Microsoft’s Mobile Gaming Strategy is Brilliant

Colin Gibbs of GigaOm thinks that Microsoft’s Mobile Gaming Strategy is a mistake, he cites that Microsoft will be bring “twitch” games like “Halo” which don’t make sense on mobile… I think that’s a little presumptuous, I think Microsoft’s focus on integrating Xbox Live games with Windows Mobile 7 is a brilliant move and Colin discounted the game database that Microsoft has and it’s ability to bring in games that mobile gamers would love.

Tomi Ahonen points out in his analysis of iPhone Economics that “most paid iPhone apps are games”, this reveals that decent quality games are a big hit with people and they are willing to pay for them so Microsoft’s focus on mobile gaming is a smart move.

In one of his keynotes, Steve Jobs said that one of the big differentiators for iPhone is that it plays full games, not miniaturized “baby” games like other Smartphones. Microsoft will up the ante on this by even better games and an integrated experience, besides, it is a distinctive feature that competitors can’t duplicate.

With the Xbox Live integration Microsoft will tap into an already existing set of users, plenty of whom looking for new ways to boost their game scores, and this could give them an opportunity to do so while they’re away from their consoles at home. I’m sure Microsoft is acting on a bunch of strategies around their phone and mobile gaming is just one of them, but if they can pull off something compelling with their Xbox Live support on the phone, it could be a big win for them.

Carnival of the Mobilists #228

Head over to this week’s Carnival of the Mobilists at msearchgroove for some of the finest in mobile blogging.

This week’s carnival also features my post Android Gingerbread to focus on user experience and fragmentation to counter iPhone

Android Gingerbread to focus on user experience and fragmentation to counter iPhone

Image credit - The Music Void

Google’s core competency is engineering, not UX, and it showed through in its mastery of the implementation of features with iPhone always trying to catch up like with multi-tasking and copy/paste. However, Android UI looks plain vanilla compared to the polish of iPhone UI, Android “UI layers” like Motorola’s Motoblur and HTC’s Sense basically scream out that the standard Android UI isn’t good enough.

With the features mostly in place, Google has decided to take the bull by the horns and make the user experience a top priority. Matias Duarte’s appointment as user experience director for Android seems to be a move in the right direction. Martin was the guy responsible for the the elegance of Palm’s webOS.

According to TechCrunch, the Android team is “laser focused” on user experience for the next firmware upgrade.

Google is focusing the bulk of its efforts on the user experience for the upcoming Gingerbread release to counter this. And they want to get the Android experience closer to the iPhone.

It’s unlikely that third parties will ever completely resist the temptation to meddle to differentiate their products and to get more control over the user. But Google’s goal is to make those “skins” as pointless as possible.

Addressing Fragmentation

Android fragmentation is an issue that has been nagging Google for a while. In the early days, Google encouraged handset makers to add their own customizations and the result was the UI layers like HTC’s Sense, Motorola’s Motoblur, and Samsung’s TouchWiz. Problem is these guys are going further and creating their own sub-platforms.

Wireless Watch points out the fragmentation that’ll follow and the devastating path it’ll lead towards

Some developers fear they will need to choose between being ‘Motoblur programmers’ or ‘Sense programmers’, rather than having their Android apps run entirely unchanged on all the versions. This would create a world more like traditional Symbian – with very different user interface layers such as Nokia Series 60, DoCoMo MOAP, and the now defunct Sony Ericsson/Motorola technology UIQ, all with their own programmer bases

Google wants to deter partners from taking this road by making the default experience superior in terms of handset performance and to homogenize the user experience and address criticisms of fragmentation.

After talking to “people whose words carry weight” at CTIA, Engadget has reason to believe that Google will be “decoupling many of Android’s standard applications and components from the platform’s core and making them downloadable and updatable through the Market” that leaves only base functionality in hands of handset makers and carriers.

This is a positive step towards consolidating and defining the Android operating system as a single, yet flexible, entity which is the only way to compete with Apple.

How will handset makers differentiate

Handset makers working on Android had made “UI layers” as the differentiator for their Android offerings, now with Google bent on making them as pointless as possible, the big question is how will they differentiate.

IntoMobile feels they can focus on “smaller things with a bigger impact like social networking or improved multimedia players”.  I doubt if that’ll be enough to influence buying decisions of the user.

How do you think they can differentiate?

The delicate art of balancing commercial imperative and user experience

I chanced upon this great presentation by Priya Prakash, Creative Director for Consumer Experience at Nokia. She talks about one of the toughest topics facing designers: how to strike a balance between the commercial imperative of revenue generation techniques and the quality of user experience.

What’s the customer’s perception of value?

Value for money is a perception, or to put it more simply, a feeling. It is the state of mind that a customer has.

The old method of “more features – more value” is not relevant anymore. As per a BBC study, people only use a small percentage of features and are baffled by overflow of features

HTC, Motorola and Sony Ericson all make phones on Android platform, but it’s the value perception that they create by enhancing the User Experience using their UI frameworks on top of Android like HTC “Sense”, Moto Blur and Sony’s Rachel UI that differentiate them from each other. The feature-set is (almost) the same but the user experience is different.

Insight - The value perceived is how you create the story – “the consume model” in the minds of the user

In the mobile world, it is all about the user experience

Mobile User Experience

Value for money is a perception, or to put it more simply, a feeling. It is the state of mind that a customer has.

The old method of “more features – more value” is not relevant anymore. As per a BBC study, people only use a small percentage of features and are baffled by overflow of features

“When technology delivers basic needs, user experience dominates.” (Donald Norman – MIT)

3 years ago, iPhone changed the game completely and ever since major handset manufacturers have started focusing on user experience instead of features.

HTC, Motorola and Sony Ericson have all taken to the Android platform, but it’s the value perception that they create by enhancing the User Experience using their UI frameworks on top of Android like HTC “Sense”, Moto Blur and Sony’s Rachel UI that differentiate them from each other (and from iPhone). The feature-set is (almost) the same but the user experience is different.

Same is true even for Microsoft Mobile 7 series.

Insight

Priya Prakash, Creative Director for Consumer Experience at Nokia sums it up nicely

The value perceived is how you create the story – “the consume model” in the minds of the user

Carnival of the Mobilists #187

This week’s Carnival of the Mobilists is up at Mobilestance with some excellent entries on mobile and wireless as always.

This week’s carnival also features my post Netbooks lead the way on how we’ll be using our mobile phones in the near future

Netbooks lead the way on how we’ll be using our mobile phones in the near future

Netbooks are set to revolutionize the mega-trend “Cloud computing” sweeping the technology landscape.

Based on some findings released by ThinkFree based on a survey they conducted, Netbooks are mainly being used for for business, entertainment and communication. Another survey noted that Netbooks will be used as secondary devices. Let’s analyze how they’re being used in each of these categories.

Business

Primarily used for reviewing documents, spreadsheets, presentations and making minor edits, but not generally treating netbooks the primary machine for these applications.

My Opinion: As they are treated as secondary devices, I don’t expect people to pay for Microsoft Office. Thunderbird, Open Office etc are sufficient for simple email management and some word processing.

Entertainment

Browsing the web, listening to music and viewing/editing photos.

My Opinion: As browser and media player are anyway free, Picasa can easily be used for viewing and quick image editing and posting photos to the net.

Communication

Sending email, IM, making VOIP calls and creating blog posts.

Next Step

Since it’s not replacing the laptop, I think what’s basically missing
is a phone added to the mix. I don’t see why users will want to carry
mobile, netbook and laptop at the same time. I foresee a Nokia communicator type device with decent screen size and usable keypad to overtake the Netbook just like Smarphones overtook the PDA. The software being used will need to be adopted for this new phone, that said, software to do all the above already exists for mobiles, it just needs to be made more easy to use.

With larger screen size and better keyboard I don’t see a reason why we’ll not see Netbooks being phased out to give way for the next generation of mobile phones.

Is this thought too outlandish? What do you think?

The Carnival of the mobilists #185

Head over to this week’s Carnival of the Mobilists at Mobileslate for some of the finest in mobile blogging.

This week’s carnival also features my post User Acceptance is the biggest challenge for LBS

Email 2.0: Google Wave solves the “See comments inline” problem

Image by marketingfacts via Flickr

Google Wave is a new model for communication and collaboration on the web. The biggest problem it solves is that you no longer have to reply to someone by saying “See comments inline” copying and pasting the email body and responding to specific points in the conversation. Wave allows you to respond within the original message itself while maintaining the context.

Users can reply anywhere in the message, edit the content and add others. It also allows replying to the other’s replies. Additionally, replies/edits are seen real-time, letter by letter, as they are typed so besides email it can also be used for instant messaging and real-time collaboration.

Oh, and you can also “playback” the thread to check the order which it was edited, and who edited/modified what and when. Pretty neat stuff.

For more, check out the video of it’s launch

The obvious next step is to incorporate it in the Blog Commenting System. WordPress, hope you’re listening… beat Blogger to the punch, after all, it’s open source.

User Acceptance is the biggest challenge for Location Based Services (LBS)

The promise of LBS is providing useful information and services at right place and right time using demographic, contextual and location awareness via the mobile. Primary applications are mostly in advertising, navigation and social networking. LBS applications have garnered the most hype since the beginning,  and yet, critical mass eludes them.

With the technical challenges more or less resolved, I believe user acceptance, owing primarily due to privacy and security concerns,  is the biggest challenge it needs to overcome. LBS apps face distrust by users owing to the loss of personal freedom and control over the technology e.g. intrusive advertising, commercial pressure, loss of autonomy, etc.

It is crucial for the service providers to maintain a level of trust with users by acting transparently with regards to personal privacy translating into strict application of a code of ethics on the service use combined with clear and simple information for consumers on the usages that could be made of their location data / ensure consumers have the means of controlling what they can and cannot do i.e. right not to be located, not to be disconnected, choose who will have access to his data, etc.