WebProNews

Tag: Mobile Web

  • Gmail on the Mobile Web Gets an iOS-Inspired Update

    Apparently, people likes the Gmail for iOS UI revamp os much that Google wanted to expand the new look to its mobile web app.

    “Since launching the rebooted Gmail app for iPhone and iPad in December, we’ve heard from many of you that you like the redesigned UI, along with new features such as improved search and integration with Google Calendar. Today we’re rolling out a similar refreshed look to the Gmail mobile web app as well as Gmail Offline that includes many of these same changes,” says Google’s Gmail team in a Google+ post.

    Basically, your mobile web experience inside Gmail is going to look and feel a lot like the new iOS app. And that UI change affects quite a few Gmail users (as plenty of device rely on the mobile web experience).

    Google launched v.2.0 of its Gmail iOS app back in December. It features an entirely updated look, plus improvements like Gmail profile pics in messages, new animations, and infinite scrolling.

    It also added some new features to search within the client, like better automcplete and Google+ commenting.

    Google added Google Calendar data to Gmail search results late last month inside the Gmail Search Field Trial.

  • Facebook Use on Mobile Web Beats iOS & Android Apps Combined, According to Zuckerberg

    Facebook Use on Mobile Web Beats iOS & Android Apps Combined, According to Zuckerberg

    Mark Zuckerberg, Russian traveler, recently sat down for an interview with The Today Show’s Matt Lauer. Although that interview won’t be airing until Thursday, October 4th, Today’s Digital Life gives us a small peek into what the two talked about.

    And already, we see that Zuckerberg said something interesting about the Facebook mobile ecosystem.

    According to Zuckerberg, mobile web is the hotbed of Facebook activity. In fact, he said that more Facebook users around the world access the site via mobile web than by the iOS and Android apps combined.

    Here’s the full quote for context (Lauer asked him about the iPhone 5):

    iPhone is a great platform. There are more people who use Facebook on Android — because Android is just — more people use it, at this point. And the thing that I think a lot of people don’t think about is that there are actually more people in the world using Facebook on mobile Web, right, so not using the apps on iOS or Android, but actually just going to a browser on a phone. There are more people doing that than the iPhone and all of Android phones combined, right? So it’s actually a pretty diverse ecosystem.

    Translation: Mobile web is HUGE for Facebook moving forward.

    That message sometimes gets lost in the clamor surrounding Facebook’s apps for iOS and Android. Of course, both have been much-maligned in the past with claims of slow, clunky, crash-prone, and generally terrible functionality. In August, Facebook for iOS got a massive update that finally brought some speed and stability to the app.

    With that app, Facebook abandoned HTML-5 and built entirely on Objective-C.

    Android users, not a group known to laud their Facebook app, have gotten some minor tweaks to it over the past few months – but no giant update like the app for iOS.

    [h/t The Next Web]

  • Facebook’s Ringmark Goes Completely Open Source

    HTML5 and Open Source software are the future. Even if the old guard of software development don’t want to admit, it’s an inevitability. Facebook has helped move us along towards the future of Web and the power of the mobile Web with its Ringmark tool. Now the social network is giving Ringmark to the people.

    Facebook announced yesterday that they would be completely open sourcing the Ringmark tool. Previously, Ringmark had some of its core functionality, including its tests, go open source, but the entire software suite is now open source. Interesting developers can get the code on github right now. The rest of us can laugh at how our browsers still can’t pass the ring one test on rng.io.

    Speaking of not being able to pass the ring one test, Facebook has changed up the actual test to add in a benchmark for drawing performance. A browser that wants to pass the ring one test must be able to animate 50 sprites at 30 frames per second. A browser that wants to pass the ring two test must be able to animate 100 sprites at 30 FPS.

    One of the major problem areas right now lies in mobile browsers. They just aren’t fast enough to handle a lot of HTML5 games. Facebook, in their ongoing work with mobile, realizes this and will be implementing more tests in Ringmark soon to better test mobile browsers. Going open source also lets developers use Ringmark themselves and test for their own needs on mobile platforms.

    IDC also published an infographic last month that looks at how HTML5 is evolving the mobile platform. Facebook’s Coremob community along with Ringmark has contributed to the number of HTML5 mobile developers that are pushing the Web as the next big platform.

    Browse more Technology infographics.

  • Mark Cuban Informs You About Facebook

    Mark Cuban, financial guru, is known for his candid and sometimes contradictory financial (or life) advice. Typically I enjoy his commentary because he likes to cut right to the core of a topic and clear the air of the convoluted bullshit that sometimes surrounds financial arguments. In this case, he swats down some non-sense about what plagued the Facebook IPO and why it isn’t performing at the level some expected.

    It comes to us in five chunks of information he blasted out on his blog site yesterday. I’ll try to summarize as best I can, but you can also follow the link to his post. To begin with, he explains why the individual investors on Wall Street are going to be getting the shaft from now on. Essentially he wants us to understand that big investors and banks are just using disinformation to screw us out of our hard-earned dollars. I think gets the nail right on the head with that, but it’s definitely nothing new.

    Second, he warns about the activity on secondary trading markets and how they can mess with the values company’s are placing on themselves. I’ll let him explain that a little further. Here’s a segment from the post:

    “Can you imagine how pissed you would be if you bought a boatload of Facebook thinking you got in at a better than IPO price only to watch the price on the open market post IPO drop below the price you paid in the private market ? Ouch.”

    “The law of unintended consequences is that the dynamics for how private companies are valued and are able to raise Pre IPO rounds could quickly change if the prices and volumes on SecondMarket and its competitors declined significantly.”

    His third point keeps right on with a company’s valuation and how it really isn’t an indicator of anything. Share prices are ultimately dictated by supply and demand. Again he comments:

    “Valuation has no relevance what so ever. Conventional wisdom says the buyers of stocks will try to determine the value of a stock before they buy or sell and make the appropriate rational decision. Not even in a Richie Rich cartoon does that happen.”

    His fourth point is the pinnacle of the conversation. It has to do with mobile browsing and, as I have already said before, cuts right to the core of the issue. I’ll summarize. Do you really think people are going to start watching movies, going on Facebook, checking out YouTube videos explicitly on the mobile web? Essentially he believes you are an idiot if you buy into the notion that mobile will kill Facebook.

    Reasons? People have limited data plans and cannot afford to only use mobile devices for online entertainment. Second, the amount of desktop internet viewers is increasing every year. Third, the only other alternative you have to your mobile device is television if you decide to disconnect your home computer from the internet. I think that just about covers it. I’ll throw in that most mobile device screens are rather diminutive in size and not what I want to curl up to on the couch. He poses the question, do you really think mobile viewing is going to put Facebook under?

    Here’s exactly how he put it:

    “Bottom line, if you think mobile will displace online usage from PCs then you should immediately short Google and other ad plays and buy TV stations and networks. If you can’t buy an ad effectively on mobile and no one is using a PC to connect to the internet any more, then the only way to reach an audience is going to be via good old tv. And all that over the top video noise, forgettabout it.”

    The fifth point and grand conclusion to his post is that he purchased about 150.000 shares of Facebook for around $32 per share. So obviously he’s not banking on the shares being worthless by any means. I like what he’s saying and think it could be some good advice for evaluating future investments, especially tech IPO’s.

  • Facebook: Mobile Could Impact Financial Performance

    There’s no doubt more and more of us are going mobile with our internet browsing and it’s a great thing because it means we can enjoy our favorite social and retail sites from anywhere, but for Facebook it could have a negative impact on their bottom line. You see, when you log onto the social platform via a mobile device you aren’t going to be exposed to as much advertising.

    This is actually a really cool thing for us, but advertising is what pays the bills and if those marketing efforts aren’t successful on Facebook, advertisers will take their money elsewhere. In a recent amendment to their regulatory filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), the california-based social giant cited mobile growth as a threat to their revenue earnings and overall financial health.

    The answer is to meet the challenge head-on. Facebook needs to target mobile users in a way which distinguishes them from their counterparts and provides a unique opportunity for advertisers. It’s a huge opportunity for growth rather than a detriment to their well-being.

    CNBC reports that Facebook executives recently met with investors in Boston and New York who may have raised the mobile growth concern, and could be the reason for the update to the SEC filing. Now that the concern has been brought to their attention, I would bet we’ll be seeing action soon.

  • Google Ranks Countries With Fastest Internet Service

    Yesterday we brought you news that Google was planning to invest billions to improve internet speeds, particularly for mobile devices. As part of that effort, they compiled page load data for countries around the world and ranked them by speed.

    According to Bloomberg, who go their hands on the data, the United States ranks solidly in the middle of the pack with load times on desktop computers of an average of 5.7 seconds and 9.2 seconds on mobile devices.

    The countries with the fastest speeds were the Slovak Republic and South Korea. The Slovak Republic was tops in desktop speeds at 3.3 seconds, while South Korea was fastest in mobile with an average of 4.8 seconds. At the opposite end of the spectrum were Chile and Malaysia. Desktop load times in Chile averaged 10 seconds, while mobile load times in Malaysia averaged 12.7 seconds.

    Check out the top tens in each category below:

    Top 10 in Desktop Speeds (in seconds)

  • Slovak Republic (3.3)
  • South Korea (3.5)
  • Czech Republic (3.7)
  • Netherlands (3.9)
  • Japan (4)
  • Denmark (4.3)
  • Switzerland (4.3)
  • Sweden (4.5)
  • Belgium (4.6)
  • Norway (4.8)

    • Bottom 10 in Desktop Speeds (in seconds)

  • Chile (10)
  • Colombia (10.2)
  • Peru (11.7)
  • Brazil (11.8)
  • Argentina (12.8)
  • Malaysia (14.3)
  • Venezuela (14.9)
  • India (15.1)
  • Philippines (15.4)
  • Indonesia (20.3)

    • Top 10 in Mobile Speeds (in seconds)

  • South Korea (4.8)
  • Denmark (5.2)
  • Hong Kong (5.9)
  • Norway (6)
  • Sweden (6.1)
  • Estonia (6.2)
  • Czech Republic (6.3)
  • Japan (6.4)
  • Romania (7.5)
  • Slovak Republic (7.6)

    • Bottom 10 in Mobile Speeds (in seconds)

  • Malaysia (12.7)
  • Indonesia (12.9)
  • Singapore (12.9)
  • Mexico (14.1)
  • Brazil (15.8)
  • Argentina (16.3)
  • India (16.4)
  • Thailand (17.4)
  • Saudi Arabia (21.2)
  • United Arab Emirates (26.7)

  • Google Offering Free GoMo Sites

    Mobile internet usage doubled in the last year, and it has been recently reported that mobile news content has now surpassed desktop content. A recent study by Limelight networks has shown that up to 80% of customers that visit a mobile site that offers a bad user experience move on and don’t return, and Google is helping small businesses to optimize online storefronts for mobile by offering free websites via its GoMo page.

    Google’s GoMo and DudaMobile have joined together to better streamline desktop sites to be more mobile-friendly, by offering various templates, which can be customized. All a small-business owner has to do is enter their URL, and begin:

    google gomo

    The GoMo-DudaMobile site converts the content into a more mobile-friendly version in 5 steps, to where mobile maps, Google AdSense, and click-to-call features can be added, all free for a year. Also, users who sign up for the GoMo-DudaMobile service can import their existing Google Analytics trackers via site settings. Google’s promotion includes:

    • Professional templates and free hosting
    • 1 year Premium Service for FREE* (value of $108)
    • No need to submit payment details – No strings attached.
    • Unlimited Email & Phone Support

    Developers of DudaMobile point out that their platform is best for converting simple sites, and those featuring a lot of e-commerce and Flash content should contact the contact the agency that built their site, or use GoMo’s own website developer directory.

  • Facebook’s Mobile Web used More than iOS/Android Combined

    According to a recent report by Pando Daily, Facebook logs more active users on its mobile web app monthly than it does on its native Android and iOS apps combined. The featured graph, shown during a press meeting at the Facebook headquarters, lacks specific numbers, but the company pointed out that the bars are to scale.

    iOS slightly beats out Android in active monthly users, and mobile web uses obviously take the cake – it should be noted that the “Web” field does include mobile web browsers accessed via Android/iOS devices. Basically, even on platforms where Facebook offers native applications, users still like to access the site plainly through a browser. Essentially, those developing a web service need to incorporate a proper mobile web app.

    A recent study has shown that mobile internet usage has almost doubled in the last year, from 4.3% to 8.5%. While iOS beats out Android regarding Facebook access, more Android users got online in general in 2011. Web access via a mobile device is expected to exceed 10% in 2012.

    OS market share

    The above chart shows the generalized trend regarding mobile OS market shares, ending last year. With RIM on the out, it can be assumed to that Android and iOS will take up the largest part of the market, as mobile web access gains on desktops.

  • Eric Schmidt Speaks at Mobile World Congress 2012

    Executive Chairman of Google, Eric Schmidt spoke at the Mobile World Congress yesterday and he had some provoking things to say about where he sees the World going and the role he sees technology playing. His presentation began by introducing Hugo Barra, director of Android products to demonstrate the Chrome app for Android.

    Barra and Schmidt illustrate the case for Chrome’s fast, clean, and simple design and speak about the importance for users to take everything they have on their computers with them via cloud technology. Quickly after the demonstration, Schmidt launched into his vision portion of the presentation.

    Schmidt speak about the global technology revalution or what he called, “the future for the privileged few”. He threw out information like, “for every one person online, two are not”. His overarching point had to do with how technology changes our lives, but not only as individuals, as a society. He says, “the way we organize ourselves matters”. Under the organization he has envisioned, technology disappears and becomes a “seamless” component of everyday life in society.

    Essentially he seeks to convey his outlook for the future under the technology we currently enjoy. It was a very interesting presentation and I urge readers to view the video of it below:

    I like a lot of what Schmidt has to say about society in the future and responsible use of technology, but he overlooks the negative role technology can take as we struggle to grow and evolve as a society. Overall an enjoyable presentation that gives me more respect for Google and their aspirations for the future.

  • Do Your Android Apps Get A Lot of Use?

    Do Your Android Apps Get A Lot of Use?

    It all depends on which Android apps we’re talking about, according to one of Nielsen’s latest studies.

    What they found, while focusing on Android use, that, while most users access mobile web content through applications, as opposed to simply using the mobile web and one of the available browsers. That being said, while app use is greater than mobile web use in the Android environment, quite a few Android apps don’t get used at all.

    The popular ones are used extensively. The others? Not as much:

    Perhaps more surprising, despite the hundreds of thousands of apps available for Android, a very small proportion of apps make up the vast majority of time spent. In fact, the top 10 Android apps account for 43 percent of all the time spent by Android consumers on mobile apps. The top 50 apps account for 61 percent of all time spent.

    Clearly, the idea is to be have an Android app that’s in high demand, otherwise, it will probably sit on the proverbial shelf, collecting dust and not a lot of users. Nielsen even presented a pie chart to visualize the app usage breakdown:

    Android App Use

    As you can see, while there is definite use of Android apps that fall outside of the top 50–39 percent, to be exact–that part of the pie is divided up between almost 250,000 different applications. Meanwhile, the top 50 get to enjoy over 60 percent of the Android crowd using their mobile programs.

    Clearly, the goal is to create an application that already has high demand, or, in the case of something like Twitter, invent something people didn’t even know they wanted and/or needed. The problem with that approach is, the returns may not be immediate.

    Nielsen goes on to discuss just how much time Android owners spend on the mobile web, either via app or mobile browser, of which, Nielsen’s blog post says:

    …the average Android consumer in the U.S. spends 56 minutes per day actively interacting with the web and apps on their phone. Of that time, two-thirds is spent on mobile apps while one-third is spent on the mobile web.

    There is, of course, an additional pie chart to emphasize their findings:

    Android Web Use

    If you’re a mobile app developer focusing on the Android crowd, Nielsen’s findings present something of a dilemma. Clearly, Android users love to use the mobile web, and they prefer to do so with an application. So far, so good. The problem is, if the app being developed isn’t a hit with Android crowd, it may simply go unnoticed and/or unused.

    Obviously, marketing comes into play here, because the idea of making people think they need the item you’re offering is incredibly basic, but also a fundamental approach that should not be overlooked.

    What about you? Do you use Android apps that fall outside of the top 50? If so, are you satisfied? If not, why? Let us know in the comments.