Opera sets mobile "mini" for global release
Saturday, 31. December 2005, 13:04:41
Opera's mobile mini software for cell phones got a boost last week as the company prepared it for global release. Until now only cell phone users in Nordic countries could use the product. According to Opera's own public assessment, the mobile mini browser is the crown jewel of the firm's software offerings.
It could be said, improbably, that the marketing folks in Oslo can get overheated even at the end of December in Oslo, but in this case they might be right, at least in in Europe and Asia where a lot more Internet access is through cell phones. Opera will thrive in these markets. In the U.S., with its reliance on desktops, use of cell phones for Internet will depend more on whether content providers will tailor their offerings to mobile devices and make the pricing attractive. Finally, the quality of the handset is going to make a huge difference. The dispay, ergonomics, ability to store data, and integration of functions will all play a role in whether U.S. uses adopt mobile devices for Internet applications beyond text messaging, which represents about one-third of all cell phone use for applications other than voice.
According to M.Metrics, a Seattle market research firm, fewer than four (4%) percent of all cell phone users access work related email via cell phones. This places mobile device email users in an elite, narrow category of early adopters. Interestingly, a growth area is that mobile gamers are more likely in the near future to sign up for paid services via cell phone than knowledge workers. Opera's success will depend on breaking out into the mainstream of these markets.
Opera Lifts Curtain on Mini Browser
December 20, 2005
By Matt Hines, eWeek
Browser maker Opera Software released a final preview of its latest mobile application, dubbed Mini, which promises to deliver improved Web viewing to wireless handsets.
The Norwegian company said Tuesday that it silently lifted a regional restriction it had placed on an advance version of the browser software, which had previously limited downloads to users in Nordic countries and Germany, ahead of Mini's expected January launch.
The application claims to deliver a more desktop-like Web experience to any handset capable of running Java-based mobile applications, which includes many popular phones already in the hands of consumers.
Opera spokesman Eskil Sivertsen said the restrictions were removed to help the company test its browser's capacity to prepare for the global launch.
[snip]
Offered free of charge, Mini was designed as a simplified version of the firm's other wireless offering, Opera Mobile Browser, which is designed to run on so-called smart phones, or more sophisticated wireless devices that offer the memory to store and run such applications.
Claiming the ability to run on most Java-capable handsets, Opera Mini promises to deliver the same performance of the Mobile Browser technology to a much wider range of devices.
Company officials maintain that the browser could run on hundreds of millions of existing phones that use WAP (Wireless Access Protocol) to access the Web, giving it a huge potential audience worldwide versus the smaller numbers of customers in the relatively new smart phone sector.
[snip]
Opera claims that despite Mini's smaller footprint, which uses a Java client application downloaded onto the phone to communicate with the company's servers, the browser offers almost the same experience as its device-hosted software.
The slimmed-down browser application leans on the servers to transform and compress Web content for smaller screens, eliminating much of the need for local memory.
[snip]
Some experts have debated whether users will ever embrace mobile browsers such as Opera's, which mimic the same style of interface as Microsoft's Internet Explorer and other popular desktop Web surfing tools.
With limited real estate on the displays of most handsets, systems which use voice input to locate and call up different types of content or Web pages may be more appealing to subscribers someday.
It could be said, improbably, that the marketing folks in Oslo can get overheated even at the end of December in Oslo, but in this case they might be right, at least in in Europe and Asia where a lot more Internet access is through cell phones. Opera will thrive in these markets. In the U.S., with its reliance on desktops, use of cell phones for Internet will depend more on whether content providers will tailor their offerings to mobile devices and make the pricing attractive. Finally, the quality of the handset is going to make a huge difference. The dispay, ergonomics, ability to store data, and integration of functions will all play a role in whether U.S. uses adopt mobile devices for Internet applications beyond text messaging, which represents about one-third of all cell phone use for applications other than voice.
According to M.Metrics, a Seattle market research firm, fewer than four (4%) percent of all cell phone users access work related email via cell phones. This places mobile device email users in an elite, narrow category of early adopters. Interestingly, a growth area is that mobile gamers are more likely in the near future to sign up for paid services via cell phone than knowledge workers. Opera's success will depend on breaking out into the mainstream of these markets.
Opera Lifts Curtain on Mini Browser
December 20, 2005
By Matt Hines, eWeek
Browser maker Opera Software released a final preview of its latest mobile application, dubbed Mini, which promises to deliver improved Web viewing to wireless handsets.
The Norwegian company said Tuesday that it silently lifted a regional restriction it had placed on an advance version of the browser software, which had previously limited downloads to users in Nordic countries and Germany, ahead of Mini's expected January launch.
The application claims to deliver a more desktop-like Web experience to any handset capable of running Java-based mobile applications, which includes many popular phones already in the hands of consumers.
Opera spokesman Eskil Sivertsen said the restrictions were removed to help the company test its browser's capacity to prepare for the global launch.
[snip]
Offered free of charge, Mini was designed as a simplified version of the firm's other wireless offering, Opera Mobile Browser, which is designed to run on so-called smart phones, or more sophisticated wireless devices that offer the memory to store and run such applications.
Claiming the ability to run on most Java-capable handsets, Opera Mini promises to deliver the same performance of the Mobile Browser technology to a much wider range of devices.
Company officials maintain that the browser could run on hundreds of millions of existing phones that use WAP (Wireless Access Protocol) to access the Web, giving it a huge potential audience worldwide versus the smaller numbers of customers in the relatively new smart phone sector.
[snip]
Opera claims that despite Mini's smaller footprint, which uses a Java client application downloaded onto the phone to communicate with the company's servers, the browser offers almost the same experience as its device-hosted software.
The slimmed-down browser application leans on the servers to transform and compress Web content for smaller screens, eliminating much of the need for local memory.
[snip]
Some experts have debated whether users will ever embrace mobile browsers such as Opera's, which mimic the same style of interface as Microsoft's Internet Explorer and other popular desktop Web surfing tools.
With limited real estate on the displays of most handsets, systems which use voice input to locate and call up different types of content or Web pages may be more appealing to subscribers someday.
WIDGETIZE