The Mobile Web Moves Forward

By NewsFactor Network | November 17, 2006

The mobile Web is moving forward — slowly. This week, 3 Group, a provider of mobile broadband in Europe, announced a new service, called the X-Series, that combines two new phones with all-you-can-eat mobile broadband in markets that have been dominated by pay-per-click or metered-download plans.

The company did not release the exact price of its new service, but plans to do so by year’s end. 3’s new plan also has some powerful partners — among them Yahoo, eBay, Google, Skype, Orb, and Sling, which lets users of high-speed handsets download and watch TV they recorded at home.

The Skype partnership is one of 3’s more intriguing moves, because it lets users make phone calls over their cell phone’s Internet connection using VoIP technology, paying nothing for the call.

View Stateside

In the U.S., Sprint, Verizon, Cingular, T-Mobile, and Helio offer mobile broadband plans that range from limited to unlimited access, with an array of technologies running them.

T-Mobile, for instance, has EDGE, the slowest of the mobile broadband options. EDGE is roughly as fast as old-school ISDN lines, which can buckle under today’s heavy, graphics-rich Web sites.

In contrast, Sprint offers EVDO and claims average speeds between 400 and 700 Kbps. Cingular is rolling out HSPDA, the fastest of the three, which offers speeds that are largely the equal of landline DSL and cable modems, although the speed still depends on the quality of the network connection, as with all high-speed mobile options.

Slow To Catch On?

But high speed or not, the mobile Web has yet to set U.S. users aflame — even though Sprint, Verizon, and others with huge investments in high-speed networks hope it will.

According to Avi Greengart, an expert in handsets and cell phone service with research firm Current Analysis, consumers’ demands for cell phone features start with voice and proceed to SMS,…

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