Re-post: answer to "What is a mobile social network"

I answered a question on "What is a mobile social network" on a LinkedIn. My response is copied below, but visit the original post for other replies.

Hi Paul,

Yours is a timely post, and I think your comment spans two broad issues: user experience in a mobile app, and adding a mobility dimension to social networking. It is getting so much easier now to develop apps for mobile devices, but developers who can build great user experience for the mobile user are still few and far between. Web browsers on mobile devices like the S60 (which uses the same WebKit browser platform as Android) have improved tremendously, and I think this has made developers a bit lazy. This won't last long though as user sophistication will drive the demand for better user experience on mobile devices.

And as you said, eventually "you either need a mobile application or a Web site that has been optimised for mobile phones". I agree, but I think it is becoming increasingly irrelevant whether the app is native to the device or web-based, and platforms like Google Gears and Adobe AIR are blurring the line even further as they let you function online and offline seamlessly.

I see some or all of the following factors (depending on app) as important for user experience, some already mentioned in the replies:

- The ability to discover the user's context and location, either automatically or manually input by the user, and use them to enhance the app's features, like answering your ‘where are you’ question. We don't have to wait for GPS phones for this - look at what the Google Maps people can already do with base-station triangulation: http://www.google.com/mobile/gmm/mylocation/index.html.

- Making full use of the device's capabilities, taking into account how the user will be using the device. For example, thumbing instructions on the number pad would be better than scrolling to a link using the arrow keys.

- A built in reputation system that will allow the user to query on the trustworthiness of objects and people within vicinity, giving the user an opportunity to gain a comfortable level security before interacting with them.

- The ability to pick up where you left off on your desktop app/wired network and continue your interaction while mobile, as in Pekka's reply. If you can have an app with those features, an amazing set of opportunities opens up for social networking, like those in the replies and many more yet to be conceived!

To answer your questions...

1. What mobile social networking sites do you like/dislike? As a user, I like Facebook, because it allows me to be lazy at keeping in touch, while at the same time being able to do just that, and to let my friends know what I'm up to at various effort levels (status update, at the very least... send a message if i'm feeling chatty, or post a blog if I have something to get off my chest). As a developer, I dislike Facebook, because while it does give me access to the largest online social network, it is still a closed ecosystem.

2. What’s the one feature you’d like to see in order to get you to use one? Actually, I would like to see my social network opened up and integrated into (or accessible from) all the apps that I'm currently using. I want to be able to forward an email from my Gmail account to a group on Facebook or advertise for post a contract job for a freelance photographer on my Flickr network straight from my Basecamp project page.

@Peter: WiMAX is coming, slowly but surely :). Our WiMAX projects are mainly focused on rural access but our infrastructure partner is part of a group that has just deployed the first mobile WiMAX pilot in Kent: http://tinyurl.com/35g93b

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