Comments on: Why should mobile social networks not be built in Java(or other downloadable platforms)?

By: Ajit Jaokar

Ajit Jaokar — Mon, 16 Jun 2008 01:56:17 +0000

dont shoot the messenger! The talk was from mark curtis – flirtomatic. I agree woith it though. The scale matters and certainly they have the numbers so their viewpoint counts rgds Ajit

By: tomsoft

tomsoft — Sun, 15 Jun 2008 22:31:47 +0000

Ajit,
Again, I strongly disagree with a pure platform approach. At Webwag, were we are doing personalized start page, we have versions in many different framework / languages:
- Web (Ajax)
- Mobile app (J2ME)
- iPhone (Ajax too)
- mobile web (XHTML)
- and even more exotic technologies, like Flash
There are many mobile client of social networks, some in J2me, some in XHTML, and each of these have adantages and disavdantages…. So I do not think you can put a statment like this. The other time, you mentionned Flash as an alternative, which also suffers from the same issue….

By: Ajit Jaokar

Ajit Jaokar — Sat, 14 Jun 2008 05:21:23 +0000

kevin
I believe they abandoned J2ME.I dont know the back end framweork. Martin – happy to speak to you and blog about Mig33. Shall send seperate email. kind rgds Ajit

By: Martin Wells

Martin Wells — Fri, 13 Jun 2008 22:27:37 +0000

I think this is dependent on markets and product. At mig33 (with 13 million users) we haven’t had a big issue with users wanting to download and install a client application. I can’t be categoric, but as far as I’m aware most of the current mobile social successes are apps, not web sites.
A mobile web experience on a mobile is going to have less functionality (dynamic updates, phone integration, interface capability) and be significantly slower than a native app. However, there is certainly a barrier in getting someone to download that app in the first place.
Ultimately, it really depends on how important those features are in creating value for your users versus the barriers that creates.
For mig33 we are primarily a J2ME app, but support WAP, mobile web and desktop web, so users can start simply and then upgrade.
As an aside, markets can create some unique barriers, such as in the US with carrier restrictions and a relatively less sophisticated (mobile) audience.

By: Kevin Leong

Kevin Leong — Fri, 13 Jun 2008 16:33:29 +0000

Ajit, I tried to find more information about Mark Curtis statement, but could not find any shared slides. I am curious. You wrote that he abandoned Java and adopted XHMTL. Did he abandoned J2ME? Or, he abandoned the Java frameworks that wrapped XHTML and JavaScript standards, such as JST etc?
At Mo’Blast we use Java at the backend, but our Web-tier uses standard XHTML, DHTML and JavaScript. So, we get the flexibility of the Web technologies, but with the Java scalability and performance on the server-side.

By: Ajit Jaokar

Ajit Jaokar — Fri, 13 Jun 2008 14:21:23 +0000

getjar is not a mobile social network. I would be interested in one which was 10 million users as you said rgds ajit

By: kimbjo

kimbjo — Fri, 13 Jun 2008 09:55:54 +0000

I think your conclusions are very territorial. All the companies you quoted are in Europe and regional.
There are bigger social networks – mxit, mig33, Airg, bluepuls that are sold as java products and are bigger networks – all over 10 million users. I think outside europe java is more widely accepted. Look at getjar… For example.