Mad about mobile

• By: ASNE staff
• On: 09/28/2011 15:54:00
• In: Leadership in diversity sessions

NEW YORK-- Mobile isn't limited to that cell phone in your pocket or pushed against your ear. Laptops, tablets, smart phones are all mobile devices and consumers use them all. If it's not attached to the wall or sitting stationary on the desk, it's a mobile device.

Think mobile and most people think apps. But Emilio Garcia-Ruiz points out that most of The Washington Post's mobile audience comes in through a web browser. The apps download comes later--if at all.  Consideration No. 1: how to optimize the website so the consumer doesn't get a tiny home page, so the experience is positive and they'll return.

The challenges of publishing for mobile devices are many, starting with the cost. Hiring a vendor to create an app can cost upwards of $100,000. There's the question of staffing and keeping the content fresh and well-curated.

When trying to figure out what kind of app to build, The Journal Register Co.'s Jim Brady suggests thinking about what you use your own mobile for. Many people use their mobile devices for utility: to check the weather, public transportation times, traffic reports--all those things that local television and radio once owned. “If someone goes to your mobile site and you only have headlines, you're missing an opportunity for people to come back,” Brady said.

Jim Colgan's approach was much more interactive, encouraging cell phone users to text WNYC's The Brian Lehrer show specific data--like the price of milk in the listener's neighborhood. The project resulted not only in a map for the website that pinpointed the location of stores offering milk at specific prices, but also resulted in a story that led to prosecution for milk price gouging.

But when all is said and done, the mobile device and app is a means of distribution. Technology so far requires “native apps”, those applications that only work on the device for which they were developed. An iPhone app won't work on an iPad, and neither an iPad nor an iPhone app will work on a laptop or tablet. But a new program is about to change all that.

Jim Malkin of The New York Times anticipates app development with HTML5. The latest program allows content to be displayed on all devices. The Financial Times was the first to develop an app exclusively with HTML5. Consternation at Apple developed--mostly because it couldn't get its 30 percent cut using that program--and the FT's new app wasn't offered at the Apple store. Therein lies the next big battle.

Malkin also points out that there's no way of knowing what users are clicking on what, because there's no way to associate demographics with what they're clicking on. That can come with asking users for information, but asking for the information up front can be a turn-off to users.

The Post's Garcia-Ruiz predicts that growth in mobile is going to be huge, especially with the younger generation. They use smart phones and apps for everything. The challenge is to get a seat at the table, so media companies don't miss the opportunity, as they did with the Web.

Moderator: Marian Liu, community manager, Storify

Panelists:

Emilio Garcia-Ruiz, editor, strategic projects, The Washington Post

Jim Colgan, news and media, Mobile Commons

Elliott Malkin, product design director, The New York Times

Jim Brady, editor-in-chief, Journal Register Company

Stats that support the discussion were tweeted by Liu: http://storify.com