. "It didn't."
Perhaps. But few argue that the technology has
matured more quickly in other countries. Analysts
from Silicon Valley to Wall Street routinely point to
Japan and Scandinavia, where average consumers
have welcomed even the most rudimentary access
to the Net over phones.
Worldwide, the only product that has emerged as
an unambiguous success is NTT DoCoMo's
I-mode service. I-mode offers color screens and
small graphics that make it look and act very
different from U.S. versions, which largely offer
only small, monochrome, text-only screens.
As of mid-January, more than 17.7 million people
had signed up for I-mode service, vastly outpacing
the rate of growth of any U.S. wireless Net
company.
To be fair, it's not a perfect comparison. Net connections via the computer are less common,
and generally more expensive, in Japan than in the United States. The I-mode technology is
thus a first or only method of reaching e-mail and the Net for many customers.
Social mores have also helped drive use of the technology. The Japanese tend to adopt
consumer electronics technologies more quickly and use them for entertainment purposes,
analysts say. Others have speculated that social conventions there frown more heavily on
talking on the phone in public places such as buses or restaurants, driving people to use the
silent Net connection more easily.
These caveats aside, virtually everyone who has played with the I-mode phones or developed
Web sites for the technology say it is easier to use than the American and European Wireless
Access Protocol, or WAP, technologies.
An investment by NTT DoCoMo in AT&T Wireless promises to bring some of that experience
with a consumer powerhouse to the United States. Although the companies have not said
precisely how they would integrate I-mode technology into AT&T's wireless service, Ma Bell has
said it is looking to add the Japanese experience to its own lineup.
Next steps
That might not be a bad idea. Although the technology industry has been subjected to a
deafening level of rosy predictions for the better part of a year, the U.S. public has reacted with
little more than a shrug.
It's not that people aren't interested in the technology. Analysts estimate
that about 6 million people in the United States use some kind of wireless
data access, even if only infrequently.
Sprint's subscriber figures, as well as numerous industry surveys, show that
consumers are open to the idea of reaching Net services--e-mail, news or
stock quotes, even simple games--on the go. Sprint PCS saw 1 million of its subscribers try the
service by the end of last year, half of that number signing up for at least a free trial
subscription.
The problem, many analysts say, has been one of unfulfilled expectations.
U.S. companies that produce phones and offer service--from Sprint PCS to Motorola--say they
had to explain their product in a simple way that consumers can understand. So phrases like
Sprint's "Wireless Web" or the "Mobile Internet" quickly took hold, as marketing campaigns
compared the new services to what they knew consumers would understand.
The reality, as anyone picking up a Net phone has seen in America, has been very different.
And that reality has led customers to a reaction that has been lukewarm at best, and in many
cases not far from an active backlash.
What is actually available is slow, text-based access to a relatively small number of sites,
which themselves vary widely in reliability. These perform adequately, but only if the consumer
is expecting something comparable to the Internet circa 1994 or so.
Because of industry marketing, "people really did think they were going to get an HTML screen
scrunched down," said Iain Gillott, chief executive of iGillott Research, a telecommunications
consulting firm.
Even many habitual users, when quizzed, lack the enthusiasm for the services.
Ryan Best, a Utah day trader and consumer electronics retailer, says he uses his phone to
reach stock quotes as quickly as or more quickly than he could over a
computer. But he says the technology needs improvements before it can be
used as advertised on a mainstream basis.
"They're going to have to have a keyboard that they can plug in or
something," Best said, criticizing today's laborious method of using the number keypad to type
URLs. "Nobody has the patience or time to do that."
In his research, Neilsen gave mobile phones with Net access to a group of average consumers,
asking them to keep track of what they did and what they liked. It turned out that most didn't
like much of anything, complaining the phones were difficult to understand and use. The
majority said they'd rather pass on the technology altogether until problems had been fixed.
Picking up the pace
Defenders of the technology note that a new generation of standards is being prepared, in which
the WAP text-based system and Japan's popular I-mode system will merge. Once the
high-speed, next-generation networks are put in place, the speed and processing limitations
that prompted the creation of three-line, text-based interfaces will disappear, they say, and
phone screens will feature graphics and multimedia.
Moving along a parallel track, the distinction between handheld computers and cellular phones
is being broken down. Companies like Kyosera and Samsung are offering phones with the Palm
operating system that have keyboards and large screens built in.
The revenue equation may be more difficult, however. The carriers themselves are still posting
strong revenues from wireless voice services. But growing competition has raised the prospect
of shrinking profit margins, and the carriers are hoping data services can fill in gaps.
Critics of today's U.S. mobile phones say carriers need new technology, new applications and a
better interface before consumers jump aboard enthusiastically. Though that point has yet to be
reached, some look with hope to the possibility of I-mode coming to the United States.
"Once consumers see something that's that much better, it's going to take over," Neilsen said.
Would Kopin CyberDisplay fix this problem? Along with Voice Recognition? |
