Mobile Platforms to Go the HTML-5 Way?

The key advantages of HTML5 app stores are cross-device portability and a buy-once-use- everywhere application model.

Aug. 17, 2011

HTML5 is to be a game-changer according to some who see it take over most mobile platforms. The question, however, is what its real impact to the mobile industry will be.

Background: Web vs. Apps

In today’s world of apps, the web seems to have taken a seat in the back row. However, many industry observers are predicting a comeback with HTML5 advancements, the proliferation of smartphones and ubiquitous backing by both telcos and Internet players. Is the web as we know it about to change?

First Things First: What is The Web?

Firstly, the web is a language for creating interactive, navigable content, which consists of three main parts: HTML, the language used to define the static text and images, CSS, the language defining styling and presentational elements and JavaScript, the language describing the interactions and animations.

Secondly, the web is a paradigm for open, unfettered access to content that is not under the control of any single entity. When single vendors like Apple and Google control apps distribution, the web seems to challenge the status quo.

Web pages differ from mobile apps in many ways today.

From Web 1.0 to the Mobile Web

The web has gone through two major phases. Web 1.0 was the era of the dumb terminals and static web pages. The first generation of the web assumed all intelligence was in the network; the device had to issue a simple request to fetch a page and then present it on the screen.

Web 2.0 is the era of smarter terminals and interactive pages. In this second generation, designed around the ‘read-write web,’ the user is not just a consumer but also an editor, curator and producer of content. Web 2.0 helped create today’s phenomena of Wikipedia, Facebook, Twitter, blogs and nano-publishing.

Though it started as an outsider to the web, the mobile industry has been rapidly catching up since the early WAP days. Apple’s WebKit browser engine is now the common ‘circuitry’ behind more than 500 million devices shipped to date by all major smartphone vendors. Opera, the mobile browser vendor, counts over 100 million monthly active users on its Mobile and Mini browsers.

In the manufacturer camp, smartphones are likely to reach well into sub-$100 retail price points this year. Operators are deploying solutions for optimization of content delivery, facilitating efficient use of the network while browsing the web.

Mobile industry initiatives such as the Wholesale Applications Community (WAC) are pushing the envelope for web applications, aka widgets, while EU-funded initiatives like webinos aim to use the web as a medium for deploying applications across mobile, PC, TV and automotive screens.

HTML5 as a Technology Change

The hype surrounding HTML5 has peaked this year. HTML5 promises to push the capabilities of web applications to the point of making web apps as engaging as Flash applications and as integrated with the device as mobile applications. HTML5 introduces several technology improvements in these domains by adding off-line storage, 2D graphics capabilities, video/audio streaming, geo-location, access to the phone’s camera and sensors, as well as user interface tools.

HTML5 promises to push the capabilities of web applications to the point of making web apps as engaging as Flash applications and as integrated with the device as mobile applications.

This next generation of web languages in the form of HTML5 is being standardized by the W3C and the WHAT working group who are driving forward web apps as equal citizens to mobile applications.

Yet, HTML5 is still work in progress and even standards bodies show fragmented approaches to HTML5 completion. The W3C expects official completion of the HTML5 set of standards in 2014. In parallel, WHAT has taken a different approach to completion and is now working on ‘HTML’ as a continually evolving set of specifications.

Despite the adoption of the WebKit engine as a de-facto standard, HTML5 implementation on mobile devices is both fragmented and incomplete.

Independent studies have shown that every mobile WebKit implementation is slightly different. In addition, the leading smartphone platforms show inadequate HTML5 support – some devices show partial HTML5 support (at best 2 out of 3 HTML5 features supported), while some others are lagging further behind.

Much like history has shown with the PC browser wars of the 1990s and the Java ME fragmentation of the 2000s, mobile browser fragmentation in 2010s will be driven by the need to differentiate (‘embrace and extend’) and the varying speeds among vendors in implementing the latest WebKit engine.

What about HTML5 app stores? Already a number of start-ups such as have proposed app stores focused on web apps. The key advantages of HTML5 app stores are cross-device portability and a buy-once-use- everywhere application model.

Unfortunately, supply does not always imply demand. HTML5 app stores cannot deliver a business model change if there is no demand. Firstly, users care about availability of popular content (Angry Birds, Skype, Facebook) most of which are not available as web apps, often due to HTML technology limitations. Secondly, users care about choosing among hundreds of thousands of apps, which is currently a 2-horse race (Apple and Google), with the web lagging far behind in terms of the number of apps. Thirdly, users are becoming loyal to their smartphone platform (Android, iOS, BlackBerry), where the native app store dominates.

How to Compete in a Software World

HTML5 introduces several technology innovations. However, HTML5 remains a technology change that is not designed to solve discovery, distribution or monetization problems – in other words, it is not designed to change the business model.

Operators can act as the matchmakers between developers and end-users by helping developers take the right apps to the right users through featured placements, social graph-based recommendations and segment targeting. Similarly, handset makers can act as on-device retailers, connecting the developers to the right audience in the right region, through white space across the handset real estate.

What will be changing the business model of the web are the innovations introduced in the apps economy – where content is created with semantic tagging (description, category, user ratings), discovered via web stores (much like app stores), distributed within walled gardens (Facebook), and monetized through micro-payments (much like apps). We call this web 3.0. 

The question is how the mobile industry can leverage on the web and the native platforms that dominate the apps world. The trick here is not to compete, but to leverage on the network effects of the platforms where handset makers/ network operators can position themselves as a new generation of over-the-top players.

For example, operators can act as the matchmakers between developers and end-users by helping developers take the right apps to the right users through featured placements, social graph-based recommendations and segment targeting. Similarly, handset makers can act as on-device retailers, connecting the developers to the right audience in the right region, through white space across the handset real estate.

This is also where we believe WAC has the best chances of success by helping operators reposition as over-the-top players on top of the app stores. That is, by helping developers reach out to users with ubiquitous billing, quality assurance, content curation, local content deals, privacy and security assurance. It can also help extend app stores away from the virtual and into the physical retail space.

At the same time, network operators and handset makers can help drive the web into a viable alternative for native platforms in many ways. They can push the development of WebKit towards better bandwidth management and closer integration with hardware multimedia acceleration. Moreover, the mobile industry can sponsor the development of better cross-platform tools that allow HTML and JavaScript developers to target multiple native platforms and mass-market browsers.

No matter how telcos decide to compete in the software world, they need to adopt agile development methods and move at software speeds to catch-up with the platform players in controlling the last mile to the consumer.

The future of connected web and devices is going to surprise us – much like how applications turned telcos’ economics upside down. As Bill Gates once famously said, “we always overestimate the change that will occur in the next two years and underestimate the change that will occur in the next ten”.

The web is going to be a game changer, but not the way we expect.

Adapted from HTML5 and What it Means for the Mobile Industry, Andreas Constantinou, 06 Jun, 2011

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