The Web: You’re Doing It Wrong

Daniel Appelquist Open Web Advocate, Telefónica

@torgo

The Web is Mobile

• The Web’s strength is that it is a commons

• The URL is the fundamental glue of the Web

• No one entity controls URLs and they are interoperable across the entire world

• People understand URLs

• What happens when someone visits a URL is under the complete control of the web site owner

Antipatterns

Let’s Talk about Door Slams

Image Credit: Terence Eden

Ok - so non-modal? Better but not by much...

Why would you send your customer somewhere else?

• Equivalent of saying to someone who walks into your shop: “go away and buy our stuff at Walmart.”

• Your customer will more than likely be pushed other competing products ... or just get distracted

Even More Mystifying• "download our app" as a call to action on print or TV

advertising?

• You're jamming your message with other brands, creating a confusing and frustrating customer experience

• What if they have a phone you don't support? The message is : f--- you!

• This is 2014 - people know what to do with URLs on their phones and tablets

• Even if you want to send your user to an app, let the Web page be the front door - control the experience

Nissan• Television and print advertising

push "download our app" (IOS and Android only, please)

• What am I supposed to search for? "Nissan?"

• This dumps me on a screen where I could just as likely download a game...

• And their web site looks great on mobile devices (responsive design++)

• Sorry: the App Store emperor has no clothes

Star Trek• Clear how to find out more

• Brings you to a responsive web site with relevant actions you can take (last year: buy tickets; this year: buy blu-rays)

• Also, download apps

“We Want our App to be on the User’s Phone”

• FT and many others use “Save to Homescreen”

• Guide your user through the process of adding the web app to their homescreen

• Thereafter, the web app appears as an app

• Optionally, it can be launched in a “chromeless” view

…but…• Do you really need your app to be on the user’s home

screen?

• How many apps do you have in your app ghetto?

• Users are getting app fatigue

• One-off experiences such as “buy tickets to a movie” don't necessarily need to stick around on the user’s home screen

• How about encouraging users to “favorite” or (gasp) “bookmark” your webapp?

Best practice for Mobile (Web) Apps

• Use the URL - understand that URLs will be passed around out-of-band and build that in to your design thinking

• Get a short domain and export short URLs

• Even if your preferred experience is in an app, offer a Web version of that experience

• If people want to interact with you via the Web, let them!

What’s missing from the Web?

From 2010

Google’s Own Jake Archibald at State of the Browser (@webstandards)

From This Weekend

So what’s changed in 4 years?

• We are now working together

• Web on mobile is no longer seen as “a mobile industry thing”

• The major Web players agree what the gaps are and are working together on the solutions

• We have solutions in the market (e.g. Firefox OS, Chrome)

• Push API - Mozilla and Google working on implementing the W3C API

• Offline experience - HTML5 appcache and related technologies have been around for a while but are difficult to use, ServiceWorker coming (Google and Mozilla)

So Firefox OS• What I said at Forum Oxford in 2012:

Since then:• OEMS: Alcatel, Huawei, LG, ZTE

& Geeksphone (developer handset)

• Launched in Brazil, Chile, Columbia, Germany, Spain, Greece, Hungary, Italy, Montenegro, Mexico, Peru, Poland, Serbia, Uruguay, Venezuela

• Open Web Device Compliance Review Board launched: DT, KDDI, Telefónica, Telenor, LGE, Qualcomm, Sony, TCL, ZTE…

• Firefox Marketplace launched

• Firefox OS has progressed from 1.1 to 1.5 with 2.0 (Haida UI) just announced

Low-Cost Phones are Key Driver

Flame Reference

Device • Qualcomm MSM8210 Snapdragon, 1.2GHZ Dual core processor • 4.5” screen (FWVGA 854×480 pixels) • Cameras: Rear: 5MP / Front: 2MP • 3G UMTS quad-band (850/900/1900/2100) • 8GB memory • 256MB -1GB RAM (adjustable by developer) • A-GPS, NFC • Dual SIM Support • Battery capacity: 1,800 mAh • WiFi: 802.11 b/g/n, Bluetooth, Micro USB

Foxconn Tablets • 10” screen (1280 x 800 pixels, 24-bit color) • A31 (ARM Cortex A7) Quad-Core 1.0GHz w/ PowerVR SGX544MP2 GPU • 16GB storage • 2GB RAM • Cameras: Rear 5MP/ Front 2MP • A-GPS • Battery capacity: 7,000 mAh • WiFi: 802.11 b/g/n, Bluetooth, Micro USB

New “Haida” UI in the works - further blurring of the lines

between Apps and Web

Thanks!