I have always believed that mobile phone is the best platform for socializing because the phonebook already contains all the contacts that you care about. The best (or widely accepted) mobile social network will be the one which will integrate with the mobile’s phonebook. Some advances have already been made in this area like Zyb, but it needs to support the phones that my friends use, till then it’s just worthless.

This is in line with the results of my models that I have innovated (please google my name). Just for your quick reference, Internet and Mobile Commerce are two different paradigms. We access Internet at homes and offices, where the environment synergizes with our mental frame of mind. Mobile is about on the go applications. Those applications which synergize with “on the go” needs are more likely to succeed on mobile.

Now coming to social networking, it is a typical Internet application and we would like to network at places, where we enjoy doing it. If we look at the success of mobile mail in Japan (which gave i-mode a success), it in fact took off when young adults (especially girls) started sending messages back and forth, while traveling on trains. This is more than just P2P application - it is in fact entertaining companionship. Social networking through the electronic media is today about entertaining companionship.

Having said that the 20% who use mobile for social networking would be either doing from home and offices or from places, where they have greater control on the environment. I would consider a seated passenger in a long distance metro (about 60 or more minutes of journey) enjoys a similar environment as homes and offices.

My analysis is slowing being accepted but what I am fighting against is the innundation of technology, which is blurring the ability of our business scientists to think more pragmatically.

You are welcome to throw bricks and bats and am sure there will be some flowers too.

“The Vodafone study figures provide interesting insight into not only usage patterns, but also the ‘challenges’ that stand in the way of consumers using their mobile device to access social networking sites.

“At Colibria we believe that these ‘challenges’ arise from the current use of portals to access social networking sites.  Furthermore we believe that next generation solutions currently in development will deliver an exemplary social network experience to the consumer, whilst also providing a natural evolutionary path to industry initiatives such as the Rich Communication Suite Initiative.

“These solutions will enable the consumer to see which of their contacts have updated their status or posted materials onto a social network service (SNS) simply by glancing at their mobile device address book.  With one click the consumer can then seamlessly view this specific update, increasing the propensity for them to communicate and interact with this contact.  This will ultimately lead to not only more people accessing their SNS via their mobile device, but will increase the speed of interaction too. 

“Incorporate the capability to do this across multiple SNS, be they mainstream such as Facebook or MySpace, microblogging sites such as Twitter or media sharing sites such as flickr, and you will deliver a completely integrated social networking experience directly to the consumers’ mobile device.

“Through enabling technologies such as Presence, SIP/SIMPLE and IMS, Colibria is developing interfaces to the SNS, enabling this new generation communication experience to become a reality.”

The fact is that internet usage via mobile phones is low right now, but will grow over the next couple of years. One of the reasons that usage is low is because of the hardware required for respectable internet capabilities. The iPhone 3G is a good start to getting the hardware into the internet users hands.

Once people have access… I think that social and professional networks are going to see most of the mobile traffic. Business networks are really going to see a surge in activity with more mobile web penetration.

Brian
http://www.konnects.com