Some predict that blind people will be frozen out of the upcoming gambit
of wireless information services that they predict will occur in the next
few months. The article below and one to follow puts a reality check on
the whole issue. There are a number of things that may be potential
barriers and need to be resolved before tens of millions of people adopt
this technology in their lives. The vision is to access information
anywhere. Whether this is the solution that delivers that goal is
uncertain.
kelly
The New York Times
July 10, 2000
Wireless Web Has Big Promise but a Few Kinks
By SAUL HANSELL
It is going to change everything, they say. A new wave of
technology will put the world at people's fingertips. Pundits speak
breathlessly of checking stock quotes, sending e-mail messages,
even buying books at the touch of the button. And investors are
racing to buy into the companies making it happen.
Sound like the Internet in 1995? Indeed it does. But today all the
same hope and promotion are directed at a new generation of
services offered through cellular telephones, pagers and myriad
other radio-wave gizmos. All that is missing is a glossy magazine
to chronicle it all, called, say, Unwired.
In some ways, the wireless Internet will spread even more quickly
than the wired one. That is because, from now on, nearly every cell
phone sold will have standard Web-browser software built in.
Adapting existing Web sites for use by these wireless browsers is a
relatively small additional expense. And thanks to the wired
Internet, tens of millions of people are already in the habit of
communicating electronically; the transition to wireless access
should seem but a natural next step to them.
But despite the analogies to the wired Internet, it is likely to be
much harder to create services for wireless devices that are easy,
useful and profitable than it has been for the wired world.
To start with, slow speeds, tiny screens and tortured methods of
entering text can make surfing the Net on a cell phone about as
satisfying an experience as reading a newspaper on a ticker tape
would be. And while the browser software does not add to the price
of a phone, most carriers charge users extra fees and per-minute
rates to send or receive data.
As for devices like two-way pagers and Palm hand-held computers,
which have bigger screens and easier ways to enter text, the
hardware and monthly service fees are even more costly than the
cell phone services.
For that matter, it is not clear how much business can be done when
it takes five minutes and 100 clicks to make an airplane
reservation wirelessly. And whatever limitations banner
advertisements may have on the Internet, they are Hollywood
productions compared with the possibilities on a cell phone screen
that shows four lines with a maximum of 22 text characters a line.
"The companies who are marketing this as the Web in your pocket are
overpromising by a long shot and well could sour the market," said
Seamus McAteer, an analyst for Jupiter Communications. "A lot of
the stuff on the Web just doesn't translate to a wireless device
today. A kid just isn't going to do research for his homework on a
cell phone."
Wireless proponents argue that people love their mobility so much
that they will put up with expensive, hard-to-use data services,
just as they tolerate the static and cost of cell phones
themselves. They point to the mobs of teen-agers in Japan and
Finland using cell phones to send wireless love notes with their
thumbs.
America Online, for one, is making a big bet that the most popular
application on wireless phones, as on its computer service, will be
buddy lists and instant messages.
Moreover, proponents argue that in the future technology will allow
bigger screens, faster data and some sort of easy way to enter text
-- possibly voice recognition. And they envision complementary
uses, PCs at home for detailed information searches and exchanges
and small wireless devices for terse updates.
"The things that people will do on mobile devices will be
completely different than on the Web," said Naveen Jain, chairman
of Infospace, a company that operates parts of the mobile data
service offered by carriers like AT&T and Verizon Wireless. "You
want utilitarian, personalized and actionable information."
Wireless Internet services have been available for several years,
first in the form of radio modems for laptops that were mainly used
by corporations that wanted to stay in touch with their traveling
sales force. More recently, two-way pagers, like the Blackberry,
made by Research in Motion, have become a status item for
executives who want to send e-mail on the run.
The first mass-market wireless data service was over the Palm VII,
a version of 3Com's popular organizer introduced a year ago with a
wireless modem built in. So far, the Palm has attracted somewhat
more than 100,000 wireless customers. More important, it has
attracted a host of developers creating wireless services.
Amazon.com, for example, lets wireless Palm VII users search its
huge selection of books and other products, read user comments and
order with their one-click accounts. Web portals, including Yahoo
and Excite at Home's Excite, enable wireless users to tap into
services like e-mail and stock quotes. Other companies, like
Omnisky and Go America, have introduced online services and clip-on
modems that can provide wireless connections for existing hand-held
devices.
But experts predict that wireless access on hand-held computers
will be overshadowed by the use of cell phones. Sprint PCS
introduced its Wireless Web service last November. It says a third
of its 7 million phones are now capable of browsing wireless Web
sites and more than a million have. Last month, AT&T introduced a
similar service and Monday Verizon, which was formed by the
combination of Bell Atlantic AirTouch and GTE and is the nation's
largest wireless carrier, plans to do the same.
Faced with customer turnover and price wars, the carriers hope data
services can help restore their profit margins. But they are taking
sharply divergent approaches to designing and pricing their data
services.
Some, like Sprint and Verizon, see wireless data as a major source
of new revenue. They charge customers a monthly fee of $7 to $10 to
gain access to data services and then a per-minute fee for each
minute spent surfing or talking, with a set number included with
the monthly service plan.
AT&T has a very different model. For customers who buy a new
Web-enabled phone, the company will give unlimited free access to
some 40 information and commerce sites. AT&T customers who want to
use e-mail must pay $7 a month, and customers who want both e-mail
and the freedom to go to other wireless sites of their own choosing
must pay $15 a month. But there is no per-minute charge on either
plan.
Much like an advertising-supported Web site, AT&T intends to earn
money from its free service through commissions from the sales Web
sites make to AT&T's Web-phone users. It also hopes that users
whose appetites are whetted by the free service can be persuaded to
upgrade to the pay services.
It is unclear, though, how customers will react to AT&T's free
offer as they discover that the wireless Internet the company
promises does not include leading services like AOL and Amazon.com.
"Some of the carriers want to be the control points," said Mohan
Vishwanath, vice president of Yahoo's mobile unit. "But we all know
that if anything is going to grow at the rate of the Internet, it
has to be open."
The other carriers are not limiting access, but they are
nonetheless charging Web sites fees to be listed in prominent
positions in their cramped on-screen menus. Recently, America
Online supplanted Yahoo as the top item on Sprint's menu after
reportedly agreeing to a sizable payment.
"We believe the first several positions are of great value, and we
have charged for it," said John Garcia, Sprint marketing director.
He declined to discuss details of the payments.
Garcia did say, though, that Sprint is not yet sure how crucial
such payments will be to its business overall. "The most important
thing now is how many minutes we rack up," he said. But over time,
the company may experiment with services in which advertisements
and commissions subsidize some or all of the air time, as AT&T is
doing.
Some Web site operators are bristling at the demands for payment.
"We don't believe in paying tremendous amounts to get listed," said
Ali Hussein, the marketing director for Amazon.com's wireless
service. "There is a definite benefit to the carriers to have
Amazon's brand and features on their service."
That said, nearly every major Web site is developing a wireless
version of its service and is paying whatever it takes to be on as
many menus as possible. Amazon, for example, has reached deals for
prominent display on Sprint and Verizon's service, but not on
AT&T's.
But it is not clear just how much Internet sites might benefit from
these wireless deals. For now, the sites primarily want to retain
their customers who happen to use wireless services, even if there
is no immediate revenue to be gained.
Travelocity.com, the online travel service, will soon allow people
to make reservations from a cell phone, though it expects people
will not want to do that very often. More valuable, perhaps, as a
convenience to its most profitable business travelers, is the new
system Travelocity has developed that will let travelers change
their return flights with just a few clicks.
"You're not going to use a phone to say 'Where should I go for a
cruise?"' said Terrell B. Jones, chief executive of Travelocity.
"But if you are in a meeting that is running long, wouldn't you
like to use your phone to pull up your reservation and click a
button marked 'Later?"'
So far there are no banner ads on wireless services, but the Web
sites are looking for ways to weave advertising in somewhere.
Yahoo, for example, offers a service that will send brief news,
weather or sports reports to users' phones, and those messages are
sponsored by advertisers.
ZDnet, the technology information site, will also soon weave some
advertising into the text of its articles about computers and
technology that users read wirelessly. Later, ZDnet hopes to earn
fees from referring customers to computer stores.
In short, the wireless strategy for most Web sites is to become big
fast and figure out how to make money later.
See? It does sound like the Internet all over again, doesn't it?
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