The Is No “Year of Mobile”

For the past decade, someone has called nearly every year “The Year of Mobile”. Even now, professionals and pundits alike continue to brand 2009 or 2010 as a mobile breakthrough year. What is required for any year to be considered “The Year of Mobile”? The fact is that there will NEVER be a year of mobile – and here’s why:

Mobile technology and adoption is under the strict and unwaivering control of the carriers. Giant, paranoid, mult-million dollar institutions want to make sure nothing is done to jeopardize their profits. This is good in that the medium doesn’t get abused, but is bad because it causes a slower, more careful adoption of new technology. We have had the technology to crank out an iPhone for 5-10 years, but it was not until a carrier was equipped and willing to support that level of connectivity and vision that it could be realized (thanks AT&T).

This painstaking process allows for innovation and adoption – but at a much slower rate than we are used to in the information age. Phenomenon like “the green movement”, reality television, and social networking can expand literally over night thanks to the internet. But if Facebook were limited to the careful oversight of a “Social Carrier” – you better believe we would have not seen 100,000,000 users for another couple years… With that said there have been many years of mobile in our time: zack-morris-phone

1908 – The Year of Wireless Telephony
1947 – The Year of Cellular Telephony
1983 – The Year of the Car Phone
1991 – The Year of the Zach Morris Phone
1998 – The Year of the big fat Nokia
2008 – The Year of Text Messaging
???? – The Year of Mobile Advertising

Interestingly, the dates are getting closer together – and there is no doubt about the communication revolution that is happening because of this technology. However, I doubt there will ever be a single, identifiable “Year of Mobile” – instead we will see a slower, steady adoption as users, carriers and marketers alike all become much more comfortable with these devices as being much more than a phone…

-Kevin