Smartphone Zone of Death
Michael Mace has an interesting post on The shape of the smartphone and mobile data markets.
Michael says that there is an incorrect assumption that mobile data is for everyone. He says the market is actually segmented into those that do (35%) and don’t (65%) want added value services.
I am not so sure the situation now necessarily reflects what will happen in the future. It wasn’t very long ago people didn’t even have mobile phones and said they didn’t need/want them. If things can be made more cost effective/transparent, more useful, easier to use and discover then there’s no reason why mobile data can’t be used by the majority of users in the future.
Michael says there’s a second incorrect assumption that there’s one smartphone market. He says… "I think we should expect mobile devices to diverge into different segments". He talks of a "Zone of death" where some devices try to do everything but end up doing nothing particularly well.
It’s interesting that phone OEMs have recently learnt this and now produce different devices for different market segments - even if the underlying device is really a "Zone of Death" device that has had relatively minor changes to hardware and software. Maybe that’s one of the problems holding back usability and currently reinforcing Michael’s first assumption?