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?

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.

Convergence of Terrestrial and Satellite mobile communication systems

Mobile Satellite Services

Mobile Satellite Services like Iridium and GlobalStar have a long established reputation of being able to successfully deliver connectivity to the most remote regions of the planet. Unlike traditional mobile phone providers that utilize cell towers for signal strength, satellite phone providers connect to low earth orbiting satellites. These orbiting satellites enable satellite phone service to connect in seconds with a clear signal. So, if you are hiking, cruising or otherwise travelling in a remote area, and need to stay in touch, the satellite phone works best. Only about 14% of the whole world is out of cover.

However, to make a call, you may have to go outside, for you’ll often find they don’t work very well under a roof of any kind. And, the handsets are large and clunky with big ugly antennaes.

Terrestrial mobile networks

Using cell towers, terrestrial mobile networks provide very good coverage in focused locations, however we all despise the “out of coverage area” message we keep getting every now and then.

There has been no good solution for people who were working on the fringes of cellular networks, crossing in and out of coverage areas. Or, those who want to be able to use thier phones when sailing, on hiking trips or vacationing in remote locations.

Integrated satellite-terrestrial Mobile Service

Enter TerreStar. They have come up with an integrated satellite-terrestrial mobile satellite service to be lauched in June this year. This service will enable users across North America to be connected to TerreStar’s network through a “virtual handshake” between the next-generation mobile satellite and UMTS (3G, upgradeable to LTE) terrestrial network. It’s the only fully IP-based satellite phone using high-speed packet data.

Terrestar has come up with a cute and compact device. It sports an internal antenna, touch screen, a full QWERTY keyboard and runs Windows Mobile 6.5. It has satellite, quad-band GSM, tri-band WCDMA/HSPA connectivity along with Bluetooth and WiFi. The device will retail at about $800 USD. It’s the first satellite-terrestrial smartphone with planned service offerings, including: SMS, MMS, IM, Email, Push to Talk, Video services and Location Based Services (LBS).

How they do it

TerreStar will be using a geostationary satellite employing ground-based beam forming technology, a critical element in the system to deliver speed and performance to handheld devices with small, even internal, antennas. In the case of Iridium, a constellation of LEO (low earth orbiting) satellites are used to provide global, but much lower speed and signal strength, coverage.

Sam Churchill of Daily Wireless explains

L-band Mobile-Satellite Service (like that of Iridium and GlobalStar) uses 1525–1559 MHz (Space-to-Earth) and 1626.5–1660.5 MHz (Earth-to-space) while the 2 GHz Mobile-Satellite Service (used by some geosynchrous satellites) uses 2000–2020 MHz: (Earth-to-space) and 2180–2200 (Space-to-Earth).

The techniques developed and patented by Mobile Satellite Ventures (a sister operation of TerreStar) allow the same (MSS) frequency band to be used for both satellite and terrestrial communications seamlessly, yielding simplified single-band/single-mode transparent user devices 

Conclusion

I think it’s a great step forward which will have a profound impact in our lives.

Some of-the-top use cases

• Extention of cellular networks to rural, remote and maritime environments
• Provide mobile users at land, at sea and in the air with ubiquotous multimedia services (Internet, phone, entertainment)
• Always-on mode of communication in Crisis/Disaster areas

Touch screen on mobiles is the new black, but will it overshadow the keypad

 

iPhone’s success has sent all the handset manufacturer’s scurrying to come up with a touch screen device of their own. We have seen touch screen devices being launched by all major players, even RIM which is mostly in the enterprise segment has come up with one. This makes good short-term commercial sense, but I wonder if it points to a trend that’ll overshadow the keypad.

Touch screen definitely has it’s advantages, you save space for the keyboard (which takes up a large percentage of the device area), you can change the complete interface for each app and provide the necessary keys and buttons only, you can save weight and due to no keyboard there are no mechanical wear parts.

That said, let’s look at iPhone’s keypad for a second, it’s not really what we were hoping for. It is so harder and longer to develop a response from the iPhone.. you keep wanting “k” but it gives “i” or some key closer to the letter and this goes for any letter. Doing the same thing on the Blackberry, however, is a breeze.

As Dr Buxton puts it: “Everything is best for something, and worst for something else.” Touch screens are best suited to manipulating information, rather than inputting it in the first place—an area in which keypads remain unchallenged. Mobiles with keypads and touch screens could offer the most flexibility, letting users choose the appropriate input method for each task. Google designers have done a great job in this regard, the G1 is strictly touch screen and has a built in keyboard that slides out.

I think touch screens are here to stay, but it’ll be a while before they overshadow the keypads.

 

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Cloud Computing offers Power to the People

Ok, so for those of you who don’t know what it is, here’s the Wikipedia definition: The computing resources being accessed are typically owned and operated by a third-party provider on a consolidated basis in Data Center locations. Target consumers are not concerned with the underlying technologies used to achieve the increase in server capability, and is sold simply as a service available on demand. Check out this Business Week article on how it works.

And why I love it… Force.com’s tagline says it best “Finally, Focus on Innovation, Not Infrastructure“. What this basically means is that application creators can focus on the experience the app provides to the end users and don’t have to worry about scalability, it’s taken care of by the service provider. It significantly lowers the barrier to entry for internet startups. Power to the people.… yeah!

Google App Engine, Amazon Web Services and Force.com are the top vendors for cloud computing as of now.

Although I’m focusing on it from an application developer’s perspective, it has lot more applications for the enterprise. Check out how cloud computing is enabling enterprise 2.0 here and here

But how is it different from SaaS, you ask? Well, here you go.